Page 40 | | pamibe

August 3, 2011

2 Comments

‘What we’re creating’

Makes you sick, doesn’t it?

August 3, 2011

21 Comments

Can we outlaw abortion now?

From 1973 through 2008, nearly 50 million legal abortions occurred.

Guttmacher Institute

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced new guidelines in Washington Monday requiring health insurance plans beginning on or after August 1, 2012 to cover several women’s preventive services, including birth control and voluntary sterilization.

According to HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius the decision is a part of the Affordable Care Act’s move to stop problems before they start. “These historic guidelines are based on science and existing literature and will help ensure women get the preventive health benefits they need,” she said in a news release.

CNN

With the coming of obamacare and its tentacles, the government is going to require insurance companies to cover birth control and sterilization, ‘among other things’, which I cannot find. If there are no excuses save personal responsibility, shouldn’t abortion die a natural death?

Photograph by ContagiousCourtney.

August 2, 2011

12 Comments

Those Voices

And now we’re ‘terrorists’.

August 1, 2011

13 Comments

Ducklings

The little boogers won’t be able to hide so easily once the yard guys do their thing.

Click for a larger version.

July 30, 2011

17 Comments

Tyler’s First Flight

Our 12 year old grandson Tyler had his first flying lesson today, called a ‘Discovery flight’. So far Tyler’s been a natural at everything he’s tried; sports, music, academics… So we wondered if he’d take to flying as easily. Once again, he’s a natural!

He’s got his own log book now with an hour’s flight time logged, along with take off and landing. He took off, flew and landed the plane with very little help from the instructor, who was suitably impressed, by the way.
He has a sim at home, but said that actual flying was much easier than the sim.

The flight school. Actually, I found out later that this is the rear door. Oops.
ATA Flight School

Mike, Tonie, Tyler, Amber and Kaytlin.
Tyler's first flight

Tyler looked a bit pensive. We learned from his mom that he was pretty nervous. Can’t say I blame him!
Tyler's first flight

The girls just wanted to get out of the sun.

Amber - Tyler's first flight

Tonie, Amber, Kaytlin and I drove on our way while Tyler had ground school, pre-flight and flew. Mike, who is busting with pride, by the way, sat in the rear seat and let the instructor do his thing. Both were amazed with Tyler’s natural ability.

They flew down the coastline, down as far as Biscayne Bay, over the Seaquariam and back.

Mike also recorded the entire thing, so I’ll try to post at least a bit of it later. Very cool, eh?

UPDATE: The images Mike took with his phone…

July 30, 2011

3 Comments

Gone Fishin’

Mike’s on vacation and HULU is streaming Father Ted. There, at least two excuses for neglecting the blog.
I have photographic evidence of the former; Mike hamming it up at Lenscrafters, holding what looks to be an alien torture device up to his face. Mike, eating at T.G.I.Friday’s, but all you see is the top of his head.
Yes, I must log simply everything.

Plus, I always get a little down right before a birthday. Doesn’t everyone? The specter of death, uncompromising in its black finality, rears its ugly head and forces us to think about things best left for those sleepless 3:00am reflections.

In the same vein, Mrs. Who’s post about visiting her and Bitterroot’s probable grave sites… wigged me out just the least little bit. I don’t care if I’m dead or not; someone puts me in a box… and buries it… underground… well, I think my blood pressure just spiked.
Here’s what I want: a Viking funeral, no skimping on the sacrificed slaves. Barring that, please just donate my body to science.

Meanwhile, new life abounds. One of my babies from years past, now grown up and a duck in her own right, brought her ducklings over this morning for an early breakfast.

It was very early and everything was soaked. She brings them round at a decent hour, I’ll get down on the ground for some good shots.

July 28, 2011

11 Comments

Blogger in need

Our very own big-hearted DaGoddess, Joanie, is in crisis [not to mention a lot of pain] and needs help.

Find out what happened.

This is one of those times karma is supposed to kick in. Joanie has a very large, soft heart for friends, family and charity. Especially if it happens to involve our military. She has given her time and talent again and again and now she is the one who needs help. But she doesn’t want charity.

Go here to discover how she plans to raise the money for the aforementioned emergency. Maybe you can disguise yourself as heavenly intervention. 8^)

If you’re strapped for cash, and many people are, I’m sure she’d appreciate prayers as well.

Thanks!

July 28, 2011

12 Comments

Who do you believe?

Some recent business news.

Debt in America: Consumers Paying off Credit Cards

Consumers are keeping their plastic on ice, rapidly paying off their credit card debts.

Credit card obligations have fallen 10% since January, according to Credit Karma, a web site that offers free credit scores. Since this time last year, credit card debts have dropped a stunning 17%.
CBS Moneywatch

…but…

Visa Profit Beats Estimates as Credit-Card Use Accelerates

Visa Inc., the world’s biggest payments network, said fiscal third-quarter profit rose 40 percent, beating analyst estimates for the 14th straight period, as consumers boosted credit-card spending.

While Visa is world-wide, 59% of its sales are from the U.S.:

Worldwide spending on Visa debit and credit cards, adjusted for currency fluctuations, climbed 13 percent from the same period last year to $941 billion, the company said. Spending by consumers outside their home countries surged 14 percent. Processed transactions rose 11 percent to 13 billion. U.S. credit-card purchases climbed 9.8 percent to $224 billion, compared with a 5.9 percent rise in the same period last year.

Visa, which derived 59 percent of sales from the U.S. last fiscal year, aims to generate more than half its revenue in international markets by fiscal 2015

But what about other card issuers? AmEx is also seeing record profits.

American Express Co., which handled 3.9 percent of worldwide purchase transactions and is also the biggest credit- card issuer by purchases, reported a record $1.3 billion second- quarter profit on July 20.
Bloomberg BusinessWeek

So, who do you believe?

Another indicator that folks have hidden their plastic:
The U.S. is at the start of a 500 Day Retail Recession….

Burt Flickinger, managing director of retail consultantcy Strategic Resource Group, said the US has just entered a 500-day retail recession, and before it’s over, the US will see weaker retail sales, more store closures and even additional retailers joining Borders in bankruptcy.

Helping to drive the trend is a weak labor market, Flickinger said.

The latest consumer confidence report from the Conference Board showed consumer attitudes perked up from the prior month, but it also captured growing fears about jobs. Those fears are likely to curtail spending, especially when you consider the large numbers of households that are living paycheck to paycheck.

Flickinger also cited the long-term unemployed who will stop receiving extended unemployment benefits this year as another contributing factor. Once the checks stop arriving, these people will have even less money than they do now.

They expect a ‘retail renaissance’ in 2013 or 2014.

And stock futures rose on news that:
slightly less people were reported jobless.

The number of individuals applying for first-time jobless claims fell to 398,000 last week from 422,000, better than the 415,000 economists forecast.
CNBC

Of course, screw the long-term unemployed; companies have said ‘don’t even apply if not currently employed’.

I’ll tell you who I believe; the WSJ, when they say that says that the job market is broken and ‘temping’ is becoming a national pastime:

Long time readers will know much of this information, as we’ve been ‘early’ on the case for years, declaring the U.S. job engine has been broken for many years but hidden by Federal Reserve induced bubbles – first stock, then housing… mixed in with a healthcare, and government bubble (the former subsidied by Medicare, the latter by property taxes on inflated home values). Meanwhile, pure private sector jobs have been in net deficit – and those that have been created generally come with lower wages and benefits.

Without grand new industries that actually create a multitude of jobs on American soil rather than 75% offshore and 25% domestic, it is very difficult to see the way out. Even with the Fed trying to create another bubble with all its might.

——————————

Over the past 10 years:

• The U.S. economy’s output of goods and services has expanded 19%.

• Nonfinancial corporate profits have risen 85%.

• The labor force has grown by 10.1 million.

• But the number of private-sector jobs has fallen by nearly two million.

• And the percentage of American adults at work has dropped to 58.2%, a low not seen since 1983.

What’s wrong with the American job engine? As United Technologies Corp. (NYSE: UTX – News) Chief Financial Officer Greg Hayes put it recently: “Sales have come back, but people have not.” That’s largely because the economy is growing much too slowly to absorb the available work force, and industries that usually hire early in a recovery—construction and small businesses—were crippled by the credit bust.

I guess we have to pick and choose who to believe; what to pass over and what to take with us. Has media always been thus, or is this a modern phenom?
Tell you what I don’t like – too many ‘articles’ on media sites that turn out to be opinion and not always from an expert on the subject at hand.