Are you having “Road Rage” when you pull up to the gas pump?

Welcome to the party,pal!

As I, being the good husband that I am, put gas in our car last night, I tried not to cry as I noticed the price here in the Mid-South: $3.39.9 per gallon! It seems like just the other day that the price was $2.78.9 per gallon.

What is even worse, is the fact that these increases in gasoline and other fuels could be around for months to come.

The national average is $3.43 per gallon, according to AAA, Wright Express and Oil Price Information Service.

The price of oil has gone up 21 percent since Feb. 15, when the Libyan revolution began. Libya controls the largest oil reserves in Africa. Even though America imports only a small amount of our oil from Libya, we’re still getting hammered at the pump.

We are now paying 29 cents more for a gallon of gas since the Libyan crisis started, an increase of about 10 percent. Americans are now having to spend an extra $108 million a day for gas.

Consumers will not only get slammed at the gas pump. Food merchants, airlines, shipping companies and other businesses will also pass along their higher costs to us.

According to retail consultant John Haber, online florists, pizza delivery companies, trash collectors, cruise lines and taxi drivers raised rates in 2008 as gasoline and diesel jumped above $4 per gallon. The rise in oil this year “is going to trigger the exact same type of behavior,” said Haber, a partner at NPI.  Diesel fuel, used by truckers, railroads and cruise ships, is up to $3.78 per gallon.

Already, the impact can be seen at the grocery store, where consumers buy lettuce, onions, strawberries, avocados, eggplant, and other produce shipped from Mexico and California, Haber said.

You know what the stupid thing is?  America has more than enough oil to supply our needs. 

America is sitting on top of a super massive 200 billion barrel Oil Field that could potentially make America Energy Independent and until now has largely gone unnoticed. Thanks to new technology the Bakken Formation in North Dakota could boost America’s Oil reserves by an incredible 10 times, giving western economies the trump card against OPEC’s short squeeze on oil supply and making Iranian and Venezuelan threats of disrupted supply irrelevant.

It was not until 2007, when EOG Resources of Texas started a frenzy when they drilled a single well in Parshal N.D. that is expected to yield 700,000 barrels of oil that real excitement and money started to flow in North Dakota. Marathon Oil is investing $1.5 billion and drilling 300 new wells in what is expected to be one of the greatest booms in Oil discovery since Oil was discovered in Saudi Arabia in 1938.

The US imported about 14 million barrels of Oil per day in 2007 , which means US consumers sent about $340 Billion Dollars over seas building palaces in Dubai and propping up unfriendly regimes around the World, if 200 billion barrels of oil at $90 a barrel are recovered in the high plains the added wealth to the US economy would be $18 Trillion Dollars which would go a long way in stabilizing the US trade deficit and could cut the cost of oil in half in the long run.

Plus, there are new techniques available to get at hard-to-reach oil:

A new drilling technique is allowing oil companies to harvest vast fields of previously out-of-reach oil in the western United States. This, if allowed, will dramatically reverse a two-decade decline in domestic production of crude.

At present, oil companies are investing billions of dollars to tap oil deposits scattered across North Dakota, Colorado, Texas and California. All the experts say that by 2015, these new fields could yield as much as 2 million barrels of oil a day. That is more than the entire Gulf of Mexico produces now.

The new drilling technique is expected to raise U.S. production by at least 20 percent over the next five years. Within 10 years, it could help reduce oil imports by more than half.

Something America’s governmental experts and professional bureaucrats have failed to do…for whatever reason.

Engineers for the oil companies are applying a method developed in recent years to tap natural gas trapped in underground shale. They drill down and across into the rock, then pump water, sand and chemicals into the hole in order to crack the shale and allow gas to flow up.

Due to the scientific fact that oil molecules are sticky and larger than gas molecules, engineers thought the process wouldn’t work to squeeze oil out fast enough to make it economical.  However, drillers figured out that by increasing the number of cracks in the rock and using different chemicals, they could access the oil deposits at low cost.

Aubrey McClendon, chief executive of Chesapeake Energy, which is using the technique, is pretty excited:

We’ve completely transformed the natural gas industry, and I wouldn’t be surprised if we transform the oil business in the next few years, too.

If the Obama Administration-backed Environmentalist Wackos don’t purposefully stand in the way.

Senior United States District Judge Roger Vinson has just handed down a ruling that gives President Barack Hussein Obama and his Administration 7 days to appeal Judge Vinson’s original decision which declared Obama’s signature legislation , affectionately known as Obamacare, unconstitutional.

Here is Judge Vinson’s conclusion:

As I wrote about two weeks after this litigation was filed: “the citizens of this country have an interest in having this case resolved as soon as practically possible”

That was nearly eleven months ago. In the time since, the battle lines have been drawn, the relevant case law marshaled, and the legal arguments refined. Almost everyone agrees that the Constitutionality of the Act is an issue that will ultimately have to be decided by the Supreme Court of the United States. It is very important to everyone in this country that this case move forward.

 I note that two of the pending appeals (in the Fourth and Sixth Circuits) are apparently proceeding on an expedited basis.

Therefore, the defendants’ motion to clarify (doc. 156) is GRANTED, as set forth above. To the extent that motion is construed as a motion to stay, it is also GRANTED, and the summary declaratory judgment entered in this case is STAYED pending appeal, conditioned upon the defendants filing their notice of appeal within seven (7) calendar days of this order and seeking an expedited appellate review.

So, now, Scooter and his minions have 1 week to file a request for review with the 11th Appellate Court, which is very Conservative in nature.

Guess which Supreme Court Justice is assigned to this court?  Justice Clarence Thomas, whom the Libs have all been screaming to recuse himself, from hearing Obamacare, because of lobbying activities by his wife.

Of course, they do not mention that new Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan, helped in the preparation of Obamacare.

Nope.  Nothing to see here.  Move along.

Referring to his original ruling, and the Administration’s defense that the individual mandate is covered under the Commerce Clause, Judge Vinson wrote:

Such an unprecedented and potentially radical expansion of Congress’s commerce power could only be authorized in the first instance by the Supreme Court, or possibly by a Constitutional amendment. It is not for a lower court to expand upon Supreme Court jurisprudence, and in the process authorize the exercise of a “highly attractive power” that Congress has never before claimed in the history of the country which Congress’s veryown attorneys have warned “could be perceived as virtually unlimited in scope.”

After concluding that the individual mandate could not be supported by existing Commerce Clause precedent — nor under Necessary and Proper Clause case law, including the recent doctrinal analysis articulated in United States v. Comstock, I then considered the question of severability.

In deciding the severability issue, I began by recognizing and acknowledging that, if at all possible, courts will usually only strike down the unconstitutional part of a statute and leave the rest intact. However, I noted that this was not the usual case, and that its unique facts required a finding of non-severability.

In particular, I noted that:

(i) At the time the Act was passed, Congress knew for certain that legal challenges to the individual mandate were coming;

(ii) Congress’s own Research Service had essentially advised that the legal challenges would have merit (and therefore might result in the individual mandate being struck down) as it could not be said that the individual mandate had “solid constitutional foundation” [CRS Analysis, supra, at 3];

(iii) And yet, Congress specifically (and presumably intentionally) deleted the “severability clause” that had been included in the earlier version of the Act.

I concluded that, in light of the foregoing facts, the conspicuous absence of a severability clause — which is ordinarily included in complex legislation as a matter of routine — could be viewed as strong evidence that Congress recognized that the Act could not operate as intended if the individual mandate was eventually be struck down by the courts.

Just a reminder, if the Supreme Court rules Obamacare Constitutional, the individual mandate requirement to purchase health insurance for all citizens and legal residents takes effect in 2014.

According to a summary prepared by the National Association of Health Underwriters on March 29th, 2010:

There are specified exceptions under current law and violators will be subject to a phased‐in excise tax penalty for noncompliance of either a flat‐dollar amount per person or a percentage of the individual’s income, whichever is higher.

In 2014, the percentage of income determining the fine amount would be one percent,then two percent in 2015, with the maximum fine of 2.5% of taxable (gross) household income capped at the average family bronze‐level insurance premium in 2016.

The alternative is a fixed‐dollar amount that begins at $325 per person in 2015 and goes to $695 in 2016.

If the Department of Justice files within the next 7 days, the stay on Judge Vinson’s original ruling will remain in place until the Appellate Court’s Ruling.

However, this is still a victory for those opposing Obamacare, as it forces the Administration’s hand, when they would rather putz around with the Wisconsin Public Unions Problem or throw Motown Parties at the White House.

Justice may be blind, but she sure ain’t stupid.

Please, gentle reader, allow me to ask you a couple of  indelicate questions:

Are you having trouble trying to make ends meet in this Obamanation of an economy?

Are you as torqued off as the rest of us about out-of-control spending by the Federal Government?

Well, then, you may not want to read the rest of this post.

According to foxnews.com, the Government Accountability Office, a nonpartisan group, has released an eye-opening report which targets billions of dollars in potential savings if Congress has with the intestinal fortitude to suck it up and turn off the money flow to taxpayer-funded programs for politically popular causes.

Your “wealth” spread by your government, sustains 47 job-training programs, 44 of which are redundant. Your “wealth” also pays for 80 programs for the “transportation disadvantaged.”

There are also 82 programs, operated by 10 separate agencies, whose sole purpose is to improve teacher quality.

I thought hundreds of local school districts were already working on that?

Politicians have promised for a long time to cut out Government waste, fraud and abuse. So, yesterday, they jumped on this report with both feet.

House Republican Leader Eric Cantor said that he and his fellow Republicans would “get our fiscal house in order” in light of the report:

Now again, we have said enough is enough. Our Congress is about delivering results.

Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., said in a statement Tuesday morning:

This report confirms what most Americans assume about their government. We are spending trillions of dollars every year and nobody knows what we are doing. The executive branch doesn’t know. The congressional branch doesn’t know. Nobody knows. This report also shows we could save taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars every year without cutting services.

According to the report:

Reducing or eliminating duplication, overlap or fragmentation could potentially save billions of taxpayer dollars annually and help agencies provide more efficient and effective services.

The study found 33 areas with “overlap and fragmentation” in the federal government.

Here are some more examples of “your tax dollars at work”:

• Fifty-six programs across 20 agencies dealing with financial literacy.
• More than 2,100 data centers — up from 432 a little more than a decade ago — across 24 federal agencies. GAO estimated the government could save up to $200 billion over the next decade by consolidating them.
• Twenty programs across seven agencies dealing with homelessness. The report found $2.9 billion spent on the programs in 2009. “Congress is often to blame” for fragmentation, GAO wrote in this section, explaining that the duplicative programs in multiple agencies cause access problems for potential participants.
• Eighty-two “distinct” teacher-quality programs across 10 agencies. Many of them have “duplicate sub-goals,” GAO said. Nine of them address teacher quality in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math.
• Fifteen agencies administering 30 food-related laws.
• Eighty economic development programs.

The report goes on to state:

Some of the oversight doesn’t make any sense.

Gee, ya think, DiNozzo?

Some of these questionable programs had a hard time justifying their existence. For example, domestic food assistance initiatives.

Per the GAO report, 18 of these programs are administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Health and Human Services. GAO estimates $62.5 billion of taxpayer money is being doled out to them.

What’s worse, “little is known about the effectiveness” of 11 of those programs, the report states.

And, regarding the 47 job-training programs run by Uncle Sugar, only five could come up with an “impact study” since 2004 looking at “outcomes.” About half of them produced no performance review at all since 2004.

Congress asked GAO to provide them with a study of

…federal programs, agencies, offices and initiatives with duplicative goals and activities, to estimate the cost of such duplication and to make recommendations to Congress for consolidation and elimination of such duplication.

I don’t think that Congress expected the size and scope of waste in government programs that the report informed them of.

Of course, it has become a political football, with the Republicans attempting to look like they’re in compliance with the mandate given on November 2nd, 2010, and the Democrats trying to appear like they actually want to bite the hand that feeds them and make cuts to these programs of government largesse that they initiated in the first place.

But don’t worry, President Barack Hussein Obama  is willing to make a deep sacrifice, according to his proposed Federal Budget.

And, if you believe that, you believe Charlie Sheen has embraced sobriety.

Allow me to end today’s blog with an e-mail that I received this morning that sums up Scooter’s Federal Budget Proposal very well :

Our “President” has ordered his cabinet to cut a whopping $100 Million from our $3.5 trillion federal budget!

I’m so impressed by this sacrifice that I have decided to do the same thing with my personal budget.

I spend about $2000 a month on groceries, household expenses, medicine, utilities, etc, but it’s time to get out the budget cutting ax, go line by line through my expenses, and cut back!

I’m going to cut my spending at exactly the same ratio:-1/35,000 of my total budget.

After doing the math, it looks like instead of spending $2000 a month; I’m going to have to cut that number by six (6) cents!

Yes, I’m going to have to get by with $1999.94, but that’s what sacrifice is all about. I’ll just have to do without some things, that are, frankly, “luxuries.” (Did OBAMA actually think no one would do the math? Oh, I forgot, liberals don’t rely on FACTS, they rely on “feel good” emotions).

John Q. Taxpayer

Remember this guy from the Sean Hannity show?

British Muslim Cleric Anjem Choudary, who proclaimed that ‘the flag of Islam will fly over the White House’, is scheduled to lead a demonstration this Thursday, in front of the White House, calling on Muslims to establish the Sharia law across America.

Fellow Americans, Choudary, 43, has stated that we are ‘the biggest criminals in the world today.’

According to Choudary:

we expect thousands to come out and support us.

The event is a rally, a call for the Sharia, a call for the Muslims to rise up and ­establish the Islamic state in America.

This is a unique event taking place in Washington, outside the White House which, Inshallah, (God willing) will garner huge support.

They have seen our activities in the UK and Europe and have decided they want to challenge the vacuum in ­freedom and democracy and the ­people in the front line of the struggle against Islam and Muslims – the ­American ­government and the ­establishment.

They have invited and ­myself and Sayful Islam from Luton to come over to address the crowd and rally support.

We are going to address ­corruption in the Senate, corrupt foreign ­policy, the mayhem around the ­Muslim world, the drug and ­alcohol culture, ­promiscuity and the pandemic of crime in America.

It is only right the call is made in the heart of Western ­civilisation in front of the biggest pharaoh that ­exists today, which is Barack Obama.

I think the American people’s hearts and minds are open to receive Islam as an alternative way of life. We expect thousands to come out and support us.

The rally has been organized by the Islamic Thinkers Society, an extremist group based in New York.

Their About US page on their website proclaims:

“Let there rise from amongst you group(s)

who invite others to the khair(Islam),

command the good, and forbid the evil, and

they are the ones who are successful.”

[TMQ 3:104]

It is based upon this verse in the Qur’an that we, the Islamic Thinkers Society have based ourselves upon. We are a handful of like-minded Muslims from Ahl us-Sunnah wal jama’ah, who invite others to Islam from the Ideological perspective which is to invite to the Aqeedah(belief, Tawheed, Imaan) as well as to the shahriah(system, rules, commandments) as this is what is being meant in the ayah when Allah s.w.t. uses the word “khair”. Alhamdulillah our numbers are growing day by day as more Muslims are realizing their obligations towards their Creator.

Our da’wah activities takes place mainly in the streets of Times Square and Jackson Heights, NYC where we give out leaflets and hold posters/banners covering all types of issues relating from spiritual, social, economical, to political issues. This methodology was adopted from the seerah(lifestyle) of the prophet Muhammad s.a.w. where he along with the sahabas(companions) would constantly night and day exhaust all their efforts to give da’wah to the Makkan society to invite them to the Tawheed(oneness in worship & reverence)of Allah s.w.t. where they would rationally challenge the belief as well as the dominant corrupt system that ruled over them that allowed them to think in this manner. They would command what Allah s.w.t. revealed to them was good which was missing in the present society whether in the belief or the system, and they would forbid the evil which was present in the society, whether it was in the belief or in the system. They would culture themselves from the wisdom of the Qur’an and then they would go to the streets to convey the message in a simultaneous manner. This is exactly what we do since Islam is complete. We culture ourselves about Islam, while giving da’wah on the street simultaneously.

Choudary’s anti-American stance is well-known. Last year, he and some of his followers burned the Stars and Stripes outside the U.S. embassy in London on September 11.

According to an article, posted 2/26/11 on  his website, shariah4america.com, he and his fellow adherents of Sharia Law, want to go even farther than that:

One of the founding principles of the Islamic constitution is to ensure that all sovereignty and supremacy belongs solely to God; the Shari’ah is a practical manifestation of this sovereignty and supremacy because it seeks to establish His command in society.

The status of a nation subsequently does not depend on its number, strength or technological advancement, but rather how much it submits to the commands of God. When a nation seeks to be free from such commands, then ultimately it will meet its destruction.

The Statue of Liberty, designed by Frederic Bartholdi, stands on Liberty Island in New York Harbor; representing Libertas, the Roman (false) goddess of Freedom, it is symbolic of the rebellious nature of the US constitution that elevates the command of man over the command of God.

In Islam, the public veneration of idols and statues is strictly prohibited. This has forced sincere Muslims to develop realistic plans that will aid in the removal of the Statue of Liberty.

Due to the scale of the task at hand, it is highly likely that rigorous safety checks will need to be employed before the demolition of the Statue of Liberty can commence; thus as a temporary measure, it is proposed that a large burkha is used to cover the statue, thereby shielding this horrendous eye sore from public view as well as sending a strong message to its French creators.

Post demolition, it is recommended that a minaret be built as a fitting replacement, allowing the glorification of God to be proclaimed daily as well as act as a powerful reminder of the superiority of Islam over all other ways of life.

Last October, he told an ABC chat show that ‘one day the flag of Islam will fly over the White House.’

Present occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue excluded, you’re going to find the America people a different breed than that of the European Union, Imam Choudary.

1.5 % of Americans are Muslim.  75 % proclaim Christ as their Savior.

Try it.  I’ll grab the popcorn.

In a suburb of Chicago, Illinois, Nation of Islam Leader Louis Farrakhan fired up a packed house of true believers. “Calypso Louie”, as the great Rush Limbaugh has nicknamed him, was delivering a message in the Allstate Arena in Rosemont as part of the 81st annual celebration of Saviours’ Day, marking the birth of his faith’s founder, W. Fard Muhammad.

His sermon, titled “God will send saviours,” was the keynote address, ending a weekend of workshops whose topics included health, preparing for natural disasters and unidentified flying objects. Farrakhan and his followers in the Nation of Islam believe in a UFO called “the wheel” or “the Mother Plane.”

Obama’s admiring neighbor from Chicago, Farrakhan, testifies to a 1985 religious experience in which he ascended into a flying saucer and heard the voice of dead Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad predicting historical events that came to pass.

Who was this “Fard” guy and what do Farrakhan and his followers believe?

Per bible.ca:

In the summer of 1930, a peddler made his appearance in the black ghetto of Detroit. He gave the name of Wallace D. Fard. He is believed to have been of Arab descent, but this has not been documented. He went from door to door selling clothing and accessories, as well as artifacts. These, he claimed, were like those the ancestors of the blacks wore and used. As he peddled his goods, he told tales about the blacks of Africa that entranced his customers. This led to informal gatherings in homes in which he told the blacks about their land of origin.

At first, his talks focused on black history, culture and diet. He did not say much about politics or religion, but as time progressed, his focus became more and more politically and religiously oriented. Eventually, his disciples were introduced to the Qur’an. Later, his talks became bitter denunciations of the white race. His audiences became so large that they could no longer meet in homes. A hall was rented and named “The Temple of Islam.” This is how the movement which calls itself “The Nation of Islam” and is called by detractors, “Black Muslims,” came into being.

Fard soon built his following into a tightly knit cult that looked to him as “Ruler of the Universe.” He established a university that was in reality a secondary school which emphasized the teaching of math and astronomy. It also focused on his teaching about “the ending of the spook civilization”.

Fard began a Muslim Girls Training Class that continues to today and still teaches the principles of home economics and how to be proper wives and mothers. He instituted a para-military unit called “Fruit of Islam” (FOI) to teach military tactics and the handling of firearms against the predicted day that whites would not tolerate their growth and prosperity.

He also set up the office of The Minister of Islam which, with the aid of a well trained staff, ultimately ran the whole organization. In three short years Fard has acquired some 8,000 followers. Under the direction of The Minister of Islam and his staff, the Nation of Islam continued to prosper. Fard retired from an openly active role in the direction of The Nation of Islam.

One of Fard’s early disciples, Elijah Poole, was given the Muslim name Elijah Muhammad. He became one of Fard’s favorites, and was ultimately named as the chief Minister of Islam. In June of 1934, only four years after he made his first appearance in Detroit, and shortly after Elijah Muhammad was named Minister of Islam, W. D. Fard completely and mysteriously disappeared.

Back to the present…

In his sermon yesterday, Farrakhan rambled for about 4 hours, on divergent topics, using religious texts to back up his opinions.

Farrakhan extolled the virtues of Scientology and its founder L. Ron Hubbard. He also praised its auditing process, which is considered spiritual counseling by its members.

According to Farrakhan:

L. Ron Hubbard is so exceedingly valuable to every Caucasian person on this earth.

… L. Ron Hubbard himself was and is trying to civilize white people and make them better human beings and take away from them their reactive minds … Mr. Hubbard recognized that his people have to be civilized.

…and the crowd cheered.

Calypso Louie went on to predict yesterday that America is on the verge of facing violent uprisings like those we are watching in the Middle East.

What you are looking at in Tunisia, in Egypt … Libya, in Bahrain … what you see happening there … you’d better prepare because it will be coming to your door.

…and the crowd cheered.

He also cautioned President Barack Hussein Obama (mm mmm mmmm) to leave these future protesters alone and not to attack these innocent people.

…and the crowd cheered.

Has Calypso Louie been given a heads up by the Muslim Brotherhood?

A NOTE FROM KJ: For more insight into the Rev. Louis Farrakhan, here is a video interview he did in 2007 with CNN.