Doris Day with Andre Previn Trio - Close Your Eyes

The 'Buying Votes Through Entitlements' Bubble

Dems Refusing To Show Up For Work...

Indiana Dems Go AWOL to Slow Labor Bill

(AP Photo/Darron Cummings) Anti-union measure would make Indiana right-to-work state

(Newser) – As Indiana Republicans push an anti-union bill at the statehouse, Democrats are fighting tooth and nail—by staying home. Many skipped floor sessions twice yesterday; without 67 members present, the state House can't legally advance its agenda, the New York Times notes. Republicans are trying to make Indiana a "right-to-work" state in an effort they say would prevent workers from being forced to join unions and bring more jobs to the state. But Democrats argue that the legislation would ultimately cut employees' pay. ------Read more

The Real Truth About Newt's Ethics Case

Byron York, The Examiner - The Romney campaign has been hitting Newt Gingrich hard over the 1990s ethics case that resulted in the former Speaker being reprimanded and paying a $300,000 penalty. Before the Iowa caucuses, Romney and his supporting super PAC did serious damage to Gingrich with an ad attacking Gingrich's ethics past. Since then, Romney has made other ads and web videos focusing on the ethics matter, and at the Republican debate in Tampa Monday night, Romney said Gingrich "had to resign in disgrace."

In private conversations, Romney aides often mention the ethics case as part of their larger argument that Gingrich would be unelectable in a race against President Obama.

Given all the attention to the ethics matter, it's worth asking what actually happened back in 1995, 1996, and 1997. The Gingrich case was extraordinarily complex, intensely partisan, and driven in no small way by a personal vendetta on the part of one of Gingrich's former political opponents. It received saturation coverage in the press; a database search of major media outlets revealed more than 10,000 references to Gingrich's ethics problems during the six months leading to his reprimand. It ended with a special counsel hired by the House Ethics Committee holding Gingrich to an astonishingly strict standard of behavior, after which Gingrich in essence pled guilty to two minor offenses. Afterwards, the case was referred to the Internal Revenue Service, which conducted an exhaustive investigation into the matter. And then, after it was all over and Gingrich was out of office, the IRS concluded that Gingrich did nothing wrong. After all the struggle, Gingrich was exonerated.
[snip]
At the center of the controversy was a course Gingrich taught from 1993 to 1995 at two small Georgia colleges. The wide-ranging class, called "Renewing American Civilization," was conceived by Gingrich and financed by a tax-exempt organization called the Progress and Freedom Foundation. Gingrich maintained that the course was a legitimate educational enterprise; his critics contended that it had little to do with learning and was in fact a political exercise in which Gingrich abused a tax-exempt foundation to spread his own partisan message.

The Gingrich case was driven in significant part by a man named Ben Jones. An actor and recovered alcoholic who became famous for playing the dim-witted Cooter in the popular 1980s TV show The Dukes of Hazzard, Jones ran for Congress as a Democrat from Georgia in 1988. He won and served two terms. He lost his bid for re-election after re-districting in 1992, and tried again with a run against Gingrich in 1994. Jones lost decisively, and after that, it is fair to say he became obsessed with bringing Gingrich down.

Ben Jones - "Cooter"

Two days before Election Day 1994, with defeat in sight, Jones hand-delivered a complaint to the House ethics committee (the complaint was printed on "Ben Jones for Congress" stationery). Jones asked the committee to investigate the college course, alleging that Gingrich "fabricated a 'college course' intended, in fact, to meet certain political, not educational, objectives." Three weeks later, Jones sent the committee 450 pages of supporting documents obtained through the Georgia Open Records Act.

That was the beginning of the investigation. Stunned by their loss of control of the House -- a loss engineered by Gingrich -- House Democrats began pushing a variety of ethics complaints against the new Speaker. Jones' complaint was just what they were looking for.[...] ----Read More

It's remarkable that liberals make charges of ‘political influence’ in the classroom when the entire public education system is based primarily on left leaning indoctrination.

Sen. Rubio's Take On SOTU Speech

California Take Heed

The Powerful Motions Of Nature

Things That Have Happened In 1000 Days

Group Interaction Can Lower Your Intelligence

"People who enjoy meetings should not be in charge of anything." - Thomas Sowell

 Daily Mail- Interacting within a group – such as taking part in jury deliberations or mingling at a cocktail party - can lower your intelligence, with women being particularly susceptible, according to researchers.

Scientists at Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to investigate how the brain processes information about social status in small groups and how perceptions of that status affect expressions of cognitive capacity.

In other words, whether ‘feeling’ less intelligent than others can affect your decision-making.

‘You may joke about how committee meetings make you feel brain dead, but our findings suggest that they may make you act brain dead as well,’ said Read Montague, director of the Human Neuroimaging Laboratory and the Computational Psychiatry Unit at the institute, who led the study.

[snip]

The women and men both had the same baseline IQ scores, but more women fell into the lower performing group.

Lead author Kenneth Kishida added: ‘Our study highlights the unexpected and dramatic consequences even subtle social signals in group settings may have on individual cognitive functioning. [...] read all here

1000 Days & Still... No Budget!

Canadian Energy Advocate Explains the Keystone Pipeline Issue

ht - iOTW

Bach, Violin Concerto in A minor

...Lara St. John, 1st mvt., BWV 1041