Yearly Archives: 2009

Quote of the Day: “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.” — Thomas Jefferson

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Subject: Hitting Reboot in our Tech Department

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From, Jim Babka, President…

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Dramatic changes have come about at Downsize DC in our technical department. The team we started November with, is now all gone. We’re excited by the opportunity to reboot.

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This means we have a part-time job opening, plus several consultant-style positions available, all related to our web-sites and back-end programming.  

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Let me say up-front that, 

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a) we prefer people who are DC Downsizers for these positions
:::b) no one gets rich working here

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Allow me to introduce our brand new IT Director, Rick Wiggins, to explain who we’re looking for.

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From, Rick Wiggins, IT Director…

Quote of the Day: “Economic growth is the result of creating new wealth, not redistributing existing wealth.” — Jeff Jacoby

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Subject: The strange thing about public opinion

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Polls suggest weak public support for the “stimulus” package. Only a minority favors it, while the majority either opposes it, or is undecided.

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This is amazing given the constant drumbeat for the bill. It raises an important question. Where would we be if the case against the “stimulus” was heard to the same extent as the arguments for it?

Quote of the Day: “White man cuts off end of rug, sews it to other end, thinks rug is longer.”
:::– an old Native American joke about “daylight savings time”

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Subject: Trickle-down hypocrisy

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The Democrats sneer at Republican proposals to cut upper-bracket tax rates. They call it trickle-down economics. But the Democrat’s stimulus plan is trickle-down economics too.

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Much of the spending will go to huge institutions like construction companies and research firms. It will have to trickle-down from there to the rest of us.

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When Democratic politicians talk about the “multiplier effect” of government spending, what they’re really saying is “I believe in trickle-down economics.”

:::The Republicans are just as bad. They may like tax cuts, but they also run huge deficits. The money they borrow
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Quote of the Day: “You do not examine legislation in the light of the benefits it will convey if properly administered, but in the light of the wrongs it would do and the harms it would cause if improperly administered.” — Lyndon B. Johnson

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Subject: It isn’t necessarily better for Congress to pass fewer bills

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The House passed seven bills and the Senate six in their first month of work. Those are relatively small numbers. You’d think we’d be happy about that. But is it really better to have fewer bills when they include . . .

Media Alert: Jim Babka will be on “Free Talk Live” this evening (Saturday), at 7 PM Eastern. This show is now bigger than ever — 46 stations nationwide. The hosts, Ian and Mark, are devoted DC Downsizers. Jim will discuss the Mexican Drug War, End the FED, and other issues. Find out how to listen at FreeTalkLive.com.

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Quote of the Day: “Personnel is policy.” — Morton Blackwell, “Laws of the Public Policy Process” (Rule 26)

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Subject: A special message from the Downsize DC FOUNDATION about a matter of public education . . .

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Before and after the election there was a run on guns and ammo. Suppliers couldn’t keep their shelves stocked. What provoked this?

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The winning candidate promised “common sense gun reform” — coincidentally, a mantra of the leading gun control lobby. Those of us who treasure the entire Bill of Rights wondered, what would be . . . 

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* restricted?
:::* taxed?
:::* banned?

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President Obama has signaled his policy intentions through the person he’s chosen as Attorney General, Eric Holder. What does “common sense gun reform” mean to Mr. Holder? As Clinton’s Deputy Attorney General, Holder advocated . . . 

Media Alert: Jim Babka is scheduled to appear on Straight Talk w/ Jerry Hughes at 3:06 PM Eastern. Details are available at the blog.  

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Quote of the Day: “Ancient Rome declined because it had a Senate, now what’s going to happen to us with both a House and a Senate?” — Will Rogers (1879-1935) American humorist

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Subject: What is it going to take to Downsize DC?

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We must gain the size and strength to stop the politicians from doing bad things. Because DownsizeDC.org constantly has new members its important to repeat our view of what it will take to do this.

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* We must recruit an army so large that it can . . .
:::* Apply relentless, overwhelming, resistence numbing pressure on Congress, and . . .
:::* Make our ideas seen and heard by everyone, everywhere, every day

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We’re making steady progress toward this goal. Our goal is $6,000 per month, plus 20 new monthly pledgers. Because of snow storms at our operations office, I don’t have precise numbers to share with you, but we’re roughly halfway towards reaching each of these numbers. And . . .

Quote of the Day: “I think this is a case where Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae are fundamentally sound. They’re not in danger of going under. I think they are in good shape going forward.” — Barney Frank (D-Mass.), House Financial Services Committee chairman, July 14, 2008

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Subject: The Scam Bill

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The House passed an $819 billion “stimulus” bill yesterday, 244 to 188. All 177 Republicans, plus 11 Democrats, opposed the bill. This doesn’t mean the battle is over. The Senate is considering a different variation of the bill and both chambers will have to vote again on a unified version. We must continue to fight.

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We cannot make this point often enough. The new Democratic majority is doing exactly what the Republicans did before them, exploiting a crisis to perpetrate a scam.

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We must repeat this constantly, to ourselves and to everyone we meet . . .

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* President Bush exploited the 9-11 tragedy to try to re-engineer the world
:::* Now the Democrats are exploiting the financial crisis to re-engineer America

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The evidence is piling high. The so-called stimulus bill is really a grab-bag of corporate welfare and social engineering projects.

:::Perhaps you’ve heard about
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If you’re suddenly having trouble logging-in to the site, and it was working for you as recently as Thursday, January 22, please read this message.
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:::An urgent message from Jim Babka…
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:::Yesterday, our Chief Programmer suddenly resigned. Today, Murphy came to visit. We are getting reports that suddenly people cannot login.
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:::Our number one tech support problem had been login issues, and a good percentage of that class of problem came from individuals who were typing in their login information without regard to capitalization and lower case. Our system was “case sensitive.”
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:::The final act of our new departed programmer was to fix that problem. But…

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…the result is that many who are presently logged-in are not recognized until they clear their old login, and re-login. I’m not a technician, and don’t know why this is the case. But the solution is relatively simple. It’s 4 (FOUR) direct steps.

Media Alert! Jim Babka will appear on Straight Talk w/ Gary Nolan this evening. See the Postscript for details.

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Quotes of the Day: “Is it too much to ask that someone criticizing (John Maynard) Keynes actually, you know, read Keynes…?” — Paul Krugman

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Okay Mr. Krugman, let’s read what Keynes wrote in 1942 . . .

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“Organized public works, at home and abroad, may be the right cure for a chronic tendency to a deficiency of effective demand. But they are not capable of sufficiently rapid organisation (and above all cannot be reversed or undone at a later date), to be the most serviceable instrument for the prevention of the trade cycle.” — Keynes, Collected Works, vol. XXVII, p.122

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Subject: Can public works stimulate the economy?

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John Maynard Keynes originated the idea that government spending could reverse an economic downturn, but even he was skeptical of using government construction projects for this purpose.

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Nevertheless, Congress, and people like Paul Krugman, want to spend hundreds of billions on public works.

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Sheldon Richman, of the Foundation for Economic Education, gives us more reasons to be skeptical. He draws attention to a major investigation of public works projects by David Leonhardt of the “New York Times.” Three points stand out . . .

Media Alert! Jim Babka will appear on the Liberty Roundtable tomorrow morning. See the Postscript for details.

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Quote of the Day: “The USDA claims it needs to be able to move fast in case of an outbreak of disease. At first blush it sure sounds fine and good, until you consider that people are in the middle of a major epidemic on US dairy farms, and the USDA hasn’t moved at all to stop it.” – Jerri Cook

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Subject: From “Voluntary” to Mandatory

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Johne’s disease is a contagious infection of the small intestine of hoofed animals.

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• There’s a strong possibility that Johne’s disease in cattle causes Crohn’s disease in humans.

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• According to a 2007 government study, 68% of America’s dairy herds may be infected.

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• Yet the USDA’s page on Johne’s disease still cites a 22% figure from 1996

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Moreover, the USDA’s 2009 budget . . .

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• Slashes the already miniscule funding for Johne’s disease eradication 

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•  While increasing funding for the National Animal Identification System (NAIS)

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