Liberals Make Up Your Mind

Democrats have a great strategy when it comes to taking down Republicans.  It helps that they have to media to be their mouthpiece.  The strategy is simple, take an issue and attack Republicans on both sides of the issue.

The prime example of this is high gas prices.

Liberal Criticism #1 - Gas prices are so high because evil gas company executives are greedy.
Liberal Criticism #2 - Evil gas company executive was to do more drilling and build refineries and they don't care about the environment.

Evaluation of Criticism #1 - Liberal are taking the side of the poor and attacking greed.  How can the poor who have to travels to their jobs afford to work with gas prices so high.  Let's punish gas companies by taxing them more.  Gas companies need to lower their price so that gas is more affordable to the working man.

Evaluation of Criticism #2 - Liberals are taking the side of the environment. Don't let gas companies do anymore drilling or upgrade and build new refineries, because gas and cars are destroying the planet.  Gas prices should be high, you evil SUV owner.

How can you win?  You can't because to the liberal it's not about improving society.  It's about maintaining political power.  Democrats need to take Republicans down, so they will attack for the sake of attack.

You have to remember the Immutable Law of Liberals, they don't need any ideas, they just need to be in office.

Dark Tuesday

As you can tell, I'm a conservative.  I was very disappointed by the results of last night's election.  I may not be in tune with Governor Schwartzenegger from a social standpoint, I am in sync with him on the public policy agenda.

He supported four very good pieces of legislation and they all when down to defeat.

The problem was that the propositions in and of themselves were good and smart ideas.  They just happen to go up against people we should admire - Teachers, Police, Firefighters and Nurses.  All four groups deserve a lot of respect.  Unfortunately, they were made the targets of these propositions, when the real targets should have been the unions they belong to.

Proposition 74 - I love teachers and they deserve to be paid more, but at the same time, a principal should be able to fire bad teachers.  Bad teachers should not be allow to hide behind tenure.  The issue is not what's in the best interest of bad teachers, it's what's in the best interest for our children.

Proposition 75 - I love teachers, police officers, firefights and they deserve to be paid more.  Their unions on the other hand should represent their members.  If they did, there would have been no reason to even have this proposition on the ballot.  The unions spent $100 million on political campaign. If the liberals think the money on the Iraq war should have gone to inner cities, then money to political campaigns should go to the membership, instead of raising dues to pay for ads.

Proposition 76 - I love schools and it's important to educate children no matter race or economic position.  But at the same time you can not hamper a state's budget with guaranteed funds.  If the state is going through an economic crisis, the governor and legislature should be allowed to reallocate funds as necessary.  This makes sense to me.  Otherwise the only alternative is to raise taxes.

Proposition 77 - Who do I trust to draw district boundaries?  Politicians who want to keep their jobs or an independent council of judges and the people of California.  Think about it.

I feel better now.

Ng's in the News

Kim Ng, Assistant General Manager, for the Los Angeles Dodgers was the first person to interview for the main post as General Manager for the Dodgers.

 

Other famous Ng's...

 

Rita Ng, Miss California

Evelyn Ng, Professional Poker Player

Charles Ng, Serial Killer

 

I thought this was interesting.

Supreme Court Candidate Alito

So far so good on Bush's Nominee.  One Democrat senator from the Gang of 14 has complimented Judge Alito on his openmindedness and void of political agenda.

Here's an interest word from AP - In college, Samuel Alito led a student conference that urged legalization of sodomy and curbs on domestic intelligence, a sweeping defense of privacy rights he said were under threat by the government and the dawning computer age.

Three decades before the Supreme Court decriminalized gay sex, Alito declared on behalf of his group of fellow Princeton students that "no private sexual act between consenting adults should be forbidden." Alito also called for an end to discrimination against homosexuals in hiring.

But they saw in the 1971 report a prescient thinker taking on issues ahead of their time, including the need for computer encryption, stronger oversight of domestic intelligence and curbs on the surveillance powers of states.

"The document itself is amazing," said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "It is a dramatic statement in support of the right of privacy.

We'll see what's to come.

Prop 75 Impact

Will Prop 75 have an impact?  In Utah, they passed a similar law and found political participation drop from 68% to 7% and in Washington 80% to 11%.  The key point to notice is that again, union leadership did not speak for the constituents.

In California, the teachers' union spent 60 million between 2000 to 2004 on political campaigns for its 335,000.  That's $36,000 per member per year.  What do you think would happen to the quality of education and the happiness of teacher had the union put $36,000 in a retirement account for each member every year?

How about this?  What if they union took half $18,000 per member and placed that in a retirement account, and spent the rest on political causes?  I don't necessarily support that, but it's staggering to think about the possibilities.

Proposition 75 - Why Liberals Lie

I'm always frustrated during election times.  Mostly because of the lying sound bites you get from both sides of the aisle (although mostly from Democrats).  Today is Prop 75.

In a nutshell, Prop 75 requires written permission from union members to use a portion of their union dues for political use.  For example, union dues can be used for supporting or opposing propositions or candidates.

Under current law, a union member can opt out.  Under proposition 75, a union member must grant permission.

I obviously support this law.  Recently unions have raised union dues specifically to fund political campaigns.  It is not fair for a person to have their dues raised without their permission and then used to support a cause they don't believe in.  That's why the AFL-CIO lost some major unions recently - http://www.mypalal.com/blog/UnionsBolt.html. The AFL-CIO spent the majority of their time and money supporting political campaigns that they lost their membership base.

The reality is there would be no need for Proposition 75 if the unions spoke on behalf of their membership.  Then again, if the unions did actually represent their membership, they have nothing to fear from Proposition 75.

Calvary Chapel

I've not talked about this much, but I have serious problems with Calvary Chapel churches.  Read here: http://www.bobofett.com/psychoticmail.html

 

She sounds crazy but I happen to believe her story for it is consistent with my experience with some Calvary Chapels.

So so depressed

The Angels are out.  It was so bad, I couldn't listen to the final game.  I wound up going to Disneyland with my wife.  The omen of the night was losing my Anaheim Angels wristband while taking off my sweatshirt.  Oh well there's always next year.

 

My real frustration was the fact that these lousy umpires couldn't make a right call all night.  For example, if the umpire makes the out motion.  The player is out.  If the catcher interferes with the batter, then the runners are safely on base.

 

Then again, if the Angels could hit, they'd be in the World Series today.

I Love the Angels

On Monday, I begged my wife to let me go to the last game of the ALDS. Angels vs. Yankees.

 

She let me go and I bought tickets on eBay.  That was a mistake.  I got ripped off. I'll tell this story later.

 

There's nothing like being in a stadium with 40,000 fans and we're all cheering for the same thing.  Everytime a run was scored, I'm high fiving complete strangers.  It was surreal.

 

I'm standing in the terrace section behind home plate during the final inning and praying that the Yankees will not tie this up.  Finally Erstad makes a great catch at first and throws out Matsui.  I'm in my section standing up, screaming and jumping like a little girls.

 

What a fantastic game. Now off to my car for an hour of not going anywhere.

The Rebirth of the DNC

AP just did an interview with Howard Dean, former presidential candidate and governer.  He discusses the strategy of the DNC.

 

His goals are:

• Making Democrats the party of values, community and reform. Armed with extensive DNC polling, Dean is consulting with party leaders in Congress, mayors and governors to recast the public's image of Democrats with a unified message.
• Improving the party's "micro-targeting," the tactic of merging political information about voters with their consumer habits to figure out how to appeal to them.
• Building a 50-state grass-roots organization using Internet and community-building tools.

Let's sum up this strategy. The Democrats will poll America and that will decide what the Democrats believe.  The biggest problem that the Democrats have is that they believe in nothing and rely on polling to remain in power.  Get a backbone people.  Take a stand on something.

The Bush Master Plan

Could Bush be a genius?  He nominates a woman who is a complete mystery. He then gets conservatives to express concern.  Now Democrats will just sit back and vote in an unknown, just to "tick off" conservatives.  Time will tell.

Anaheim Angels Post Season Blog

And now for something completely different.  I'm hoping you won't get too bored with my politics, I know turn to sports.

 

I'm sitting with my wife and the first game of the ALDS is going to start in a few hours.  I'm an Angels Fan. I was going to say big, but I couldn't get to any games this year.  My wife has chronic knee problems and I can only get wheelchair seat and that requires planning.

 

I think the Angels have a good shot this year.  My only concern is the hitting.  That's the only thing they lacked this year.  Vlad was out for most of the season and Finley has just not been what I hoped for.

 

To you Yankee fans, you're going down just like you did in 2002.

Yet another example of Media Bias

From AP (10/3/05) Headline - Hispanics Upset Bush Passed on Them

"President Bush has again ignored highly qualified Latino judges, attorneys and law professors who could serve the nation ably on the United States Supreme Court," said Ann Marie Tallman, executive director of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, after Miers' nomination was announced Monday.

"The failure of this administration to nominate a Hispanic judge to the Supreme Court is a slap in the face to all those highly qualified Hispanic judges that dutifully serve on our federal courts across the nation," said Raul Yzaguirre, former president of the National Council of La Raza. "Our community continues to contribute to the greatness of this nation and yet, we are ignored for a vital role on our third branch of governance."

Here's how the media goes to liberal groups to get quotes about the President's Actions that are unwarranted. This story would have had some credence if the organization they interviewed were actual Bush supporting organizations.

If Bush had nominated a Hispanic, then the National Organization of Women would have been all over Bush's case for not replacing O'Conner with another women.  Either way you had two separate groups that the media was eager to get comments based on the nomination.  Bush should have picked a Hispanic Woman.

One last thing, we already know that the Democrats would have shot down two of Bush's Hispanic nominees because they were too conservative.

Example of Liberal Media Bias

Today, President Bush nominated attorney Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court.

One would think that an unbiased news organization would have a headline that might say:

"President Bush Nominates Miers to Supreme Court"

No, here's AP's headline (10/3/05):

"High Court Nominee Has Never Been a Judge"

Which headline reports the fact and which one offers opinion?

Judge Roberts is installed

What a great day for bi-partisanship.  Judge Roberts is confirmed as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.  He was confirmed by all Republican Senators (no surprise), all Independent Senators (Jeffords) and half of the Democrats.

Let's hope that the next nomination goes smoothly.  My call is to nominate a person who is just like Roberts. A person with exemplary judicial qualifications.

I'm reading some of the reports from Democrats about the next nominations and they are like a broken records.  Democrats what Bush to nominate a liberal to the Supreme Court.  Maybe a moderate at best.  You know what?  Your party's not in power…too bad.

I could just scream sometimes.

New Poker Blog

I've decided to put my Poker musings on another blog site.  Visit here for my thoughts on Poker - http://palalpoker.blogspot.com/

This Week In Poker

This has been my best week in poker overall.  I started this week with $80 in my Full Tilt Poker Account.  Today I have $220 in my Full Tilt Poker account.  I also went to Pechanga Casino in Temecula and I walked away with $120.

 

What happened this week compared to any other week? I finally to my own advice and I decided to play very tight.  The reason I lose in Limit Hold'em is that I play way too many hands. Basically, I wait for playable hole cards.  In early position, I'm playing premium hands.  In late position, I'm looking for good flush and straight draws.

 

Here's some highlights of the week.  One reason I get in trouble online is that I get bored and will play anything.  I now play two tables at a time. Generally two different games so that I don't mix things up.  The only trouble I ran into with this strategy is when I play Hold'em and Omaha Hi/Lo. I am tempted to go for the low hand in Hold'em.

 

My second strategy is any game is to wait for good starting hands.  I already talked about Hold'em a little, the standard I want to maintain is playing no more than 33% of the hands dealt. In the case of Omaha, I'm looking for hands that can scoop the pot.  I want Aces with suited x cards, good pairs, three cards to the wheel.  I'm also playing Razz and here I want my first three cards to be below an eight.

 

I also started playing a lot of Sit-N-Go.  Here's how it went.  I played three Omaha High/Low SNG's and came in first in games 1 and 2.  Third in game 3.  I played two Razz SNG's and came in third in game 1 and first in game 2.

 

Today, I was at Pechanga.  I performed only in the 9:45 show at NCT so I figured I'd play from 3:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.  By the time, it hit 5:00 I was already up $120.  I decided to take my winnings and leave early.

 

I sat down at the $2/$4 table and I figured I only played 10 hands and muck everything else preflop. Also, everytime I made it to the river, I won the hand, which means I won every showdown.  The key is that I was more willing to throw away bad hands.

 

If you every play low limit Hold'em, you know that the rake is very high.  The only way to beat the rake, is to win and not lose. One final note is that calling down the river is very expensive. If I bet every round, that means I'm putting at risk, $12 per hand.  If I can be aggressive and raise preflop and after the flop, I'd only spend $8 to know where I stand. Once the flop hits you should spend the money to find out where your at.  Many times I folded on the flop with top pair, when anyone was aggressive with me.  There's no reason to call off a stack of chips on top pair.

 

I'll have more to day later.

Kristin Uninvited to Women of Faith

I'm not sure how I feel about this message posted on Kristin Chenoweth's website:

"It is with great regret that we let you all know Kristin Chenoweth will not be participating in the November Women of Faith concert in Oklahoma City. She has been asked to withdraw by the organization due to her publicized and heartfelt beliefs that God is accepting of all people on earth. Kristin's personal views and faith to this effect have not changed, despite the Women of Faith's actions."

Apparently, Kristin made a comment on the 700 Club that she was a member of the NYC Gay-Men's Choir.  Thus the acceptance of homosexual disqualified her from Women of Faith.

Here's an interesting post from the Women of Faith bulletin board:

It was very disappointing to hear someone so very impressed with themself....After hearing Kristin speak, a young mother came up to me and said that after listening, she felt like maybe she needed more faith so that God could do great things in her life. She had already been feeling inadequate going into the conference, but to then hear a speaker say "I know you can't take awards with you to heaven, but they sure are nice aren't they?" was very hard for her.

I'll agree she really didn't understand her audience at Women of Faith. But these actions truly sadden me.  I have gay friends, but as a friend, I do not need to constantly be in their face about the sinfulness of homosexuality.  Show me one place in the Bible where he got in the face of sinners.  I can show you passage after passage that shows Jesus getting in the face of hypocrites (the Pharisees).

It all comes to my basic belief about the Christian's response to homosexuality.  When did homosexuality become the unpardonable sin?  I know of very few people who know of ministry to homosexuals or even have strong convictions toward one.  The only response is that of judgment.

I guess this is why all Christians have bad haircuts.

Lost in the New TV Season

Just a few comments about the new TV Season.  I've only seen a handful of new shows and so far:

"How I Met Your Mother" - Sucks
"Surface" - Sticks
"My Name is Earl" - Good show so far
"Invasion" - Interesting, but not very engaging.  Will have to see more episodes.

I saw Lost last night. Very cool and still incredibly frustrating.  Is there no resolution on this island? "Lift it up"????

=========

I was talking to my co-worker about "Surface."  I mentioned that this show about alien creature on earth.  How can this show last more than one season?  My co-worker says, "what about a show about castaways on an island?" I mentioned that Gilligan's Island, lasted three seasons, so Lost can go on forever.

=========

I'm not a big fan of the supernatural/horror genre.  My wife has been wanting me to see "Medium".  I told her that I just don't care for these type of shows.  The season premiere aired and my wife really wants me to see it.  I told her that there's another show airing tomorrow called "Ghost Whisperer" starring Jennifer Love Hewitt.  Same premise, how about I watch that show.  Silence.  I laughed and then I cried.  I can still fell her punch.

Shining Hope for the Democratic Party

Based on a report from AP, there is disagreement within the Democratic Party…

"The Senate Judiciary Committee's senior Democrat, Patrick Leahy of Vermont, announced his endorsement shortly after leaving the White House. That guaranteed bipartisan backing for Roberts in Thursday's scheduled vote by the committee."

Leahy, who has led filibuster fights against Bush's lower court nominees, said in a Senate speech, "I do not intend to lend my support to an effort by this president to move the Supreme Court and the law radically to the right."

But Roberts "is a man of integrity," said Leahy, who told Roberts over the telephone about his decision. "I can only take him at his word that he does not have an ideological agenda."

Other Democrats, including Sens. Tim Johnson of South Dakota and Max Baucus of Montana, also have announced their support. Sens. Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana are leaning toward voting for Roberts. Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota is viewed as a possible vote for him, as well.

==================================

It appears that some Democrats are above partisanship.  It's interesting that no one ever called Clinton's nominee "Ginsberg" an ideologue.  She's hardly been a moderate open-minded justice.  But then again, that was Clinton's right as President, he was allowed to pick whoever would act appropriately as a justice, regardless of personal beliefs.

I still believe Democratic politicians are hypocrites, but some have been moved down the scale a little.  Let's see what happens with President Bush's next pick.