RUTHFULLY YOURS

If you want to learn whether subsidizing wind turbines makes sense, just glance across the pond. Wind and solar subsidies have effectively doubled the cost of electricity in many European countries.Wind and solar sound good until you run the numbers.Every installation places an ongoing burden on tax and rate payers.At the end of 2013 the PTC, the production tax credit for wind power, expired.
The push is on for Congress to bring it back.Electricity from the wind and sun is anything but free.

Marita Noon argues effectively at CFACT.org that this would be a mistake.
The author of Energy Freedom, Marita Noon serves as the executive director for Energy Makes America Great Inc. and the companion educational organization, the Citizens’ Alliance for Responsible Energy (CARE). Together they work to educate the public and influence policy makers regarding energy, its role in freedom, and the American way of life. Combining energy, news, politics, and, the environment through public events, speaking engagements, and media, the organizations’ combined efforts serve as America’s voice for energy. – See more at: http://www.cfact.org/2014/07/08/the-ptc-extension-more-taxpayer-dollars-for-green-energy/#sthash.AeEMO8Kn.dpufMarita Noon argues effectively at CFACT.org that this would be a mistake.http://www.cfact.org/2014/07/08/the-ptc-extension-more-taxpayer-dollars-for-green-energy/
This tug-of-war is seen, perhaps most obviously, in the so-called renewable energy field. After Solyndra, and the more than fifty other stimulus-funded Green energy projects that have failed or are circling the drain, the public has grown weary, and wary, of any more spending on Green energy. The money isn’t there to spend, and the motive behind the 2009 rush to push billions of taxpayer dollars out through the Department of Energy has been tainted by corruption and illegal activity.
The Green-energy emphasis was sold as a job creator for unemployed Americans, as a cure for global warming, and as a way to slow a perceived energy shortage. It sounded so positive in the many speeches President Obama gave as a sales pitch to the American public.
Today, Americans know better.
They knew about Solyndra—which took over five hundred million dollars and then folded. Thanks in large part to my exposé, many now know about Abengoa and the Solana solar project—which took billions of taxpayer dollars and is now functioning and producing electricity but does so by breaking immigration and labor laws, giving foreigners hiring preference, and stiffing American suppliers.
Watching multiple predictions fail and proponents get rich, Americans instinctively know that the whole global warming agenda doesn’t add up—as evidenced by this week’s International Conference on Climate Change where more than 600 “skeptics” from around the world gathered to discuss real science and policy.
With headlines heralding: “North Dakota has joined the ranks of the few places in the world that produce more than a million barrels of oil per day,” people know there isn’t an energy shortage. And America’s new energy abundance is on top of our rich reserves of coal and uranium that can provide for our electrical needs for centuries to come.
Yet, the White House keeps pushing the Green-energy narrative and, on July 3, 2014, “The Energy Department Just Announced $4 Billion For Projects That Fight Global Warming,” as the headline reads at ThinkProgress.org.
Wind Energy and the Production Tax Credit

According to the latest opinion poll, published on July 16, President Putin’s approval rating among different segments of Russia’s electorate has risen to an unprecedented 66 percent. This may change quickly, however, if he comes to be perceived as weak and indecisive in handling the next stage of the Ukrainian crisis – the one that may entail heavy fighting in Donetsk and Lugansk, with fresh civilian casualties and further deterioration of the beleaguered insurgents’ military position.

Putin’s popularity is partly due to the improving living standards, but it also rests on the hugely important perception that he has managed to bring Russia back to major power status after the decade of domestic decline and international humiliation under Boris Yeltsin. His counterattack in Southern Ossetia in August 2008, his nifty defusion of the Syrian crisis last September, and his energy deal with China in May are widely seen as the key markers on the road to Russia’s geostrategic recovery.

The Russians are far more concerned about external security than their peers in Western Europe or North America, which is unsurprising in view of the historical record and the country’s absence of natural barriers to foreign invasions. The massive Golden Horde onslaught from the east (1237-1240), which destroyed Kiev and eventually devastated all of the Kievan Rus’ – save the forest belt-protected Novgorod and Pskov – coincided with the attack by the Swedes (1240) and the Teutonic Knights (1242) from the west. The latter two were defeated by Prince Alexander Nevsky, but the consequences of the two-pronged attack for the Russian collective psyche were profound and long-lasting.

The sense of insecurity was enhanced by the Polish invasions of 1610-1613. They occurred during the “Times of Troubles,” a period of domestic political turmoil which was overcome at the last minute by the joint early-modern patriotic appeal of a commoner and an aristocrat, Kuzma Minin and Count Dmitry Pozharsky. The long-term result was Russia’s conscious and continuous policy of territorial enlargement – most notably from Peter’s decisive victory at Poltava to Catherine’s participation in the partitions of Poland – which permanently brought Russia into the league of great European powers by the end of the 18th century. The two autocrats’ successful attempt to create defensible buffer zones on all sides – in Ukraine, the Caucasus, Central Asia, and Siberia – paid rich dividends in defending the heartland against Napoleon in 1812. In all key respects the same geostrategic principle applied to the existential struggle against Hitler in 1941-1945.

Below is a list of 267 protests against our porous borders and the open invitation by the Obama regime to people from all over the world to come to America and receive myriad social services and other incentives AT YOUR EXPENSE – our taxpayer dollars at work. This at a time when many Americans are unemployed and under-employed, government spending for entitlement programs is at an all time high, defense spending is dropping precipitously and domestic law enforcement is being militarized!
This travesty is already wrecking havoc by bringing DISEASE (tuberculosis, chagas, leprosy, scabies, lice, swine flu, etc), CRIME (human trafficking, drug smuggling, gangs, murder, property destruction), ISLAMIC TERRORISTS, etc., to our once great nation.
National sovereignty is fast becoming a concept of the past and the Constitution has been shredded. (Obama and his DOJ are publicly signaling impunity for anyone coming to America illegally – even criminals and Islamic terrorists)! The iconic phrase extolling our representative government as one that is “for the people, by the people, of the people” (Gettysburg Address) has been trampled on.
The days of our once great constitutional republic may be limited.
JANET LEVY, LOS ANGELES
http://www.alipac.us/f8/protest-times-locations-july-18-19-national-protests-against-amnesty-307111/

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued directives for expanded passenger screening at airports as a result of the turmoil and new threat intelligence coming out of the Middle East, especially in Syria and Iraq. DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson said that he’s told the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) to put in place “enhanced security measures in the coming days.”

There are reports of new generations of bombs now being developed by terrorists that could present serious risk to commercial aviation. This could lead to enhanced scrutiny of U.S.-bound passengers, including more explosive-detection equipment and random screenings in the near future. The new challenge facing intelligence agencies, such as the DHS and particularly the TSA — the component of the DHS that runs airport security — is the growth of potentially radicalized terrorists or foreign fighters carrying valid U.S. and European passports. Syria and Iraq have become an incubator for terrorists that pose a similar threat to that of al Qaeda a decade ago.

Thankfully, airport security has come a long way since 9/11. We now have hardened cockpits, air marshals, more sophisticated screening equipment and better intelligence sharing among law enforcement. Although weapons and potential threats are uncovered almost every day by the TSA, we have been fortunate not to have experienced another major terrorism incident in recent years in the transportation arena.

The new warnings about new bombing capabilities being developed by terrorists are a signal that we cannot be complacent and that our own security capabilities must be constantly upgraded against growing and dangerous malicious intent.

The DHS, through the Transportation Security Lab and the Science and Technology Directorate, are dedicated to working together in research and development to ensure that a new generation of technology is incorporated into our transportation security posture. The DHS is pursuing layered defenses at airports and train stations, often referred to as “the checkpoint of the future,” that will help prevent attacks.

The president has been able to restore something that Barnum and Bailey abandoned back in 2006 — the three-ring circus. Every week there seems to be some new gimmick or act that is meant to entertain and distract from the reality that we face: that, by design or by incompetence, Team Obama has no clue what they are doing or trying to accomplish on the world stage – but the show must go on!

The president is able to keep the show going – with his global “big top,” there is always something to delight his base – as he and his minions poke and taunt the Republican elephants in the first ring, with his cabinet of high wire walkers who keep narrow control of the message over the top of the second ring, and the third ring the ever-present Vice President “Joseph the Great” Biden doing his dog and pony show. Oh, and did I mention the clowns?

Entering from stage left is his Clown Car of Freedom that contains an endless line up of clowns (also known as national security “experts”) to delight the global audience with a constant stream of hysterical antics. Ah, yes – Ambassador Susan Rice is quite the driver, weaving in and out and around the three rings – and that red rubber nose compliments her big red clown shoes!

Let’s look at a few of the recent acts that have come popping out of the Obama White House Clown Car of Freedom: