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Archive for the 'National Politics' Category
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To my Readers, I am sorry to have been so very lax these past months in keeping up with my blog, but it just seemed that the news was so very depressing. More and more scandals which our President and his cohorts refused to do anything about or even to investigate. Remember the Presidents words that "there is not even a smidgen of evidence" of wrong doing by anyone in the IRS! when all know that Americans rights were being trampled and denied and the President and all involved were lying. Remember Benghazi and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's outburst of "what dopes it matter?" when 4 people died while everyone who could have possibly come to their aid had orders from on high to stand down! And it goes on and on! Those of you who follow FOX NEWS know what is going on and my comments would not have added anything. I would sincerely suggested that if you do not subscribe to Heritage Online you do so as an added source of in-depth information. Here is the latest issue.
I hope and believe that the American people have finally awakened to the evil monster that Obama is and will vote in a Republican Senate this year so that we may begin to undo some of the great damage he and his appointees have done to our country. It will of course take decades to rec0ver from this assault on our nation and values, and in some areas we may never become the America that we once were . I do have hope however. First we must vote in a Republican Senate and then in 2016 a Republican President. Then we MUST begin to replace the old dogs in both the House and the Senate who have grown lazy, complacent and greedy with power with younger Americans who are trying to remember what our country stood for when formed: a government by the people and for the people. Yours sincerely, Brenda Bowers
Updated daily, InsiderOnline (insideronline.org) is a compilation of publication abstracts, how-to essays, events, news, and analysis from around the conservative movement. The current edition of The INSIDER quarterly magazine is also on the site.
May 31, 2014
Latest Studies: 28 studies, including a report from the John Locke Foundation on what helps schools succeed, and a report from the Fraser Institute on the deadly consequences of rationing health care via wait times
Notes on the Week: Over 1 million restrictions in federal regulations, reasons an Article V convention wouldn't work, The Insider looks at Obama's disastrous foreign policy, and more
To Do: Remember the victims of Tiananmen Square, examine China's human rights practices
Budget & Taxation
• Four Myths about American Taxes – Independent Women's Forum
• A U-Turn on the Road to Serfdom – Institute of Economic Affairs
Crime, Justice & the Law
• New York's Next Public Safety Revolution – Manhattan Institute
Economic and Political Thought
• Catholic Social Teaching and the Market Economy (Revised Second Edition) – Institute of Economic Affairs
Economic Growth
• Please Stop Helping Us: How Liberals Make It Harder for Blacks to Succeed – Encounter Books
• Patent Trolls: Predatory Litigation and the Smothering of Innovation – Independent Institute
• Machines v. Lawyers – Manhattan Institute
• The Economic Situation, June 1, 2014 – Mercatus Center
• Educational Freedom Works – John Locke Foundation
• Blended Learning: Leveraging Teachers and Technology to Improve Student Outcomes – Maine Heritage Policy Center
• How to Address Common Core's Reading Standards: Licensure Tests for K-6 Teachers – Pioneer Institute for Public Policy Research
Elections, Transparency, & Accountability
• Faithless Execution: Building the Political Case for Obama's Impeachment – Encounter Books
Foreign Policy/International Affairs
• Al Qaeda Isn't 'On Its Heels' – American Enterprise Institute
Health Care
• The Effect of Wait Times on Mortality in Canada – Fraser Institute
• How to Sustain Sound Dietary Guidelines for Americans – Hudson Institute
• The Political Roots of Health Insurance Benefit Mandates – Mercatus Center
• Specialty Drugs and Pharmacies – National Center for Policy Analysis
• The Biggest Myths of ObamaCare – National Center for Policy Analysis
• The VA Health System Is a Tragic Warning Against Government-Run Health Care – Reason Foundation
• The ENLIST Act: A Back Door to Instant Citizenship – Heritage Foundation
• Why the Earned Income Tax Credit Beats the Minimum Wage – Independent Women's Forum
National Security
• From Black Boots to Desert Boots: The All-Volunteer Army Experiment Continues – Foreign Policy Research Institute
• Reforming DHS Through the Appropriations Process – Heritage Foundation
Natural Resources, Energy, Environment, & Science
• Ending Ex–Im Would Remove Wasteful Energy Subsidies – Heritage Foundation
• Property Rights Save the Environment – Hoover Institution
• Smaller, Faster, Lighter, Denser, Cheaper: How Innovation Keeps Proving the Catastrophists Wrong – PublicAffairs
Regulation & Deregulation
• Evaluating Regulatory Reforms: Lessons for Future Reforms – Mercatus Center
The Constitution/Civil Liberties
• The Case Against Reparations for Slavery – Hoover Institution
Image of the week: Federal regulations now contain over 1 million restrictions.
How many of those regulations are beneficial on net? How would anybody know? As Patrick McLaughlin and Richard Williams point out: "The American regulatory system has no working, systematic process for reviewing regulations for obsolescence or poor performance […] ." [Mercatus Center, May 27]
Maybe the federal government should take a cue from Minnesota and hold an "unsession":
It's no longer a crime in Minnesota to carry fruit in an illegally sized container. The state's telegraph regulations are gone. And it's now legal to drive a car in neutral – if you can figure out how to do it.
Those were among the 1,175 obsolete, unnecessary and incomprehensible laws that Gov. Mark Dayton and the Legislature repealed this year as part of the governor's "unsession" initiative. His goal was to make state government work better, faster and smarter.
"I think we're off to a very good start," Dayton said Tuesday at a Capitol news conference.
In addition to getting rid of outdated laws, the project made taxes simpler, cut bureaucratic red tape, speeded up business permits and required state agencies to communicate in plain language. [St. Paul Pioneer-Press, May 27]
As the governor said: A very good start.
The dose of Rachel Carson makes the poison. May 27 was the 107th birthday of Rachel Carson, and Google decided to devote a doodle to celebrating the environmentalist on its homepage. Carson is most famous for her 1962 book Silent Spring, which warned of the detrimental effects of pesticides on the environment. Carson's warnings were particularly influential in curbing the use of DDT, an insecticide that had been widely used in agriculture and to control mosquito-spread malaria and typhus. The book is not without its critics, including Henry I. Miller of the Hoover Institute. In 2012, on the 50th anniversary of the publication of Silent Spring, Miller wrote that the book was "an emotionally charged but deeply flawed denunciation of the widespread spraying of chemical pesticides for the control of insects." Miller continued:
In the words of Professor Robert H. White-Stevens, an agriculturist and biology professor at Rutgers University, "If man were to follow the teachings of Miss Carson, we would return to the Dark Ages, and the insects and diseases and vermin would once again inherit the earth."
In 1992, San Jose State University entomologist J. Gordon Edwards, a long-time member of the Sierra Club and the Audubon Society and a fellow of the California Academy of Sciences, offered a persuasive and comprehensive rebuttal of "Silent Spring." As he explained in "The Lies of Rachel Carson," a stunning, point by point refutation, "it simply dawned on me that that Rachel Carson was not interested in the truth about [pesticides] and that I was being duped along with millions of other Americans." He demolished Carson's arguments and assertions, calling attention to critical omissions, faulty assumptions, and outright fabrications.
Consider, for example, this passage from Edwards' article: "This implication that DDT is horribly deadly is completely false. Human volunteers have ingested as much as 35 milligrams of it a day for nearly two years and suffered no adverse effects. Millions of people have lived with DDT intimately during the mosquito spray programs and nobody even got sick as a result. The National Academy of Sciences concluded in 1965 that 'in a little more than two decades, DDT has prevented 500 million [human] deaths that would otherwise have been inevitable.' The World Health Organization stated that DDT had 'killed more insects and saved more people than any other substance.'"
In addition, DDT was used with dramatic effect to shorten and prevent typhus epidemics during and after WWII when people were dusted with large amounts of it but suffered no ill effects, which is perhaps the most persuasive evidence that the chemical is harmless to humans. The product was such a boon to public health that in 1948 the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Dr. Paul Müller for his discovery of the "contact insecticidal action" of DDT. [Forbes, September 5, 2012]
Also in 2012, Roger Meiners and Andrew Morris examined the book in some detail, highlighting the book's impact on the mindset of the environmental movement. They noted that Carson was inconsistent in claiming on the one hand that she was against only the overzealous application of pesticides while also suggesting that policy should strive to reduce chemical residues to zero. Meiners and Morris:
The problem is that a "no-residue" policy is tantamount to a no-use policy. As Larry Katzenstein explains' Carson's rhetorical question is an articulation of the present-day environmentalists' version of the precautionary principle. Carson's view that policy regarding synthetic chemicals should be "no risk" was not uncommon in her time' as exemplified in the Delaney Amendment. The policy is not only unrealistic but poses significant harm […] .
The contradiction could be reconciled by striving to balance the risks and benefits of not using pesticides against those of using them. Many of Carson's disciples' however' do not favor such balancing of the risks of using DDT versus the risk of abandoning its use. This is evident from their support of a global ban on all DDT uses prior to the signing of the Stockholm Convention's ban on persistent organic pesticides and the continuing efforts to phase out DDT despite its public health benefits. ["Silent Spring at 50: Reflections on an Environmental Classic," by Roger Meiners and Andrew Morris, Property and Environment Research Center, April 2012]
See also: "Rachel Was Wrong: Agrochemicals' Benefit to Human Health and the Environment," by Angela Logomasini, Competitive Enterprise Institute, November 2012.
The Insider: Why the Obama foreign policy has been a disaster: Making the world safe for classical liberal values like individual liberty, free trade, and constitutionally constrained government requires a foreign policy that does more than just not start wars. Our cover story for the Spring 2014 issue takes up that theme. The editor's note:
If you follow the news, you probably know that a Select Committee of the House of Representatives is investigating whether the Obama administration has been sufficiently forthcoming about the security situation in Benghazi in the fall of 2012 and about how it responded to terrorist attacks on U.S. government facilities there on the 11th anniversary of 9/11. In particular, investigators are trying to determine why the administration downplayed terrorism and insisted that the attack had been merely a spontaneous protest against an Internet video that got out of hand.
Indeed, there are unanswered questions about Benghazi, but one thing we do know is that Islamist terrorism has not gone away. That was clear enough when we learned that the supposed spontaneous demonstration in Benghazi consisted entirely of men bearing rocket launchers driving trucks displaying Ansar al-Sharia logos. Two years later, foreign policy failures abound. Russia is in the Crimea, democratic reformers have been marginalized in the Middle East, and nobody takes our "red lines" seriously, to name just a few.
The problem, as Mackubin Thomas Owens explains, is that the Obama administration thinks peace and order are the natural conditions of world affairs, and that military force is only an alternative to diplomacy not an integral part of an overall diplomatic strategy. These confusions leave the administration unable to meet the challenges of maintaining a world order based on liberal democracy and open trade. And that is a tragedy for the whole world, not merely the United States.
Also in this issue, we have Bob Moffit and Nina Owcharenko reminding us that fixing health care doesn't mean just repealing ObamaCare; it means implementing the consumer-oriented reforms that conservatives have been championing for decades. Nathaniel Ward and Tim McGovern show how a culture of testing can help you improve your marketing. Mike Gonzalez reveals the Left's complaints about partisan commentary to be rather, well, partisan. And finally, if you've ever wondered what studies actually show about which policies lead to economic growth, then you should read John Hood's summary of the literature.
There's no theory in that theory. There's something missing from Thomas Piketty's argument (contained in his bestseller Capital in the Twenty-First Century) that year-in and year-out the returns to capital exceed the growth rate of the economy as a whole. As Don Boudreaux points out, Piketty offers no explanation for why that must be so:
The entire tenor of Piketty's volume suggests that he thinks capital reproduces itself, both from the perspective of its individual owners and from the perspective of society at large.
The creativity and fortitude of entrepreneurs, the skillful risk-taking by investors and the insight and effort of managers are all strangely absent throughout Piketty's performance. These very fonts of modern prosperity are at best assumed to play uninterestingly routine and unseen roles backstage. Onstage, capital—the stuff that is in fact created and skillfully steered by flesh-and-blood entrepreneurs, investors and managers—appears to grow spontaneously, without human involvement. [Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, May 27]
Of course, when you attempt to explain economic conditions—like inequality—you run the risk of discovering that capitalism might not be the problem. For example, here is this point from Robert Murphy:
[…] Mother Jones loved this chart showing income inequality soaring in the late 1920s and in the mid-2000s: Look everyone, if we let the 1% earn too much, it sets the world up for a giant financial crash! But actually what happened is that loose monetary policy drove down interest rates, thereby fueling asset price booms, which showed up as huge income (in the form of capital gains) accruing disproportionately in the hands of the wealthy. It's not surprising that these Fed-fueled asset bubbles eventually collapsed, leading to the Great Depression and Great Recession. To prevent a repeat, the government doesn't need to confiscate property from the super-rich; instead the Fed needs to stop inflating asset bubbles. [Rare, May 29]
Beth March, scarlet fever, and Thomas Piketty: One secret to Thomas Piketty's success in selling Americans his book Capital in the Twenty-First Century is his embrace of great literature. Piketty retells key moments in Honore de Balzac's Pere Goriot to illustrate the importance of inheritance in the 19th century and draws on Jane Austen's Mansfield Park when he discusses the value and the vexation of overseas investments. Piketty's insight is that books capture the sense and flavor of their era—and occasionally report typical prices and incomes.
The writers of the past are equally valuable for illuminating the astounding progress of economic growth in the past two hundred years, a fact Piketty acknowledges but to which he devotes little ink. Reading Capital, one comes away with the impression that the distribution of wealth and income is the central fact of each era: He reports most statistics as percentages of national income. But when per-person national income was doubling every generation, it was surely a more noticeable phenomenon than a few percentage points of national wealth more or less in the portfolios of the top centile.
Long-term comparisons of income levels are tricky: How many buggy whips is an iPhone worth? Stories of human life under different conditions can help us appreciate the immensity of growth.
In One Thousand and One Nights, hilarity ensues when characters meet in the dark and fail to recognize one another. Artificial light was expensive. Roger Fouquet and Peter J. G. Pearson estimate that a dollar's worth of lighting in the year 2000 would have cost $3,000 two centuries before. Like all long-term economic growth, the cheapness of modern light comes from applying free enterprise to technological innovation. At times, the British government stood athwart history, taxing windows and Dutch whale oil. ["Seven Centuries of Energy Services: The Price and Use of Light in the United Kingdom (1300-2000)" by Roger Fouquet and Peter J.G. Pearson, The Energy Journal, Vol. 27, No. 1 (2006)]
In Little Women, Beth March dies of strep throat (scarlet fever) despite being an affluent New Englander. Today, an antibiotic would have cured her quickly, and the entire episode might warrant a few Facebook status updates. Oliver Twist is thrown into a life of poverty and loneliness by the death of his mother in childbirth, a common occurrence in 19th-century London. The advances in medicine alone make the era of enterprise and innovation a success.
Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days celebrates the breakneck speed of an era of dynamic growth and technological progress. Steam, rail, and telegraphy remade the world in a generation.
Although Piketty has introduced some new data on the distribution of income and wealth in different eras, we should not lose sight of the great progress that has lifted all standards of living since the times of Charles Dickens and Jules Verne. —Salim Furth
A note from Martin Feldstein: A couple of weeks ago, we pointed to some analysis by Martin Feldstein on the inequality argument put forth by Thomas Piketty in his book Capital in the Twenty-First Century. Feldstein had pointed out that Piketty was looking at U.S. income tax return data, which is misleading because the tax reforms of 1986 encouraged high earners to increase the amount of income reported on individual income tax returns. The income didn't change so much as how it was counted on tax forms.
Dr. Feldstein has let us know that his article, originally published behind a paywall at Wall Street Journal, is now available ungated at www.nber.org/feldstein/wsj05152014.pdf.
Piketty's book, we see, is still in the news—perhaps more so this week than in previous weeks—because of some questions about his data. Those who are following the argument should be sure to read Dr. Feldstein's contribution.
The contradictions of European union: A report on Greece, from Alexander Skouras:
Golden Dawn's rise from a tiny group of radical Hitler-sympathizers to the third largest party in Greece occurred when the Greek economy was collapsing. The origins of this crisis are well-known and well-documented: excessive borrowing, low productivity, corruption, and a profligate welfare state. At the height of the crisis the entire nation was angry; the people felt betrayed by their political elites. The Nazi party arose from the need to blame outsiders and to feel special. […]
In this political climate Golden Dawn rose from 0.3 percent of the vote in 2009 to approximately 7 percent in the 2012 national elections. For the last year many analysts thought that the prosecution of Golden Dawn members on charges of organized crime and the imprisonment of many of its elected leaders, including General Secretary Nikos Michaloliakos, would keep the party from further electoral success. But the May 18 municipal and gubernatorial elections and the May 25 European ones told a different story. Golden Dawn received 9.4 percent of the European parliamentary vote, enough to elect three members. Among them there are two former high-ranking army officers. The week before that, in Athens, the country's capital and largest city, Golden Dawn's municipal candidate and MP, Ilias Kassidiaris, who made global headlines when he slapped a female communist MP on live television, gathered 16 percent of the vote, securing him fourth place in a close election. Ilias Panagiotaros, Golden Dawn's gubernatorial candidate in Attica, the region that includes Athens and its suburbs, won 11 percent and also finished fourth.
From these results it is safe to assume that Golden Dawn is no longer merely the beneficiary of a protest vote. The Greek electorate has been fully informed of the party's Nazi affiliation, Holocaust denial, anti-immigrant slurs, and raw violence in the streets of Athens. We can now safely conclude that Greece has a viable, robust, and dangerous national socialist political force. [AtlasOne, May 28]
Wasn't preventing a rebirth of nationalist parties the point of a united Europe?
Video of the week: Reasons an Article V convention would not give conservatives what they want: The main problem with the country's constitutional set-up, says Trent England, is not the words of the Constitution but a lack of fidelity to what those words mean. Amending the Constitution will just give liberals different words to ignore. England is the Executive Vice President of the Freedom Foundation, Washington State's free-market think tank. Talking with the Daily Caller's Ginny Thomas, England outlines some other reasons conservatives should be wary of an Article V constitutional convention.
For one thing, says England, the convention would not necessarily work the way conservatives imagine it would work. Convention delegates would have their own constitutional standing, and their work could not simply be constrained by an act of Congress. Furthermore, says England, sitting federal judges—most of whom are not conservatives—would likely play a bigger role than Congress in shaping any convention.
Also, it's not easy to amend the Constitution and conservatives might be wiser to invest their resources pushing other levers of change (e.g., the Senate). And England notes that it's probably a good thing that the Constitution is hard to amend because the Left has bigger dreams of changing the Constitution that conservatives do; there's a lot of freedom that could be lost at an Article V convention, too.
The point of federalism is to protect the rights of the people, not the rights of states. Noting the rash of stories about new federal requirements for school lunches, David Corbin and Matt Parks point out how inadequate is the Republican waiver-based defense of federalism, which they say "simply shovels a little less dirt on [federalism's] grave":
Approximately one out of every fourteen Americans is a government employee today, compared to one in twenty-two Americans in 1955. The greatest part of the total increase of government employees amounts to the enlargement of state and local government employment. It matters little if the lunch lady pouring chocolate milk down the sink and serving fruits and vegetables is a local government employee if her job ultimately depends on monies slopped out by federal bureaucrats wielding carrot sticks.
Which brings us to the third part of Madison's argument as to why the proposed federal republic was a great improvement over the earlier confederation; namely, its powers would be "few," "defined," and "exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce." Madison likely never could have imagined the Federal government adding management of sodium intake to this list as the American people sat listless on the political sidelines.
As troubling as the death of federalism is, we need more fundamental reform, as the Republican response to the school lunch mandates makes clear. There is, after all, an even more important third leg to the governing stool, implicit in Madison's argument, but made explicit in the 10th Amendment: the people. Often conservatives read that Amendment as if it is meant to protect the rights of the states. But it is much better understood, both textually and historically, as an attempt to protect the people's distribution of powers among themselves, the states and the national government. If we really want to restore 10th Amendment government, we'll need to work much harder at removing power from both state and federal hands than at replacing the divine right of the Washington King with the divine right of state Barons. [The Federalist, May 26]
Michael Greve made a similar argument in a recent issue of The Insider:
The balance question isn't just beside the point; it is an assault on the foundations of the republic. To quote Madison's impassioned language in Federalist 45:
Was … the American revolution effected, was the American Confederacy formed, was the precious blood of thousands spilt, and the hard-earned substance of millions lavished, not that the people of America should enjoy peace, liberty, and safety, but that the government of the individual states, that particular municipal establishments, might enjoy a certain extent of power, and be arrayed with certain dignities and attributes of sovereignty?
The answer he is trying to evoke is: Hell, no. […]
States are Purely Instrumental. If they can advance the "real welfare of the great body of the people," good for them. If they stand as a hindrance, ignore them or get rid of them. That is the fundamental calculus and the irreducible premise of the United States Constitution. The cartel federalism we have is profoundly state-friendly: It serves the interests of the political class. The constitutional, competitive federalism we need is citizen-friendly: It would discipline government, not help it grow. ["But What Kind of Federalism?" by Michael S. Greve, The Insider, Winter 2013.]
And speaking of states doing the wrong things … Low-income people in Arkansas used to be able to get their teeth cleaned cheaply, thanks to Dr. Ben Burris. Now, instead of paying $99 (or $69 for children), they have to pay hundreds of dollars for a cleaning. Burris, who is a dentist, had to stop offering the cleanings because the state board of dental examiners told him that he couldn't offer basic dental services.
According to the board, Arkansas law says dentists can't offer dental services if they are also licensed as a specialist. Burris is a licensed orthodontist. Orthodontists, by the way, normally employ dental hygienists who clean teeth, and that's all perfectly legal as long as the teeth getting cleaned also get fitted for braces later.
Of course, the restriction on specialists offering services outside their specialty has nothing to do with protecting consumers and everything to do with limiting competition in basic dental services—so that dentists can charge more. No patients had complained about Burris's service. At a hearing of the dental board, notes the Institute for Justice, "Board members and general dentists condemned Ben for offering the cleanings. There was no allegation that Ben had endangered, much less harmed, anyone."
On behalf of Burris and his colleague Elizabeth Grohl, IJ filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against the board of dental examiners. The lawsuit contends that the restriction against specialists offering basic dental services serves no purpose except to protect general dentists from competition, and that the restriction thus violates the 14th Amendment's Equal Protection, Due Process and Privileges or Immunities Clauses.
• Learn about the human rights situation in China on the 25th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng will talk with American Enterprise Institute president Arthur C. Brooks. The conversation will begin at 1:45 p.m. at the American Enterprise Institute on June 3.
• Examine the connection between liberty and character. The Beacon Center of Tennessee will host a talk by Lawrence Reed, President of the Foundation for Economic Education. Reed will speak at the Nashville City Club on June 3 at 6 p.m.
• Show what a great communicator for liberty you are by entering Think Freely's Great Communicators Tournament. All you have to do is make a one- to three-minute video in which you take the moral high ground while making an argument for liberty. Submissions are due by July 15. Twelve finalists will be selected to compete in the Great Communicators Tournament at the State Policy Network's Annual Meeting in Denver in September.
• Discover whether administrative law is even lawful. Philip Hamburger, Professor of Law at Columbia University, thinks it is not, and he'll explain why at the Cato Institute at noon on June 5.
• Find out how sex education courses have become caught in the crosshairs of the "war on women" debate. Valerie Huber, President of the National Abstinence Education Association, will speak at the Family Research Council at noon on June 4.
• Learn how the Left want to amend the First Amendment so they can stifle criticism of elected officials. The Heritage Foundation will host a panel discussion featuring Bobby Burchfield, who argued the recent and important McCutcheon case before the Supreme Court; Don McGahn, former Chairman of the Federal Election Commission; and Hans von Spakovsky, Senior Legal Fellow at The Heritage Foundation. The discussion will begin at 2 p.m. on June 2.
• Cartoonists, get your submissions in for the Center for International Private Enterprise's 2014 Global Editorial Cartoon Competition. Hurry—the submission deadline is June 2.
• Check out The Daily Signal, The Heritage Foundation's new media platform, launching June 3.
(Want more stuff to do? Check out InsiderOnline's Conservative Calendar.)
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The best that can be said for the budget deal Congress is now considering is that it appears to be a bit of cooperation between the Republicans and the Democrats, the House and the Senate for the first time in years. Other than that it is no "deal" for the American people. Read the following report from Heritage and decide for yourself. For myself I don't like it but rather have this than nothing at all because nothing at all but "continuing resolution" puts Obama in charge of spending what he wants with no input or control from the Congress or the people. BB
The Budget Deal's Sneaky Tax Increases
The Heritage Foundation
The Budget Deal's Sneaky Tax Increases
The congressional budget deal includes some "user fees."
For the Washington establishment, that's apparently the politically correct way of telling Americans they'll be paying more to the federal government. For the rest of us, it's a tax increase.
The Ryan-Murray budget deal, which passed the House on a 332-94 vote, includes a number of "fee" increases. One would make flying more expensive. Travelers are currently charged $2.50 per flight under the Transportation Security Administration's airline security "fee." Under the budget deal, that would increase to $5.60 per flight or $11.20 for a round-trip ticket.
Supporters of the deal are claiming this isn't a tax increase—but take a look at your airline receipt. The airline security charge is just one of the taxes you'll see. According to Delta Airlines, there's also the Domestic Transportation Tax (7.5 percent), Travel Facilities Tax ($8.40), and U.S. International Transportation Tax ($17.20). These are all considered taxes.
When asked if the "user fees" were a code name for a tax increase, Representative Tom McClintock (R-CA) explained it this way: "I happen to believe once government spends a dollar they have decided to tax that dollar. The only question is when and by what means."
And in the case of this airline security fee increase, the money isn't even going back to the TSA to fund or improve security. Instead, as Heritage's Cassandra Lucaccioni explained, "it will be deposited annually into a general fund of the Treasury."
Not all government user fees are problematic. If they're used to provide services to distinct groups of individuals or specific businesses or industries, they might make sense. That's not what's happening here.
"If a higher fee does not directly cover the cost of a government service and instead goes to pay for more spending, then it is akin to a tax increase," said Curtis Dubay, Heritage's senior tax policy analyst. "The budget deal uses the higher fees to cover the cost of more spending; hence it is essentially a tax hike."
Taxpayers are tired of Washington's gimmicks and games—and conservatives on Capitol Hill shouldn't fall for this sneaky wordplay. The $63 billion spending hike in the Ryan-Murray budget has to come from somewhere.
Only in Washington could something like this fly. The American people shouldn't buy it—or, in this case, pay for it.
Read the Morning Bell and more en español every day at Heritage Libertad.
Quick Hits:
- Ever wondered how America got $17 trillion in debt? In his latest column, Heritage President Jim DeMint says Congress' budget deal provides an example.
- PolitiFact awarded President Obama with its "Lie of the Year" designation. Click here to find out the winner.
- Dishonest, Orwellian word games undermine the GOP's credibility, argues Sean Davis at The Federalist.
- Do you know who Paul Teller is? Here's why it matters that he got fired from a Republican group.
- Even the "Sexiest Man Alive" can't make this unpopular, unworkable law appealing.
- Want to know how Interpol works? Don't trust Hollywood. A Heritage expert explains how the system really works.
- With his popularity dropping, President Obama seems to be distancing himself from his "signature legislation."
- Is the "Buffett Rule" already happening? The facts show the top 1 percent of earners already pay three times the effective rate of the middle class.
- In: Barack Obama | Health Care | Health Care Reform Summary | Internet | national deficit, taxes, national budget | Obama 2013 and beyond | Obama admistration | Obama Against America | Obama and ethics | Obama Executive Decress | Obamacare | Obamanation | Obamcare repeal and replace | Progressives Movement to Destroy America | Rep Tom Price | Thye Tea Party Patriots Movement | Tort Reform Needed | Unfunded liabilities | United States taxes | US in Revolt
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A Conservative solution to our health care problems is what is needed now I have heard people say. Well there has been this Conservative solution since before Obamacare was forced thru the Congress by the Democrats who were in control of both houses and the Presidency. These same Democrats who refused to allow any Republican input at all during the drafting of this bill. the same Democrats who refused to be bothered reading the 2000+ page bill that they passed without one Republican vote for it. If you check back on this blog site you will see the Republican plans and proposals that were submitted in both the House and the Senate that were never allowed by the Democrat leaders to see the light of day. They were trash canned. What we got stuck with is a so-called Affordable Healthcare Act (Obamacare) that we are now finding out is not at all affordable for the few people who have been able to get a look at the available plans on a web site set up to show these plans to people and allow them to enroll in and purchase insurance. There were, we are now being told, all of 6 people in the entire country who managed to enroll in Obamacare and purchase an insurance policy the first day before the site crashed and burned. The same web site that cost $6 billion and three years to get up and running but isn't running at all. The web site that was built by a Canadian company but is now being fixed by what the President assures us are experts, or this same Canadian company. Funny I thought the "experts" on the Internet and building programs for the Internet would be the very Americans who built the Internet in the first place. Guess none of these people had a friend in the White House. Or maybe they were willing to take less time and cost less money to build a web site that probably would have worked almost as well as the Internet they built in the first place. Ya think?? But no "friend" in the WH gets no contract.
The following letter is from Jim DeMint who outlines the Republicans and Conservatives Healthcare Plan that is affordable and available and more important, Constitutional. Please check it out. BB
The Conservative Alternative to Obamacare11/01/13Dear friends,We've been very critical of Obamacare because it's hurting Americans. But that has caused some to ask, "What's your alternative?"
The truth is, we've always had alternatives, but our critics weren't ready to listen. Now, the disastrous rollout of Obamacare has a lot of people asking for alternatives to government-run health care. And conservatives are ready.
With each passing day, it becomes clearer that Obamacare will not reduce premiums for average American families, bring down health care spending, or truly improve health care in this country. Instead, people are receiving notices from their insurance companies that their policies are being canceled or their premiums are skyrocketing.
At The Heritage Foundation, we are envisioning a health care system where you and your family come first.
What if you could choose and control your own health insurance? What if you could buy the insurance and health care services you want and need? What if your health insurance didn't go away when you changed jobs?
The good news is, all of these things are possible. There can be life after Obamacare—and it doesn't mean going back to the status quo that we had before. We can move ahead, taking the best health care system in the world and making it even better.
Our experts in the Center for Health Policy Studies have put together a new paper that explains how these conservative ideas work. It includes:
- How we will help people with pre-existing conditions
- How we will help you keep your health insurance when you change jobs
- How we can lower costs and improve health care quality—no matter what your income is
- How we can honor people's faith and protect the right of conscience in health care
We are excited to share this set of commonsense solutions with you—not just because they are good public policy solutions, but because they bring hope. We have hope for life after Obamacare, and these policies would give you back control over your own health care.
Now that's worth working toward. I hope you'll join us.
Jim DeMint
Heritage Foundation Insider Online Newsletter–topics of interest to all patriots.
Posted June 23, 2013on:
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The following article is from the Heritage Foundation and is a listing of studies made by various groups on the state of our government and social programs. I found many of them informative and felt that perhaps my Readers would also. Just check out the listings and click on the topics that interest you. You may also wish to subscribe and have the Insider Online newsletter delivered to your home page. sincerely, BB
Updated daily, InsiderOnline (insideronline.org) is a compilation of publication abstracts, how-to essays, events, news, and analysis from around the conservative movement. The current edition of The INSIDER quarterly magazine is also on the site.
June 22, 2013
Latest Studies: 38 new items, including a Manhattan Institute report on the student debt problem, and an American Legislative Exchange Council report on environmental overcriminalization
Notes on the Week: Not even low-income workers can count on benefiting from ObamaCare, things to know about the CBO's immigration scoring, and more
To Do: Keep an eye on Russia
Budget & Taxation
• Four Tenets to Less Government Spending – e21 – Economic Policies for the 21st Century
• The Municipal Government Debt Crisis – Heartland Institute
• Proposed New Farm Programs: Costly and Risky for Taxpayers – The Heritage Foundation
• Soaring National Debt Remains a Grave Threat – The Heritage Foundation
• Taxing Online Sales: Should the Taxman's Grasp Exceed His Reach? – The Heritage Foundation
• The Big Choice for Jobs and Growth: Lower Tax Rates Versus Expensing – The Heritage Foundation
• The Many Real Dangers of Soaring National Debt – The Heritage Foundation
• The Simple Economics of Pro-Growth Tax Reform – The Heritage Foundation
• Turn Down the Heat, Switch On the Light: A Rational Analysis of Tax Havens, Tax Policy and Tax Politics – Institute of Economic Affairs
• The Best Solution from Both Budgets: "Reverse Logrolling" Shows the Best Option for Government Spending and Tax Reform – John Locke Foundation
• Creating a Fair Property Tax System: Is it Possible? – Public Interest Institute
• Kansas 2013 Tax Reform Improves on Last Year's Efforts – Tax Foundation
• New Zealand's Experience with Territorial Taxation – Tax Foundation
• A Review of the 83rd Session of the Texas Legislature – Texas Public Policy Foundation
• Virginia Economic Forecast 2013-2014: State to Add Jobs Despite Sequestration – Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Crime, Justice & the Law
• Ignorance of the Law Is No Excuse, But It Is Reality – The Heritage Foundation
• Comeback States Report: Reducing Juvenile Incarceration in the United States – Texas Public Policy Foundation
• Scientific Evidence in State Courts: Florida Reform as a Model – Washington Legal Foundation
• Beyond Retrofitting: Innovation in Higher Education – Hudson Institute
• College Credit: Repairing America's Unhealthy Relationship with Student Debt – Manhattan Institute
Foreign Policy/International Affairs
• Beyond the Border: U.S. and Canada Expand Partnership in Trade and Security – The Heritage Foundation
Health Care
• The Right Way to Fight Obesity – Hoover Institution
• An Analysis of the Proposed Medicaid Expansion in Michigan – National Center for Policy Analysis
• Veterans Affairs Fails to Curb Suicide Epidemic – National Center for Policy Analysis
• Advancing the Immigration Nation: Heritage's Positive Path to Immigration and Border Security Reform – The Heritage Foundation
• Senate Immigration Bill Does Not Require Payment of All Back Taxes – The Heritage Foundation
Information Technology
• FCC Must Maintain Open Eligibility for Incentive Spectrum Auction – Free State Foundation
Monetary Policy/Financial Regulation
• Rethinking the FHA – American Enterprise Institute
• Recent Arguments against the Gold Standard – Cato Institute
National Security
• Obama's Wish to Cut Nuclear Arsenal Undermines National Security – The Heritage Foundation
• Preventing the Next "Lone Wolf" Terrorist Attack Requires Stronger Federal–State–Local Capabilities – The Heritage Foundation
Natural Resources, Energy, Environment, & Science
• Efficiency Policy – American Action Forum
• Five Solutions for Addressing Environmental Overcriminalization – American Legislative Exchange Council
• Improving Incentives for Federal Land Managers: The Case for Recreation Fees – Cato Institute
• Denial of Supreme Court Review Leaves Ninth Circuit ESA Case Intact – Washington Legal Foundation
• Ohio Court Limits Localities' Authority over Energy Exploration – Washington Legal Foundation
• Paint Is Cheaper Than Rails: Why Congress Should Abolish New Starts – Cato Institute
• Moving the Road Sector into the Market Economy – Institute of Economic Affairs
Notes on the Week
Rector on CBO on immigration: The Congressional Budget Office told us this week that letting large numbers of immigrants into the country and changing the status of those currently here illegally will be great for the economy and the federal budget. Robert Rector has a few things to say about the CBO's scoring of the Gang of Eight immigration bill. Here are the highlights:
[T]he immigration coming in under this bill looks like previous immigration in the sense that its predominantly lower-skilled plus the fact that you're taking 11 million illegal immigrants and giving them access to the welfare and entitlement states. They have an average education of 10th grade, so it's very difficult to imagine that those households would somehow pay enough in taxes to equal their benefits […] .
The trick is the CBO 10-year budget window. […] For mysterious reasons, when an amnesty bill is written, the amnesty recipients become eligible for everything under the sun in about the 11th year. So that they pay taxes in the first 10 years and they don't get additional benefits for some mysterious reason until you move outside the CBO budget window. […]
[T]he federal government, because of Social Security and Medicare, inherently transfers from the non-elderly to the elderly. State and local governments kind of do the opposite. If you just look at state and local governments you would find that they transfer from the elderly to the non-elderly to pay for education. The elderly pay a lot of property tax; they don't get any education benefits any more. […] Of course immigrants are not elderly themselves. For a limited period of time they pay in but then they take out more than they have paid in. It's important to put both flows together because the opposite process is happening down at the state and local level. […]
One of the interesting things that CBO does tell us is that the number of illegal immigrants who will enter the country over the next 20 years goes down by only 25 percent. There would have been, they estimate, 10 million illegal immigrants entering over the next 20 years. They estimate that that will drop to 7.5 million illegal immigrants entering the country […] . The net cost of those illegals alone would be about $400 billion over that period. […]
When you look at the Gang of Eight explain their bill they always say: Oh, we're shifting from low-skill immigration to high-skill immigration. You can trust us. That's what we do. But in fact the numbers from CBO show exactly the opposite. Roughly 80 … 85 to 90 percent of the individuals getting green card status are not skill-based. [The Foundry, June 21]
Turn on, tune in, pay up. Online learning may transform higher education someday, but right now it serves mainly as a prop in the familiar university system, say Andrew Kelly and Frederick Hess:
Many online programs generate large revenues because most colleges charge the same price (or more!) for students enrolled online as for those on campus. A survey of 199 universities by the educational technology arm of the Western Interstate Commission on Higher Education found that 93 percent of universities charged the same or higher tuition for their online programs. This is bizarre, given that online courses are less costly to deliver than in-person courses. But instead of competing on price (meaning that cost savings get passed to the student), institutions have maintained in-person prices for online courses—even as the cost of delivery has fallen.
What do colleges do with that extra revenue? They cross-subsidize activities on the brick and mortar campus: unfunded research, student life, institutional aid programs, and so on. Put more genteelly, they "reinvest" it in their traditional campus.
Real innovation, as Kelly and Hess point out, is about unbundling the research-based university, and that's not going to happen until the government regulations, subsidies, and accreditation policies that protect that model from competition are reformed. ["Beyond Retrofitting: Innovation in Higher Education," by Andrew P. Kelly and Frederick Hess, Hudson Institute, June 2013.]
Not even low-income workers can count on coming out ahead under ObamaCare. Some low-income workers could end up paying a lot more for health insurance than they paid before ObamaCare became law, reports Jillian Kay Melchior. ObamaCare requires employer-provided health insurance to cover at least 60 percent of health-care costs while not costing employees more than 9.5 percent of their household incomes. Since low-income households may have multiple sources of income, it can be difficult for companies to figure out if a particular plan is sufficient to avoid penalties. The federal government has proposed "safe harbor" standards in order to provide clarity: Companies offering plans that have a $3,500 deductible, a $6,000 cap on out-of-pocket costs, and premiums of $90 or less per month would put companies in the clear of any penalties. Under those standards, says Melchior, a low-income worker not eligible Medicaid has few good options:
He could take the employer's plan — but if it's a safe-harbor plan, it would cost, at minimum, $1,080 a year. And that's before the deductible is even factored in. For someone who earns $28,725 a year, falling at 250 percent of the poverty level, these costs are sizeable.
Option two: He could shop around on the health exchange for an alternative. But because his employer provides a sanctioned plan, he's disqualified from any subsidy he might have received to help offset costs. Even a very basic plan would cost up to $2,316 a year in premiums alone.
Option three: Forgo insurance altogether and pay the steadily increasing penalty to the federal government. In 2014, for an individual, that's $95 for the year or 1 percent of household income, whichever is greater. But by 2016, it will rise to either $695 or 2.5 percent of household income. And that's not even factoring in whether the worker has kids. In that case, he could face an annual penalty of $2,085 or more by 2016. […]
Before, many employers who paid by the hour offered limited medical plans. These policies often got a bad rap because of their lack of catastrophic coverage. But to their credit, they were inexpensive and contributed to health-care costs immediately, without workers needing to first meet a deductible.
Now, these low-wage hourly workers would be forced to spend at least $5,300 before their coverage really begins to benefit them. [National Review, June 17]
Who elected those guys? ask teachers in Kansas. Last week, teachers in Deerfield, Kansas, did something that almost never happens, report James Sherk and Michael Cirrotti: They voted to decertify their union:
Unlike most public officials, unions do not stand for re-election, so their members cannot regularly hold them accountable. Workers can remove an unwanted union only by filing for decertification. But bureaucratic obstacles make it difficult to hold a vote on decertification. The hoops Deerfield's teachers had to jump through illustrate this problem.
Joel McClure, the teacher who led the effort, submitted the appropriate paperwork to the Kansas Department of Labor in November 2012. But Kansas teachers can request a vote only in a two-month window every three years. KNEA officials contested the petition by claiming that the teachers missed the December 1 deadline. (The Department of Labor had misplaced the initial petition paperwork.) Then the KNEA objected that the teachers' attorney was not certified in Kansas and that they did not have enough signatures. However, the teachers prevailed and voted out their union—in June, just eight months after the initial submission.
When asked why they went through such protracted effort, the teachers said their union ignored their concerns. They wanted instead to be actively involved in negotiations and work collaboratively with the school district. "The desire is for teachers to participate at the [bargaining] table, to have free access to information," McClure said. "In our little school district, there's no reason we can't sit down at the table and work out our issues." [The Foundry, June 18]
Did we mention that next week is National Employee Freedom Week?
The death panel is coming. Last week, a federal judge in Philadelphia blocked the enforcement of an age-limit rule on lung transplants, thus allowing a very sick 10-year-old girl to obtain a new set of lungs. Doctors had said the girl, who suffers from cystic fibrosis, would live only three to five weeks without new lungs. Earlier, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius had said she would not to intervene in the case by overturning the rule.
When the ObamaCare-created Independent Payment Advisory Board is up and running in two years, it too will make decisions on matters of life and death, but unlike Sebelius's decision on lung rules, the decisions of the IPAB cannot be reviewed by courts. Those decisions are also protected from politics in some extraordinary ways. As David Rivkin and Elizabeth Foley explain, the IPAB set-up is certainly unconstitutional, but likely not challengeable in the short run because no one would have standing to sue:
Once the board acts, its decisions can be overruled only by Congress, and only through unprecedented and constitutionally dubious legislative procedures—featuring restricted debate, short deadlines for actions by congressional committees and other steps of the process, and supermajoritarian voting requirements. The law allows Congress to kill the otherwise inextirpable board only by a three-fifths supermajority, and only by a vote that takes place in 2017 between Jan. 1 and Aug. 15. If the board fails to implement cuts, all of its powers are to be exercised by HHS Secretary Sebelius or her successor. […]
The power given by Congress to the Independent Payment Advisory Board is breathtaking. Congress has willingly abandoned its power to make tough spending decisions (how and where to cut) to an unaccountable board that neither the legislative branch nor the president can control. The law has also entrenched the board's decisions to an unprecedented degree.
In Mistretta v. United States (1989), the Supreme Court emphasized that, in seeking assistance to fill in details not spelled out in the law, Congress must lay down an "intelligible principle" that "confine[s] the discretion of the authorities to whom Congress has delegated power." The "intelligible principle" test ensures accountability by demanding that Congress take responsibility for fundamental policy decisions.
The IPAB is guided by no such intelligible principle. ObamaCare mandates that the board impose deep Medicare cuts, while simultaneously forbidding it to ration care. Reducing payments to doctors, hospitals and other health-care providers may cause them to limit or stop accepting Medicare patients, or even to close shop.
These actions will limit seniors' access to care, causing them to wait longer or forego care—the essence of rationing. ObamaCare's commands to the board are thus inherently contradictory and, consequently, unintelligible.
Moreover, authorizing the advisory board to make rules "relating to" Medicare gives the board virtually limitless power of the kind hitherto exercised by Congress. For instance, the board could decide to make cuts beyond the statutory target. It could mandate that providers expand benefits without additional payment. It could require that insurers or gynecologists make abortion services available to all their patients as a condition of doing business with Medicare, or that drug companies set aside a certain percentage of Medicare-related revenues to fund "prescription drug affordability." There is no limit. [Wall Street Journal, June 19]
What is candy? Depends on which state wants to tax it online. Forcing online retailers to remit sales taxes to the state where the purchaser resides, as the federal Marketplace Fairness Act (MFA) does, is not going to level the playing field between online and bricks-and-mortar retailers. Rather, as James Gattuso explains, it will tilt the playing field heavily against online retailers—especially smaller ones:
While the legislation does require states to provide retailers with free software for managing tax compliance, that software need only cover the individual state. Retailers are left on their own to get nationwide software, unless they want to integrate 46 individual software packages. No compensation is offered for recurring costs incurred by retailers, such as accounting services or online tax management services.
In addition, internal staff time would be needed for an array of tasks, including handling claims by tax-exempt customers, fielding inquiries from tax authorities, and addressing the inevitable glitches.
Even the simple act of classifying the item being sold can be problematic, with thousands of idiosyncratic distinctions and definitions through each state's tax code. In Wisconsin, the Wisconsin flag as well as the U.S. flag is not subject to tax. All other flags are taxable. Unless they are bundled with flagpoles, in which case the rules change yet again.
Similarly, candy is defined—under the "streamlined" sales tax agreement, as "a preparation of sugar, honey, or other natural or artificial sweeteners in combination with chocolate, fruits, nuts or other ingredients in the form of bars, drops, or pieces." But sellers beware: "'Candy' shall not include any preparation containing flour and shall require no refrigeration." Thus defined, states still vary on whether the concoction is taxable or not.
The problems do not end with the sale. Each of the 46 state tax authorities with which retailers would have to deal directly require tax returns to be completed, on an annual, quarterly, or even weekly basis. To ensure that it is all done correctly, sellers would be subject to audits from each of 46 states. (If tax authorities on Indian reservations are included—as they are in the MFA as passed by the Senate—the number of tax forms and potential audits jumps to the hundreds.) [The Heritage Foundation, June 19]
Carbon taxers forget the externalities of not using cheap, abundant energy. One reason putting a tax on carbon in order to price its negative externalities is not a free-market idea:
[E]ven if SCC [social cost of carbon] estimates were not assumption-driven hocus-pocus, their use by activists, policymakers, and agencies would still be biased and misleading, because proponents of "climate action" always ignore the social costs of carbon mitigation.
As Cato Institute scholar Indur Goklany explains in a recent study, fossil fuels are the chief energy source of a "cycle of progress" responsible for the amazing improvements of the past 250 years in life expectancy, health, nutrition, safety, comfort, human capital formation, and per capita income. The cycle of progress is to no small extent a "positive externality" of fossil fuels. Thus, policies that suppress the extraction, delivery, and consumption of fossil fuels, or that make fossil energy less affordable, have social costs in addition to whatever compliance burdens and economic losses the policies entail.
For example, the more stringent the carbon mitigation scheme, the more severe the impacts on household income and job creation. Numerous studies find that poverty and unemployment increase the risk of sickness and death. Carbon tax advocates never acknowledge this side of the ledger.
Given the continuing importance of fossil fuels to human flourishing and the undeniable connection between livelihoods, living standards, and life expectancy, carbon taxes can easily do more harm than good to public health—even if one accepts the IPCC's version of the science.
That's from Marlo Lewis's excellent summary of the recent R Street-Heartland Institute debate on the carbon tax. [GlobalWarming.org, June 16]
Progressives make use of rights that progressives think should not exist. It's a good thing for progressives—and everybody else—that one particular progressive idea hasn't been adopted, observes Wendy Kaminer:
If progressives had their way, the ACLU's latest challenge to the NSA's domestic surveillance would easily be dismissed.ACLU v Clapper, filed in the wake of the Snowden revelations, is based on the ACLU's First and Fourth Amendment rights, which, according to progressives, ACLU should not possess. It is, after all, a corporation, and constitutional amendments aggressively promoted by progressives would limit constitutional rights to "natural persons."
"The words people, person, or citizen as used in this Constitution do not include corporations, limited liability companies or other corporate entities," the popular People's Rights Amendment declares. [The Atlantic, June 17]
Arthur Koestler's protagonist in Darkness at Noon referred to the first-person singular as a "grammatical fiction" because it conflicted with the logic of self sacrifice demanded by the party. Today's real progressives are now trying to subvert the plural form. By insisting that only individuals, not corporations, have rights, they elide the fact that corporations are made up of individual people. Individuals can't fully exercise their rights if the things they choose to do cooperatively with others do not have the same protections as the things they choose to do alone. Maybe the American Civil Liberties Union can spread the word.
• Find out what Russia is up to with its efforts to construct a Eurasian Union. The Heritage Foundation will host a half-day conference on June 27 in Washington, D.C.
• Reflect on the Battle of Gettysburg and its meaning for the nation, which happened 150 years ago this July. Allen Guelzo of Gettysburg College will make remarks at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., at 4:30 p.m. on June 26.
• If you are a young, professional, conservative woman, come meet other young, professional, conservative women at the Network of enlightened Women's National Conference. The conference will be held June 27 – June 28 at The Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C. Christina Hoff Summers will deliver a keynote address.
• Request a free copy of the movie Amazing Grace, which tells the true story of William Wilberforce's fight to abolish slavery. The offer is part of the Foundation for Economic Education's Blinking Lights Project, which educates about the importance of personal character as a vital element of free society. Be sure to check that out, too.
• Don't forget that next week is National Employee Freedom Week, "a national effort to inform union employees of the freedom they have regarding opting out of union membership and making the decision about union membership that's best for them."
• Save the dates! These events are no longer classified, are they?
—The annual IEA Hayek Memorial Lecture, delivered this year by Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform, talking on "The Leave Us Alone Coalition vs. The Takings Coalition: The On-going Struggle" at 6:30 p.m. in London;
—The 42nd National Fourth of July Soiree, featuring barbeque, blue grass, balloon artists, and more at Bull Run Regional Park in Centreville, Va., on July 4 from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.;
—The Heritage Foundation's annual Scholars & Scribes review of the Supreme Court's 2012-2013 term, July 11, in Washington, D.C.;
—Freedom Fest, the largest gathering of free minds, July 10 – July 13 at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas;
—and Cato University, July 28 – August 3 at the Cato Institute in Washington, D.C.
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Facts you really should know about what your government is doing and how to take action against this tyranny NOW.
Posted June 20, 2013on:
- In: amnesty | Barack Obama | Big Labor Unions | Black community family | Brain washing our children | Bribery called Earmarks in congress | Climategate | Commentary | Communism in America | Constitution of the United States of America | Economy/Money | Education | Environment | EPA Environmental Protection Agency | Federal Reserve | Financial Industry Reform | Government Failure Series from Cato Institute | Health Care | illegal immigration | Immigration | Ineffective Government Programs | Internet | Internet Neutrality | Know the enemies of America | Laws and Regulation--stupidities | laws and regulations--stupidities | Left's and Obama's attack on religion | Leftist violence in America | national deficit, taxes, national budget | National Politics | Obama admistration | Obama and ethics | Obama's moratorium on drilling in the Gulf | Obamcare repeal and replace | Off Shore Drilling for oil and natural gas | patriotism | Progressives Movement to Destroy America | Project to Restore America | public service employees | Radical Left at War with America | Redistributing wealth | Regaining our moral standards | Subverting America by Uri Bezmenov | Supreme Court rulings | Taking back our schools | Taxes | The Fight Back | Unfunded liabilities | United Nation's Agenda 21 | United Nations | US in Revolt
- 7 Comments
I thought I was pretty well up on what is happening in our country because I really try hard to keep up and do a lot of reading, but now way was I even close to knowing what is happening to everyday people just like me and you. This article from the Heritage Foundation is an eye opener and a blood pressure raiser. Be sure and go to all the referred sites for all the information. The time for We the People to act is now when we have the momentum with the Tea Party and other groups up and moving. Time for you to get involved too before it has gone too far for the United States and Americans to turn the tide towards tyranny around and defeat those who would imprison us in a country no American wants to live in. Sincerely, Brenda Bowers BB
Every day, more Americans get trapped by big government. In addition to groups targeted by the IRS, upstanding citizens going about their normal lives are suddenly targeted by law enforcement authorities and charged as criminals. Just a few examples:
- A young girl was fined $535… for rescuing a wounded woodpecker.
- A businessman was jailed for years… for shipping lobsters in plastic bags rather than cardboard boxes.
- A Maryland father and building engineer faced a years-long legal ordeal… after being unfairly targeted under the Clean Water Act.
These are only a few of the shocking incidents The Heritage Foundation chronicles in our new project, USA vs. YOU. Experts at Heritage's Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies reveal the stories of 22 people from all backgrounds, races, and income levels victimized by carelessly written laws.
Get the FREE e-book USA vs. YOU now >>
When criminal laws are created to "solve" every problem, punish every mistake, and compel the "right" behaviors, this troubling trend is known as overcriminalization. Ultimately, it leads to injustice for honest, hard-working Americans at every level of society.
Public interest groups from across the political spectrum recognize how this flood of criminal laws violates our basic liberties. Diverse organizations including the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys, the American Center for Law and Justice, and Right on Crime, among others, have joined with Heritage to reaffirm the true purpose of America's justice system: to ensure public safety and protect the innocent.
When was the last time you saw the ACLU work together with a faith-based group like Justice Fellowship? WithUSA vs. YOU, the problem is grave enough to bring together unlikely allies. And we're delivering this bipartisan message just as the House of Representatives has launched a task force aimed at correcting this issue.
This morning, Heritage Senior Legal Fellow John Malcolm will testify at the first hearing of the Overcriminalization Task Force—shining a spotlight on the scope and severity of this threat to our liberties. Ending the practice of trapping our citizens with unnecessary laws will be no easy task, with an estimated 4,500 criminal law offenses and 300,000 criminal regulations on the books.
Experience the stories of Americans like you treated unjustly – download the FREE e-book now >>
Over the next six months, Members of Congress from both parties will study this issue in depth, hold hearings, and—with the right encouragement—take steps to enact real reform.
This new effort includes tools for you to raise your voice and make a difference in defending our liberties. So explore the documented stories in USA vs. YOU, follow the links, and take real action today to help turn the tide.
Read the Morning Bell and more en español every day at Heritage Libertad.
Quick Hits:
- President Obama has changed his policy on Syria, saying that Bashar al-Assad used chemical weapons and that the U.S. will provide military support to the rebels.
- The Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, won't be so "affordable" for many workers, reports the Associated Press.
- What would redefining marriage mean for Father's Day?
- Investigative journalist James O'Keefe has produced some shocking stories of corruption. In a new book, hedetails his undercover work with Project Veritas.
- For decades, inappropriate IRS behaviors have been revealed. Each time, the agency has assured the public that it takes these breaches "very seriously."
- Heritage's Jessica Zuckerman fact-checked President Obama's latest speech on immigration and amnesty.
- In: American Crash 2011 | Barack Obama | Big Labor Unions | Dodd-Frank Financial Reform Bill | Economy/Money | Environment | EPA Environmental Protection Agency | Ineffective Government Programs | Know the enemies of America | Laws and Regulation--stupidities | laws and regulations--stupidities | national deficit, taxes, national budget | Obama 2013 and beyond | Obama admistration | Obama Against America | Obama and ethics | Obama Executive Decress | Obamanation | Progressives Movement to Destroy America | Radical Left at War with America | Redistributing wealth | SEIU Service Employees International Union | Subverting America by Uri Bezmenov
- Leave a Comment
We Americans believe that we are the truly free people in the world, but this since Obama is a myth, a lie! We are not at all FREE because the one thing that made us Free–our capitalist system— has been almost destroyed by Obamanation. Thru the overwhelming intrusion of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations and Obama's pandering to the unions with his radical liberal stacked National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) our economy and the business (capitalism) that fuels it has been so handicapped as to be crippled. The United States now ranks 10th. in the world in the list of free economies. Hong Kong and Singapore rank as 1 and 2! How did we get here? Why are We the People willing to accept this situation? When will the workers of America realize that it is in our best interest for the FREE Market to truly be free? Have any of you ever gotten a job from a poor man? NO! NO! It is the rich man who invests in companies which then provide the jobs for all of us to get ahead. Damnit anyhow. I am so tired of hearing "tax the rich" and "spread the wealth around". The government taxes the rich means the rich do two things: stop investing and creating American businesses and 2. move their money out of the United States. People do you remember the tax payer bail out of Chrysler and the Unions by Obama? Well don't look now but Chrysler is now producing JEEPS in China. Yes! They took our tax payer dollars and politely moved their operation to a freeier less government intrusive and union demanding China. (But don't you union guys worry because your pensions and benefits have been protected. Of course your kids and grandkids will not have a decent life and will be paying for your demands, but who cares , right? )
Well, my rant for today. Read the following article and weep. sincerely, BB
e America's Ranking in the 2013 Index of Economic Freedom
When we talk about "economic freedom," what do we mean—and why does it matter?
Economic freedom is the fundamental right of every human to control his or her own labor and property. In an economically free society, individuals are free to work, produce, consume, and invest in any way they please, with that freedom both protected by the state and unconstrained by the state.
Since reaching a global peak in 2008, sadly, economic freedom around the world has continued to stagnate. (Now refresh my poor memory: what happened in 2008? Oh yes, Obama and the Democrats took over the government! that's what happened! BB)
Today launches the 19th edition of the Index of Economic Freedom, produced by The Heritage Foundation and The Wall Street Journal. The 2013Index was edited by Ambassador Terry Miller, director of Heritage's Center for International Trade and Economics; Kim Holmes, Ph.D., Heritage's Distinguished Fellow; and Edwin J. Feulner, Ph.D., Heritage's president.
What are the reasons for the worldwide sluggishness? As Ambassador Miller writes in The Wall Street Journal, "Particularly concerning are the rise of populist 'democratic' movements that use the coercive power of government to redistribute income and control economic activity."
While "corrupt political and legal environments cause underdevelopment in poorer countries," Miller writes, "unfortunately, economic favoritism and cronyism exist in advanced democracies, too." Americans are well aware, and the overall U.S. score has been dropping since 2009. From 2009 to 2010, the U.S. declined from being a "free" economy to "mostly free." This year, it ranks 10th in the world.
The Most Free
1. Hong Kong
2. Singapore
3. Australia
4. New Zealand
5. Switzerland
6. Canada
7. Chile
8. Mauritius
9. Denmark
10. United States
One reason for America's lack of freedom is that its scores on regulatory efficiency—which include business freedom and labor freedom—have dropped. The editors point to the fact that "over 100 new major federal regulations have been imposed on business operations since early 2009 with annual costs of more than $46 billion."
Miller explains that what happens in Washington affects not only every corner of America, but of the world:
It is no exaggeration to blame the recent slowdown in economic liberalization around the world on the lack of U.S. leadership. Trade flows—the engine of world growth—have declined as the U.S. economy has stagnated. Protectionism threatens consumers and businesses with higher costs and restrictions in supply. Ill-conceived banking regulations such as the Dodd-Frank law generate uncertainty and anxiety. And investment freedom declines in the face of higher costs and new legal and tax liabilities such as those introduced by ObamaCare. These misguided U.S. policies hurt Americans first, but others feel the harm as well. (READ this paragraph again and again until you understand it! Dodd-Frank and Obamacare are bad news for Americans! BB)
North America continues to be the world's freest region, though Mexico was the only economy that improved its Index score over the last year. The region boasts two "mostly free" economies (Canada and the United States) and one "moderately free" economy (Mexico). It leads the world in terms of rule of law, regulatory efficiency, and open markets, but is getting worse where government spending is concerned.
About the Index
Launched in 1995, the Index evaluates countries in four broad areas of economic freedom: rule of law; regulatory efficiency; limited government; and open markets. Based on an aggregate score, each of 177 countries graded in the 2013 Index was classified as "free," "mostly free," "moderately free," "mostly unfree," or "repressed."
The broader areas are broken down into 10 measures: property rights, freedom from corruption, fiscal freedom, government spending, business freedom, labor freedom, monetary freedom, trade freedom, investment freedom, and financial freedom.
The New Website
The updated website, launched today, is interactive:
- Compare up to three countries of your choice on all 10 measures of economic freedom with an interactive, color-coded chart feature. (Do this now to see how America has fallen in all areas since Obama! BB )
- See a colorful heat map of the spread of economic freedom around the world, or select a specific region.
Each country's profile includes quick facts such as its population, gross domestic product (GDP), unemployment rate, and the amount of foreign investment flowing into the country—and you can embed this data in your blog or website.
- In: American Crash 2011 | Constitution of the United States of America | Education | History: the truth | Me and Mine | National Politics | patriotism | Progressives Movement to Destroy America | Radical Left at War with America | Regaining our moral standards | States revolt | Supreme Court | The Fight Back | US in Revolt
- Leave a Comment
I have received a newsletter from Hillsdale College for several years now and consider it one of my favorite things. The newsletter features a different conservative speaker each month on a topic of timely national interest. Hillsdale College is offering a 10 week e-course on "The History and Meaning of the Constitution" that I highly recommend to any one , even those who feel they have a fair understanding of the Constitution. I am taking it now. For you who may be interested below is the information that will get you started. BB
Welcome to Constitution 101!
To access each week's course material, click the hyperlinked title in the schedule below.
Please email us at firstname.lastname@example.com with any questions.
Constitution 101 Schedule
Each lecture is pre-recorded and lasts approximately 40 minutes. Lectures and other study materials will be released by noon each Monday according to the schedule. Once released, they are available to view at your convenience.
You will receive an email each week informing you that new material is available.
Pre-course Introductory Materials
- The American Mind
Larry P. Arnn
Monday, February 20
- The Declaration of Independence
Thomas G. West
Monday, February 27
- The Problem of Majority Tyranny
David Bobb
Monday, March 5
- Separation of Powers: Preventing Tyranny
Kevin Portteus
Monday, March 12
- Separation of Powers: Ensuring Good Government
Will Morrisey
Monday, March 19
- Religion, Morality, and Property
David Bobb
Monday, March 26
- Crisis of Constitutional Government
Will Morrisey
Monday, April 2
- Abraham Lincoln and the Constitution
Kevin Portteus
Monday, April 9
- The Progressive Rejection of the Founding
Ronald J. Pestritto
Monday, April 16
- The Recovery of the Constitution
Larry P. Arnn
Monday, April 23


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Dr. Adeel Pasha, Assistant Professor and Director of the Electronics and Embedded Systems Lab (EESL) at the Department of Electrical Engineering (EE), Syed Babar Ali School of Science and Engineering (SBASSE) presented a paper titled, "Towards Design and Automation of Hardware-Friendly NOMA Receiver with Iterative Multi-User Detection" at the 54th Annual IEEE/ACM Design Automation Conference (DAC 2017) held in Austin, Texas, from June 18 to 23, 2017. The article is the result of the Faculty Initiative Fund (FIF) grant allotted to Dr. Adeel Pasha in 2016-2017.
Mr. Muhammad Hassan Ahmad (MSEE-2015), Muhammad Aimal Rehman (former RA and MSEE-2017 student) and Dr. Momin Uppal are the co-authors of this paper. The paper also won the HEC International Travel Grant as well as LUMS Faculty Travel Grant (FTG).
The paper consider a two-user non-orthogonal-multiple-access (NOMA) communication channel with an iterative multi-user receiver. It is known that NOMA provides performance gains over conventional orthogonal-multiple-access, but it comes at the cost of increased decoder complexity. Moreover, the decoder complexity varies with fraction of duration in which the users' transmissions overlap using NOMA. For this scheme, the authors presented a hardware-friendly implementation of an LDPC-code-based multi-user-detector (MUD). They also presented a MATLAB-based high-level design-automation tool that generates hardware descriptions of different NOMA-receivers. Results indicate that the simplified MUD design results in significant area and power savings with negligible impact on performance.

subset: commoncrawl


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The Titanic
The Titanic
A Memorable Event – The Titanic Adventure Slide! The ship is sinking! Can you survive the slide down?
Get to the top of the stern of the Titanic and slide the wild 12m ride down the deck of the awesome Dual Slide! This dual slide captures all the excitement of the famed ocean liner on it's maiden voyage.
The spacious centre cabin features an easy to climb stairway with handrails for safety and replaceable climbing and slide covers.
Measuring 8m in height and 12m in length, this awesome slide captures the feeling of the real giant. Adding to the realism of this ride are the famed triple screw propellers and rudder.
This ride is suitable for any age group.
The Titanic slide is available for hire throughout Brisbane, Gold Coast, Sunshine Coast, Toowoomba, Redland Bay, Redcliffe, Caboolture, Bribie Island and beyond. Contact Affordable Amusements for a quote on the Titanic slide today.
The Titanic
Suitable Age
5 years – adult
Number of Riders
Continuous slide
Special features
Very bright and colourful
Area required
10m x 8m
We Can Be Contacted By
phone on (07) 3802 0511 or
Mobile: Daniel - 0415 66 55 44
Email: email@example.com


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published by the Historical League, Inc.
Volume I 2007 Regional winner of the Tabasco Community Cookbook award
Wednesday, December 25, 2013
Magical Chocolate Pudding
Tastes & Treasures Cookbook has Strawberry Spinach Salad but this takes healthy to another level.
Magical Chocolate Pudding
1 medium banana, frozen (it makes the pudding more creamy when frozen)
Flesh from 1/2 medium or 1 small avocado
1/3 cup strawberries, hulls removed
1/3 cup kale, chopped
2 dates
2 heaped tbsp cocoa powder (raw if desired)
Put everything in a food processor, and process. Serve immediately or allow to chill in the refrigerator first.
Thanks to bitesizedthoughts.com for recipe
Posted by Ruth at 4:30 AM No comments:
Labels: avocados, Baker's chocolate, Chocolate chip banana bread, dates, kale, strawberries, strawberry spinach salad
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Saturday, October 20, 2018
Two years ago, Kim Ogg was elected district attorney of Harris County. One of her campaign promises was to implement a diversion program for first time offenders charged with low-level marijuana possession. These are cases where a person gets arrested for "two ounces or less" of marijuana.


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Whoever wins Kutch wins Gujarat, goes the saying. The region voted in Phase 1
There is a famous saying in the Kutch region of Gujarat – whoever wins Kutch, wins Gujarat. The incumbent BJP government has been dominating the region for the past several decades but if ground reports are to be believed all of that is set for a change.
Though Congress is not hoping to wrest control of the region but for the first time in many decades, it could be a tie between the BJP and the grand old party.
A dry and arid region in the western-most corner of India, Kutch's problems are a plenty. Non availability of clean drinking water, widespread unemployment, poor education and health facilities and the twin evils of demonetsiation and GST are the main poll issues that dominate the political discourse here.
Meanwhile, BJP is banking on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's popularity along with development that he brought in the region during his tenure as chief minister. In fact, in entire Gujarat, Kutch is the only region where BJP is hoping that Modi's development initiative will help the party secure at least five of the six assembly segments for which voting began early this morning.
After the Bhuj earthquake in 2001, which flattened the entire region, killing 2,370 people and destroying 38,000 houses, Modi unleashed a host of rebuilding programmes that has ushered economic prosperity in the region. People across the region never fail to mention how Kutch owes its economic boom to Modi and his popularity for the first time since becoming chief minister is being tested.
It is no wonder that Modi chose to begin his election campaign in the poll-bound state from Kutch which also happens to be the state's largest district.
On the other hand, the Congress is hoping that anti-incumbency combined with a host of other factors like the Patidar agitation, impact of note ban and GST would work in its favour in 2017.
Moreover, with Muslims constituting nearly 25% of the region's population, Congress is banking on the community to help it wrest control of the region.
Kutch has a total of six Assembly seats – Abdasa, Bhuj, Anjar, Mandvi, Gandhidham and Rapar – and here is looking at each constituency and how they might vote:
Congress has fielded Adambhai Chaki against BJP's sitting legislator Neemben Acaharaya who seem to have an upper edge over her rival. Neemaben has been Bhuj's sitting MLA for the last two terms and looks set to retain her seat. In fact, what has worked for Neemaben is that Chaki, a Muslim, has led to religious polarisation across the assembly segment.
Catch had earlier reported how Hindus have consolidated as a vote-bank against Congress' Muslim candidate which is a cause of concern for Congress. Former Gujarat Chief Minister Suresh Mehta told Catch – "As far as electoral results are concerned, yes it will not bode well for Congress. According to me, it seemed more like a political compulsion and even Congress knows it is on a weak wicket. I think they were aware of the consequences."
Muslims in Bhuj constitute nearly 355 of the population and average 25% in Kutch district. According to Mehta, Congress had to allot one seat to a Muslims candidate to ensure it gets votes of the community in other Assembly segments.
However, Congress is hoping that along with the Muslims, if it manages to get a certain percentage of votes from other dominating communities like Patidars, Dalits, among others, it could pose threat to Neemaben. Whether it will work or not would only be known on 18 December.
An Assembly segment dominated by Ahirs and Muslims, Anjar is said to be oldest town in Kutch. In 2012, BJP's Ahir Vasanbhai Gopalbhai defeated Congress' VK Humbal by a slim margin of 6,000 votes.
This year again the two heavyweights will come against each other in contest which is likely to go down to the wire. Congress is hoping on Muslims, Dalits, Patidars, and even Ahirs to vote in its favour.
Meanwhile, BJP remains confident of a victory here largely because of the development work carried out by Vasanbhai. However, locals informed this correspondent that Ahirs, who constitute nearly 25% of the population, are not happy with Vasanbhai's performance and blame him and BJP for their misfortune.
Ahirs in Anjar primarily earn thir living through transport business and they feel let down by the incumbent government. According to Ramesh Ahir, a resident of Anjar constituency, the shutting down on Panandhro Lignite mine has deeply hurt business interests of Ahirs.
"This mine produced the finest quality of Lignite and there was a huge demand for it across Gujarat which benefitted the Ahirs. However, the government shut down the mine and started operating on Mata Na Math mine which had low-quality lignite leading to low demand," he said.
As a result, the demand for better quality lignite from Bhavnagar rose leading to transporters of Kutch feeling the pinch.
"Vasanbhai is also the Chairman of the Truck Transporters Association and yet he remained silent. This has made Ahirs revolt and they are likely to vote against him," he added.
Congress is hoping that this resentment against Vasanbhai could help them wrest control of the seat.
Home to Kandla port, Gandhidham is a reserved constituency that has an overwhelming Hindu population and also considered a BJP bastion. The constituency has close to 2.7 lakh voters with a 65,000 strong Dalit population. In 2012, BJP defeated Congress in Gandhdiham by a margin of 21,313 votes.
In a surprising decision BJP allotted ticket to 29-year-old Malti Maheshwari who also happens to be the youngest candidate in 2017 Assembly polls. Malti was given preference over her uncle and sitting legislator 49-year-old Ramesh Maheshwari which led to widespread protests across the Assembly segment.
However, all those differences seem to have been put to rest with Rameshbhai even campaigning for her against Congress' Kishor Pingal – a Dalit leader. With Hindus forming almost 95% of the population, it seems an uphill task for Congress to win this particular Assembly segment.
Congress would be hoping that internal feud within the party over Malti's candidature could help them divide BJP's vote.


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Host your next special gathering at our beautiful vineyards! $800 - 100 people or less $1075 - 101-175 people $1375 - 175-224 people $1575 - 225-274 people $1700 - 275+ people
Terms and Conditions
Please contact us for our complete terms & conditions.
The Vincent Family Event Center has two different spaces available for rent for conferences, classes, meetings, receptions, parties, reunions, etc.. The Loft area seats approximately 40 people. Our Big Room seats 300. Pricing depends upon expected attendance but would be approximately $6 per person. We also have tablecloths in cream and black for rent at $6 a piece. Stereo and Sound System $15.00 Projector $15.00 Our outdoor grounds are also available for events. Call for pricing.
Terms and Conditions
Please contact us for complete terms & conditions
Wedding reception rental required for weddings. Reception rental is based on expected attendance. Wedding rental space (including outdoor grounds and the loft area for the bride and bridesmaids) is $200 extra. Our comfortable and charming space is the perfect place to relax with others or to just escape with a glass of fine wine. The Vincent Family Event Center is the perfect place to enjoy gatherings and social events such as weddings, receptions, parties, business meetings, and family celebrations. We also have tablecloths, stereo, sound equipment and a projector for rent. Tablecloths come in cream and black and cost $6 a piece. Stereo, Sound and Projector rental is $15.00 per unit. Please visit our website for more details at www.woodenwheelvineyards.com.
Terms and Conditions
Contact us for complete terms & conditions.
Our large room seats approximately 300 people. The space is a renovated barn, modern and a little rustic. We have a large stone fireplace with a projector space above it. Please see photographs for a better idea of the room. The space is perfect for conferences, classes, company parties, private parties, receptions, reunions and more.
Supported Layouts and Capacities
Our outdoor space is perfect for your wedding. We have a lovely and level grass area for the ceremony. We also have a covered patio with a fire pit just off of our tasting room. The area is picturesque and landscaped with mature trees, flowers, shrubs and grapevines. The wedding space is available at an extra charge with your booked reception. Our outdoor space is also available for other events. Call for more information.
Supported Layouts and Capacities
Our Loft is a smaller room available for rental for small receptions, classes, meetings and more. When you hold your wedding reception in our large room, the Loft and the Grounds are available at an additional charge for your wedding. Call for more details. The Loft will seat, at a maximum, 40 people.
Supported Layouts and Capacities


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To limit the spread of COVID-19, the Shambhala Centre is closed until further notice. Please view the calendar for the Virtual Practice and Study sessions.
We could use your help to keep things running! If you feel like you have the means to help keep the Centre and its offerings going during the COVID-19 shutdown, we gratefully accept online donations . Every bit helps us to provide a space of peace online, and a space for people to come back to when it's all over. All donations are tax-deductible.
The Ottawa Shambhala Meditation Centre is part of a global community that aspires to awaken kindness, goodness and wisdom within society. This vision is rooted in the principle that every human being has a fundamental nature of basic goodness.
Addressing harm in the Shambhala community
Learn to meditate and naturally grow your confidence, mindful awareness, and compassion.
The Ottawa Shambhala Meditation Centre offers meditation instruction, regular practice sessions, and classes and weekend retreats for new and experienced practitioners. Our community welcomes people from all walks of life, traditions and religions. Learn more about us.
The Shambhala teachings point to innate goodness as the nature of all individuals and society. Developing confidence in basic goodness through meditation supports us in cultivating gentleness and bravery in daily life and in service to others.
Getting started
Meditation is a practice anyone can do. New meditators and those practising in other traditions are invited to attend a "Learn to Meditate" class.
Learn to Meditate is offered in English on the 1st and 3rd Wednesday of the month, 7:00pm to 8:30 pm. It is free of charge (but donations are always appreciated if you are so inspired).
View our monthly calendar.
Pour débuter
Tout le monde peut méditer. Que vous n'ayez jamais médité ou que vous pratiquiez dans une autre tradition, vous êtes invités aux séances ci-dessous.
Les soirées Apprendre à méditer sont offertes en français le deuxième mercredi de chaque mois, de 19 h à 20 h 30. L'entrée est gratuite (mais vos dons sont toujours les bienvenus). Durant cette période de crise, il est possible de recevoir des instructions de méditation virtuelles en français. Veuillez nous contacter au [email protected] pour en faire la demande.
Voir notre calendrier mensuel.
Support Your Centre
The Ottawa Shambhala Centre relies entirely on member fees, revenue from courses and donations for all operating expenses. If you feel inspired to give please see the donation page. Donations are tax deductible.