Light slows to less than 93,000 miles per second when passing through a diamond.
Month: May 2017
Free Speech, Political Correctness And Hate
Free Speech, Political Correctness And Hate — Attention-seeker Kathy Griffin who some call a comedian circulated a photo of herself holding our President’s bloody head.
This isn’t speech to be defended. Speech to be defended concerns telling objective truths i.e. Nigger Jim was a character in Huckleberry Finn, and expressing opinions i.e. the theory of evolution is wrong.
Speech that unambiguously incites violence, much less murder, must not be defended. Note the word “unambiguously”. Certain snowflakes, who are ironically far more likely to be fans of Ms. Griffin than the rest of us, would claim that saying MAGA or that homosexuality is sinful incites violence. That is the Kafkaesque sea in which they swim.
In the 1960s and 1970s, funnymen like Redd Foxx, Don Rickles and Mel Brooks used ethnic humor in ways that would give the children who now set our social standards vapors. There was no hate in what they said, though. One always felt they actually liked the people they teased.
That is not the case for the “edgy” garbage that passes for “humor’ today. Holding the bloody head of a living person can only be construed as hate.
Free Speech, Political Correctness And Hate
William Lawrence Sr Omnibit 5-30-17
The average high in Timbuktu in May is 108 F.
William Lawrence Sr Omnibit 5-30-17
William Lawrence Sr. Omnibit 5-29-17
1,354,664 Americans have died in war since 1776 according the latest statistics. Combat deaths account for 666,441 of them.
William Lawrence Sr. Omnibit 5-29-17
War Cemetery Reopens After Renovation
War Cemetery Reopens After Renovation — Poplar Grove National Cemetery near Petersburg, Va. was transferred from the War Department to the National Park Service in 1933. It was final resting place for 6,100 war dead, mostly from the Civil War,
The Park Service did not have the skill set to maintain the graves and the grounds fell into severe disrepair.
Last month, an 18-month renovation ended and the cemetery is now as it should be.
A story regarding it can be found here.
Thank you Bob Small for sending the link.
War Cemetery Reopens After Renovation
William Lawrence Sr. Omnibit 5-27-17
Yes Miranda, those Odd Thomas paperbacks are codices. A codex is merely Latin for book i.e. bound stacked pages. Codices started creeping into use at about the start of the 2nd century. They quickly became the preferred medium albeit scrolls managed to hang around for another 300 years.
Now it appears the codex is being replaced by digital publications. It’s a tad ironic as the word “code” comes from codex as it was books it which laws were record i.e. the legal code.
Codex William Lawrence Sr. Omnibit 5-27-17
William Lawrence Sr. Omnibit 5-26-17
Public pool urine — A typical public pool contains about 17 gallons of urine but don’t let it keep you from the water. That pool holds about 219,000 gallons of water so the urine content is only about .008 percent. Consider that the FDA allows canned apricots to be 2 percent insect filth.
Public pool urine — William Lawrence Sr. Omnibit 5-26-17
Greg Gianforte Body-slammed Partisan Not Journalist
Greg Gianforte Body-slammed Partisan Not Journalist — Republican Greg Gianforte waltzed into Montana’s congressional seat, yesterday, mere hours after he was charged with misdemeanor assault for roughing up Ben Jacobs of the British-owned media publication The Guardian.
Some are decrying this as an assault on the free press. It is not. Jacobs is not a journalist. He is a partisan with a platform. His goal is not to provide the citizenry with accurate information but to advance an agenda and make obstacles to it look bad. This often means harassing the targets and distorting — to be polite — their positions.
It appears the citizenry, though, is catching on.
Americans hopefully also wake up to the reality that the battle is not about advancing a political party. It’s about advancing the idea that freedom is good; that freedom can only exist with courage, and that courage requires strong personal morals.
The special election was held to fill the seat vacated by Republcan Ryan Zinke who was appointed as Secretary of the Interior. Montana is a conservative state but not a knee-jerk Republican one. Its governor is Steve Bullock, a Democrat, who campaigned hard for Gianforte’s opponent, Rob Quist.
Greg Gianforte Body-slammed Partisan Not Journalist
William Lawrence Sr Omnibit 5-25-17
The longest war was between the Netherlands and the Isles of Scilly. It lasted 335 years.
The Isles of Scilly are English but were used as a base against the Dutch by the Royalists during the English Civil War. Rather than declaring war on all of England — which was in the hands of Cromwell’s Parliamentarians, who were their allies — the Netherlands declared war specifically on Scilly on March 30, 1651. The declaration became moot when Cromwell captured the isles.
In 1985, the chairman of the Isle of Scilly Council, wrote to the Dutch Embassy in London in attempt to dispel the legend that his community was at war with a nation of Europe. The Embassy, however, found that the legend to be true as no peace treaty was ever signed.
So on April 17, 1986, that was rectified.
William Lawrence Sr Omnibit 5-25-17 Longest War
Pa School Districts Reserves Are $4.4 B
Pa School Districts Reserves Are $4.4 B
By Leo Knepper
The amount of money held by school districts in “reserve” has more than doubled over the last 10 years according to a new report by the Commonwealth Foundation. At the end of the 2015-2016 school year, district reserves were over $4.4 billion. According to that same report, there were 13 school districts who held more than 20 percent of their budget in reserves and requested property tax increases well above the limit established by the Department of Education. Not only did they request higher taxes, they did it between eight and ten times in a ten year period. In other words, the school districts could operate on their savings accounts for more than 20 percent of the year, but still wanted taxpayers to pad the accounts even more.
One of the names on the list, Lower Merion School District, has been sued by local taxpayers for their budget practices. A Commonwealth Judge found their budget practices so egregious that the district was ordered to roll back their 2016 tax increase. despite a $56 million reserve fund, Lower Merion is seeking a tax increase again this year that exceeds the state cap.
The worst offenders among schools seeking unnecessary tax increases are not confined geographically. Rather, it seems that there is a systemic problem among school boards. It is hard to argue against keeping a rainy day fund in reserve. At some point, the reserve fund becomes an insult to taxpayers. Although school district finances do not garner the same attention as national, or even state-level scandals, understanding how they are spending your money is vital.
To see how your local school district stacks up, take a few minutes and review the financial data collected by the Department of Education. You will probably be surprised by what you find.
PS-The Senate will begin working to advance pension reform legislation later this week. Their legislation does not include funding reform at this point. Please, take a moment and contact the General Assembly about this important issue.
Mr. Knepper is executive director of Citizens Alliance of Pennsylvania.
Pa School Districts Reserves Are $4.4 B