Of headlines, stupidity, Founding Fathers and JFK

I had several things I was going to post about today but, like I do every morning, I read the Drudge Report headlines.

I was struck by the stuck-on-stupid actions and comments of people - and I couldn't help but wonder what our Founding Fathers would think of some of these things.

For example:

Detroit Mayor: 'We are in an environment of entitlement'...

“We are in an environment, I think, of entitlement, we’ve got a lot of people who are city workers, who for years and years, 20, 30 years, think they are entitled to a job and all that comes with it,” Bing said.

He added: “Nobody wants to go backwards, but in order for us to move this city forward we’re going to have to take a step or two backwards — and then, I think, all of us have to participate in the pain that’ s upon us right now.”

He's right, but nobody wants to admit it and, if he wasn't Black, he would probably be called racist for saying so.

Fast food workers demand $15 per hour salaries...

Yeah - because I should earn what I think I'm worth rather than what my employer thinks I'm worth and because flipping burgers and putting the right food on a tray is as valuable as being able to run a multi-million international company.

So much for a 99-cent menu.

Any job I hold should pay me a wage that is capable of supporting a family of four, regardless of the job, the skills that are (or are not) required or the resulting impact on the cost of the products or services I'm providing via that job.

This concept is being promoted by unions and willingly adopted by gullible individuals - and it is completely and totally opposite of all the principles on which this country was based.

If you can hold any job and be paid what you want, where is your drive to succeed and excel? What is your motivation to do better and be a more active contributor to your community? What happened to the idea of building a better mousetrap?

And where does such a concept lead? What would our Founding Fathers think of this attitude? Forget turning over in their graves - they're spinning faster than a top

UPDATE: EGYPT ISLAMISTS HURRIEDLY APPROVE NEW CONSTITUTION...

Liberals, leftists, Christians, moderate Muslims withdrew before vote...

Retains Islamic law as main source of legislation...

No equal rights for women; owning slaves not banned...

Remember when President Barack Obama and other leftists were praising the so-called Arab Spring and saying how democracy in Egypt was such a good thing? Now we find that their new constitution doesn't contain equal rights for women and doesn't ban the owning of slaves.

How do you have an otherwise 'civilized' nation that takes such positions? And will we have outraged comments from our president, leftists, womens' rights organizations and the NAACP???

Syria shuts down Internet...

Curtails land lines, cell phones...

Things have been really bad in Syria for a long time, but not many have paid as much attention to what's going on there - at least, not compared to Egypt and other countries in the area. But I'm not surprised by the action to block the Internet - limited communication and reporting on events is usually one of the first things an oppressive government does in order to prevent news about what they are doing from getting out. Controlling the message is critical to tyrants.

And then I think about some of the other news reports I've read in the last several days, including:

Judge: Northside ISD CANNOT Expel Student for Rejecting RFID Tracking Chip

says district's tracking program 'violates fundamental Constitutional Rights'

Seriously? We're letting schools track our kids? Are we just getting them used to be tracked by the controlling authority?

TSA Refuses to Show at Committee Hearing

Claims House Transportation Committee has no jurisdiction over it

Are we going to continue to let agencies ignore the checks and balances inherent in the system by letting them thumb their collective noses at Congress?

And on a local level, we have politicians and the daily paper calling for a ban on a type of business they don't like. Yes, in this era of high unemployment and people and businesses leaving the city, they want to ban a job provider who pays property taxes, income taxes, wages and who purchases supplies and goods, contributing to the overall economy of the area.

What kind of bizzaro world are we in?

With all this, I got depressed at the state of the world today because it seems so daunting to fight against the constant attack on individual liberty and penchant for being dependents of governmental tyranny.

But then I remember these three quotes and I'm ready to face the day:

"Today, we need a nation of Minutemen, citizens who are not only prepared to take arms, but citizens who regard the preservation of freedom as the basic purpose of their daily life and who are willing to consciously work and sacrifice for that freedom." ~ John F. Kennedy

"[W]hat country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time that [the] people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms...The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants." ~ Thomas Jefferson

"Live free or die; death is not the worst of evils." ~ General George Stark

Quotes of the Day - Michigan

From a Wall Street Journal article on the disaster that is Michigan's finances: "Michigan's War on the Middle Class" by William McGurn (emphasis added).

Michigan today is not a struggling state like California or New Jersey or even Wisconsin. It is a basket case, with worse to come if things do not change quickly—especially in the relation of the public to the private sector.

"Many of the protesters seem to think the war is between rich and poor," says Michael LaFaive, director of the Morey Fiscal Policy Initiative at the Michigan-based Mackinac Center. "But the real class war today is between government and the people who pay for it. And the government's been winning."

and this:

For every dreary statistic, Michigan has a real advantage: a large freshwater coastline, a farm sector that could be an even larger export industry, a rising health-care industry, energy reserves waiting to be tapped, and affordable communities. The point here is not that if you build it they will come. The point is if you get off their backs, they will come build it themselves.

David Littmann, an economist and colleague of Mr. LaFaive at Mackinac, says he's deeply skeptical of whether Mr. Snyder's reforms go far enough. But about Michigan's potential he has no doubts, if government would only let the market decide.

"If we created a climate where the risks and rewards were attractive to capital, we'd find entrepreneurs from all over the world finding their way to Michigan," he says. "They in turn would be a catalyst for other industries we can't even imagine now—and the kind of Michigan that could be even more dynamic than it was when the auto industry was at its peak."