Report: 10 states face looming budget disasters

Report: 10 states face looming budget disasters
Michigan, where two of the Detroit Three automakers filed for bankruptcy protection this year, continues to offer tax incentives even as they take a toll on the state's pocketbook, leading to declining tax revenue.
According to the Pew study, Michigan offered $6.3 billion more in total tax exemptions, credits and deductions than it actually collected in taxes in 2008."

The Swine Flu Boogeyman

The Swine Flu Boogeyman
"What Schuchat didn't say is that, as tragic as any child's death always is, in this case they merely represent a disproportionately larger slice of a very small pie.
Very few people are dying of swine flu in any age category.
Put another way, it's not that younger people are being slammed but that older ones are catching a break."

Not all happy with new road commissioner

Not all happy with new road commissioner
"Derezinski claims Mahoney favored DeWolf because of DeWolf’s ties to the United Auto Workers and the Democratic Party. He said DeWolf and the UAW played a key role in financing many Democratic candidates over the years, giving DeWolf an edge over other applicants for the road commission seat.

Even though he is a Democrat, Derezinski said he does not want to play politics with such appointments, especially at a time when township supervisors are demanding better communication with the road commission. Derezinski represents Egelston and Muskegon townships.

“This is party politics at its worst,” Derezinski said. “It’s the good-old-boys’ system, and I don’t want any part of it."

Cannibal who ate his mum jailed

Cannibal who ate his mum jailed
"A Russian man who killed and ate parts of his mother has been given a reduced sentence because he was starving and needed to eat.
Sergey Gavrilov, 27, was handed a lighter jail term of 14 years and three months after he confessed to eating his mother's body but said he did not enjoy it, the Daily Mail newspaper reports.
'I did not like the meat very much ... it was too fatty but I was so hungry I had to eat it,' the newspaper quoted him as telling a Russian court.
Gavrilov told the court he had no money to buy food after spending it all on alcohol and gambling machines.
When his 55-year-old mother Lyubov refused to lend him more money for alcohol he hit her over the head with a brick and strangled her with an electrical cable.
Gavrilov then put her body outside on the balcony of the family unit where it froze."

The Late Movies: Dogs Welcoming Home Soldiers

Dogs Welcoming Home Soldiers

These reunion videos—for me, at least—shed a tiny beam of light on how emotionally draining being a military family can be.
They’ll also make you want a dog.
To commemorate Veterans Day, here are some overjoyed dogs greeting returning soldiers.

See them all!
And make sure you see the last one.
Not doggie, but even better!

What's wrong with this picture?

What's wrong with this picture?
"The First Lady, a woman widely acclaimed for her fashion sense in the courtier media, has no common sense at all when it comes to respecting a solemn occasion.
Apparently, nobody among her score of personal aides in the White House had the gumption to tell her she was about to make a fool of herself at the Veterans Day memorial."

Just send your $7,000

Just send your $7,000
"Fellow citizens of Illinois, Gov. Pat Quinn, legislators: Welcome to yet another public pension fiasco.
Yet another festival of denial.
Because in one obscure and maddening moment last week, every one of us slipped closer to burying our children and grandchildren -- unless they flee the state -- in still more debt by the billions."

CUNY's got math problem: Report shows many freshmen from city HS fail at basic algebra

CUNY's got math problem: Report shows many freshmen from city HS fail at basic algebra
"During their first math class at one of CUNY's four-year colleges, 90% of 200 students tested couldn't solve a simple algebra problem, the report by the CUNY Council of Math Chairs found.
Only a third could convert a fraction into a decimal."

Airventure 2009

I'm going next year!

Dressed to Kill

Dressed to Kill
Of Berets and Turbans The Blog home page Another Piece of Evidence in the Fort Hood Case »

Tarek Fatah writes in the Ottawa Citizen:
No one seemed to notice the significance of the attire that Maj. Nidal Hasan was wearing the morning of the killings. It was captured on a store surveillance video where he bought a coffee....

Hasan was wearing the 'shalwar-kameez,' the traditional attire worn by Pashtuns on both sides of the Pakistan-Afghan border....I have lived a decade in the Arab world and not once did I see an Arab wearing the shalwar-kameez.

There is one particular group of Arabs who did embrace the garb of the Pashtuns - those who went to Afghanistan to wage jihad alongside al-Qaeda and the Taliban.

This guy was walking around a U.S. military installation dressed like Osama bin Laden and nobody said anything, yet the Army is being accused of intolerance and anti-Muslim bias. To repeat, according to Tarek Fatah, Hasan was not merely dressed in traditional Arab garb--he dressed in the traditional garb of al Qaeda terrorists."

DeMint tries to ban 'permanent politicians'

DeMint tries to ban 'permanent politicians'
"Sen. Jim DeMint says Washington politicians are like fruit on the vine: the longer they hang around, the more rotten they get.
The South Carolina Republican - hearkening back to the days of the party's 'Contract with America' - on Tuesday offered a fix to the corrupting influence of 'permanent politicians,' introducing an amendment to the Constitution that would limit Senate members to three six-year terms and House members to three two-year terms."

Detroit pension trustees take flight on funds' tab

Detroit pension trustees take flight on funds' tab
"The trustees who oversee Detroit's two public pensions, their lawyers and staff spent $380,000 over the past year circling the globe to attend conferences -- often traveling in packs, with virtually no limitation on where they went or how often they traveled."

Daily Presidential Tracking Poll - Rasmussen Reports™

Daily Presidential Tracking Poll - Rasmussen Reports™
"Overall, 46% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of the President's performance.
Fifty-three percent (53%) disapprove."

Meals on Wheels cuts may endanger elderly

Meals on Wheels cuts may endanger elderly
The woman’s son was pacing back and forth, looking at Lisa Roosien with helpless frustration.

His mother weighed just 87 pounds after dementia and a lack of nutritional resources had driven her into a dangerous spiral of weight loss in recent months.

He looked to Roosien, a registered dietitian at AgeWell Services, as a lifeline.
Times were tough and money was tight — his mother needed assistance.

“What do I do?” he asked.

At any other time, Roosien could have set the woman up with a Meals on Wheels plan where volunteers would check on her daily and bring warm food right to her home.

But recent state funding cuts have AgeWell Services in a tough place, she said.

Her hands were tied"

Time to raise taxes in Grand Rapids? With police, firefighter layoffs ahead, some say yes

Time to raise taxes in Grand Rapids? With police, firefighter layoffs ahead, some say yes
"City Manager Gregory Sundstrom’s announcement he will lay off 125 city employees — including 44 police officers and 25 firefighters — is giving birth to a push to raise city taxes not seen in 15 years"

The Man Who Despises America

The Man Who Despises America: "Barack Obama despises America.
When people who voted for Obama in 2008 -- including registered Democrats -- start speaking in normal conversational voices at dinner parties, neighborhood gatherings and PTA meetings that the over-inflated ego from Chicago has it 'in for America,' then it's clear most reasonable people have reached the same conclusion.
The central conviction of Obama's ideology is that America is guilty of limitless moral failures and is the chief architect of the world's ills.
Obama has boundless enmity for America, its key institutions, and its longtime allies."

Is China headed toward collapse?

Is China headed toward collapse?
"But there’s a growing group of market professionals who see a different picture altogether.
These self-styled China bears take the less popular view: that the much-vaunted Chinese economic miracle is nothing but a paper dragon.
In fact, they argue that the Chinese have dangerously overheated their economy, building malls, luxury stores and infrastructure for which there is almost no demand, and that the entire system is teetering toward collapse"

2009-10 MSU Basketball Preview

2009-10 MSU Basketball Preview

Muskegon may 'nudge' more students toward college

Muskegon may 'nudge' more students toward college
"Students at Muskegon High School would have to apply for college or other continuing education in order to graduate under a plan proposed by school administrators.

The proposed graduation policy, which would take effect with this year’s seniors, states that the requirement is the result of an economy that “demands highly skilled workers who have further education beyond high school.”

The district also would require that in order to graduate, students must take the Michigan Merit Exam, which includes the ACT college entrance exam. The MME is administered by school districts to high school juniors"

They're "graduating" kids who can't wright a sentence, add 3 numbers in their head and now those fools demand this.
Gimme a break!

Thank you former President George W. Bush and former First Lady Laura Bush

Thank you former President George W. Bush and former First Lady Laura Bush
"As we will always be grateful for what George and Laura Bush did this week, with no media attention, when they very quietly went to Ft. Hood and met personally with the families of the victims of this terrorist attack.
FOR HOURS.
The Bushes went and met privately with these families for HOURS, hugging them, holding them, comforting them."

Why will the unemployment extension payments take so long to receive in Michigan?

Why will the unemployment extension payments take so long to receive in Michigan?
"But many are also asking:
Why the big delay in receiving extension payments?"

It's run by the feds and Jenny?
Serious "duh" here.

FORT HOOD’S GUN-FREE ZONE.

FORT HOOD’S GUN-FREE ZONE.
“Neither Smith nor the other victims of Hasan’s assault had guns because soldiers on military bases within the United States generally are not supposed to carry them.
Last week’s shootings, which killed 13 people and wounded more than 30, demonstrated once again the folly of ‘gun-free zones,’ which attract and assist people bent on mass murder instead of deterring them.”"

US Postal Service honors our veterans by taking the day off...with pay

Federal Holiday Schedule

How proud our military veterans must feel.......yeah right....

For $20, kids can buy a better grade

For $20, kids can buy a better grade
"Selling candy didn't raise much money last year, so a Goldsboro middle school is selling grades.
A $20 donation to Rosewood Middle School will get a student 20 test points - 10 extra points on two tests of the student's choosing.
That could raise a B to an A, or a failing grade to a D."

Alms for the teachers?