If you're in the Salisbury/Fruitland area on Tuesday, I hope you can make it out to my town hall event. I'll be taking questions about the work I'm doing in Washington and listening to your concerns.
The town hall will be at Black Diamond Catering and Lodge starting at 5:30 PM.
Here are all the details:
When - Tuesday, August 20th 5:30pm-7:00pm
Where - Black Diamond Catering and Lodge 219 S Fruitland Blvd Fruitland, MD 21826
I look forward to hearing from you about issues you care about.
Other dates and locations...........
I'm hosting two more town hall events Thursday.
I'll be in Chestertown at noon and Easton at 5:30pm.
Here are all the details:
Chestertown Town Hall When - Thursday, August 22nd Noon-1:30pm
Where - Kent County Public Library 408 High Street Chestertown, MD 21620 ---
Easton Town Hall When - Thursday, August 22nd 5:30pm-7:00pm
Where - Brookletts Place Senior Center 400 Brookletts Avenue Easton, Maryland 21601
I look forward to hearing from you about issues you care about.
It’s about how things really work on the inside of a bank.
Any big bank – any big bank with an incentive to make money, which of course would be all of them.
This is one lesson you won’t ever forget…
Banks have “assets,” otherwise less technically defined as “stuff.”
The stuffing in the stuff banks own (meaning they have a position, or are the beneficiaries of a stream of income) is stuff like loans, like real mortgages, like mortgage-backed securities, like derivatives.
Let’s talk about derivatives.
Why? Because they amount to a huge pile of stuff banks own.
Why? Because derivatives aren’t exchange-traded, for one thing. And that’s where I’m going to be going in a second, so stay with me.
BERLIN — An alleged drunk driver crashed into a marked police car early Saturday morning on Route 50, causing significant damage to each of the vehicles.
On Aug. 17, at approximately 2:39 a.m., a trooper assigned to the Maryland State Police, Berlin Barrack, was on duty on routine patrol travelling west on Route 50 in a marked Maryland State Police Unit.
As the trooper entered the intersection of Keyser Point Road with a green traffic signal, a 2010 Ford Mustang, being operated by David Leyden, made a left turn from eastbound Route 50 at Keyser Point Road against a red traffic signal and into the path of the marked State Police vehicle. More
More than 14,000 current and former Energy Department employees are at risk of identity theft. For a second time this year, DoE confirmed hackers broke into its unclassified computer network, which disclosed employees' personally identifiable information (PII).
"Individual notifications to affected current employees will begin no later than this Friday, Aug. 16, and will be completed by Aug. 30," stated an internal Energy Department email sent to employees earlier this week, which was obtained by Federal News Radio. "While a significant number of employees whose information may have been affected may no longer be employed by the department, it will be necessary to obtain current contact information in order to notify these personnel. The individual notification process for former employees will begin this week."
DoE told employees it is working with federal law enforcement agencies to find out more about the hacking incident, which happened at the end of July. More
According to the New York Times, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano "popped in" to a 2011 meeting between Terry McAuliffe, at the time chairman of GreenTech Automotive, and Alejandro Mayorkas, director of the Department of Homeland Security's US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) branch, as the two men were discussing issues related to the issuance of temporary residential visas for foreign national EB-5 investors in McAuliffe's company.
On September 1, 2011, not long after this meeting, Mayorkas reversed a ruling made by career DHS officials that had blocked EB-5 investments into GreenTech Automotive. Over the next year, according to the New York Times, an additional $25 million from 50 Chinese nationals flowed into the coffers of investment funds whose sole use of proceeds was to provide cash to GreenTech Automotive.
Speaking at a town hall meeting on Wednesday, Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) claimed former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton “screamed at a member of Congress” two days after the Benghazi attack for daring to classify the tragedy as terrorism.
The alleged incident occurred during a briefing just two days after four Americans were killed in a fiery assault on a U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya.
“Two days after this attack we were in a briefing with Hillary Clinton and she screamed at a member of Congress who’d dare suggest that this was a terrorist attack,” Kinzinger told constituents in Rochelle, Ill., on Wednesday. ”Now we find out that while it was happening they knew it was a terrorist attack. These are answers, we are going to get to the bottom of this.”
Scott Brown is thinking about a 2016 Presidential run. The former Massachusetts Senator was in Iowa this weekend to attend the state fair. As we all know, Iowa is the first state to caucus or have a primary. Many politicians will make a stop in Iowa early on in the process to try to gauge interest.
According to the former Senator he made the trip all the way out to Iowa to try and gauge interest in his “brand of politics”. The fair especially is a place for many candidates to visit before a presidential run.
Currently Scott Brown is working at a law firm, but has been rumored to be looking at several different seats. Many have thought that Scott Brown would look into challenging incumbent U.S. Senator from New Hampshire, Jeanne Shaheen. Also, the latest rumor found Mr. Brown looking at a run for Massachusetts Governor in 2014. More
The specter of libertarianism is haunting America. Advocates of sharply reducing the government’s size, scope and spending are raising big bucks from GOP donors, trying to steal the mantle of populism, being blamed for the demise of Detroit and even getting caught in the middle of a battle for the Republican Party. Yet libertarians are among the most misunderstood forces in today’s politics. Let’s clear up some of the biggest misconceptions.
1. Libertarians are a fringe band of “hippies of the right.” In 1971, the controversial and influential author Ayn Rand denounced right-wing anarchists as “hippies of the right,” a charge still leveled against libertarians, who push for a minimal state and maximal individual freedom.
Libertarians are often dismissed as a mutant subspecies of conservatives: pot smokers who are soft on defense and support marriage equality. But depending on their views, libertarians often match up equally well with right- and left-wingers.
The earliest example of libertarian principles in partisan politics might have come in the late 19th and early 20th centuries,when Anti-Imperialist League Democrats rejected empire and war — and believed in free trade and racial equality at a time when none of that was popular. More recently, civil libertarians such as Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) supported Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) in his filibuster on domestic drones and government surveillance.
Libertarians are found across the political spectrum and in both major parties. In September 2012, the Reason-Rupe Poll found that about one-quarter of Americans fall into the roughly libertarian category of wanting to reduce the government’s roles in economic and social affairs. That’s in the same ballpark as what other surveys have found and more than enough to swing an election.
An El Al plane heading from Tel Aviv to New York City made the unusual move of returning to the gate to pick up an 11-year-old cancer patient after she was earlier removed from the aircraft for having lost her passport.
The rabbi who organized trip earlier this month called the event “one of the most incredible stories regarding El Al that I have ever come across in my life.”
Inbar Chomsky, an Israeli girl, was one of 30 children flying to the U.S. to take part in Camp Simcha, a summer camp in Glen Spey, New York for children with serious illnesses run by Chai Lifeline. More
This might be the perfect piece of furniture for the folks living in the Doomsday Castle. It’s a full-sized sofa that also houses a large gun safe.
The sofa with a secret comes from the Heracles Research Corporation and is on display this weekend at the Fort Worth Hunter’s Extravaganza. It’s a standard size sofa, with a 78-inch long safe hiding under the cushions. According to the company’s website, the safe has a two hour fire rating. However, weighing in at 650 pounds, it’s not likely that your friends will be eager to help when you move. More
Book names names, details strategies to 'transform' U.S. NEW YORK – New Zealander Trevor Loudon has just published an encyclopedic new 689-page volume, “The Enemies Within: Communists, Socialists and Progressives in the U.S. Congress,” to accompany his 668-page 2011 book, “Barack Obama and the Enemies Within.”
In both volumes, Loudon has proved himself to be among the foremost experts in the world investigating and reporting the penetration of communists, socialists and the current group of “progressives” affiliated with Democratic Party politics who portray themselves as liberals.
Big, nonnative and hungry, the blue catfish is spreading into Chesapeake Bay tributaries and could alter the balance of species in local waters.
One reason: As the fish grow close to their normal 30- to 40-pound weight, they shift their feeding habits from a little bit of everything to fish only.
That has some worried about what will happen to smaller species in the bay and its tributaries. More
As a reaction to the crack epidemic of the 1980s, many federal drug laws carry strict mandatory sentences. This has stirred unease in Congress and sparked a bipartisan effort to revise and relax some of the more draconian laws.
Traditionally — meaning before Barack Obama — that’s how laws were changed: We have a problem, we hold hearings, we find some new arrangement, which is ratified by Congress and signed by the president.
That was then. On Monday, Attorney General Eric Holder, a liberal in a hurry, ordered all U.S. attorneys to simply stop charging nonviolent, non-gang-related drug defendants with crimes that, while fitting the offense, carry mandatory sentences. Find some lesser, non-triggering charge. How might you do that? Withhold evidence — e.g., about the amount of dope involved.
Lawmakers on Sunday sharply differed over how the United States should respond to the latest round of violence in Egypt that left hundreds of civilians dead and thousands injured during last week's crackdown by a ruling military that is still being aided by the U.S.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a leading voice in Congress on foreign affairs, called on the Obama administration to cut off $1.3 billion in annual aid to Egypt, saying the administration's reluctance to do so has weakened U.S. credibility there.
"For us to sit by and watch this happen is a violation of everything that we stood for," said McCain, said on CNN's "State of the Union." "When we threaten something... and then not do it, then you lose your credibility and your influence." More
Oslo - Private Bradley Manning, the US intelligence analyst behind the largest single leak of secret documents in American history, would be a worthy winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, according to a petition presented Monday in the Norwegian capital Oslo.
Norman Solomon of US activist group RootsAction handed over a list signed by over 100,000 people, mainly from the United States, who claim that Manning helped shorten the Iraq war by leaking secret documents to WikiLeaks, Norwegian public broadcaster NRK reported.
Some signatories added comments explaining why Manning deserved the award, including a Czech national who wrote: "I know you can't really do this because of (the) USA, but still. He deserves it more than (US President) Barack Obama did."
Obama was a surprise winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009.
Manning faces 90 years in prison. A court martial is ongoing at Fort Meade, Maryland. The petition was presented to the Norwegian Nobel Institute, which helps the Nobel Committee vet candidates for the coveted award.
Asle Toje, head of research at the institute, said it was not the first time a petition had been presented in support of a candidate and that the five-member committee was not swayed by such initiatives.
"This is not a popularity contest," Asle told news agency NTB.
The Nobel Committee has received a record 259 nominations for the 2013 Nobel Peace Prize, including Pakistani teenager Malala Yousafzai who was shot by the Taliban in October for advocating education for girls.
The previous record was 241 nominations in 2011.
The name of this year's winner is due to be announced October 11.
A massive weekend raid netted several hundred illegal immigrants who were either car wash workers or customers in Phoenix, according to immigrant-rights groups who say the move highlights the ongoing tensions within President Obama’s deportation policy.
Even as Capitol Hill lawmakers debate whether to move on an immigration bill this year, many immigrant-rights advocates are lobbying Mr. Obama to halt all deportations, and they have picked several cases to make a stand.
Just last week, activists in Ohio demanded a halt to the deportation of a man whose son suffers from cerebral palsy. The Obama administration complied, granting him a one-year stay. More
You know that the rule of law has essentially vanished when the Attorney General himself feels compelled to state: “America’s legal system, we must face the reality that, as it stands, our system is in too many respects broken.” That is precisely what Eric Holder stated earlier this week, while seemingly taking no responsibility for that fact despite being the top lawyer in the nation. Guess he was too busy protecting his banker masters from prosecution to notice.
In any event, the broken criminal justice system really took center stage earlier this year when the federal prosector Carmen Ortiz drove child prodigy Aaron Swartz to his death by piling on overzealous charges in an attempt to advance her career. Instead she drove a gentle genius to an untimely death. Kudos Ortiz.
In light of Holder’s comment, Bloomberg columnist Clive Crook wrote an excellent article outlining some of the main attributes of out increasingly Kafkaesque legal system. Here are some key excerpts:
“As a prosecutor, a judge, an attorney in private practice, and now, as our nation’s attorney general, I’ve seen the criminal justice system firsthand, from nearly every angle. While I have the utmost faith in — and dedication to — America’s legal system, we must face the reality that, as it stands, our system is in too many respects broken.”
A new study says more Americans received Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) benefits in 2012 than the entire population of New York City.
Our Generation, a free market non-profit advocacy group, says in its “Drivers of SSDI Growth” report that a record 8,733,461 Americans now receive disability benefits. According to U.S. Census data, the population of New York City is 8,336,697.
“Despite its humble beginnings as an insurance plan for long-tenured workers with the misfortune of becoming disabled before retirement, SSDI has ballooned into a $135 billion behemoth threatening to collapse under its own weight, and to take a bite out of Medicare on the way down,” said Our Generation Executive Director MacMillin Slobodien.
The group says it plans to mount an aggressive public relations campaign to educate taxpayers on the explosive growth in the disability program.
The chart below explains, in the simplest possible terms, why there are many more "Detroits" on deck. It shows the underfunded status of public vs private retiree healthcare plans. It needs no commentary, although it may deserve one question: what happens when all those public servants who have been promised over a trillion in healthcare benefits upon retirement, realize it was all a lie? And then come... the pensions.
AND NOW FOR a more global perspective on paying for pension fund obligations, here is Del. Andy Serafini of Hagerstown, who emailed me with his own, thoughtful analysis, which is more downbeat than mine. Except for editing to clarify or to make grammatical changes, the thoughts are the Republican delegate’s:
“I read with interest some of the recent posts and comments on the Maryland Pension Plan. I know that politicians have trouble with feeling that we are the subject of every comment but your statement about ‘conservatives warning of doom and gloom,’ or something along those lines got my attention.
“I have attached several pieces of information for your review that might paint a different picture. Certainly, the piece from The Economist, which would never be confused for a conservative publication, speaks volumes. That we make the top for [poorly] funded status is not encouraging. More
No wonder they're called man's best friend. It seems that some people can show more caring for dogs than they do for their own species.
A new Northeastern University study uncovers the compassion people can feel for dogs.
People feel more empathy with dogs than they do for other humans, according to the study. However, people feel the same amount of empathy for children as they canines, the study adds. More
A Rhode Island Catholic bishop said that he has changed his voter registration from Democrat to Republican because of the strong support for abortion and same-sex marriage on display at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in 2012.
According to CNSNews, Bishop Thomas Tobin, 65, who heads the diocese of Providence, RI, said, “The a-ha moment for me was the 2012 Democratic National Convention – it was just awful.”
Tobin was at a meeting of the Rhody Young Republicans in Providence. He has been a registered Democrat since 1969.
“I just said I can’t be associated structurally with that group, in terms of abortion and NARAL and Planned Parenthood and [the] same-sex marriage agenda and cultural destruction I saw going on,” he said. “I just couldn’t do it anymore.”
Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley gave his 7th consecutive annual address to the Maryland Association of Counties Convention today in Ocean City which focused on a litany of what the governor touted as his economic successes and achievements. Business Leader Larry Hogan took aim at the falsehoods in O’Malley’s speech. “He was not just stretching the truth, it’s worse than that. Nearly everything he said in his speech today was blatantly false, much of what he said was actually the complete opposite of the truth.” Hogan, a former Maryland Cabinet Secretary said, “The governor is entitled to his own opinions but he can’t just make up his own facts and pretend that they are true.” Change Maryland recently showed that unemployment has nearly doubled under O’Malley from 3.6% to 7%, and the actual number of Marylanders unemployed grew from 108,000 to 218,000 people under O’Malley. “You can’t say you are most proud of your success in job creation, and say you recovered 99% of all the jobs lost, when you actually doubled the unemployment rate and lost 110,000 more jobs, more than any governor in history,” said Hogan, who founded the group Change Maryland.
Larry Hogan, the founder and President of the Hogan Companies, leaders in economic development who have brought hundreds of companies and thousands of jobs to Maryland went on to say, “You can’t brag about your success in strengthening small businesses, when you have lost 6,500 small businesses. You can’t claim success in economic development when you have lost 10 of the 13 Fortune 500 companies in the state, under your watch."
“How can the governor say that he cut more spending - more than anyone in history, when he actually increased spending by $8 billion, an increase of more than 30%, and claim that he lowered taxes when he enacted the largest tax increases in history, 40 consecutive tax hikes that take an additional $3.1 billion a year out of the pockets of struggling Maryland families and small businesses,” said Hogan.
The economic think-tank, Change Maryland, has produced a number of economic reports that have shown the decline in Maryland’s economy. The group was the first to itemize, and then total, all of the O’Malley tax increases and study their impact on Maryland families and businesses. They did a report which gained national attention showing a mass exodus of 31,000 taxpayers fleeing the state, the largest of any state in the region and one of the worst in the nation. The group also held a business summit on improving economic competitiveness, attended by economists, policy groups, and over 400 business leaders from across the state to come up with proposed solutions to the state's serious economic decline under the O’Malley Administration.
“What we saw today was a governor spinning magical tales of successes that only exist in his own mind. The people of Maryland deserve to know the truth,” Hogan said.
Location: John J. Williams Highway SR 24 west of Mulberry Knoll Road, Lewes, DE
Date of Occurrence: Saturday, August 17, 2013 at 9:20 p.m.
Defendant/Charges/Bond Information: Henry Roblero-Mazariegos-24 of Georgetown, DE (no photo available at time of release) Vehicular Homicide Second Degree Vehicular Assault Second Degree (2 counts) Driving Under the Influence of Alcohol Driving while Suspended or Revoked Child Under 8 and < 65 lbs must be in Child Restraint Committed to SCI on $13,001 Cash Bond
Victim(s): Genesis Valasquez-Santizo-2 of Georgetown, DE (Deceased) 17 year old male from Lewes, DE (Non-life threatening injuries) 21 year old male from Lewes, DE (Non-life threatening injuries)
Resume: Lewes-The Delaware State Police Crash Reconstruction Unit has charged a 24 year old Georgetown man with Vehicular Homicide and related charges in connection with the death of a 2 year old girl from a motor vehicle crash that occurred last night in Lewes, DE.
Preliminary investigation indicates that the crash occurred last evening at approximately 9:20 p.m. as a 19 year old man from Rehoboth Beach, DE was operating a 1999 Chevrolet Trailblazer traveling John J. Williams Highway eastbound, stopping and preparing to make a left turn into a private driveway. The Trailblazer was stopped and had its left turn signal activated while waiting for westbound traffic to clear.
Henry Roblero-Mazariegos-24 was operating a 2002 Mazda Protégé traveling eastbound on John J. Williams Highway SR 24 and failed to observe the stopped Trailblazer. The front of the Mazda Protégé struck the rear the Chevrolet Trailblazer.
Genesis Valazquez-Santizo-2 from Georgetown, DE was a rear seat passenger in the Mazda Protégé operated by Roblero-Mazariegos. The investigation determined that the 2 year old victim was not properly secured within the child restraint seat, and the seat was not properly secured within the vehicle, causing her to be ejected and propelled forward within the vehicle.
Genesis Valazquez-Santizo was transported by ambulance to the Beebe Hospital and was pronounced dead due to traumatic injuries.
Roblero-Mazariegos was properly restrained and refused medical treatment.
The 19 year old male driver of the Chevrolet was properly restrained and was not injured. Two passengers of the Chevrolet identified as a 21 year old male from Lewes, DE and a 17 year old male also from Lewes, DE were both properly restrained and transported to the Beebe Hospital with non-life threatening injuries. (Treatment status and disposition not available at the time of this release.)
After further investigation it was determined that Roblero-Mazariegos was driving under the influence of alcohol. He was taken into custody without incident and charged with the above crimes. He was committed to the Sussex Correctional Institution on $13, 001 Cash Bond.
The roadway was shutdown in both directions for three hours while the crash was investigated and cleared. The Delaware State Police Crash Reconstruction Unit continues to investigate this crash.
We now have a plethora of pertinent information regarding the state of our economy in Wicomico County.
1. Number of Wicomico County state & local Income tax returns - actual filing data, and, liability per individual tax return, including corporate liability. 2. Extensive compilation of US BLS data regarding our local area workforce numbers, unemployment, etc. 3. Realty-trac foreclosure rate information. 4. Actual number of factory business closings and identities. 5. Population census numbers 6. Voter registration numbers
According to all of the above cited information sources, and, not depending on any single one - but through collective analysis - I believe one can accurately conclude that the current state of our local economy is in shambles. Although some of our elected officials can try and put lipstick on a pig and call it beautiful - (reference to 2014 County Executive Budget Narrative - http://www.wicomicocounty.org/departments/finance_budget/budget%20narrative%20April%2016.pdf -) that does not hide the simple fact that our County's economic picture is horrible. Every one of the economic indicators cited above - confirms that Wicomico County is deep in malarkey - yet the government spending grows. Why the DT has not addressed it until today - I have no idea.
On the bright side - SBYnews reporting - has been ON THE BULLSEYE!
