Pay No Attention To The Man Behind The Curtain; He Is No Wizard, And He Certainly Is No Economist

FORBES MAKES UP INFORMATION ON ACA

Please, just give us the facts and nothing but the facts:

An article published by Forbes claiming that Obamacare will increase health care costs by $7,450 for a typical family of four is spreading like wildfire across the internet, but causing eyes to roll from economists across the country.

The estimate by author Chris Conover, an adjunct scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, comes from a Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) report, which projects that national health care spending will increase once the uninsured begin enrolling in the law’s health care exchanges.

“By 2022, the ACA is projected to reduce the number of uninsured people by 30 million, add approximately 0.1 percentage-point to average annual health spending growth over the full projection period, and increase cumulative health spending by roughly $621 billion,” the report finds.

To translate that number to a “typical American family,” Conover took “the latest year-by-year projections, divided by the projected U.S. population to determine the added amount per person,” multiplied that result by four and voila: Obamacare will add $7,450 to average health spending for a family of four between 2014 and 2022!

One economist interviewed said that the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities’ Paul Van de Water, described this calculation as one of the stupidest things he’s read in a long time and likened it to arguing that college costs will increase for a “typical” family if the federal government adopts policies that help lower-income Americans afford college educations. Yes, the nation will spend more on education if more students enroll in colleges and universities, but the “typical” student already attending college won’t; she or he will continuing paying tuition at more or less the same rate, while the newly-enrolled student will presumably benefit from some sort of subsidized tuition rate.

The same is true here. The so-called “typical” family that Conover describes already receives health care insurance through their employer. The existence of 30 million newly-insured people — many of whom will receive tax credits if they purchase insurance in the law’s exchanges — won’t do much to move their premiums in one way or another. (Health advocates hope that the law will slow the rate of growth in health care spending, but that’s a long-term proposition.)

In fact, if anything, the CMS report that Conover links to shows that Obamacare is a good financial proposition. In 2022, total health care spending will increase by 1.5 percent, while the number of non-elderly adults with health care coverage will increase by 9 percent. That’s a pretty good deal any way you slice it.

Conover produces “an average that doesn't mean anything for anyone,” Van de Water said. “He understates the value of the coverage that uninsured will be getting, but greatly overstates and mis-states the cost of the typical family will experience. Typical is employer-sponsored insurance and that is not being affected to any significant extent.”

“This is a typically misleading use of data by opponents of Obamacare,” MIT’s Jonathan Gruber added. “The bottom line is that the government has consistently reported that Obamacare will raise national health spending by about 1 to 2 percent.” “This is a small fraction of the typical 5 to 7 percent annual growth rate in health care – and is a small price to pay for insuring 30 million or more Americans.”

The American Enterprise Institute has a fancy name with idiots at the helm, much like the current Heritage Foundation, who chose Jim DeMint as their new executive.

They specialize in propaganda, cutely wrapped with some obscure scientist or economist preaching doom and gloom - that if we don't immediately remove the black guy in the White House - that we are purposed for failure.

One would tend to think they would perhaps issue a study on wealth disparity, but no, that would shed a bad light on the uber rich, like the Koch Suckers, who routinely finance much of this crazy bullshit that we see coming from camp "Wacko Bird".

Sorry to burst your bubble folks, but this latest attempt to fear the country is totally bogus! Fear mongering failure.

The GOP motto: "never ever let facts get in they way of a good story"!

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain; he's no wizard, and he certainly is no economist!

NFTOS

Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

The GOP's Guide To Shutting Down The Government:

THE AMERICAN TALIBAN

As the nation races toward another budgetary crisis, Radical GOP leaders are using the prospect of a government shutdown and the need to raise the nation’s debt ceiling as leverage points to undermine the Affordable Care Act — just days before uninsured Americans are expected to sign up for health care coverage — and extract additional cuts to government programs.

Past Congresses have used the debt ceiling as a “vehicle for other legislative matters” or no germane amendments, but as the timeline below demonstrates, the Republicans that came to power after the 2010 midterm elections demanded something entirely different: they threatened to push the nation into default and shut down the government unless Congress approves deep structural budget cuts during a period of economic recession.

In November of 2010, GOP leaders informally polled the incoming freshman and were surprised to discover that “all but four of them said they would vote against raising the ceiling, under any circumstances.” This response was the result of what the Washington Post described as a “natural outgrowth of a years-long effort” by GOP recruiters to build a new majority with uncompromising anti-tax, anti-spending candidates and it effectively hamstrung Republican leaders from accepting any kind of budgetary compromise from the Obama administration. As a result, House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) walked away from so-called grand bargains with the White House at least twice and have since adopted the same kind of uncompromising rhetoric that’s known to animate political campaigns, not actual governance.

Though Congress has already enacted approximately $2.4 trillion in deficit reduction since the start of fiscal year 2011 — 72 percent of the savings have come through spending cuts — the deficit has fallen to the lowest level since 2008, and inflation-adjusted discretionary spending is now below the final two fiscal years of the Bush administration, Republicans keep holding the debt ceiling and continuing resolution hostage, to achieve more cuts. Here is how we got here:

2010

FEB 4: Congress votes to increase the nation’s borrowing limit — a vote it had taken 40 times in the past three decades. Republicans increased the debt ceiling 19 times during the presidency of George W. Bush, raising the nation’s limit by nearly $4 trillion.

Martha Roby, who will go on to represent Alabama in Congress, issues a statement condemning the vote. “This ‘need’ to raise the debt ceiling is caused by one thing: out-of-control spending in Washington,” she says. Reid Ribble, a soon-to-be Congressman from Wisconsin, agrees, “This Congress has done nothing but spend future generations of this country into a black hole.”

SEP 10: Speaking at the Faith & Freedom Conference, Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA) tells the crowd, “The government shut down…That’s what I wanted to hear! A good clap for that!” “We want you with us,” says Westmoreland. “We gotta have you there. Because they’re going to come and say, ‘Daddy can’t go to the VA, the national parks are closed’ … we need to make sure you’re going to be with us.”

SEP 30: With the fiscal year ending and the 2011 budget not yet adopted, Congress passes an extension –- known as a continuing resolution –- to keep the government running under existing spending levels until Dec. 3.

NOV: Republicans vow to cut $100 billion from the 2011 budget during the mid-term elections and win back control of the House. Initially, Boehner seems hesitant to use the debt ceiling as leverage to achieve the cuts. “I've made it pretty clear to them that as we get into next year, it’s pretty clear that Congress is going to have to deal with” the debt limit, Boehner told reporters on Nov. 19. “We’re going to have to deal with it as adults. Whether we like it or not, the federal government has obligations, and we have obligations on our part.”

DEC: Alarmed by growing talk from Republicans about taking the debt ceiling hostage to achieve spending cuts, the White House tries to increase the borrowing limit as part of a tax package that passed Congress, but the effort fails. “I’ll take John Boehner at his word — that nobody, Democrat or Republican, is willing to see the full faith and credit of the United States government collapse,” Obama says at an end-of-the year press conference. “Once John Boehner is sworn in as speaker, then he’s going to have responsibilities to govern. You can’t just stand on the sidelines and be a bomb thrower.”

DEC 2-21: Unable to pass a spending bill, Congress enacts four different continuing resolutions to keep the government running until March 4.

These appropriations cut the Congressional Budget Office’s projection of discretionary spending from 2013 through 2022 by more than $400 billion.

2011

JAN: At a closed-door retreat at a Marriott in Baltimore’s Inner Harbor, just days after taking power, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) promises to use the debt ceiling as leverage to achieve spending cuts.

“I’m asking you to look at a potential increase in the debt limit as a leverage moment when the White House and President Obama will have to deal with us,” he says. “Either we stick together and demonstrate that we’re a team that will fight for and stand by our principles, or we will lose that leverage.”

FEB: Paul Ryan announces that Republicans will seek a budget for FY 2011 with $35 billion in budget cuts, far less than the $100 billion in cuts that House Republicans had promised. Later that month, the House passes $61 billion in cuts for the remainder of FY 2011, “the amount that would remain to be slashed had a $100 billion cut been applied to the full-year budget.”

MARCH 2: Congress passes a short-term resolution extending operations to March 18. Spending is cut by $4 billion.

MARCH 16-17: Congress approves yet another continuing resolution extending federal operations through April 8. Spending is cut by $6 billion.

APRIL 4: House Republicans “gave the speaker an ovation” when he informed them that he was advising the House Administration Committee to begin preparing for a possible shutdown. That process included alerting lawmakers and senior staff about which employees would not report to work if no agreement is reached.

APRIL 14: Shortly before 11 pm, Boehner announced that he has agreed to support a seventh short-term extension, funding the government through Sep. 30. Spending is cut by $38 billion, but budget analysts reported that the plan would reduce actual spending in the current year by only $350 million.

JUNE-AUG: House leaders try to convince their caucus of the dangers of defaulting on the debt ceiling. “Leaders like me would try to tell them: Look, no, really, we think it could be bad,” Ryan says. “They’d look at it with suspicion …If there was any semi-credible source saying default wouldn't be so bad, they clung to that.”

AUG: At the last minute, Congress passes the Budget Control Act, increasing the debt ceiling immediately by $400 billion, then by another $500 billion after September.

The measure cuts $2.4 trillion over 10 years and establishes a Super Committee to recommend a deficit-reduction package by Thanksgiving 2011. If the committee fails, automatic cuts worth $1.2 trillion are automatically triggered. After deep cuts are enacted by the end of the year, the debt ceiling will increase by another $1.2 trillion to $1.5 trillion, covering the Treasury’s borrowing needs until 2013. Ryan boasts that Republicans won two-thirds of the cuts to discretionary spending that they wanted.

AUG 5: Standard & Poor’s issues the first downgrade of the nation’s credit rating, saying the “political brinkmanship of recent months” had shown evidence of “America’s governance and policy making becoming less stable, less effective, and less predictable.” This costs the country a million jobs and $19 billion.

2012

SEP: Congress passes a continuing resolution through March of 2013. The government is funded at an annual rate of $1.047 trillion, consistent with the cap set by the Budget Control Act.

2013

JAN 2: Congress passes the American Taxpayers’ Relief Act. The measure makes permanent most of the Bush tax cuts. The Act also reduces deficits over the next 10 years by about $750 billion: $630 billion comes from revenue increases, approximately $30 billion comes from programmatic spending cuts, and the rest from interest savings resulting from lower deficits.

The measure also postpones automatic cuts for two months, until March 1, 2013. An increase in the debt ceiling is not included.

JAN: Congress agreed to suspend the debt ceiling without additional program cuts –- but only through May 2013.

MARCH 1: The sequester begins to take effect at the end of the two-month delay under ATRA. Democrats have called for a balanced package of revenue increases and spending cuts to replace the sequester, while Republican congressional leadership has stated that deficit reduction must come solely from cuts.

MARCH 21: Congress approved an appropriations bill to fund government operations through the remainder of fiscal year 2013, which largely maintains low current funding levels –- further reduced by $85 billion in cuts from the sequester.

JULY: Sens. Mike Lee (UT), Ted Cruz (TX), and Rand Paul (TX) circulate a letter warning they will not approve any spending measure to keep the government operating “if it devotes a penny” to Obamacare. The letter is signed by Sens. John Cornyn (TX), John Thune (SD), and Marco Rubio (FL).

AUG 22: Eighty members of the House Republican conference sign on to a letter sent to Republican leaders “demanding that any spending bill that reaches the House floor be free of funds to implement or enforce the president’s healthcare reform law.”

AUG 26: The Treasury Department announces that the nation will hit the debt ceiling by mid-October.

SEP 30, 2013: Fiscal year 2013 ends. Congress and the President must agree on appropriations for fiscal year 2014 by September 30 so the government can function when the new year begins on October 1, 2013.

You do not have to kill to be a terrorist, but in essence, denying the poor food, and denying 30 million Americans affordable healthcare is in essence killing your own kind! Americans do not need to be worried about foreign terrorists, when our bigger threat is terrorism from within - from the right wing nut job better known as "The American Taliban".

Since the presidency of George W. Bush, we have seen nothing from the GOP but:

Radicalism to the highest degree
The party of "Do-Nothings"
The party of "Know-Nothings".
They party of Filibusters
The Party of Extortionists
The party of Obstructionists
The party of elite whites only
The party of racists
The party of kick the poor when they are down
The party of ideals of 50- 300 years ago.
They party of extreme human control [Women and Blacks]
The party of biblical and constitutional hypocrisy Since the era of George W. Bush

There is a huge difference between educated decisions versus unlettered irrational ones. Even the slightest tinge of conversations of shutting down this country, this preposterous and incoherent idea, should not be taken lightly. Sarah Palin, Ted Cruz, and any other tin foil hat society member suggesting such extreme measures, should be considered internal enemy combatants.

The president has sworn to uphold the constitution from "all enemies, foreign and domestic". These teahadists need to be considered domestic enemies of the constitution. These special "patriots" seem hell bent on one thing, to do harm to this nation and its people. Domestic enemies should be treated accordingly.

Most RWNJ's seem to admire Ted Cruz's willingness to risk other people's careers, humans health and his party's future in order to impress Sarah Palin.

Maybe this horrible GOP extortion plan, in which a GOP/Cuban/Canadian terrorist kills millions of Americans by denying them coverage for pre-existing conditions - is actually just a dream.

I leave you with two queries: Why is it OK to mandate transvaginal ultrasounds on women and not mandate full healthcare? How dare the RWNJ's - to not bat an eyelash when telling women that they must have a probe forced inside their vagina - yet call foul on affordable healthcare. Why is the ACA acceptable under Mitt Romney and not Obama? They are one in the same!

Portions of blog from thinkprogress

NFTOS

Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

I"M A 35-YEAR OLD VETERAN ON FOOD STAMPS

JASON KIRELL MILITARY AND ON FOOD STAMPS

Story from Huffington Post:

My name is Jason. I turned 35 less than a week ago. My first job was maintenance work at a public pool when I was 17. I worked 40 hours a week while I was in college. I've never gone longer than six months without employment in my life and I just spent the last three years in the military, one of which consisted of a combat tour of Afghanistan.

Oh, and I'm now on food stamps. Since June, as a matter of fact.

Why am I on food stamps?

The same reason everyone on food stamps is on food stamps: because I would very much enjoy not starving.

I mean, if that's okay with you:

· Mr. or Mrs. Republican congressman.

· Mr. or Mrs. Conservative commentator.

· Mr. or Mrs. "welfare queen" letter-to-the-editor author.

· Mr. or Mrs. "fiscal conservative, reason-based" libertarian.

I do apologize for burdening you on the checkout line with real-life images of American-style poverty. I know you probably believe the only true starving people in the world have flies buzzing around their eyes while they wallow away, near-lifeless in gutters.

Hate to burst the bubble, but those people don't live in this country.

I do. And millions like me. Millions of people in poverty who fall into three categories.

Let's call them the "lucky" category, since conservatives seem to think people on welfare have hit some sort of jackpot:

Those living paycheck to paycheck? They're a little lucky.

Those living unemployment check to unemployment check? They're a little luckier.

Those living 2nd of the month to 2nd of the month? Ding! We've hit the jackpot!

The 2nd of the month being the time when funds gets electronically deposited onto the EBT card, [at least in NY] for those who've never been fortunate enough to hit that $175/month Powerball.

I fall into the latter two categories. But I've known people recently -- soldiers in the Army -- who were in the first and third. They were off fighting in Afghanistan while their wives were at home, buying food at the on-post commissary with food stamps.

And nobody bats an eye there, because it's not uncommon in the military.

It's not uncommon -- nor is it shameful. It might be shameful how little service-members are paid, but that's a separate issue.

The fact remains anyone at a certain income level can find it difficult from time to time to pay for everything. And when you're poor you learn to make sacrifices. Food shouldn't be one of them.

The whole concept is un-American. People living here, in the greatest country on Earth, with the most abundant resources, should be forced to go hungry because of the intellectual notion of fiscal conservatism and the ideological notion of self-reliance.

Are you fucking kidding me?

I didn't risk my life in Afghanistan so I could come back and watch people go hungry in America. I certainly didn't risk it so I could come back and go hungry.

Anyone who genuinely supports cutting food stamps is not an intellectual or an ideologue -- they're a bully.

And nobody likes a bully. Except other bullies.

It's time for regular Americans to stand up to these bullies. Not cower in the corner, ashamed of needing help. Because if there's one thing life has taught me, it's that you never know when you'll be the one in need.

I know that the NRA asshat Wayne LaPierre spoke on meet the press this morning, but we at NFTOS have made a decision that this waste of human flesh will not get further air time on our blog.

NFTOS

Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

"PARLIAMENTARY TRICK" IS SUGGESTED BY TIN FOIL HAT SOCIETY LEADER AMY KREMER

AMY KREMER TEABIRCHER RWNJ

For the second time in two days, Al Sharpton battled a conservative on Obamacare and the threat of a government shutdown. Tea Party Express chair Amy Kremer argued that Democrats are the ones who want to shut the government down, but Sharpton didn’t buy it, saying at some point, conservatives need to accept Obamacare is the law of the land and stop trying to take it down.

Watch the video below, via MSNBC:



Kremer argued that even Democrats have said the health care law is “not ready for primetime,” so the goal right now is just to delay. Sharpton went through all the steps of the law being upheld, from Congress approving it to the Supreme Court upholding it to Mitt Romney losing on a platform of repealing it, concluding, “You lost, it’s the law!”

Kremer shot back that Democrats used a “parliamentary trick” to pass it in the first place, while Sharpton brought up all the Republicans who are starting to sour on the defunding idea. Kremer was a lot more bullish, saying the very fact House leadership brought it to the floor is a victory, and citing several red-state Senate Democrats she believes might end up joining the GOP.

Towards the end of the debate, Sharpton pressed Kremer to say that if the Senate rejects the House bill, Congress can go ahead and fund the government without the Obamacare defunding provision. Kremer hedged, insisting the Republicans have no interest in shutting down the government.

Kremer is your A-typical "low-info" voter who found her calling when a non-White president was elected. Kremer is the original "Teabircher", incoherent, hysterical and low on facts. Amy Kremer is living in an alternate reality if she really thinks that a government Shutdown won't have a catastrophic outcome not only in this country, but the global economy as well.


O'REILLY TRYS TO EDUCATE FELLOW TEABIRCHER




Republicans' concern about the problems implementing Obamacare is touching but yet utterly disingenuous all in the same breath.

The synopsis of listening to the tin foil hat society: "We will decide what laws are actually laws!"

The bottom line here is - There is no lead in "pencil lead", there are no grapes and no nuts in "grape nuts", ... and there is nothing patriotic about a "tea party patriot". There is no doubt in this bloggers mind- clear evidence that Teabircher's wear the pants in the conservative family.

NFTOS

Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

CREEPY UNCLE SAM

THE CREEPY KOCH BROTHERS AND THEIR VERSION OF UNCLE SAM

I have said too many times to count, that nothing is beyond the pale of the slimy sloth aptly named the conservative.

The below video, courtesy of the Koch Whores, is, well, just watch for yourself. Prepare yourself for 62 seconds of pure, unadulterated WTF-ery.


CREEPY UNCLE SAM FROM THE KOCH WHORES

The very model, the foundation of the ACA was birthed by the once GOP Presidential loser, "keep your Mittens off me Romney." Why the ACA is diabolical under Obama and a success under Mittens you ask - this is the unlettered conservative we have come to know and love.

The facts are the World Health Organization who ranks the world's health care systems, ranked the USA 37th. Many of the higher ranked systems, you guessed it, were indeed single payer and government run systems.

MADDOW CREEPY UNCLE SAM

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Let me see if I have this correct, the GOP has mandated internal vaginal ultrasounds without blinking an eye, but is against mandating health insurance for all? How does that make sense? It doesn't!

Speaking of the definition of imbecile: Let's face it readers, if you're gullible and stupid enough to believe this Koch Brother's commercial, and you do choose not to get insurance, then you deserve everything you get. Why not take it a little further and not get car insurance, home insurance or better than that, decline life insurance as well!

An intelligent person who does stupid things is still stupid, also known as " a stupid is as a stupid does".

David and Charles Koch, you two brothers win the asshats of the decade award. Congratulations asshats!

NFTOS

Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

GUNS OVER PEOPLE: KEEP THE SECOND AMENDMENT, SCREW THE REST OF THEM

On the heels of yet another senseless mass shooting, Jon Stewart posed a question: why are conservatives so eager to throw away all the amendments to keep the country safe… except the second one.

Stewart found it odd how someone with mental health and legal issues was able to legally own a gun and even pass a background check “with flying crazy.”

But more importantly, Stewart wanted to know why no form of gun control whatsoever seems to be acceptable. He called out conservatives from Senator John Cornyn to Fox News’ Eric Bolling for seemingly having no issue being lenient when it comes to most of the Constitution but being very gung-ho about guns. Stewart could only conclude, “With guns, the Constitution is ironclad, but with terrorism, it’s a list of suggestions.”

GOP Loves Second Amendment and The Rest Are Just ‘Suggestions’ Part 1
Video courtesy of Comedy Central

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,The Daily Show on Facebook

GOP Loves Second Amendment and The Rest Are Just ‘Suggestions’ Part 2
Video courtesy of Comedy Central

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,The Daily Show on Facebook

These videos are yet another hilarious take on the GOP hypocrisy – not that it’s anything we didn't already know.

The holier-than-thou Conservative patriots apply their own interpretations as they pick and choose parts of the Constitution – just as they pick and choose verses of the Bible – and then ignore or make exceptions to other parts of those same documents to fit the needs of their agenda.

This is the problem you have when you literally worship words written centuries ago and assume they are infallible, or applicable as written in today’s real world.

I played these videos for a Guns Over People nut prior to posting my blog today. He went absolutely batshit crazy. After fifteen minutes of pure unadulterated madness and seething blather, I suggested that perhaps if I played the clips at half-speed for him, that maybe he would understand what was being argued. This GOPer, a bona fide 'Fox News Listener' - I told him it must be tough for him to understand adult conversations. Its been three hours and I've heard nothing but crickets.

Yesterday we mentioned about Fox and Friends, their newest idiot, Elizabeth Hasselbeck, and how this RWNJ suggested that video games and guns in said video games be monitored. And I got to thinking, if you think we need gun control in video games, but not in real life, it's time for you to relinquish your rights to breathing.

An example of just how archaic and useless some parts of the constitution are, look at the 3rd amendment:

"No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law."

The Constitution needs to be placed in a historical context. The authors of the constitution, didn't see into the future. Adhering to documents that are as old as Methuselah - without edits to reflect the times - are as useless as used toilet paper.

The second amendment was written with powered muskets in mind, not weapons that can shoot multiple rounds. I have written a plethora of times on the mindset of the American Talibaner - where only the first and second amendments are of value, I doubt, and would bet the farm that not a single solitary tin foil hat society member could tell you what the reaming amendments are.

The Guns Over People only show up to bitch when a big liberal voice like Jon Stewart attacks the second amendment - the need for gun control is obvious - but the GOP is so obsessed and OCD with the second amendment, that the remaining - the majority of Americans end up feeling like puppies that have been sodomized with a shotgun!

NFTOS

Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

ELIZABETH HASSELBECK ENTERS THE GALACTALLY STUPID CLUB

Hasselbeck "Footwear Designer" Now Fox News Subject Matter Expert 

New Fox & Friends host Elisabeth Hasselbeck on Tuesday suggested that “the left” was trying to make Monday’s mass shooting at the Washington Navy Yard about “gun control,” when what the country really needed was a registry to track video game purchases.

“You know, certainly, this topic has already taken a turn again, the left’s already making this about gun control,” Hasselbeck said.

Co-host Steve Doocy noted that 34-year-old Aaron Alexis was thought to have taken a shotgun onto the Navy Yard and then possibly used it to acquire a handgun and an AR-15 assault rifle from someone at the facility.

“Is this about gun control or is this about a guy who has a history of drinking a lot, playing video games a lot and a few shooting incidents?” co-host Brian Kilmeade asked.

“One thing that happens often in a situation as tragic as this is we start to spread blame where it possibly doesn't belong, right?” Hasselbeck remarked. “I think we all know where the blame truly belongs, and that would be right in Alexis’ hands.”

“But you talk about this guy’s background, as we look into it,” Kilmeade continued. “He’s got a friend, who said, ‘Yeah, he had an obsession with video games, shooting video games. In fact, he would come over and he would be playing so long — these video games, these shooting games — we’d have to give him dinner, we’d have to feed him while he continued to stay on them.’”

“Are more people susceptible to playing video games?” Hasselbeck wondered. “Is there a link between a certain age group or [demographic] in 20- to 34-year-old men, perhaps, that are playing these video games and their violent actions?”

“What about frequency testing?” she added. “How often has this game been played? I’m not one to get in there and say, monitor everything, but if this, indeed, is a strong link, right, to mass killings then why aren't we looking at frequency of purchases per person? And also, how often they’re playing and maybe they time out after a certain hour.”

“You go to your room!” Doocy quipped.

If this wasn't so tragic id be laughing my ass off. Ignorance can be forgivable, taking pride in it cannot. I would tell Ms. Hasselbeck that its "better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt."

The meme of the Guns Over People - anything to deflect the reality that more guns equals more murders, and its the ease of access to WMD's, not video games that are the culprit for mass murder shootings.The facts are, a "lone good guy with a gun" has never once in the history of mass murder ever stopped that individual from mass murder.

An argument could be made that there's been a significant increase in the number of mass shootings since the launching of the Fox News Channel. Is there a link between Fox News and gun violence? Perhaps instead of monitoring video game players, we should monitor Fox News viewers.

If ever there was an argument for smacking idiots in the head with a brick when they spread their stupidity........It's not the hours spent playing video games that is the problem, it's the hundreds of millions of dollars spent by the NRA glorifying, protecting, and perpetuating the gun culture in this country.

NFTOS Editor-In-Chief Roger West was asked during a debate this week, "How about parents not buying those games for their children?":

"How about not letting kids smoke, drink, watch sexual content movies, watch violent movies. I am sorry, this instance, nor the thirty other mass shootings had little or nothing to do with playing games! Why do we placate other non-related bullshit into the calculus of gun violence? Columbine was done prior to FPS games, what's the excuse for that one? Kids watching Wiley Coyote trying to kill the road runner with Acme products?

Blame the source, and that source is the preponderance and overwhelming thunder of the Gun drums! Nothing else, to suggest anything else, only continues to fuel the fire of mass shootings - which also spreads the ignorance of the issue at hand - and this issue is enacting laws which restricts "the so called responsible" gun huggers from getting weapons with the intent of killing the masses."

Elizabeth Hasslebeck is a perfect match for Fox & Friends News, dumber than a box rocks and full of more shit than Christmas turkey. Maybe because Hasselbeck just showed up on the  Fox & Friends set- that she is just trying to earn her stripes as Fox News's bullshit artist extraordinaire.

Maybe the best solution is that we start registering, arresting and incarcerating the Galactally Stupid?

NFTOS

Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

JUST ANOTHER MASS SHOOTING IN AMERICA, NOTHING TO SEE HERE, MOVE ON!

Here we go again, yet another mass shooting, this time at the Navy Yard in Washington, D.C., claiming the lives of 13 people including the suspect.

George Zornick, of The Nation, called the scenario “the latest iteration of a now-familiar US news event,” which is a very sad commentary of our time. It’s hard to think that when he said “a now-familiar US news event,” he meant anything other than this has become frighteningly familiar, which is something that should never have been allowed to happen. His piece focuses on the U.S.’s growing gun problem, and how the NRA and their ilk, both in and out of Congress, fight against even reasonable measures in the face of these awful tragedies.

For instance, following the Sandy Hook tragedy, Rep. Louis Gohmert (R-TX), Governor of Virginia Bob McDonald, Governor of Texas Rick Perry, and others, issued statements to the effect that, had the teachers been armed, lives could have been saved that day. NRA President Wayne LaPierre also said something to that effect, and blamed violent video games for the escalating mass shootings here.

The NRA also proposed having armed guards at every school, which is something that may or may not be effective. Gunmen have cut down trained police officers before, Columbine High School had an armed guard with 15 years service in the Jefferson County sheriff’s department, who was unable to stop the shooters.

Known gun zealot Ted Nugent weighed in on the Aurora movie theater shooting, predictably suggesting that if moviegoers had been armed, lives would have been saved, despite strong evidence and even demonstration that the ability to accurately pull a concealed weapon, aim it, and fire it without also getting hit and without hitting innocents isn't something that can be done remotely well without extensive and ongoing training. To say nothing of the fact that James Holmes was wearing quite a bit of body armor.

After Sandy Hook, Ann Coulter weighed in on school shootings, saying that the way to stop them is more laws that allow concealed carry. She cited a study done by economists William Landes of the University of Chicago, and John Lott, of Yale University, who looked at mass shootings from 1977 to 1995, and says they found no evidence that waiting periods, stronger background checks, and other things touted by Democrats as “reasonable gun control measures” had any effect. However, apparently, they did find that concealed carry laws do have an effect. This reason is two-fold: One, the criminals won’t know who’s packing and who isn't, and will therefore be less likely to actually commit their crime. And two, people will be armed and able to take down a shooter before he fires off more than a couple of rounds.

The right-wing media is already pushing an agenda for even weaker gun laws, chanting the familiar, and frankly maddening, refrain that more guns there could and would have stopped this. According to MediaMatters, Fox News’ Martha MacCallum said that people aren’t allowed to carry weapons on a military base and that the shooters targeted the area because of that. That statement ignores research that only 23% of mass shootings occur at gun-free zones, according to author Matt Gertz.

Some random blogger thoughts:

What's the answer? I can think of many solutions for reigning in the Americans who favor guns over everything else, but unfortunately, there are not enough "patriots" that are willing to stand up to the four million strong of the NRA. Which is frightening in itself, where this organization can bully 316 million Americans.

One such solution, education, The Prevention Institute, a non-profit organization dedicated to educating the public about violence (and other issues), advocates approaching the issue from a public health perspective. One thing they support is the CDC’s restored funding to conduct research into violence, something the NRA opposes because they fear the studies will scare people into supporting stronger gun laws.

What can we expect when we live in a country where its harder to get a job, harder to vote, and harder to get healthcare than it is to purchase a weapon of mass destruction? At what point readers, do we get serious with gun laws? Americas narcissistic view of self preservation is irrational, stupid, ignorant and reckless - another mass shooting, and another chance to do absolutely nothing about gun safety and violence.

Praying for the victims is an empty gesture and does nothing to actually aide the problem......you want to help you say, then get off your ass and do something that will prevent the next shooting -  to those that say today is not the day to debate gun control, you're right, the day to do it was yesterday.

Another mass shooting, and conservatives immediately rush to say that there weren't enough guns on site. But the reality is, an armed citizen has never ever stopped a mass shooting in 30 years - yet we all know, all to well, that somewhere out there, this very moment, Wayne LaPierre revises his usual speech to explain how the NRA is the real victim in all these mass shootings!

So quiet is the night, as the Guns Over People, the bully pulpit, and the NRA ponder how they can keep screaming about Benghazi and ignore the Navy Yard massacre all in the same breath!

Congratulations NRA, you are once again today's worst organization in the world!



NFTOS
Editor-In-Chief
Roger West

KENTUCKY SCIENCE DENIERS BE ADVISED

FACTS AND SCIENCE ELUDES THE GOP

Last Wednesday, a Kentucky review committee voted down the state’s plan to incorporate new federal science education guidelines into its curriculum. But Kentucky’s governor is making sure the committee doesn't get the last word on science education in his state.

Gov. Steve Beshear (Democrat) said Wednesday that he plans to implement the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) “under his own authority,” despite the Kentucky legislature’s Administrative Regulation Review Subcommittee’s 5-1 decision that the standards are deficient. The governor’s announcement will ensure the standards will move forward for the time being — they could still be killed by Kentucky’s general assembly when it returns in January, but the governor would then have the option to veto that decision.

Kentucky’s path to implement the NGSS — which are voluntary guidelines that, if adopted by states, provide standards for science education that include the teaching of climate science and evolution — has been a rocky one. The state Board of Education approved the standards this June, but since then, the state’s Tea Party along with religious and family-based groups have lobbied hard against the adoption of the rules — lobbying that Robert Bevins, president of Kentuckians for Science Education, a group that supports the NGSS, said resulted in the subcommittee’s vote against the standards.

Kentucky’s Senate Education Committee’s chairman Mike Wilson has also taken issue with the standards, saying in a May op-ed they included “troubling assumptions” on the topics of climate change and evolution. Those assumptions included the NGSS’s statements that “human activities, such as release of greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels, are major factors in the current rise in Earth’s mean surface temperature” and “outcomes predicted by global climate models strongly depend of the amounts of human-generated greenhouse gases added to the atmosphere each year.”

Only five other states so far — California, Vermont, Maryland, Kansas and Rhode Island — have approved the NGSS, which represent the first major overhaul of science education in the U.S. in more than a decade. The standards are facing big challenges in some other states — in 2012, Texas Board of Education Chair Barbara Cargill said there was a “zero percent chance” the state would approve the guidelines. Texas updated its science education standards in 2009, an overhaul which resulted in a curriculum that required students to learn the “strengths and weaknesses” of all scientific theories, notably Darwin’s theory of evolution. And this month in Texas, state-appointed textbook reviewers are pushing the state to go even further in downplaying the legitimacy of largely scientifically-agreed upon topics like climate change and evolution.

Lisa Hoyos, co-founder and director of Climate Parents, a group that’s been vocal in its support of NGSS and testified in support of the standards in front of the Kentucky state legislature earlier this year that the group was thankful for the governor’s support of NGSS and was planning to continue to monitor the situation in the state. The group also organized a petition in Kentucky in support of the standards, which Hoyos said garnered about 6,000 signatures and many comments from parents and grandparents urging the state legislature to adopt the standards.

“A very small percentage of kids are actually receiving climate change education in their public school experience, and at the same time climate change is clearly something that is going to affect every child not even over the course of their lifetime but in their immediate future,” she said. “We need to prepare our kids to build a low-carbon economy and they need to know the basics about climate change in order to do that.”

Ignorance can be forgivable Kentucky, taking pride in it cannot!

Congratulations, Gov. Steve Beshear, you are today's hero of the day!

NFTOS
Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

BREAKING: ACTIVE SHOOTING IN WASHINGTO NAVAL YARD

UPDATED: 9/16/13 15:17

Gunman identified as Aaron Alexis, 34, originally of Fort Worth, Texas
12 KILLED.

Police were seeking an active shooter on Monday morning in Washington, DC, after someone apparently opened fire at the headquarters of the Naval Sea Systems Command in Navy Yard, the shore facility of the U.S. Navy. Shots continued late into the morning as the gunman apparently barricaded himself inside a room in the building where the shooting took place.

NBC’s Washington affiliate reports that at least 10 were injured in the shooting. A press release from the U.S. Navy added that “emergency personnel are on scene and a ‘shelter in place’ order has been issued for Navy Yard personnel.”

One dispatch from a local Fox News affiliate identified a “Male gunman – large shot gun – still on the loose – 4th floor of Navy Yard building.” According to ABC, however, the gunman had an assault rifle.

A Twitter user who identified himself a Congressional staffer posted this photo on Twitter, of a purported victim of the shooting:

CREDIT: Twitter user @timjhogan

The shooting took place at one of the Navy Yard buildings — 197 — at 8:20 am EST Monday morning. About 3,000 people work in the building, according to the U.S. Navy’s twitter feed.

Flights were grounded from DC’s National airport Monday morning as police continued to try to capture the gunman.

This is a breaking news item and we will update as more information becomes available.

NFTOS

STAFF

MORE GUNS, EQUAL MORE MURDERS, EQUALS MILLIONS IN HOSPITAL CARE

Following yesterday's blog; a story about the biggest study ever conducted about guns.

Emergency room and inpatient procedures related to firearm injuries cost $629 million in 2010 alone, according to a new study by the Urban Institute. Since a large majority of these injuries afflicted poor males from low-income regions, U.S. taxpayers subsidized over half the costs of the treatments through public insurance programs.

Victims of gun violence are almost exclusively men aged 15 years and older, with American males between the ages of 15 and 34 comprising 69 percent of firearm assault injuries. Women constituted just nine percent of gun injuries across all ages.

Researchers found that the average emergency room visit for a gun injury ran $1,126, while an inpatient visit cost $23,497 — $14,000 more than the average cost of all inpatient stays in 2010.

These injuries were also concentrated in low-income regions with high numbers of uninsured Americans and Medicaid beneficiaries. In fact, over half of all the injuries occurred in zip codes in the lowest income quartile, while just seven percent occurred in areas with the highest incomes. That means that many of these hospitalization costs had to be covered by taxpayers through public insurance and assistance to hospitals that serve large numbers of the uninsured:

Earlier research has also found gun violence to be a costly enterprise for the health care system and taxpayers. An extensive Center for American Progress (CAP) report on gun violence found that three types of violent crime involving guns — homicide, robbery, and aggravated assault — cost taxpayers $3.7 billion per year in higher medical costs, lost work productivity from injuries, and spending on police and the courts.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has concluded that nonfatal gun injuries and gun-related deaths ultimately cost the U.S. $5.6 billion in medical spending every year. That number goes up to $64.6 billion when accounting for lost productivity due to the injuries.

NFTOS

STAFF WRITER

WHO KNEW? THE MORE GUNS, THE MORE MURDERS

The largest study of gun violence in the United States, released Thursday afternoon, confirms a point that should be obvious to any human with at least one brain cell: widespread American gun ownership is fueling America’s gun violence epidemic.

The study, by Professor Michael Siegel at Boston University and two coauthors, has been peer-reviewed and is forthcoming in the American Journal of Public Health. Siegel and his colleagues compiled data on firearm homicides from all 50 states from 1981-2010, the longest stretch of time ever studied in this fashion, and set about seeing whether they could find any relationship between changes in gun ownership and murder using guns over time.

Since we know that violent crime rates overall declined during that period of time, the authors used something called “fixed effect regression” to account for any national trend other than changes in gun ownership. They also employed the largest-ever number of statistical controls for other variables in this kind of gun study: “age, gender, race/ethnicity, urbanization, poverty, unemployment, income, education, income inequality, divorce rate, alcohol use, violent crime rate, nonviolent crime rate, hate crime rate, number of hunting licenses, age-adjusted non-firearm homicide rate, incarceration rate, and suicide rate” were all accounted for.

No good data on national rates of gun ownership exist, so the authors used the percentage of suicides that involve a firearm (FS/S) as a proxy. The theory, backed up by a wealth of data, is that the more guns there are any in any one place, the higher the percentage of people who commit suicide with guns as opposed to other mechanisms will be.

With all this preliminary work in hand, the authors ran a series of regressions to see what effect the overall national decline in firearm ownership from 1981 to 2010 had on gun homicides. The result was staggering: “for each 1 percentage point increase in proportion of household gun ownership,” Siegel et al. found, “firearm homicide rate increased by 0.9″ percent. A one standard deviation change in firearm ownership shifted gun murders by a staggering 12.9 percent.

To put this in perspective, take the state of Mississippi. “All other factors being equal,” the authors write, “our model would predict that if the FS/S in Mississippi were 57.7% (the average for all states) instead of 76.8% (the highest of all states), its firearm homicide rate would be 17% lower.” Since 475 people were murdered with a gun in Mississippi in 2010, that drop in gun ownership would translate to 80 lives saved in that year alone.

Of course, the authors don’t find that rates of gun ownership explain all of America’s gun violence epidemic: race, economic inequality and generally violent areas all contribute to an area’s propensity for gun deaths, suggesting that broader social inequality, not gun ownership alone, contributes to the gun violence epidemic. Nevertheless, the fact that gun ownership mattered even when race and poverty were accounted for suggests that we can’t avoid talking about America’s fascination with guns when debating what to do about the roughly 11,000 Americans who are yearly murdered by gunfire.

Americans have a gun worshiping problem. It will be extraordinarily difficult, maybe impossible, to cure. Like convincing an ardent biblical creationist that Darwin had it right.

For all the fervent Second Amendment uber-gun hugger folks - that we see in the news daily with their anger towards; a black President , at government , at the poor hordes that will try to kill them for their canned goods and squirrel pelts - when the collapse comes, and anybody that tries to have a conversation about our gun culture, "is infringing on my second amendment rights", you folks should be wearing protective head-gear while trolling the earth, as you freaks are a special kind of stupid!

NFTOS

Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

Zimmerman, "Another Sandy Hook Waiting To Happen"

Police Chief Steve Bracknell, who is responsible for the Florida town where George Zimmerman resides, agreed in a series of emails that Zimmerman is a “ticking time bomb” and another “Sandy Hook” waiting to happen.

Bracknell expressed his views in response to two emails from Santiago Rodriguez, who reached Bracknell through a contact form on the police department’s website. Bracknell confirmed the emails’ authenticity and subsequently tried to distance himself from the remarks.

Rodriguez’s first email was an extended, and sometimes angry, critique of how the Lake Mary Police Department handled their response to the recent altercation between George Zimmerman, his wife and his father in law. Rodriguez told Bracknell that he had a responsibility to charge Zimmerman because he was another “Sandy Hook… waiting to happen.” Bracknell responded with a detailed defense of the police department’s conduct, but explicitly endorsed Rodriguez’s comments on Sandy Hook.

[Ellipses are from the original email.]

Asked to elaborate on his email, Bracknell attempted to distance himself from Rodriguez’s comments, saying he did not agree and was “referring to the fact that [Zimmerman] seems to be involved in incidents” involving firearms.

In his second email, Rodriguez called Zimmerman a “ticking time bomb” who will snap “sooner or later.” Again, Bracknell agreed.

The full email exchange between Rodriguez and Bracknell is available here.

The police are still deciding whether or not to charge Zimmerman in connection to the incident. They are attempting to recover video of alleged assault that Zimmerman’s wife, Shellie, recorded with her iPad. Zimmerman’s attorney, Mark O’Mara, acknowledged that Zimmerman broke the iPad into pieces before the police arrived. According to witnesses, Zimmerman also punched his father-in-law in the nose.

In her call to 911, Shellie Zimmerman told the police that Zimmerman was threatening her with his gun. “I don’t know what he’s capable of. I’m really, really scared,” Shellie said.

Zimmerman told police at the scene that he did not have a gun, according to Bracknell and a police department spokesman. O’Mara, however, insisted on CNN that he did have a gun on him during the entire incident. Bracknell said that one of them isn’t “telling the truth.”

What is not in dispute is that Zimmerman, despite his legal troubles and the police chief’s concerns, is still permitted to carry a concealed weapon in the State of Florida. In Florida, unlike other states like New York and New Jersey, authorities have no discretion over whether to grant or revoke concealed carry permits. Dr. Daniel Webster, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, recently told Salon, “You’ve got all kinds of George Zimmermans and everything in between there who fall through the cracks of our exclusions. But if you ask any reasonable person how comfortable they are with an individual like that running around with a concealed, loaded gun, the vast majority would say they are not.”

NFTOS

Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

DON'T YOU JUST HATE IT WHEN AN EXECUTION GETS IN THE WAY OF YOUR FUNDRAISER

FLORIDA ATTY GEN PAM BONDI

Earlier this year, in a land littered with palm trees, pristine beaches and radical tea baggers, an Attorney General and Governor Skeletor pushed for a bill that would speed up executions. The bill, Florida’s Timely Justice Act, restricts ‘frivolous’ appeals by death row inmates and sets competency standards for lawyers. Florida Attorney General, Pam Bondi, was one of the most staunch advocates for the bill’s passage and supported Skeletor’s decision to sign it into law. Opponents of the bill said that it could cause innocent people to be put to death. After all, sometimes it takes years and years for a person to be exonerated; Seth Penalver for example sat on Florida’s death row for eighteen years before he was set free. Bondi and other supporters of the law said that it is all about getting justice for the families. Nothing is more important than seeing justice done….well, nothing except campaign fundraisers, that is.

On August 19th Rick Scott informed the Florida State Prison Warden John Palmer that he would be moving Marshall Lee Gore’s execution 6 p.m. Sept. 10 to 6 p.m. Oct. 1 at the request of the Attorney General. On August 20th Molly McFarland, the deputy press secretary for the Attorney General’s office, said that the September execution date conflicted with a previously scheduled event but did not say what that was.

MADDOW Video courtesy of MSNBC

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The event that Bondi felt was so important that she must delay the execution of a man convicted of murdering two woman was a ‘hometown campaign kickoff’ at a waterfront home in Tampa. Bondi’s press team was quick to explain away the rescheduling and try to make it seem like a responsible decision on Bondi’s part:

In light of the seriousness of any execution, it was very important to Attorney General Bondi that she be available personally to carry out her office’s duties in the execution process,” McFarland said in an email. On Friday, Jennifer Meale, a spokeswoman for Bondi, reiterated that the fundraiser was on the calendar before Gore’s execution had been planned for the same night.

Rick Scott, however, sensing the media shit storm that was about to rain down made sure to be very clear he had no idea why Bondi wanted the execution moved:

“Her office contacted my office and asked for a postponement, and that’s what we did. No, I did not know (the reason). We set the date,the attorney general’s office asked for a postponement, so we went along with that … When another Cabinet officer asks for something, we try to work with them.”

On Monday Bondi issued a press release in an attempt to smooth the feathers she ruffled with her selfish move:

“As a prosecutor, there was nothing more important than seeing justice done, especially when it came to the unconscionable act of murder,” Bondi said. “I personally put two people on death row and, as attorney general, have already participated in eight executions since I took office, a role I take very seriously.”

“The planned execution of Marshall Lee Gore had already been stayed twice by the courts, and we should not have requested that the date of the execution be moved.” 

Nothing is more important than justice being served, except of course collecting money from donors so that you can be reelected. The contrariness, that Bondi pushed and pushed to get the Timely Justice Act signed into law and then actually pushes an execution back to accommodate her campaign schedule? The whole point of the law was to get justice for the families of the victims.

It doesn't matter if you believe in the death penalty or not, this is one more very clear example of how the American Taliban could give two shits about their duties as public servants.

Congratulations Pam Bondi, you are today's worst person in the world!


NFTOS
Editor-In-Chief
Roger West

MY CITY OF RUINS

On the twelfth anniversary of September 11, 2001, we leave you with Bruce Springsteen's tribute to the World Trade City attacks.

Having lost many personal friends in this attack.......May We Never Forget!

NFTOS
Editor-In-Chief
Roger West

THE SOUTHERN FAMILY

SOUTHERNERS APT TO BE MORE RACISTS STUDY SHOWS

White Southerners are one of the great outliers in American politics. President Obama polled significantly worse with white voters in the South than he did with whites in swing states. One survey of working class white voters found Obama only 4-8 points behind Romney in the majority of the country, while he polled 40 points behind Romney among Southern white working class voters. And a new study by political scientists Avidit Acharya, Matthew Blackwell and Maya Sen suggests that there may be a simple explanation for this divide — slavery.

The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution banned slavery nearly 150 years ago, yet this study suggests that the legacy of slavery continues to drive voters in areas that once housed large numbers of slaves to vote Republican:

Drawing on a sample of more than 39,000 southern whites, we show that whites who currently live in counties that had high concentrations of slaves in 1860 are on average more conservative and express colder feelings towards African Americans than whites who live elsewhere in the South. That is, the larger the number of slaves in his or her county of residence in 1860, the greater the probability that a white Southerner today will identify as a Republican, express opposition to race-coded policies such as affirmative action, and express greater racial resentment towards African Americans. We show that these differences are robust to a variety of factors, including geography and mid-19th century economic conditions and political attitudes. We also show that our results strengthen when we instrument for the prevalence of slavery using local measures of the agricultural suitability to grow cotton. In fact, our findings indicate that in the counterfactual world where the South had no slaves in 1860, the political views of white Southerners today would be indistinguishable from those of similarly situated white Northerners.

The authors offer several potential explanations for how a human rights atrocity banned more than a century ago can continue to drive political attitudes today. Among them, the authors suggest that “the sudden enfranchisement of blacks was politically threatening to whites, who for centuries had enjoyed exclusive political power. In addition, the sudden emancipation of blacks substantially undermined whites’ economic power by suddenly increasing blacks’ wages and threatening the plantation economy.” These two factors, according to the author of the study, “led Southern white elites to promote localized anti-black sentiment by encouraging violence towards blacks, propagating racist norms and cultural beliefs, and, to the extent legally possible, pushing for the institutionalization of racist policies (such as Jim Crow laws). In turn, these racially hostile attitudes have persisted as each successive generation has, to some degree, inherited the attitudes and beliefs of the previous generation.”

.....In turn, these racially hostile attitudes have persisted as each successive generation has, to some degree, inherited the attitudes and beliefs of the previous generation..

"You've Got To Be Carefully Taught," (Lyrics from South Pacific, 1949).
You've got to be taught to hate and fear,
You've got to be taught from year to year,
It's got to be drummed in your dear little ear,
You've got to be carefully taught.

You've got to be taught to be afraid.
Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a diff'rent shade,
You've got to be carefully taught.
You've got to be taught before it's too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate,
You've got to be carefully taught!

This certainly holds true in most Southern Teabaggistan states (all southern red states), where the Civil War didn't end, it is just in intermission.

NFTOS
Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

BREAKING: GEORGE ZIMMERMAN IN CUSTODY FOR GUN THREAT TO FAMILY MEMBER

Trayvon Martin shooter George "twinkie guzzler" Zimmerman is under police investigation for a possible domestic battery following a fight with his wife and her family on Monday afternoon. According to news channel WKMG Local 6, police are “trying to determine what exactly happened” but they report a gun was present. The Associated Press reports that Zimmerman allegedly violently threatened his estranged wife, Shellie, and her father first with a knife, punched the father-in-law in the nose, and pulled out his gun at her parents’ house in Lake Mary, Central Florida, just days after Shellie filed for divorce.

In her 911 call, Shellie said, “He continuously has his hand on his gun and he keeps saying ‘get closer.” She continued, “I’m really really afraid. I don’t know what he’s capable of. I’m really, really scared.”

The family is considering whether to press charges, and no arrest has been made yet.

In the meantime, Zimmerman’s brother, Robert, has tweeted:

Zimmerman has had documented instances of domestic violence before, including a restraining order from his ex-fiancee.

Since Zimmerman was acquitted for shooting and killing Martin, he has gone shopping for a new firearm from the manufacturer that made the gun that killed Martin. He has also received speeding tickets from police, and revealed he had a gun stored in his car glove compartment at the time. An Ohio gun group raised over $12,000, which they sent Zimmerman to purchase the new gun.

Under Florida law, Zimmerman’s alleged actions likely amount to “aggravated assault,” a third degree felony punishable by up to five years in prison. Additionally, if Zimmerman is convicted of this felony, he would be legally barred from owning a gun.

Stay tuned for further developments.

NFTOS 

STAFF WRITER