Is Rush Limbaugh still in the Country?

I’ll just tell you this, if this passes and it’s five years from now and all that stuff gets implemented — I am leaving the country. I’ll go to Costa Rica..
- Limbaugh

I have been waiting for it, and hoping for it. Well, the bill has passed, and I am wondering if Limbaugh has bought his ticket to leave the country. Costa Rica is waiting for him...although I don't know if he will be admitted in the country. Last time I heard, Costa Rica was not accepting political commentators who will spend their time there bashing their culture and government.
Maybe he should move to Somalia........

Health Care Bill...

Yes, I am a bit slow in the blogging process, but I figured that I needed to examine and read a bit of what I wanted to write about.
Tuesday, March 22nd 2010 is the day that Americans might not forget. Its more like we've been part of the history already.
The democrats, have gained status! They have now left the Jimmy Carter legacy behind...and they may be the FDR and JFK material.....
Did anyone care to look at the faces of the Democrat politicians when the Bill was being signed....priceless. Lets hope they can make advancements towards making this country as great as it claims to be.

Now to the most important part...>THE BILL
The most controversial issue is actually the cost. This bill is supposed to be costing about $940 billion over ten years. (I would say compared to how much deficit the US is already in, I say that much might be a piece of cake...well, that is if they stop spending money going to war.) A big plus to the 32 million who will be able to receive health care coverage.

According to CBO, a careful examination at the bill seems to advantageous for the American people as it would reduce the deficit by closely to $143 billion over these first ten years. and after that we are looking at a $1.2 trillion reduction.
As for the uninsured and self-employed, they would be able to purchase insurance through state-based exchanges

As for who is paying....well, taxes off course. In particular, the medicare payroll tax, the excise tax, that should be enacted in 2018. Surprisingly, so will the tan tax. ( so thank you for all those who love to tan?)
As for the author's favorite- Insurance reform.

Six months after enactment, insurance companies could no longer denying children coverage based on a preexisting condition. and in a couple of years (2014)...that will expand to the adults too. This is a celebration for the college kids, they can stay on their parents' insurance untill they are 26.
As for abortion, federal funds will not be paying for them unless it a case of rape, incest or it is to the best of the health of the mother.

Most importantly, unless one is poor, by 2014, everyone will have to purchase health insurance...otherwise, they will be fined something close to $625.

This does not seem like an evil plan, therefore, it is hard to imagine why the tea party or now as they are favorably called Tea baggers...protesting and causing mayhem..

BURUNDI GOES GREEN!

United States Breaks Ground on 100th Diplomatic Facility with the New Embassy Compound in Bujumbura, Burundi - US AFRICOM News

I might be the only one on this, but doesn't $137 million seem a bit much for a statement? This is what is it after all....a statement on conservation. This country, that is among the poorest of world. I mean, Somalia almost beats it in GDP....and Somalia, is a libertarian political mess.
81% live under the poverty line.....
and they are spending $137 million on a BUILDING....that would mean little to the people of Burundi.

To be fair...there is a silver-lining. This would indicate an improved relationship between Burundi and the US.

Is America turning to socialism? .....

This here was written by my uncle Steve..... might shed a bit of light

This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock powered by electricity generated by the public power monopoly regulated by the U.S. Department of Energy. I then took a shower in the clean water provided by a municipal water utility.

After that, I turned on the TV to one of the FCC-regulated channels to see what the National Weather Service of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration determined the weather was going to be like, using satellites designed, built, and launched by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

I watched this while eating my breakfast inspected by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and took my drugs which have been determined safe by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

At the appropriate time, as regulated by the U.S. Congress and kept accurate by the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the U.S. Naval Observatory, I get into my National Highway Traffic Safety Administration approved automobile and set out to work on the roads build by the local, state, and federal Departments of Transportation, possibly stopping to purchase additional fuel regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency, using legal tender issued by the Federal Reserve Bank. I stopped by to deposit the mail I have to send out via the U.S. Postal Service.

After spending another day not being maimed or killed at work thanks to the workplace regulations imposed by the Department of Labor and the Occupational Safety and Health administration, enjoying another two meals which again do not kill me because of the USDA, I drive my NHTSA car back home on the DOT roads, to my house which has not burned down in my absence because of the state and local building codes and Fire Marshal's inspection, and which has not been plundered of all its valuables thanks to the local police department.

And then I log on to the internet -- which was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration -- and post on Freerepublic.com and Fox News forums (yeah right) about how SOCIALISM in medicine is BAD because the government can't do anything right.


By Steve Dean

I would not want his job....

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/12/opinion/12brooks.html


This article reminded just how hard Washington politics are. I mean, here we are, pointing fingers on the president, and forgetting that he is just the face...the real culprits are on Capitol Hill.
Those are the ones people should be worrying about.
Those are the guys whose words no one should take at face value.

Ex Africa semper aliquid novi!

"SOMETHING NEW ALWAYS COMES OUT OF AFRICA!"
When these words were spoken, it was horror that came to the mind of the Europeans. It didn't help that those who came to plunder the continent opted to call the people savages, rather than a people who were intellectual, with advanced means of production. After all, if they were to say that Africans were not so primitive, it would make it harder to justify the plunder. yes, it can be supposed that its true. However, whenever people hear of Africa, there is no qualm about the pain, suffering, diseases and starving children. After all, National Geographic has been kind enough to show people the destitution of Africa.
No one can deny that this is indeed in existence.
However, people have not come to appreciate the complexity of Africa.
“The magic and romance of Africa still lives with us. From all walks of life, men and women of different nations have poured into Africa: to explore it, to conquer it, and to question it" (Rubadiri, 1964) Some succeeded in exploring and conquering Africa and if Kipling’s White Man’s Burden is any indication, the Europeans thought they were doing a great favor to the Africans by colonizing them. However, those who went there with questions have yet to get their answers. The African continent carries a mystery that is yet to be solved. For its vastness and beauty, Africa still houses the most under-served populations of the world. Africans certainly owe it to themselves to find a new path that will lead them to development. Whether this new path is termed as the African renaissance or a rebirth of African Socialism, Africans must seize the moment and turn inwards to rind within themselves the solutions to their problem (Martin, 1993)
Frantz Fanon was the one who said that "Each generation must out of relative obscurity discover its mission, fulfill it, or betray it” (Fanon, 1965, 206). It should be the mission of the present generation of Africans to revive Africa. They have been given a great start. All the authors of the different articles point to that specific truth. African centers will have to be built to focus on African studies. This will give rise to true scholarship of Africa’s history. The African Renaissance ultimately offers a new beginning for Africa. It is a way that Africans can revive their “values of creativity, generosity, communal spirit and hospitality” and to reinsert their pride and dignity. To achieve this, recapturing the African spirit is key. This spirit is on display in African culture, in the dances, in the magnificent architecture, and art. This spirit is ever present in the pyramids and sphinxes of Egypt, the stone buildings of Axum, the ruins of Carthage and Great Zimbabwe, the rock paintings of the San, the carvings of the Makonde and the stone sculptures of the Shona, just to name a few. It must be that when we hear the words Ex Africa semper aliquid novi!” (Something new always comes out of Africa), the world will think of glory and not horror.

I AM AN AFRICAN- Speech by Thabo Mbeki

I am an African.

I owe my being to the hills and the valleys, the mountains and the glades, the rivers, the deserts, the trees, the flowers, the seas and the ever-changing seasons that define the face of our native land.

My body has frozen in our frosts and in our latter day snows. It has thawed in the warmth of our sunshine and melted in the heat of the midday sun. The crack and the rumble of the summer thunders, lashed by startling lightening, have been a cause both of trembling and of hope.

The fragrances of nature have been as pleasant to us as the sight of the wild blooms of the citizens of the veld.

The dramatic shapes of the Drakensberg, the soil-coloured waters of the Lekoa, iGqili noThukela, and the sands of the Kgalagadi, have all been panels of the set on the natural stage on which we act out the foolish deeds of the theatre of our day.

At times, and in fear, I have wondered whether I should concede equal citizenship of our country to the leopard and the lion, the elephant and the springbok, the hyena, the black mamba and the pestilential mosquito.

A human presence among all these, a feature on the face of our native land thus defined, I know that none dare challenge me when I say - I am an African!

I owe my being to the Khoi and the San whose desolate souls haunt the great expanses of the beautiful Cape - they who fell victim to the most merciless genocide our native land has ever seen, they who were the first to lose their lives in the struggle to defend our freedom and dependence and they who, as a people, perished in the result.

Today, as a country, we keep an audible silence about these ancestors of the generations that live, fearful to admit the horror of a former deed, seeking to obliterate from our memories a cruel occurrence which, in its remembering, should teach us not and never to be inhuman again.

I am formed of the migrants who left Europe to find a new home on our native land. Whatever their own actions, they remain still, part of me.

In my veins courses the blood of the Malay slaves who came from the East. Their proud dignity informs my bearing, their culture a part of my essence. The stripes they bore on their bodies from the lash of the slave master are a reminder embossed on my consciousness of what should not be done.

I am the grandchild of the warrior men and women that Hintsa and Sekhukhune led, the patriots that Cetshwayo and Mphephu took to battle, the soldiers Moshoeshoe and Ngungunyane taught never to dishonour the cause of freedom.

My mind and my knowledge of myself is formed by the victories that are the jewels in our African crown, the victories we earned from Isandhlwana to Khartoum, as Ethiopians and as the Ashanti of Ghana, as the Berbers of the desert.

I am the grandchild who lays fresh flowers on the Boer graves at St Helena and the Bahamas, who sees in the mind's eye and suffers the suffering of a simple peasant folk, death, concentration camps, destroyed homesteads, a dream in ruins.

I am the child of Nongqause. I am he who made it possible to trade in the world markets in diamonds, in gold, in the same food for which my stomach yearns.

I come of those who were transported from India and China, whose being resided in the fact, solely, that they were able to provide physical labour, who taught me that we could both be at home and be foreign, who taught me that human existence itself demanded that freedom was a necessary condition for that human existence.

Being part of all these people, and in the knowledge that none dare contest that assertion, I shall claim that - I am an African.

I have seen our country torn asunder as these, all of whom are my people, engaged one another in a titanic battle, the one redress a wrong that had been caused by one to another and the other, to defend the indefensible.

I have seen what happens when one person has superiority of force over another, when the stronger appropriate to themselves the prerogative even to annul the injunction that God created all men and women in His image.

I know what if signifies when race and colour are used to determine who is human and who, sub-human.

I have seen the destruction of all sense of self-esteem, the consequent striving to be what one is not, simply to acquire some of the benefits which those who had improved themselves as masters had ensured that they enjoy.

I have experience of the situation in which race and colour is used to enrich some and impoverish the rest.

I have seen the corruption of minds and souls in the pursuit of an ignoble effort to perpetrate a veritable crime against humanity.

I have seen concrete expression of the denial of the dignity of a human being emanating from the conscious, systemic and systematic oppressive and repressive activities of other human beings.

There the victims parade with no mask to hide the brutish reality - the beggars, the prostitutes, the street children, those who seek solace in substance abuse, those who have to steal to assuage hunger, those who have to lose their sanity because to be sane is to invite pain.

Perhaps the worst among these, who are my people, are those who have learnt to kill for a wage. To these the extent of death is directly proportional to their personal welfare.

And so, like pawns in the service of demented souls, they kill in furtherance of the political violence in KwaZulu-Natal. They murder the innocent in the taxi wars.

They kill slowly or quickly in order to make profits from the illegal trade in narcotics. They are available for hire when husband wants to murder wife and wife, husband.

Among us prowl the products of our immoral and amoral past - killers who have no sense of the worth of human life, rapists who have absolute disdain for the women of our country, animals who would seek to benefit from the vulnerability of the children, the disabled and the old, the rapacious who brook no obstacle in their quest for self-enrichment.

All this I know and know to be true because I am an African!

Because of that, I am also able to state this fundamental truth that I am born of a people who are heroes and heroines.

I am born of a people who would not tolerate oppression.

I am of a nation that would not allow that fear of death, torture, imprisonment, exile or persecution should result in the perpetuation of injustice.

The great masses who are our mother and father will not permit that the behaviour of the few results in the description of our country and people as barbaric.

Patient because history is on their side, these masses do not despair because today the weather is bad. Nor do they turn triumphalist when, tomorrow, the sun shines.

Whatever the circumstances they have lived through and because of that experience, they are determined to define for themselves who they are and who they should be.

We are assembled here today to mark their victory in acquiring and exercising their right to formulate their own definition of what it means to be African.

The constitution whose adoption we celebrate constitutes and unequivocal statement that we refuse to accept that our Africanness shall be defined by our race, colour, gender of historical origins.

It is a firm assertion made by ourselves that South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white.

It gives concrete expression to the sentiment we share as Africans, and will defend to the death, that the people shall govern.

It recognises the fact that the dignity of the individual is both an objective which society must pursue, and is a goal which cannot be separated from the material well-being of that individual.

It seeks to create the situation in which all our people shall be free from fear, including the fear of the oppression of one national group by another, the fear of the disempowerment of one social echelon by another, the fear of the use of state power to deny anybody their fundamental human rights and the fear of tyranny.

It aims to open the doors so that those who were disadvantaged can assume their place in society as equals with their fellow human beings without regard to colour, race, gender, age or geographic dispersal.

It provides the opportunity to enable each one and all to state their views, promote them, strive for their implementation in the process of governance without fear that a contrary view will be met with repression.

It creates a law-governed society which shall be inimical to arbitrary rule.

It enables the resolution of conflicts by peaceful means rather than resort to force.

It rejoices in the diversity of our people and creates the space for all of us voluntarily to define ourselves as one people.

As an African, this is an achievement of which I am proud, proud without reservation and proud without any feeling of conceit.

Our sense of elevation at this moment also derives from the fact that this magnificent product is the unique creation of African hands and African minds.

Bit it is also constitutes a tribute to our loss of vanity that we could, despite the temptation to treat ourselves as an exceptional fragment of humanity, draw on the accumulated experience and wisdom of all humankind, to define for ourselves what we want to be.

Together with the best in the world, we too are prone to pettiness, petulance, selfishness and short-sightedness.

But it seems to have happened that we looked at ourselves and said the time had come that we make a super-human effort to be other than human, to respond to the call to create for ourselves a glorious future, to remind ourselves of the Latin saying: Gloria est consequenda - Glory must be sought after!

Today it feels good to be an African.

It feels good that I can stand here as a South African and as a foot soldier of a titanic African army, the African National Congress, to say to all the parties represented here, to the millions who made an input into the processes we are concluding, to our outstanding compatriots who have presided over the birth of our founding document, to the negotiators who pitted their wits one against the other, to the unseen stars who shone unseen as the management and administration of the Constitutional Assembly, the advisers, experts and publicists, to the mass communication media, to our friends across the globe - congratulations and well done!

I am an African.

I am born of the peoples of the continent of Africa.

The pain of the violent conflict that the peoples of Liberia, Somalia, the Sudan, Burundi and Algeria is a pain I also bear.

The dismal shame of poverty, suffering and human degradation of my continent is a blight that we share.

The blight on our happiness that derives from this and from our drift to the periphery of the ordering of human affairs leaves us in a persistent shadow of despair.

This is a savage road to which nobody should be condemned.

This thing that we have done today, in this small corner of a great continent that has contributed so decisively to the evolution of humanity says that Africa reaffirms that she is continuing her rise from the ashes.

Whatever the setbacks of the moment, nothing can stop us now!

Whatever the difficulties, Africa shall be at peace!

However improbable it may sound to the sceptics, Africa will prosper!

Whoever we may be, whatever our immediate interest, however much we carry baggage from our past, however much we have been caught by the fashion of cynicism and loss of faith in the capacity of the people, let us err today and say - nothing can stop us now!