Crossroads GPS: "Math"

Obama's greatest hits

President Obama's NLRB & Their Summer Assault On American Jobs

Smoke more.... eat less

Years ago, I remember my grandmother telling me that in the country, parents used to encourage kids to smoke and drink coffee so they wouldn't eat so much. Of course, cigarettes were 10 cents a pack in those days.

But it took a million dollar study to tell us what some country bumpkin already knew.......

Scientists publishing new research through the National Bureau of Economic Research have concluded that quitting smoking is the biggest quantifiable cause of obesity.

In a working paper released Monday morning, Charles Baum of Middle Tennessee State University and Shin Yi-Chou of Lehigh University in Pennsylvania found that a decrease in the average number of cigarettes smoked per person in America likely causes an increase in obesity.

Referring to the Body-Mass Index, a crude but common obesity measurement, the researchers write: “We find that cigarette smoking has the largest effect: The decline in cigarette smoking explains about 2 percent of the increase in the weight measures. The other significant factors explain less.”

During the past three months, Gordon has been on a health kick and lost 35 lbs. Here's what I can tell you about my weight loss.

1) Eat the food pyramid and become a fat ass. Seriously, I consider flour to be poison. I eat as much as I want for any given meal; as long as it's meat, dairy, vegetables and fruit. What I have found and what I've researched is that bread screws with your body's ability to regulate it's insulin levels. As I've eliminated bread from my diet, I've found that I feel much fuller after a meal with a lot less food.

2) Despite Michelle Obama's war on food, I've found that nothing beats good old exercise. I was a 155 lb track and cross country runner in college. During cross country season, I would run 8-10 miles a day. But that didn't count the number of miles I walked around campus and to my job which was at least three miles from my apartment. That's a lot of burn when compared to sitting at my computer blogging.

I've kept a log of my running and when I started, I walked/ran 3.5 miles in 45 minutes. Last night, I covered 4.5 miles in 40 minutes.

And it all started by just walking on the treadmill for three minutes and running one. Each day, I increased that run interval by fifteen seconds. You'd be surprised at the improvement if you just give yourself the time.

3) I rarely drink beer, if we are out, I might have a glass of red wine. For the most part, I keep my beer consumption limited to ball games and concerts.

For me, I can't drink one beer. If I have a beer I have to chase it down with some nachos, cheese coney's or pizza. It's a never ending cycle for me.

So you can follow that prescription for weight loss or smoke.

You decide.

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Four more years?

I can honestly say I've been in public accounting and banking professions for 22 years and I've never seen such apathy from business owners.

Gary Shapiro is the author of the New York Times bestseller, “The Comeback: How Innovation Will Restore the American Dream,” released earlier this year.

Shapiro, who is the president and CEO of the Consumers Electronics Association, told The Daily Caller in a recent interview that President Obama is presiding over an administration that is the most hostile to business in his memory.

“You have investigations and breakdowns of companies like Gibson. You have monopoly investigations of great American companies like Google. You have an attack on American business which is unprecedented by this administration at different levels. This is the most anti-business administration in my lifetime,” he said.

“You could go back to Clinton and Carter and others, and Johnson and Kennedy, and say, did they do things where there was regulation? Yes. But it was more like business is good — they create jobs. Here business is bad.”

The association that Shapiro heads deals with over 2,000 electronics companies. While he said his membership was generally supportive of Obama’s candidacy in 2008, he couldn’t imagine they would support him now.

“We three years ago surveyed our membership and they supported the election of Obama over McCain,” he said. “I guarantee if we surveyed them today we would not get this response.”

Over the weekend, my business neighbor was doing what we often do on the weekend..... work.

We were kidding around about working while there was football to watch and he said "this is the life we've chosen". To which I responded "Yeah but how is it that in this environment, we're treated like pricks for doing it".

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Life in "Progress" City - Cincinnati edition

Getting shot for looking at someone? Now that's "progress"

Two men exchanged a glance at a Camp Washington gas station – and that led to gunfire that left one person hurt, two vehicles crashed and Interstate 75 shut down for an hour and a half Tuesday afternoon.

A man in a black car fired multiple shots toward a white car – whose occupants were unarmed, as far as police know -- while both vehicles were moving, said Sgt. Danita Kilgore, Cincinnati police spokeswoman.

She wasn’t sure where the vehicles were when the shot struck the victim, but the vehicles ended up crashed into each other on Interstate 75 southbound near the Western Hills Viaduct around 3 p.m.

Out in my little community of "Redville", a new gun shop opened up. But somehow I don't expect the lead to be flying out here.

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Attack Watch Commercial

Peter Schiff - A must watch

Howard Dean: Obamacare good for small businesses

Why I'm a conservative

One of he big reasons that I am a conservative/libertarian is that politicians & government cannot prioritize it's basic functions.

This is why I cannot support any tax increase proposed by The One. To him, everything is of equal priority. See for the feds, the FBI is of equal importance as sugar and mohair subsidies. The Department of Education is equally as important as the Defense Department.

And that these stupid ass sound walls the governments have spend gabillions on over the years are just as important as modernizing our bridges..........

But it would be one thing if these graffiti magnets were a one and done project for the Feds. But now we find out that these things are no more than crumbling eyesores...........

Noise walls along area highways are crumbling faster than expected -- and proving costly to replace.

Ohio Department of Transportation officials acknowledge that stretches of the sound barriers have become pitted eyesores, years before reaching a 20-year life expectancy.

A big reason is widespread use of a concrete product approved by ODOT headquarters in Columbus, ODOT officials in this region say. The material has not held up well to Cleveland-area winters, especially where walls rise closest to icy, salted interstates.

ODOT is now spending $5 million a year to repair and replace walls statewide, a spokeswoman said. Cuyahoga County communities have claimed the lion's share of money so far.

"I'm not happy with the original material that we had available and how long it has lasted," said Dale Schiavoni, planning and engineering administrator for ODOT District 12, which includes Cuyahoga County. "We're disappointed we didn't get a longer life out of the concrete walls, especially."

So now we have to spend money to fix the crap we didn't need and didn't work in the first place.

As I told one of my assistants today. I'm not opposed to a tax increase in general but how else, as a public, do we keep the government from blowing more money on meaningless, ineffectual eyesores?

By the way. Ask anyone near these things and they will tell you that more trees would have been a better, more green and more aesthetic alternative.

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I'm still waiting.....

.... for a liberal to tell me how much would be fair.

I am working on a tax return for a client making $300k a year.

How much should he pay in taxes?

Forget deductions and exemptions. If you have self appointed yourself to be the arbiter of what is "fair" then tell me and tell the world how much this guy should pay in taxes.

I'll give you a hint. This guy pays more, much more, than his secretary.

When you've lost David Brooks

I guess the next time David sees a guy with a nice crease in his pants his first go to won't be "this guy will be president".................

Yes, I’m a sap. I believed Obama when he said he wanted to move beyond the stale ideological debates that have paralyzed this country. I always believe that Obama is on the verge of breaking out of the conventional categories and embracing one of the many bipartisan reform packages that are floating around.

But remember, I’m a sap. The White House has clearly decided that in a town of intransigent Republicans and mean ideologues, it has to be mean and intransigent too. The president was stung by the liberal charge that he was outmaneuvered during the debt-ceiling fight. So the White House has moved away from the Reasonable Man approach or the centrist Clinton approach.

It has gone back, as an appreciative Ezra Klein of The Washington Post conceded, to politics as usual. The president is sounding like the Al Gore for President campaign, but without the earth tones. Tax increases for the rich! Protect entitlements! People versus the powerful! I was hoping the president would give a cynical nation something unconventional, but, as you know, I’m a sap.

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DAY OF RAGE!!

Checkmate

Life in "Progress" States New York - New Jersey edition

How's this for a deal -- $12 for a ticket to New York City! But there's a catch: the fare is for drivers entering Gotham via bridges and tunnels from New Jersey, and it's the wallet-busting toll that replaced the $8 fare over the weekend despite a last-ditch attempt by the Automobile Association of America (AAA) to block it.

The new toll affects two tunnels and four bridges: Holland Tunnel, Lincoln Tunnel, George Washington Bridge, Goethals Bridge, Bayonne Bridge and Outerbridge Crossing.

There are ways to lessen the sticker shock -- E-ZPass holders pay less, for instance, though their costs also shot upward -- but some Jersey motorists seem to object more to one of the reasons for the hike: to raise money to rebuild the World Trade Center site. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey manages the bridges and tunnels, and it owns the land on which Manhattan office complex destroyed in the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks sits.

Port Authority officials, who proposed the toll hike in August, said the money also will help pay for maintenance of tunnels, bridges and other transportation infrastructure. The agency, which also runs four major airports in the region, said more money also is needed to help cover security costs that have risen as a result of the 2001 attacks.

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Petition to Redistribute GPA Scores

We need more cowbell

I just listened to another speech from Obama ordering congress to "pass the bill".

NOW.

Remember, this is the same bill that couldn't get in the way of his vacation just three weeks ago. Because, you know, it's so time sensitive to get this thing done now. Do you think Jake Tapper will ask what the rush is given his own personal delays?

I will give it up to Obama. I never thought I would see the light of day where I wished Hillary was president.

We're there.

Roger Williams for Congress - The Donkey Whisperer

Thanks reader Tony

When they eat they own

I don't watch the Sunday morning news shows because I already know what's going to happen.

None the less. This is pretty good.

Life in "Progress" State - Rhode Island edition

One of the things that has always stumped me about liberals is their propensity for never taking an inventory of the success of their beliefs.

For instance, I've never read one liberal piece analyzing the success of their anti poverty programs.

In addition, I have yet to read a liberal discuss how it is that the bluest of blue states face pension meltdowns and how they plan to clean up the mess they created.............

Rhode Island is the nation's smallest state. But its pension problem may well be the largest in the land.

The state is on the hook for billions of dollars' worth of pension benefits owed to police officers, firefighters, teachers, judges and state workers. But the money's not there. Projected investment gains never happened. State actuarial projections failed to keep up with public workers who are retiring earlier and living longer.

Estimates put Rhode Island's unfunded liability for public workers' pensions at $7 billion, slightly less than the entire state budget for one year. To make good on promises to public workers, the state must pour more and more into the pension system every year, from $319 million in 2011 to $765 million in 2015 and $1.3 billion in 2028.

Several states including Ohio, Illinois and California face even larger unfunded pension costs, but when Rhode Island's cost is divided among its 1 million residents, it becomes clear that it has one of the weakest pension systems in the nation.

"We kind of go back and forth with Illinois as to who is last," said Treasurer Gina Raimondo, who took office in January and has made the pension problem her top priority. Raimondo and Gov. Lincoln Chafee are working on a pension overhaul bill they hope to submit to lawmakers soon.

Let's face it. If Ohio failed to enact SB5, we'd be in the same ballpark with these other losers.....

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Dem Rep. Schakowsky: 'You Don't Deserve To Keep All Your Money'

Social Security a Ponzi Scheme?! (CROWDER CALLS THE SEC!)

GSU Abortion Activists' Epic Fail

How government works

This is pretty good...........

This is... just perfect:

Ex-employees of the failed solar panel company Solyndra have applied for aid under the federal government’s Trade Adjustment Assistance program, the Labor Department has confirmed.

If approved, the employees of what was once touted as a leading exemplar of the White House’s green jobs program will be eligible for more federal funds to enable them to be retrained for other jobs.

It would be an ironic coda to the saga of Solyndra, which manufactured solar panels and received $527 million in loan guarantees from the Energy Department and praise from President Obama during visits to the firm’s California headquarters.

Now those green workers will be seeking the government’s help to find work again and not necessarily in the conservation jobs sector. A source at the department confirmed the request for assistance was received on Sept. 2, just two days after the company filed bankruptcy, placing all 1,100 employees out of work....

The company’s failure was based in part on competition from China, which has been able to produce the panels at a far lower cost than U.S. manufacturers. The request was made by a representative of the 1,100 ex-employees and covers all of them. The department estimates the aid will cost $13,000 per worker for the coming year.

The TAA program offers help to domestic workers who have lost their jobs due to the trade practices of foreign countries. The assistance includes job retraining, allowances for job searching, health benefits and up to 130 weeks of income support.

So to recap: massive government subsidies created 1,100 "green jobs" that never would've existed but for those massive government subsidies. And when those fake jobs disappeared because the subsidized employer-company inevitably couldn't compete in the market, the dislocated workers blamed China (instead of what's easily one of the worst business plans ever drafted) in order to receive... wait for it... more government subsidies.

Behold, the Circle of Government Life.

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It's all right to be on the take.... as long as you're liberal

One of the things that I find fascinating about liberals is how they are so easy to ignore or explain away scandal all in the name of the cause.

Here's such a person...........

You've probably heard of Solyndra by now, right? It's the solar power company that got $500 million in Recovery Act loans from the Department of Energy and then went belly up a couple of weeks ago.

Conservatives have been trying to paint this as a big scandal of some kind, despite the fact that: the company had plenty of private investors too; it's the only DOE loan that has failed so far; and there's no real evidence that anyone in the White House did anything worse than push OMB to speed up their decision-making process a bit in 2009. Stephen Lacey has the full timeline here.

So this guy has no problem if the investigation of Solyndra turns into a quid pro quo for taxpayer dollars it's all about how to minimize the coming scandal....

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Rodeo: The EPA Needs To Slow Down

Life in "Progress" City - Philadelphia edition

From the city of brotherly love; if shooting your brother is part of your family tradition..............

AFTER PASSING a growing sidewalk memorial in front of a corner store where three people were killed in a Sept. 5 armed robbery, Mill Creek resident Jerome Dorsey said he's seen a lot of change in the area over the past 40 years.

Most of it has been negative.

"First of all, it's an embarrassment to this community," Dorsey said outside Lorena's Grocery, the sound of sirens wailing just before sunset.

"It just goes to show you, when you talk about crime prevention, there's no such thing."

The 16th Police District, which covers West Philadelphia north of Market Street from the Schuylkill to 52nd Street, is typically less violent than others in West Philadelphia. But it has seen a dramatic increase in homicides this year.

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Life in "Progress" State - California edition

The unemployment picture in California – the largest state by population – worsened in August, as the jobless rate ticked up to 12.1 percent.

Only neighboring Nevada – at 13.4 percent -- has a higher unemployment rate in the nation. (On the whole, the jobless rate for the country is at 9.1 percent).

California’s Employment Development Department (EDD) said employers in the state slashed payrolls by 8,400 during the month. The government in particular is shedding positions at an alarming rate – local and state government agencies cut 3,600 positions in August.

Since March, California employers have added only a net 11,000 jobs.

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Mexican Coke

The other day, I read this article about high fructose corn syrup.........

The setting sun splashes warm hues across a ripening cornfield as a man and his daughter wander through rows of towering plants.

Like any parent, the dad says in the television commercial, he was concerned about high fructose corn syrup. But medical and nutrition experts reassured him that in essence, it's the same as cane sugar.

"Your body can't tell the difference," he says. "Sugar is sugar."

That key claim, made last year by the corn industry as it tries to rebrand high fructose corn syrup as simply "corn sugar," was weighed for the first time by a federal judge Tuesday after a group of sugar farmers and refiners sued corn processors and a lobbying group.

Their lawsuit alleges the father-in-the-cornfield advertisement and other national television, print and online commercials from the corn industry amount to false advertising because sugar is not the same as high fructose corn syrup, the sweetening agent now found in the bulk of sodas and many processed foods.

Somewhat ironically, the day I read this article I went to a Meijer's store where they had an end cap display of Mexican soda's. Soda bottled with real sugar and not the high fructose stuff.

Has it ever occurred to anyone as to why so much processed food in this country is not made with sugar? If you want anything made with sugar in this country it's almost always made outside of the country. Most high end chocolate is produced in Canada and of course, soda made in Mexico.

Sugar tariffs were designed to protect domestic sugar farmers but at what cost? Food production using sugar has almost all been moved out of the country and if you're a believer that high fructose corn syrup is partly responsible for our obesity problem it's also cost us our public health.

But hey at least some domestic sugar farmer still gets to live high on the hog.

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The Media Creation

As I've said a hundred times, the liberal media does no favors to liberal candidates by not adequately vetting their candidates.

Look, I'm no fan of the Billary, but just think about how different things would be if it were president. And she would have been, had the media not worn out their kneecaps servicing The One.

Every doubt they hid from themselves about Obama, every potential embarrassment they tucked under the blanket of their superior sensibilities, they furiously over-compensated for by their remorseless hounding of Palin — from utterly trivial e-mails, to blogger Andrew Sullivan’s weird speculations about Palin’s womb, musings that put the Obama “Birther” fantasies into a realm near sanity. (We are now seeing an echo of that — with a new book promoting all sorts of unconfirmed gossip about Palin, including her alleged sexual dalliance with a basketball star.)

As a result, the press gave the great American republic an untried, unknown and, it is becoming more and more frighteningly clear, incompetent figure as President. Under Obama, America’s foreign policies are a mixture of confusion and costly impotence. It is increasingly bypassed or derided; the great approach to the Muslim world, symbolized by the Cairo speech, is in tatters. Its debt and deficits are a weight on the entire global economy. And the office of presidency is less and less a symbol of strength.

To the degree the press neglected its function as watchdog and turned cupbearer to a styrofoam demigod, it is a partner in the flaws and failures of what is turning out to be one of the most miserable performances in the modern history of the American presidency.

Read the while thing...........