Student Loans for Gov Workers Only - What?

Student loan interest rates were dropped for one reason and one reason only, it was to dupe the young into believing Mr Obama carried about them more then those mean Republicans, so vote for him in November, which they did in droves.

The reality is, it had nothing to do with easing the financial burden of students and their parents due to a bad economy, which Mr Obama made worse, it was just about getting elected. dah! Student loan debt now stands at 1 trillion dollars.

Now the progressive socialist Democrats want to extend the low interest rates for another two years so the students will vote for the progressive again in 2014. And if that isn't enough, the liberal Democrats will want another extension for another two years after 2014 until after the 2016 election cycle.

That special government workers are getting student loans that aren't available to the general pubic doesn't come as any surprise - What ever new revelation comes to light now after all the criminal activity we have seen lately, it's just more of the same coming from progressive Democrats attacking taxpayers.

Why is so hard to understand? The progressives have shown for all to see the last four years what they believe, and proclaim more of the same is needed, complete failures,  yet millions buy into the progressive socialist agenda every election.

Taxpayers Pay Millions for Fed Workers' Student Loans
Source: Paul Singer, "Taxpayers Pay Millions for Fed Workers' Student Loans," USA Today, June 19, 2013.

June 21, 2013

Congress may let student loan interest rates double July 1, but some federal workers and congressional staff likely are protected from the impact by a taxpayer-funded benefit that provided more than $20 million last year for them to pay down their college debts, says USA Today.

• Congress created the benefit more than 10 years ago to make government jobs more appealing to job candidates who could get higher-paying jobs in the private sector.
• Meanwhile, a 2007 law that cut student loan interest rates in half will expire July 1, and Congress has been unable to reach a deal to extend it.
• Federal agencies spent about $72 million in 2011, the last year for which data are available, to pay down student loans for 10,134 federal workers.

The program may make sense for some federal jobs, but it should be limited to those where the benefit really makes a difference, says Tom Schatz, president of the non-profit Citizens Against Government Waste. It is harder to defend for congressional staff, Schatz says.

Participation in the federal program and its costs grew rapidly between 2002 and 2010, statistics kept by the Office of Personnel Management show.

• In 2002, 690 employees received the loan payments at a total cost of a little over $3 million.
• By 2010, more than 11,000 workers in 36 federal agencies had received loan payments totaling $85.7 million. That number dropped to $71.8 million in 2011.

Congress lowered student loan interest rates in 2007 as part of an economic stimulus effort, but as of July 1 they will jump from 3.4 percent back to the 6.8 percent in place before Congress acted. The Republican-controlled House has passed a bill to peg new interest rates to market rates for other loans, but Democrats and the White House objected, saying the Republican plan would allow lending rates to fluctuate and create uncertainty for borrowers.

Democrats are calling for a two-year extension of current loan rates to allow more time for Congress to figure out a better plan. The Senate rejected both Democratic and Republican student loan bills earlier this month.
 

Green Energy - Environmental Disaster : Ethanol

WoW - this comes as a big surprise, right? Well, no, this has always been a nightmare for poor countries as well as for us in that using more then 40% of our corn harvest to make Ethanol drove up transportation costs for everything.

The demand by progressives to use Ethanol at 10%,  and soon a 15% blend, in all motor fuels, using a 55 cent subside on ever gallon to make it competitive, is designed to force people to changing their driving habits and therefore changing their life styles. The smartest in Washington have decided what is best for all of us, so shut up and stay home.

 And who did it hurt the most, the middle class and the poor, those  people that the progressive socialist environmentalist Democrats to be the most disadvantaged and loudly proclaim they love and fight for. What nonsense. Who believes this stuff? The majority of the population, that's who. Remember what happened last November?

In reality, the left couldn't care less about the poor and disadvantaged, what they care about is keeping them poor and disadvantaged, making them more and more dependent on government and therefore a growing voter base.

Ethanol Harms the Economy and the Environment
Source: Nicolas Loris, "The Ethanol Mandate: Don't Mend It, End It," Heritage Foundation, June 12, 2013.
June 21, 2013

Praised as a policy that would reduce dependence on oil and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), which requires refineries to blend ethanol into gasoline, has been fraught with unintended consequences, says Nicolas Loris, the Herbert and Joyce Morgan Fellow at the Heritage Foundation.

• The Energy Policy Act of 2005 mandated the first requirement that renewable fuels be mixed into America's gasoline supply.
• By 2022, there must be 15 billion gallons of corn-based ethanol and 21 billion gallons of non-corn biofuels in the nation's fuel supply.

In essence, the RFS mandates a market for corn farmers and biofuel producers, gives preferential treatment to the production of corn and soybeans, and artificially eliminates the risk and competition necessary for a healthy and growing economy.

RFS requires that fuel blenders use biofuels regardless of the cost. If Congress's goal is to have a commercially viable alternative to oil-based fuels, the best approach is not for the federal government to distort invention and investment by hanging its hat on a single possibility, such as ethanol.

The 2012 summer drought in the United States ravaged crops, driving corn prices up dramatically. Since corn is a staple ingredient for many foods and an important feedstock for animals, many in the food industry (from cattle and chicken farmers to restaurant associations) have expressed concern regarding the mandate's effect on food prices.

Environmentalists are now arguing that the ethanol mandate is poor environmental policy.

• After accounting for land-use conversion, the use of fertilizers, insecticides and pesticides, as well as the fossil fuels used for production and distribution, biofuel production is quite carbon-intensive.
• To grow corn, farmers must plow more land, and more land plowed means not only less area for trees but also the release of carbon dioxide stored in trees, plants and soil.
• The Environmental Protection Agency also acknowledges that increases in soybean production as a result of the mandate can cause adverse effects to water quality and ecosystems.

The RFS mandates the use of an inefficient fuel, drives up food prices and causes adverse environmental effects. The 2012 drought and problems meeting the quotas in the RFS have put the program under the political microscope. The only true reform to the Renewable Fuel Standard is to eliminate it.
 

Federal Reserve & Eminent Domain Seizures : More Dodd/Frank Failures?

What this sounds like is just another scheme like the first mortgage disaster brought on by Barney Frank and Chris Dodd where loans were given out with no money down and you didn't even need a job to pay the premiums. Remember how that worked out?

This is very much like someone else will pay the price for failure, taxpayers, it's a short term gain for the politicians and another long term loss for the taxpayer. Goodness.

Federal Reserve Advocates Use of Eminent Domain for Private Gain
Source: "The Fed's Eminent Mistake: A Plan to Seize Private Mortgages, Courtesy of the Private Beneficiaries," Wall Street Journal, June 11, 2013.
June 19, 2013

The Federal Reserve has spent trillions of dollars trying to revive U.S. housing prices, and at long last a recovery is underway. So it's more than a little surprising that amid this progress the New York Fed would suddenly lend its intellectual "credibility" to a dubious proposal for government to use eminent domain to seize underwater mortgages, says the Wall Street Journal.

Yet there it was recently on the New York Fed website: "Paying Paul and Robbing No One: An Eminent Domain Solution for Underwater Mortgage Debt," a research paper by Cornell law professor Robert Hockett.

• Hockett notes with alarm in the paper that home prices "still linger close to 30 percent below peak levels," and he warns that government must act to keep pushing prices back up.
• He wants politicians to identify mortgages worth more than the homes, seize them via the power of eminent domain out of private trusts, refinance them with government help, repackage them into new securities, and sell those securities to new investors.
• He muses that the money to buy the mortgages could come from the feds (that is, taxpayers) or "private investors" or both.
• This might please underwater borrowers who would immediately pay less for their loan, and the politicians would take credit for the windfall. But the not-so-free lunch would be financed by the original mortgage investors, who would suffer losses without recourse.

There's also the issue of higher interest rates for future borrowers as lenders price this new political uncertainty into mortgage contracts. Eminent domain is supposed to only be used for public purposes, with adequate compensation to the private parties whose assets are seized, but in this case government would seize private assets (with uncertain compensation) for someone else's private gain.
 

Farm Bill Subsides Defy Logic : Votes and Voters

With the ever rising food stamp problem that takes up nearly 70% of the farm bill, little wonder the congress will probably do nothing to trim out any of the goodies. After all, for politicians it's all about getting votes and what a good way to do it, feed the beast, be the champion of the down trodden, more free stuff.

Of course all this will end badly for the entire nation 'but hey that's not my problem, let those guys handle that down the road. I have to concern myself the problems we have now and getting reelected so I can solve the pressing issues of our nation.'  Sure, and actual responsibility be damned.

 It's Time to Reform Farm Subsidies
Source: Vincent H. Smith, "The 2013 Farm Bill: Limiting Waste by Limiting Farm-Subsidy Budgets," Mercatus Center, June 17, 2013.
June 19, 2013

American taxpayers currently spend more than $20 billion per year on farm subsidies, the vast majority of which flows to the largest and wealthiest farming operations. The upcoming farm bill provides Congress the opportunity to eliminate the programs that simply transfer money from less wealthy taxpayers to wealthier farm households, says Vincent H. Smith, co-director of the American Enterprise Institutes agricultural policy initiative.

• The federal government spends approximately $100 billion per year on farm bill programs.
• Of this, $23 billion (nearly 20 percent) goes to farm subsidy programs, including: $17.5 billion to the largest 15-20 percent of farm operations; of this, $14 billion is paid to the largest 10 percent.
• $2.5 billion goes to private agricultural insurance companies.

Since the 1960s, successive farm bills have funded subsidies going mainly to farm households that are much wealthier and enjoy much higher incomes than the average American household. The U.S. General Accounting Office reported that in 2011 more than 50 farms received over $500,000 in crop insurance premiums. Many of these farms also obtained additional benefits from other subsidy programs, such as the Direct Payments program.

A recurring justification for these subsidies is that farmers need a safety net because farming is such a risky business. This claim is inaccurate.

• The annual failure rate for farms is 0.5 percent. The annual business failure rate, at 7 percent, is 14 times greater.
• The average debt-to-asset ratio in farming is currently 10 percent and has not exceeded 15 percent since the late 1990s.
• This indicates that farmers generally face very little financial risk, and as a result, even less-efficient farming operations are able to survive.

House Republicans, Senate Democrats and the Obama administration have all proposed reducing farm subsidies by more than $3 billion per year. This study considers the potential outcome of a required cut in this range, as well as potential outcomes should Congress be required to make higher levels of cuts.
 

Marine Vets Job Search Problem - "Honesty"

 

Why Marine veterans have a hard time getting a job

 

Personnel Manager: "What is your greatest weakness ?"

Old Marine: "Honesty"

Personnel Manager: "I don't think honesty is a weakness !"

Old Marine: "I don't give a shit what you think"

 

Semper Fi

         

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Free Trade Supports Free Markets Brings Prosperity

Trade has to be comprehensive and open as this allows all aspects of our country to participate in the prosperity of abundance that we have - to restrict trade by government is to lobby for special interests.

Free Trade, Free Markets: Rating the 112th Congress
Source: K. William Watson, "Free Trade, Free Markets: Rating the 112th Congress," Cato Institute, June 4, 2013.
June 10, 2013

The 112th U.S. Congress saw renewed action in trade policy but very little initiative. There were 15 individual votes that had an impact on Americans' freedom to trade, whereas the 111th Congress held only three. Despite this increase in attention, the congressional trade agenda during the 112th Congress was largely reactionary to external events, says K. William Watson, a trade policy analyst for the Cato Institute.
The 112th Congress deserves credit for passing three free trade agreements, but only because previous Congresses had worked to block their passage.

• Between 2003 and 2007 the United States signed 10 free trade agreements with 15 different countries.
• All of those agreements were approved by Congress, except for three (South Korea, Colombia and Panama), which were held in limbo by congressional leadership who refused to hold a vote.
• Congress finally implemented those three agreements in 2011, after the administration renegotiated the level of liberalization in certain trade areas.

The 112th Congress also dealt with trade with China. Critics of trade with China complained that the Chinese government suppresses the value of its currency in an effort that amounts to a subsidy on exports and a tax on imports.

• Advocates of currency sanctions claim that the undervalued Chinese Yuan explains the bilateral U.S. trade deficit with China, which in turn explains persistently high unemployment in the United States.
• Those relationships, however, are severely exaggerated. In fact, the deficit has increased as the Yuan has appreciated, and employment and the deficit seem to be positively correlated.
• Higher duties on imports from China to compel currency appreciation would not reduce U.S. unemployment, but would instead raise prices for U.S. consumers, jeopardize U.S. exports to China, and further inflame tensions with a major trading partner.
• On October 11, 2011, the Senate voted 63-35 for authorizing additional tariffs on imports from China based on its "misaligned currency."

The 2012 elections made no changes to the partisan makeup of Congress and returned President Obama to the White House. Trade policymaking in the 113th Congress is expected to act only on periodic issues that the 112th Congress did not get around to. There will almost certainly be votes on a new farm bill, passage of a miscellaneous tariff bill, further consideration of China's currency and a debate over trade promotion authority.
 

Obama's Agenda Based on 'Trust Me' : Faith or Ignorance Wins?

Is it just ignorance that so many of us believe if we just hope for the best, everything will turn out okay, or is it that we all have been so privileged to be living in this fantastic country for so many generation it has become impossible to believe that our own government, populated by a party that wants to destroy all history of our past and fundamentally change this country in to a socialist democracy where all power flows from an elite few?

Some call it just progressive liberal socialism, but as this article so aptly points out, it's just plain tyranny of the few. Given the nightmare of the past few months about what our government is doing, and all of the things we don't know about what our government is doing, to believe hope is enough to save us will  actually doom us all to generations of dependency and poverty.

Tipping Toward Tyranny
–John Myers    June 19, 2013

After the past few months, nothing President Barack Obama and his Chicago troika (first lady Michelle Obama, senior adviser Valerie Jarrett and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder) says shocks me. Their ideology is based on their African-American heritage and their Islamic sympathies. What should shock us is that we are allowing the Obama Administration to do what it wants with nary an objection — not from the people, not from the press and not even from our Republican representatives in Congress.
Our latest engagement in Syria will only make that nation a breeding ground for future terrorists. The consequences of that will be arguments by the Obama Administration for even greater authority. That will mean Americans will have fewer liberties.  Don’t count on public outrage.
In a recent poll from the Pew Research Center and The Washington Post, 56 percent of those surveyed said the National Security Agency’s (NSA) program to track phone records is acceptable. Only 41 percent said it was unacceptable. When asked about anti-terrorism efforts, 62 percent of respondents said it was more important for the government to investigate possible terror threats, even if the price was personal privacy.
I cannot comprehend how almost two out of every three Americans are perfectly willing to let Obama shred the 4th Amendment. It gets worse. Some Republicans in Congress are suggesting that journalists should be subject to arrest if their articles put the Nation at risk. Risk is how the Obama Administration defines it. If this happens, there goes the 1st Amendment. All of this begs the question: If we are willing to give up these Constitutional rights, are we willing to give up everything in the Constitution? Will America sacrifice the right to bear arms and even the 22nd Amendment, the only instrument that limits the President to two terms?
I try not to be too pessimistic, but it seems that we are at a tipping point — something Malcolm Gladwell studied and wrote about in his acclaimed book The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference. In it, he states, “Change happens not gradually but at one dramatic moment.”

Flying Blind And Blind Trust

My own personal experiences have demonstrated that Gladwell is correct. I almost had a life-ending moment, and I wasn’t aware of it until it was upon me.
It was 20 years ago when my uncle, Dick Myers, flew me to Billings, Mont., in his Cessna 172. We took the trip to see Little Bighorn Battlefield, the site of Gen. George Custer’s last stand.
Dick had let me handle the controls from the co-pilots seat many times before in mid-flight, but only on perfectly clear days. Dick had flown for decades, with 2,000 hours as first in command. When he asked me if I wanted to take control over the middle of Montana, I said, “You bet.”
We were cruising at 120 mph at an altitude of 8,000 feet. Dick was taking a rest in the left seat, eyes closed.
A cloudbank overcame us with me at the controls. I understood only two gauges: the altimeter and the airspeed indicator. In pilot jargon, I was flying VFR, or visual flight rules. Given my inexperience, it was necessary for me to be able to see the horizon just to keep the plane flying straight and level. But I was blissfully ignorant as the clouds came upon us. Everything seemed fine when Dick became startled, saying, “I have the controls!”
I didn’t know what all the excitement was about, but certainly Dick was plenty excited. He grabbed the yoke and rammed the throttle forward. The small Cessna’s single engine roared. We momentarily broke through the clouds. It was then that I was able to see I had not been flying straight. Our plane was listing to the right, and the nose of the plane was pointed toward the prairie below.
It couldn’t have been much more than a minute; but in that time, I had lost all ability to tell up from down. It is called spatial disorientation. It is what happened to John F. Kennedy Jr. when he crashed his Piper Saratoga into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard, Mass., in 1999. All Dick had to do was give the instruments a quick check to stabilize the plane as we flew back into cloud cover.
“That was close,” Dick exclaimed. I could tell he was angry at himself for not being alert as I flew into the clouds. He had trusted the weather report before we departed which said there would be an unlimited ceiling. After we landed (and over a much-needed beverage), he told me that when flying, things can go bad in the blink of an eye. As Gladwell explained in his book, a great many things reach a tipping point.
It is easy to blame the loss of liberties on Obama because of his disregard for the Constitution. Yet millions of Americans implicitly trust Obama to do the right thing — even after the Benghazi, Libya, cover-up; abuses by the Internal Revenue Service; the seizure of telephone records of reporters; and the all-encompassing NSA spy program.
How can you blindly trust someone you have never met and don’t know? Even the people who have written about Obama and support his policies admit that nobody — with the exception of his wife, Michelle — knows who Obama is.
Let me tell you about trust. That same summer I was flying the airplane, there was a front-page story in our hometown newspaper. Our family doctor of 15 years was arrested (he was later convicted) for having a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old male patient. The news was crushing because he was a good doctor and, I thought, a sensible man. He delivered our babies and even made house-calls if anyone in the family was ill. He had a wife and child. He was the kind of man that women wanted to be with and men wanted to be like. He had a thriving practice. And I thought I knew him well.
All these years later, I still ask: How could I have been so wrong? Who do we really know?
I have known my wife for 40 years. I believe I know what is in her heart, and she knows what is in mine. But beyond my wife, I really can’t make blanket statements about anyone. And I certainly wouldn’t make one about someone I have never met who is also a politician.
When millions of Americans feel they can trust Obama, we are near a tipping point. I just hope that America can save itself before it’s too late.
Yours in good times and bad,

Foreign Aid Requires Study/Research - Not Just More Money

It always seems that when a problem needs attention the easiest way to fix it is to throw money at it. Whether it's education, health care, gun control or foreign aid, the answer is to take the road of least resistance. If the problem requires real mental activity, count most politicians out to lunch.

Why U.S. Foreign Aid Fails
Source: Christopher Coyne, "Why Government Aid Programs Aren't the Best Way to End Poverty," Mercatus Center, May 21, 2013.
May 31, 2013 

For upwards of 50 years the U.S. federal government has been sending developmental aid to other countries trying to create vibrant economies. Yet, there have been no recorded monumental successes with the use of developmental aid.

Based on the high standard of living enjoyed in the United States, you might think that the U.S. government would know how to replicate that standard of living, but they don't, says Christopher Coyne, F. A. Harper professor of economics at the Mercatus Center.

In the minds of many first world leaders, development of impoverished nations does not come from going through the same long process first world countries did. Instead, it contains a top-down approach that promises great things like ending poverty. However, there are multiple reasons why state-provided aid cannot bring nations out of poverty:

• Policymakers do not have access to the knowledge needed to allocate scarce resources to their best uses. In his critique of socialism in the 1930s and 1940s, Nobel Laureate Friedrich Hayek made this exact point, noting that even the most qualified and benevolent planners lack the knowledge to produce even the most basic items in a cost-effective manner.
• Aid creates the incentive for already dysfunctional governments to remain ineffective. A cross-country study by Stephen Knack of the World Bank found that foreign aid undermines the quality of political institutions in recipient countries through weakened accountability of political actors, more corruption, greater chances of conflict, and a weakening of the incentive to reform inefficient institutions and policies.
• Government agencies tend to focus on spending money as quickly as possible on observable outputs to signal their importance and the need for more money. In the absence of clear lines of accountability, money is often wasted.

The current operations of aid to foreign countries fail because there is not enough supervision as to where the funds go, or how the funds are spent specifically. The real solution to these problems is the guarantee of person liberty and property for citizens in those impoverished nation. Human nature will do the rest.
 

Eco-Terrorism in Northern Wisconsin : Organized & Growing

Remember how PETA attacked and burned cars on a lot some years ago because they believed cars were counter productive to the environment and therefore animals? Well here we go again, except this time the attackers aren't doing it in the middle of the night, they are attacking in broad daylight.

 

It's the new norm of protest, it's terrorism, it's organized around the belief that the general public will do nothing to intervene because to do so will invite retaliation. Politicians are afraid for their reelection chances if they demand authorizes take action to stop the attacks, while locals stand by in fear for their personal safety allowing the destruction of their future lively hood.

 

The truth, if it can be known, is the attacks by hooded individuals, all dressed in black, against a legitimate business that has been certified by the people's dually elected representatives, signed into law by a governor dually elected twice by the people, has gone nearly unreported by the media and has attracted  nearly complete silence for the states top law enforcement officials at the state capital, begs us to believe our of affairs in the state of Wisconsin are in grave danger of becoming untenable.

 

As this article points out, and radio host Charlie Sykes has demanded authorities take notice, organized eco-terrorism is here for all to see. The problem of course is the majority of us can't comprehend something like eco -terrorism of any kind is actually this close to home. Real terrorism happens is Boston, not in remote Northern Wisconsin.

 

Eco-Terrorists Brag Online

By Patti Breigam-Wenzel

 

With Gov. Scott Walker’s signature still warm on the comprehensive mining bill that would allow for the development of an iron ore mine in the Penokee Hills of Northern Wisconsin, the ecoterrorists struck exploratory drilling operations last week. 

 

Right Wisconsin had video of the attack on Gogebic Taconite employees and property, but the hoary band of protesters also posted their own account of the crime.

 

On the blog post Earth First News, the criminals describe the event without apology. 

 

"Wearing t-shirts and bandannas for masks, about fifteen wild ones sprang into action, added their own lock and chain to the gated entrance (trespassing) and built several barricades out of small boulders and down trees. This was done on the access road in order to delay the anticipated police response for what was to happen.  

 

"Once arriving to the site where the drill workers and managing geologist were, folks took the space over for about an hour. They jumped on trucks and the collection tank and threw pieces of equipment like pickaxes, fire extinguishers and shovels down the hillside into the thick of the woods. 

 

"Fences were knocked over and broken and personal cigarettes were raided out of one of the company vehicles as workers and the manager stood in awe. 

 

"When it was discovered that the manager was taping all of this for evidence, their camera was snatched, broken and thrown into the woods. Minutes later, a smart phone was snatched for the same reason and it met a similar fate. 

 

This is ecological terrorism It's domestic terrorism. The Earth Firsters even admit it's economic terrorism: "Making the preliminary stages of this mine as expensive as possible to send a clear message to financiers that this is an extremely risky investment is one strategy that was being pursued in the following action."

 

Paul DeMain, a journalist for the Indian Country News and activist for Lac Courte Oreilles tribal interests used his bully pulpit to call for attorneys to help with the arrests of the ecoterrorists. He asked that a list be compiled and distributed amongst the protesters’ camps. He also challenged "all the Gtac, (Gogebic Taconite), Iron County and GOP political trolls" to keep reading his posts for the truth. 

 

DeMain had told Wisconsin Public Radio that the Harvest Camp (where all the eco-bums are headquartered) was an educational campsite. 

 

"You can learn about mushroom gathering, plant medicines, wigwam building.  There’s ironwood up there.  There’s basket weaving with birch bark. There’s people fishing.  There are people doing all kinds beautiful things and it is so healing," he said. "That’s ultimately what it was: The idea of, 'How can we help mend our communities and come together."

 

But his Facebook post took an ominous twist:

If and when the LCO Tribal Governing Board declares war on Gtac or other entities -- we will reveal the secret door to the war planning operational rooms in the subsurface of the Penokee Range that have been found. Until then, Fry-Bread, Wild Onions and Music are the visible weapons of choice -- and geez, just that is enough to bug the shit out of them Gtac boys. That is why they and some in the media are attempting to paint the Harvest Camp as a bastion of something it is not.

Hello to all those Gtac, Iron County, and GOP political trolls who keep an eye on my posts -- I hear you are about to be rattled again.

 

The LCO Harvest Camp comes on the heels of the Central Wisconsin Action Camp, held earlier this year.

The Central Wisconsin Action Camp will be holding a three day training program for protesters against the proposed iron mine in northern Wisconsin. The group will hold the camp in a secret location about an hour northwest of Wausau. One organizer told the Journal Sentinel protesters will learn techniques for tree climbing so activists could prevent a mining company from doing advance work at the mine site.

 

Looks like they're putting their training to immediate use.

Animal Connections : Relationship Designed by God

What a great video of how animals connect with all of us on so many different levels. You can't watch this and not understand the beautiful relationship that we have with our dogs. Their sole purpose is to bond with us and deliver, free of charge, joy and love.

We have three Goldens that delivery excitement that's unbounded every day. Without them, how could we escape humanity.


http://www.youtube.com/embed/JA8VJh0UJtg?rel=0