Car lies overturns and buildings destroyed

A car lies overturns and buildings destroyed in Tuscaloosa, Ala., Wednesday, April 27, 2011. A wave of severe storms laced with tornadoes strafed the South on Wednesday; buildings across swaths of the university town were damaged or destroyed

The Associated Press reported:

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – The death toll from severe storms that punished five Southern U.S. states jumped to a staggering 178 Thursday after Alabama canvassed its hard-hit counties for a new tally of lives lost.

Alabama’s state emergency management agency said it had confirmed 128 deaths, up from at least 61 earlier.

“We expect that toll, unfortunately, to rise,” Gov. Robert Bentley told ABC’s “Good Morning America.”

Mississippi officials reported 32 dead in that state and Tennessee raised its report to six from one. Another 11 have been killed in Georgia and one in Virginia.

The fierce storms Wednesday spawned tornadoes and winds that wiped out homes and businesses, forced a nuclear power plant to use backup generators and prompted the evacuation of a National Weather Service office.

The National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla., said it received 137 tornado reports around the regions, including 66 in Alabama and 38 in Mississippi.

One of the hardest-hit areas was Tuscaloosa, a city of more than 83,000 and home to the University of Alabama. The city’s police and other emergency services were devastated, the mayor said, and at least 15 people were killed and about 100 were in a single hospital.

April 27, 2011 Close Range Mississippi Tornado!

Senator Mark Pryor wants our ideas on how to cut federal spending. Take a look at this video clip below:

Senator Pryor has asked us to send our ideas to him at cutspending@pryor.senate.gov and I have done so in the past and will continue to do so in the future. Here are a few more I just emailed to him myself at 7:26 am CST on April 28, 2011.

Is Mark Pryor sincere in his pledge to cut wasteful spending? John Brummett suggests he is not. I am hopeful that he is.

John Brummett in his article “Pryor’s words drift in gentle breeze,” Arkansas News Bureau, April 24, 2011 asserted:

By offering the momentary illusion of substance, U.S. Sen. Mark Pryor gave a vintage performance the other day at the Political Animals Club.

The first report I came across declared that Pryor had said he would not vote to raise the federal government’s debt ceiling unless that action was accompanied by real and significant spending cuts.

That sounded like the senator only to a limited extent, that being the extent to which he often propounds as much like a Republican as a Democrat and can be flat wrong…

But this pronouncement didn’t sound like the senator in another respect, that being the one by which he appeared to be making a boldly declarative statement (even if wrong). Pryor’s style is the aforementioned momentary illusion of substance, meaning a statement that sounds real as the sound waves reach your ears, only then to drift away with the gentle breeze.

Indeed, the next report I came across clarified the matter. Pryor had not declared that he would insist on real and meaningful spending cuts before he voted to raise the debt ceiling. He had declared only that he would insist on a real and meaningful “commitment” to debt reduction.

Commitment is not an empirical thing. It is of the heart, mind and soul, thus not visible to the naked eye. Pryor was not making his debt-limit vote contingent on actual reductions in spending. He was making the vote contingent on reading the minds of his colleagues.

In my past posts I could have been accused of giving just general ideas of where to cut. Now I am starting in with specifics that are taken from the article “Federal Spending by the numbers, Heritage Foundation, June 1, 2010 by Brian Riedl. He notes:

• Washington spends $60,000 per hour shooting Air Force One photo-ops in front of national landmarks.
• Congress has ignored efficiency recommendations from the Department of Health and Human Services that would save $9 billion annually.
• Taxpayers are funding paintings of high-ranking government officials at a cost of up to $50,000 apiece.
• The state of Washington sent $1 food stamp checks to 250,000 households in order to raise state caseload figures and trigger $43 million in additional federal funds.
• Suburban families are receiving large farm subsidies for the grass in their backyards—subsidies that many of these families never requested and do not want.
• Homeland Security employee purchases include 63-inch plasma TVs, iPods, and $230 for a beer brewing kit.
• The National Institutes of Health spends $1.3 million per month to rent a lab that it cannot use.
• Congress recently spent $2.4 billion on 10 new jets that the Pentagon insists it does not need and will not use.
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• 

  

  2010

  With glossy waves and a rosy glow, Middleton announced her engagement to Prince William._______________________________________________________tvnewsblog.tkPrince William has spoken of his and fiancee Kate Middleton’s happiness, as the newly-engaged couple faced the cameras for the first time.The couple, both 28, will marry next spring or summer after he proposed while on holiday in Kenya in October.

  

  

  In: Joss Stone

  Joss Stone also made the cut—the English soul singer and songwriter performed at a memorial concert held at London’s Wembley Stadium on July 1, 2007, in honor of what would have been the late Princess of Wales’ 46th birthday. “We wanted to have this big concert full of energy, full of the sort of fun and happiness which I know she would have wanted,” said Prince William, who organized the event with his brother, Harry. The memorial concert was followed by a church service on August 31, the 10th anniversary of Diana’s death.

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  Kate Middleton during a visit to Witton Country Park in Darwen, northwest England, on April 11, 2011.

  

  CBS News’ royal contributor Victoria Arbiter gave Russ Mitchell a look into Prince William and Kate Middleton’s to do list as their royal wedding approaches.

Senator Mark Pryor wants our ideas on how to cut federal spending. Take a look at this video clip below:

Bradley R. Gitz wrote an excellent article about lawmakers that are not taking the debt serious. Here is a portion of the article “Heads in the sand,” Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, April 24, 2011:

    With those grand hopes now crushed by hard budget realities, the embittered response to our budget crisis on the left is to deny that it even exists, or to claim that it is of such modest nature that it can be taken care of by raising taxes on “the rich” only—a proposition which no reputable economist agrees with. 
    There is simply no serious discussion taking place at present on the left about how to prevent a looming national financial collapse. There is nodebate because there are no conceptual categories or even terminology in such quarters for dealing with such problems, only a mindset that says government must always do and spend more (which is, of course, precisely the mindset that brought us to our current impasse). 
    Liberals cannot work in a bipartisan manner with Republicans to cut spending because it would mean abandoning their rationale for political existence. There are no takers for the Founders’ idea of “limited government” any longer among Democrats, only a powerful addiction that requires fixes in the form of new government programs and functions.
    The problem isn’t just that Democrats aren’t serious about the budget deficit. It is that they refuse to allow anyone else to be. Those proposing even modest budget cuts are said to be waging “war” on (take your pick) the poor, women, minorities, children, homosexuals, and the elderly, not to mention the environment and education and whatever else can be added to enhance the hysteria level. 
    The real issue here, then, isn’t liberal demagoguery. That can always be expected. Rather, it is whether, as Democrats are betting, the American people are so dumb it will work. 
    —–––––
•–––––— 
    Free-lance columnist Bradley R. Gitz, who lives and teaches in Batesville, received his Ph.D. in political science from the University of Illinois.

Senator Pryor has asked us to send our ideas to him at cutspending@pryor.senate.gov and I have done so in the past and will continue to do so in the future. Here are a few more I just emailed to him myself at 8pm CST on April 27, 2011. 

In my past posts I could have been accused of giving just general ideas of where to cut. Now I am starting in with specifics that are taken from the article “Federal Spending by the numbers, Heritage Foundation, June 1, 2010 by Brian Riedl. He notes:

• Congress recently gave Alaska Airlines $500,000 to paint a Chinook salmon on a Boeing 737.
• The Transportation Department will subsidize up to $2,000 per flight for direct flights between Washington, D.C., and the small hometown of Congressman Hal Rogers (R–KY)—but only on Monday mornings and Friday evenings, when lawmakers, staff, and lobbyists usually fly. Rogers is a member of the Appropriations Committee, which writes the Transportation Department’s budget.
• Washington has spent $3 billion re-sanding beaches—even as this new sand washes back into the ocean.
• The Defense Department wasted $100 million on unused flight tickets and never bothered to collect refunds even though the tickets were refundable.
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• 
  

   Kate Middleton shakes hands with well-wishers following a visit with fiance Prince William to Darwen Aldridge Community Academy in Darwen, northwest England, April 11, 2011.

  

  Kate Middleton was filmed doing some pre-wedding shopping at bargain stores in London. Royal watcher Victoria Arbiter dishes on the latest wedding details.

Senator Mark Pryor wants our ideas on how to cut federal spending. Take a look at this video clip below:

Bradley R. Gitz wrote an excellent article about lawmakers that are not taking the debt serious. Here is a portion of the article “Heads in the sand,” Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, April 24, 2011:

____________________________________
    When Ryan put forth his long-term budget proposals, there was still some hope that the other side would join the conversation by offering its own plan. What the president offered instead in his recent speech at George Washington University was a shameless campaign document accusing the GOP of wanting to throw granny into the snow and starve little kids. 
    Ryan and Republicans had to have known this was coming. After all, by presenting a clear plan to reduce our gaping deficit and reform our unsustainable entitlement programs, they were striking at the heart of the Democratic empire. Democrats don’t do budget cuts and they don’t do tax reform, even if both have become necessary for the very survival of the welfare state they cherish. 
    Apart from the inherent ideological revulsion on the left to any reform that entails government spending less than before are also the consequences of dashed expectations. When Barack Obama was elected president, the assumption was that he would dramatically expand the role and size of government by creating a third installment of the New Deal (LBJ’s Great Society in the 1960s having been the second). There was no talk of reforming entitlements or of the structural insolvency of already existing social programs; rather, the focus was almost entirely upon all those new “investments” that would flesh out a new progressive era of American governance. 

•–––––— 
    Free-lance columnist Bradley R. Gitz, who lives and teaches in Batesville, received his Ph.D. in political science from the University of Illinois.

Senator Pryor has asked us to send our ideas to him at cutspending@pryor.senate.gov and I have done so in the past and will continue to do so in the future. Here are a few more I just emailed to him myself at 9:16 am CST on April 27, 2011.

In my past posts I could have been accused of giving just general ideas of where to cut. Now I am starting in with specifics that are taken from the article “Federal Spending by the numbers, Heritage Foundation, June 1, 2010 by Brian Riedl. He notes:

• A GAO audit found that 95 Pentagon weapons systems suffered from a combined $295 billion in cost overruns.
• The refusal of many federal employees to fly coach costs taxpayers $146 million annually in flight upgrades.
• Washington spent $126 million in 2009 on projects associated with the Kennedy family legacy in Massachusetts. Additionally, Senator John Kerry (D–MA) diverted $20 million from the 2010 defense budget to subsidize a new Edward M. Kennedy Institute.
• The federal government owns more than 50,000 vacant homes.
• The Federal Communications Commission spent $350,000 to sponsor NASCAR driver David Gilliland.
• Members of Congress have spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars supplying their offices with popcorn machines, plasma televisions, DVD equipment, ionic air fresheners, camcorders, and signature machines—plus $24,730 leasing a Lexus, $1,434 on a digital camera, and $84,000 on personalized calendars.
• More than $13 billion in Iraq aid has been classified as wasted or stolen. Another $7.8 billion cannot be accounted for.
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• Britain’s Prince William and Prince Harry talked about their potential future roles in the Royal Air Force. (June 18)
  
   
  Kate Middleton arrives at City Hall on March 8, 2011, in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

   
  __________________________________________________
   
  Prince William gives a rare interview. Prince William of Wales (William Arthur Philip Louis; born 21st June 1982), KG, is the elder son of Prince Charles, Prince of Wales, and the late Diana, Princess of Wales, and grandson of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. As such, he is second in the line of succession to 16 independent states, although he is resident and most directly involved with the United Kingdom, the oldest realm. PUBLIC COMAIN News item
   
  
  Britain’s Prince William watches, as Kate Middleton flips a pancake at a display by the charity Northern Ireland Cancer Fund for Children, outside the City Hall in Belfast, Northern Ireland, Tuesday, March 8, 2011.

  Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/2300-207_162-2341626-8.html#ixzz1KjDZqAqG
  __________________________________________
  He was interviewed by Alice, a ten year old cancer patient
  
  Kate Middleton, fiancee of Britain’s Prince William, meets the public after a visit to Belfast City Hall in Belfast, Northern Ireland, on March 8, 2011.

   
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Another tough night of storms and tornadoes but no one was killed. On Monday night in Arkansas eight people were killed. I did hear that three 18 wheeler trucks were turned over by the wind though.

Senator Mark Pryor wants our ideas on how to cut federal spending. Take a look at this video clip below:

Senator Pryor has asked us to send our ideas to him at cutspending@pryor.senate.gov and I have done so in the past and will continue to do so in the future. Here are a few more I just emailed to him myself at 6:59 am CST on April 27, 2011.

Bradley R. Gitz wrote an excellent article about lawmakers that are not taking the debt serious. Here is a portion of the article “Heads in the sand,” Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, April 24, 2011:

The American public seems to have finally become alert to the fact that the nation’s finances are slipping over the edge. 
    Paul Ryan’s “roadmap” has performed a useful public service in this regard. Taken together with the recommendations of the Simpson-Bowles Commission, we now have, at least on paper, a vision of how we can get out of the mess we’re in. Along these lines, the columnist Charles Krauthammer has suggested a “grand compromise” which essentially merges the ideas of Wisconsin Congressman Ryan with Simpson-Bowles by combining Ryan’s $6 trillion in cuts over the next 10 years with a nudge of the top marginal rate to 28 percent, producing a closing of the deficit gap with a federal budget at about the average post-World War II level of 20 percent of GDP. 
    Except that liberals aren’t interested, at least not in the part about cutting spending and reforming entitlements and cleaning up the tax code (which are all of a piece). What they are interested in, and displaying plenty of, beginning with President Obama himself, is demagogy. 

    Free-lance columnist Bradley R. Gitz, who lives and teaches in Batesville, received his Ph.D. in political science from the University of Illinois.

In my past posts I could have been accused of giving just general ideas of where to cut. Now I am starting in with specifics that are taken from the article “Federal Spending by the numbers, Heritage Foundation, June 1, 2010 by Brian Riedl. He notes:

• The State Department will spend $450,000 on art shows in Venice, Italy.
• During a recent three-day conference, NASA spent $62,611 on “light refreshments” for its 317 attendees—$66 per day per person. NASA officials said such expensive snacks were needed to keep its officials from wandering away from the conference.
• NASA spent $500 million constructing a 355-foot steel tower to launch a rocket that is now unlikely to ever be built.
• The Congressional Research Service has confirmed that the new health care law may subsidize Viagra and other sexual performance drugs for convicted rapists and sex offenders.
• Federal agencies are delinquent on nearly 20 percent of employee travel charge cards, costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars annually.
• The Securities and Exchange Commission spent $3.9 million rearranging desks and offices at its Washington, D.C., headquarters.
• Over half of all farm subsidies go to commercial farms, which report average household incomes of $200,000.
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• 

  Light Blue Dress

  The Princess of Wales arrives at St David’s Hall in Cardiff, for a charity concert, October 1982. She wears a gown by the Emmanuels. (Photo by Jayne Fincher/Princess Diana Archive/Getty Images)

  Part 8

  
  Associated Press

  JULY 29, 1981: Prince Charles looks at his beaming bride, the Princess of Wales, at the top of St. Paul’s Cathedral steps after their marriage in London July 29, 1981.

Another bad group of tornadoes heading to Central Arkansas tonight. Yesterday eight people were killed in Arkansas.

Senator Mark Pryor wants our ideas on how to cut federal spending. Take a look at this video clip below:

Spendthrift politicians and runaway spending. Is a balanced budget amendment the answer? Professor Williams looks at the situation. (He argues for law banning spending over certain limit of GDP, not for the balanced budget amendment.)

Wall Street Journal columnist and FOX News contributor John Fund talks to the Mackinac Center for Public Policy about the 2010 elections and their implications in Michigan as well as the evolution and impact of Alternative/New Media on the political landscape in Michigan and beyond.

Mark Pryor may have seen the light concerning cutting federal spending, but I still have my doubts because I know he is still very close to all those liberal Democrats. Sometime I wonder why the Democrats can not see the light concerning the need to cut spending and attack the huge federal debt. Below is a portion of an article by John Fund of the Wall Street Journal that was published on April 20, 2011:

Senator Pryor has asked us to send our ideas to him at cutspending@pryor.senate.gov and I have done so in the past and will continue to do so in the future. Here are a few more I just emailed to him myself at 3:57 pm CST on April 26, 2011.

In my past posts I could have been accused of giving just general ideas of where to cut. Now I am starting in with specifics that are taken from the article “Federal Spending by the numbers, Heritage Foundation, June 1, 2010 by Brian Riedl. He notes:

• The Legal Services Corporation, which is supposed to provide legal services to the poor, has repeatedly ignored warnings to stop spending its money on alcohol. It also funds limousines, first-class airfare, and “death by Chocolate” pastries for its executives.
• The Department of Energy spent nine years and $153 million on an obsolete cyber-security project that was supposed to safeguard America’s nuclear weapons information.
• The stimulus set aside $350 million for a national broadband coverage map—even though one private firm stated it could create one for $3.5 million.
• Fannie Mae—now backed up by taxpayers—paid $6.3 million in legal defense costs for ousted executives such as Franklin Raines. An additional $16.8 million was spent defending Fannie Mae’s regulators in litigation against the former executives.
• The Census Bureau spent $2.5 million on Super Bowl ads, and on-air mentions by sportscasters.
• New documents reveal that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) lost 1,000 computers in 2008. Not to be outdone, Homeland Security officers lost nearly 200 guns in places like restaurant restrooms, convenience stores, and bowling alleys. Several of the guns ended up in the hands of criminals.
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•  

  

  Attending a Wedding

  Princess Diana wearing a pink outfit at the wedding of her former flatmate Carolyn Pride and William Bartholomew, London, September 1982. (Photo by Jayne Fincher/Getty Images)

  Part 7

  

  Associated Press

  JULY 29, 1981: Prince Charles kisses his bride’s hand on the balcony of Buckingham Palace in London July 29, 1981.

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