Ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes

Good Morning,

The flu season has hit and according to the latest news, it’s earlier than expected and it’s a pretty bad season already. Our house apparently wanted to jump on the ‘earlier than expected’ bandwagon, so coughing, fever, aches and pains, actually allowed for even more time spent scouring the news this weekend.

Jumping right in – some of you may have noticed your insurance premiums have gone up; some have yet to go up but they will. Astoundingly, the increases are double digit increases – in spite of the ‘affordable care act’. You know it’s insane when the NYTimes takes note of it.

• H.J. Res 15 is the latest mindbloggling piece of legislation to hit the halls of DC. This gem seeks to repeal the 22 Amendment, thus removing the limitation of the number of terms an individual may serve as President. Rep. Jose Serrano (D-NY15) is the brainchild of this atrocity.

• The GOP has their eyes on Jeb Bush for 2016; Sen. Rand Paul is contemplating his own run for the presidency; Obama will nominate Brennan as CIA Chief; and Hilary Clinton miraculously goes back to work today.

• The Supreme Court Returns Today With Gay Marriage, Affirmative Action, and Voting Rights in View.

• Our collective exercise in austerity appears to be over. Americans are adding to their credit card balances again, and experts warn more of us are likely to get in over our heads this year. The lack of broad-based improvement remains a cause for concern… slow job growth, continued uncertainty and falling consumer confidence could signal rising delinquencies in the year ahead. The expiring payroll tax cut also means that the average household will have about $1,000 less in take-home income this year. How is it that DC doesn’t have this information?

• An investigation into where welfare recipients are using their Electronic Benefit Transfer cards has revealed that some are withdrawing taxpayer money from EBT-friendly ATMs at strip clubs and liquor stores. The only people that are ‘shocked’ by this story are the journalists.

• Zero Hedge reports this morning that our government is using terrorism against us. The define terrorism as ‘the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, especially for political purposes. The American government has also been using violence and threats to intimidate and coerce the American public for political purposes. For example, the U.S. government is doing the following things to terrorize the American public into docility and compliance:

Labeling peaceful protest as terrorism

Using homeland security laws to crush dissent

Spying on all Americans

Threatening to indefinitely detain American citizens without cause and without any due process

You can read the rest of that here: http://www.zerohedge.com/contributed/2013-01-06/us-government-using-terrorism-against-american-people

When you sit and read for hours you can only come to one conclusion: Washington has gotten so caught up in itself that it daily sets off a chain reaction of fear and their results systematically slow America’s recovery and hurt the most those most needing help.

Victor Davis Hanson wrote:

The New Poverty Is the Old Middle Class

We have redefined poverty itself through government entitlements, modes of mass production and consumerism, and technological breakthroughs. The poor man is not hungry; more likely he suffers from obesity, now endemic among the less affluent. He is not deprived of a big-screen TV, a Kia, warm water, or an air conditioner. (My dad got our first color television during my first year in college in 1972, a small 19 inch portable; I bought my first new car at 39, and quit changing  my own oil at 44.)

In classical terms, today’s poor man is poor not in relative global terms (e.g. compared to a Russian, Bolivian, or Yemeni), but in the sense that there are those in America who have more things and choices than does he: a BMW instead of a Hyundai, ribeye instead of ground beef, Pellegrino rather than regular Coke, Tuscany in the summer rather than Anaheim at Disneyland, and L.L. Bean tasteful footwear rather than Payless shoes. I was in Manhattan not long ago, and noticed that my cheap, discount-store sportcoat and Target tie did not raise eyebrows among the wealthy people I spoke to, suggesting that the veneer of aristocracy is now within all our reach. When I returned to Selma, I noted that those ahead of me at Super Wal-Mart were clothed no differently than was I. Their EBD cards bought about the same foods.

Continue reading: http://thedifferencesofus.com/2013/01/07/ch-ch-ch-ch-changes/