MARYLAND, DELAWARE GOVERNORS ISSUE FRIENDLY WAGER ON “GOVERNOR’S CHALLENGE” YOUTH BASKETBALL TOURNEY

ANNAPOLIS, MD (December 21, 2010) – Governor Martin O’Malley of Maryland and his counterpart, Delaware Governor Jack Markell, announced today a friendly wager on the outcome of the inaugural Governor’s Challenge at the Wicomico Youth and Civic Center December 28-30.  The Governor's Challenge, a three-day tournament, where supremacy in boy’s high school basketball between the two states will be determined, pits 24 teams from Delaware and Maryland against each other for a year of bragging rights. Tickets are on sale now through the Wicomico Youth and Civic Center ticket office.

On the line in this friendly wager is a Smith Island Cake, the Maryland State dessert, against a savory Delaware Peach Pie.

“Interscholastic sports bring not only family, but neighbors and friendly rivals together,” Governor O’Malley observed.  “This annual tournament presents a wonderful opportunity to enjoy basketball over the holiday season, with our fellow residents on the Eastern Shore.  To further enhance excitement around this event, I’m happy to put Maryland’s famous dessert on the line with Governor Markell.”

“Friendly—but fierce—competition is a great way to encourage active lifestyles and good sportsmanship,” added Governor Markell.  “This should be an exciting community event, and I hope our wager is a fun way to show our young athletes that we are proud of them.”

Scholastic basketball enjoys great popularity and support in both Maryland and Delaware. 

From Dec. 28-30, the Civic Center will run two games simultaneously from 2:00-8:00 p.m. The state-vs.-state match-ups with multiple games running simultaneously should increase attendance for the tournament, said Mike Delano, chairman of the Wicomico County Tourism Advisory Board.

STATEMENT FROM GOVERNOR MARTIN O’MALLEY ON THE AGREEMENT REACHED FOR HORSE RACING IN MARYLAND

ANNAPOLIS, MD (December 22, 2010) – Governor Martin O’Malley issued this statement today following an agreement for the 2011 racing calendar:

“I am pleased to announce that an agreement has been reached, and that industry representatives, track owners, horsemen and breeders were able to come together to reach a consensus that will allow for a full season of racing in 2011.  Over the next several hours, the parties will put in writing a proposal for consideration by the Racing Commission.

“Today’s agreement not only keeps Maryland’s treasured Preakness Stakes where it belongs, but it helps protect the thousands of jobs that depend on our rich history of horse racing.”

Maryland’s horse industry employs more than 28,000 people full time, with an annual economic impact of more than $1.5 billion.

Advertising On Salisbury News WORKS!

"I just wanted to check in with you and see when our ad was set to expire on sbynews.  I want to make sure I can renew it before it expires and keep our place on the site.  We've had so many referrals from the site that it has become our only advertising source due to the feedback we have received.  

Let me know when it is going to expire or you can just renew and mail the invoice to us again"

Anti Albero Bloggers Planning To Disrupt Turkey Giveaway Tomorrow

"Just a heads up - I've been told that a couple of the other blogs are trying to organize a crowd to jeer and harrass Joe at the turkey giveaway. Some have even encouraged throwing rocks at him. They say it is because Joe is claiming to have paid for the turkeys when in actuality he only contributed a small portion of the purchase price. Good luck and Merry Christmas."

J. Thome

Editors Notes: Let it be known to all, Salisbury News paid 100% for all 300 turkeys being given away. If the Anti Albero Bloggers spent half as much time giving back as they spend tearing down, this would be a much better community to live.

Lesson Learned???????

So what have we learned in 2,065 years?

 

"The budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be refilled, public debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest Rome become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance." Cicero - 55 BC

 

Evidently Nothing !!!

Test

Here's a little test to get your brain cells flowing today.

 If you make the wrong choice, fear not, they provide the correct answer.

http://www.cramersweeney.com/smiq.html

RESTAURANT SAFETY

Forget about Chick-fil-A and the cows telling you to eat more chicken!
   

For your safety, eat more pork!

Gov't By Decree: How The Grabbers Pulled It Off

The Federal Communications Commission's new "net neutrality" rules, passed on a partisan 3-2 vote yesterday, represent a huge win for a slick lobbying campaign run by liberal activist groups and foundations. The losers are likely to be consumers who will see innovation and investment chilled by regulations that treat the Internet like a public utility.

There's little evidence the public is demanding these rules, which purport to stop the non-problem of phone and cable companies blocking access to websites and interfering with Internet traffic. Over 300 House and Senate members have signed a letter opposing FCC Internet regulation, and there will undoubtedly be even less support in the next Congress.

Yet President Obama, long an ardent backer of net neutrality, is ignoring both Congress and adverse court rulings, especially by a federal appeals court in April that the agency doesn't have the power to enforce net neutrality. He is seeking to impose his will on the Internet through the executive branch. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, a former law school friend of Mr. Obama, has worked closely with the White House on the issue. Official visitor logs show he's had at least 11 personal meetings with the president.

The net neutrality vision for government regulation of the Internet began with the work of Robert McChesney, a University of Illinois communications professor who founded the liberal lobby Free Press in 2002. Mr. McChesney's agenda?

 "At the moment, the battle over network neutrality is not to completely eliminate the telephone and cable companies," he told the website SocialistProject in 2009. "But the ultimate goal is to get rid of the media capitalists in the phone and cable companies and to divest them from control."

A year earlier, Mr. McChesney wrote in the Marxist journal Monthly Review that "any serious effort to reform the media system would have to necessarily be part of a revolutionary program to overthrow the capitalist system itself."

Mr. McChesney told me in an interview that some of his comments have been "taken out of context." He acknowledged that he is a socialist and said he was "hesitant to say I'm not a Marxist."

For a man with such radical views, Mr. McChesney and his Free Press group have had astonishing influence. Mr. Genachowski's press secretary at the FCC, Jen Howard, used to handle media relations at Free Press. The FCC's chief diversity officer, Mark Lloyd, co-authored a Free Press report calling for regulation of political talk radio. 
                      
More from John Fund and the Wall Street Journal

Uncle Steny-- Gay Rights Champion

When Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) led more than a dozen lawmakers onto a Capitol stage Tuesday to commemorate the repeal of the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, she earned a minute-long standing ovation from a packed auditorium of gay rights supporters.

But behind the scenes, several leading gay rights advocates say it is Pelosi’s chief deputy and former rival, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), who deserves the lion’s share of credit for pushing the legislation across the finish line in recent weeks.

“He brought it back from the dead twice,” said Winnie Stachelberg, senior vice president at the Center for American Progress, who represented the liberal think tank in meetings on the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” repeal bill.

Gay rights advocates describe Hoyer as the unsung hero of the painstaking push to end the military ban, giving him the kind of praise on gay rights more often reserved for the Speaker from San Francisco.

“At the moment where it was critical to get this done, Hoyer really stepped up to the plate and made it a priority,” said Steve Elmendorf, a Democratic lobbyist and gay rights advocate.

The vice president of the Human Rights Campaign, Fred Sainz, said Hoyer made the repeal effort “a personal cause of his.”

More gushing praise here

Census Says

People in the US: 308,745,538

Debt: $ 13,868,461,000,000

( Your share: $ 44,918.74 ) 

Remember Cast Lead

This time two years ago, Israel was on the verge of launching the 22-day Operation Cast Lead. The fighting began at 11:30 a.m. on December 27 with a wave of F-16 air strikes on Hamas strongholds in Gaza, aimed at putting a stop to the relentless cross-border fire that was terrorizing Israelis living in towns and cities in the South. Now, after two years of relative quiet, Gaza seems to be heating up again.

Late Monday, IDF Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi ordered the air force to strike eight targets in the Gaza Strip, including a Hamas training camp and a tunnel used for smuggling, in retaliation for a string of offensives against Israeli troops and civilians over the last two weeks. Upping the ante, terrorists in Gaza on Tuesday morning fired a Kassam rocket that struck near a kindergarten in Ashkelon, lightly wounding a girl on her way to school and causing shock to two other people. Later on Tuesday, the IAF struck back again.

SOME ANALYSTS believe that Hamas is losing popularity among the Palestinians, who may be internalizing the destruction their Gaza government brought down upon the Strip by goading Israel into military action two years ago. Some argue, too, that Gazans are beginning to look across to the West Bank, where stability and economic coordination with Israel are producing a much-improved day-to-day climate. Finally, it is suggested that Hamas’s gradual efforts to impose a fundamental Islamic framework in Gaza are producing growing disaffection.

Whatever the accuracy of these assessments, however, there are no significant signs that Hamas’s grip on Gaza is loosening. Having capitalized on ballot-box support to engineer its violent takeover, Hamas will not willingly relinquish control.

The prospects of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations producing a peace breakthrough are faint enough; Hamas’s rule in Gaza represents a huge obstacle to the implementation of any substantive accord.

More immediately, the current minor-escalation of fire from Gaza underlines Hamas’s potential to wreak havoc in southern Israel with the mortars, rockets and missiles it has been steadily acquiring since Operation Cast Lead.

For two years, the force of that operation evidently served as a deterrent to this kind of cross-border fire. However firm it considers its hold on Gaza to be, Hamas would be foolish to risk forcing Israel into a repeat resort to such use of force.

JPost

Hamas Shells Prompt Resolute Israeli Response

The Israel Air Force's attack on seven Gaza targets last night was the strongest in the past two years, ever since Israel's counterterrorist Cast Lead campaign. So say top IDF sources, adding that the objective was to "send a clear message to the terrorists of Hamas that the situation cannot continue as is."

 The Israeli response followed the firing from Gaza of at least a dozen mortar shells and rockets at Israel over the past two days, as well as other attacks in the past two weeks. Tuesday morning, following the IAF strike, Hamas terrorists fired a Kassam rocket at Israel, wounding a 15-year-old girl and damaging several buildings.

The Hamas terrorist organization has run Gaza ever since it overthrew Fatah in 2007, just two years after the Disengagement - Israel's unilateral withdrawal from Gaza – that was supposed to have improved Israeli security.

Security sources say that Hamas feels it has tremendous amounts of weapons and ammunition, such as Kassam rockets, light-weapons, and explosives, and that Israel is limited in how strongly it can respond when attacked.

At the same time, IDF sources say, Hamas is not interested in a full-scale conflict with Israel at this time. Neither is Israel, for that matter – "but the picture could easily change," they say. "If, for instance, today's rocket had exploded inside a kindergarten, instead of nearby, and children would have been hurt, it is very likely that this afternoon would not have been peaceful as it is."

The IAF strikes Monday night targeted, among others, new tunnels dug by terrorists for the purpose of dispatching terror squads into Israel, ostensibly for the purpose of attacking or kidnapping civilians or soldiers.

IDF officials say that their latest offensive is not the end of the story, and they will not hesitate to act again if indicated.

UN Middle East envoy Robert Serry on Wednesday condemned the "firing of indiscriminate mortars and rockets by militant groups in Gaza at Israel which has escalated in recent days."

"These attacks are in clear violation of international humanitarian law and endanger civilians in Israel,''  Serry said in a statement.

More from INN

The Big Lie: ‘1967 Borders’ Is A Fallacy, Says Former Ambassador

The term “1967 borders,” the Arab world’s mantra for the borders of a PA state, never existed, says former Ambassador to Canada Alan Baker in a research paper for the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs.
Ever since neighboring Arab countries attacked Israel in 1948 as it became an independent country for the first time in 2,000 years, there were no borders, only temporary military lines defined by the 1949 “Armistice Lines” that ended, at least formally, the War for Independence.

However, the Arab world has repeated the term “1967 borders” so much that it has been adopted as fact by mainstream media and most international leaders. The term refers to the 1949 ceasefire line from which Israel military forces advanced at the beginning of the Six-Day War on June 4, 1967 and should  be called  "pre-1967 War Armistice Lines" or "1949 Armistice Lines". (INN, it should be noted, has used those accurate terms consistently..)

Even Brazil, which recently decided to “recognize” the Palestinian Authority based on the supposed 1967 borders, stated during a United Nation debate on Resolution 242 in 1967 calling for negotiations for boundaries, “Its acceptance does not imply that borderlines cannot be rectified as a result of an agreement freely concluded among the interested States. We keep constantly in mind that a just and lasting peace in the Middle East has necessarily to be based on secure permanent boundaries freely agreed upon and negotiated by the neighboring States."

More from INN

Medicaid Pushes States Off ‘Cliff’ As Governors Seek Cuts

Washington State may not pay for glasses anymore. Massachusetts already chopped dentures. As of Oct. 1, North Carolina no longer covers surgery for the clinically obese.

Governors nationwide are taking a scalpel to Medicaid, the jointly run state and federal health-care program for 48 million poor Americans, half of whom are children. The single biggest expense for states, Medicaid consumes about 22 percent of their total $1.6 trillion in expenditures, more than what is allocated to elementary and secondary education, according to a National Governors Association report.

With federal stimulus funds to help states pay higher Medicaid costs running out June 30, “we’re heading for a cliff in July,” said Brian Sigritz, director of state fiscal studies at the National Association of State Budget Officers in Washington.

Medicaid enrollment has jumped 13.6 percent since the recession began in 2007, according to the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation based in Menlo Park, California. The 2009 federal stimulus bill and a supplemental appropriation this year allocated a total of $103 billion for Medicaid. With that funding ending, state health-care expenditures may climb as much as 25 percent in fiscal 2012, according to a Kaiser report.

Read more

Labor Department Fails To Release Union Corruption Report

The Office of Labor Management Statistics (OLMS) was supposed to release an annual report tracking labor unions and evidence of corruption in union leadership in January 2010 but still hasn’t released the document.

OLMS, which falls under the Department of Labor, has released no such tracking report since George W. Bush’s administration, something that has the conservative nonprofit organization Americans for Limited Government (ALG) up in arms. ALG filed a Freedom of Information Act request for the 2009 report, and OLMS denied the group’s request by saying it needed more time to complete the report. Originally, however, those reports were publicly available on the OLMS website.

The report would tabulate the number of cases nationwide of union leader prosecution, the amount of funds they embezzle and the misuse of union funds. It also would keep track of indictments. Those statistics do exist elsewhere, as criminal and most civil court proceedings become public record after the cases close, but they’re difficult to track down as they’re in courthouses all over the country. The OLMS annual reports kept track of that information, allowing people to access it easily.

ALG’s current head of research, Don Todd, who led OLMS during the Bush administration, told The Daily Caller he doubts it would be too difficult for the Obama administration to release that information, as they’re supposed to keep track of it all year long. He also said that this administration’s failure to release the report is “freakishly incompetent.” He suspects politics is to blame.

“It’s got to be a political decision,” Todd said in a phone interview. “You know, I ran the agency during the Bush administration, and it’s the career people that put the thing together. So, the fact that it’s not out is a political decision.”

Todd said he thinks the decision to withhold that information comes from the Secretary of Labor’s office, though, not President Barack Obama.

“I wouldn’t think it would reach anywhere near that high of a level,” Todd said, referring to why he doesn’t think Obama is calling these shots. “But, the Labor Department is pretty much owned by the union movement now. A lot of the people who work there are from the movement.”                  

More here

Hold The Homosexuals! Military Ban Not Over Yet

America's military isn't going  'gay' quite yet.

While President Obama plans this week to sign the repeal of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy banning open homosexuality in the military, the policy must remain in force until the president, the secretary of defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff can certify that the change will not impair combat readiness.

Before that happens the military must rewrite laws and regulations that could affect same-sex relationships, such as the Uniform Code of Military Justice ban on sodomy, and also indoctrinate soldiers, sailors and airmen to tolerate open homosexuality. The transition period is expected to take a year.

"It's important for people to know that this is not over," said Robert Knight, a leading opponent of the homosexual political agenda. "There are no permanent victories or defeats in politics. And this can be reversed at some point, in a more conservative Congress."

"Congress will have to legalize consensual sodomy, which is currently illegal under the UCMJ," said retired Army Col. Dick Black, former chief of the Army's Criminal Law Division and a Virginia state legislator. "There's a backlash brewing. This is a very serious issue for a lot of people. We're entering the presidential season, and if there's a candidate who says he will issue an executive order to ban homosexuality in the military, a lot of people would be very fired up about that."                                   

There's more at WND

Generals, Diplomats Warn Of New START As Senate Moves Toward Ratification

The proposed New START agreement would handcuff the United States while giving the Russians free rein, retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul Vallely tells Newsmax.TV.

The Senate should reject the treaty because, “In reality, the Russians don’t have to do anything,” Vallely said.

“We’re the only ones that would be limited and cut back,” said Vallely, a Vietnam veteran who retired from the Army in 1993 as deputy commanding general in the Pacific Command.

“We have to realize that Russia really is not our friend. The more we are lessening our power in the United States, the more power the likes of Russian and China begin to rise,” he said.

Vallely was among more than 30 former defense officials and diplomats who issued an open letter to the Senate Monday expressing their “professional judgment” that New START, “is not consistent with the national security interests of the United States,” and “should be rejected by the U.S. Senate,” which is considering it now.

Russia easily could cheat secretly to our detriment, they maintain, and it would restrict deployment of new U.S. anti-missile defenses. They also believe that Russia would reduce the survivability and flexibility of our our strategic forces, which could be militarily destabilizing.

Read more

PRUDEN: Nothing Neutral About This Scheme

Hugo Chavez, the rowdy left-wing president of Venezuela, doesn't have to nibble at freedom of speech via the Internet. Unlike government officials here and elsewhere, Mr. Chavez runs an "efficient" government. He just scarfs down everything in his way.

The fixers here are pursuing something called "net neutrality," which will change the way certain Internet providers pay for privileged rights to the Web and charge their customers accordingly. "Net neutrality" sounds good to anyone not paying attention, but it must be accomplished by a seizure of authority to do so, a seizure not by Congress (which would be scary enough), but by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

Anyone paying attention can see how this would be a first step toward revival of the so-called Fairness Doctrine, sought by Barack Obama and the Democrats since he first arrived in Washington. The Fairness Doctrine would require broadcasters, definitely including the cable-TV networks, to provide airtime for anyone criticized by someone else on the air. That, too, sounds good to the inattentive and the well-meaning. What could be nicer than never having to hear anyone say discouraging things about you?

But in actual practice, this would encourage broadcasters - not the most stand-up folk anyway - to keep anyone or anything vaguely controversial off the air. The likes of Rush Limbaugh, Keith Olbermann, Sean Hannity and Chris Matthews and their noisy ilk would be silenced and sent out to find jobs selling shoes or arranging flowers. Everyone likes shoes and flowers, so what's wrong with that? But even the inattentive can see how the Fairness Doctrine could - and no doubt would - be used to silence criticism of favored politicians and propositions dear to the hearts of favored politicians.

Mr. Chavez is only a step or two ahead of the Democrats on this one. In the name of protecting the much-abused Venezuelans, he has asked for a law imposing draconian broadcastlike regulations on the Internet. He would ban all messages showing "disrespect for public authorities," that "incite or promote hatred," or create "anxiety" in the population.

"We aren't eliminating the Internet here, nor ... censoring the Internet," Mr. Chavez told his weekly television and radio audience, where his remarks definitely were not censored. "What we're trying to do is protect ourselves against crimes and cybercrimes through a law." He identified these crimes as messages promoting drug use, prostitution and "other" crimes. He didn't say how the law would be enforced, but no doubt it will be enforced in the efficient way all dictatorships and authoritarian regimes enforce the law.

The new "net-neutrality" regulations here, which will have the force of law though Congress need have nothing to do with writing them, will be considered for a vote by the FCC on Tuesday. The rules being considered for the Tuesday vote are technical and complicated, and the timing of the vote clearly was arranged for Christmas week, when most people are delighted not to have to think about Washington and the trouble it makes for the rest of us.

But the FCC's power grab has attracted a diverse array of naysayers anyway. The liberal Democrats are mostly concerned that the FCC will write rules to give breaks to Internet providers, the conservative Republicans that it's a first step toward content control.More from The Washington Times

School Administration Changes Effective Jan. 3

Several administrative changes for Wicomico County Public Schools will take effect on Jan. 3. The adjustments in school administrative leadership teams are related to filling an administrative vacancy and ensuring that school leadership staff are in place in all schools to best meet the needs of students, said Dr. Margo Handy, Assistant Superintendent of Instruction and Student Services. The mid-year adjustments will ensure stability and consistency in the affected schools.

Leadership teams in the affected schools, effective Jan. 3, will be:

Beaver Run Elementary:
Principal - William Curtis (no change)
Acting Assistant Principal – to be announced

Delmar Elementary:
Acting Principal - Judy Nicholson
Assistant Principal - Karen Parsons
Assistant Principal – Dr. Kathy Vail

Glen Avenue Elementary:
Principal - Michael Collins (no change)
Assistant Principal - Larry Collins

Prince Street Elementary:
Principal - Chris Nunzio
Assistant Principal - Maria Marshall (no change)

Open INDOOR Bell Ringing Slot UPDATE!!!!!!!

Thanks to the Naugle Family, it only took a matter of seconds to fill this particular slot. Merry Christmas and THANK YOU!!!!!

Joe,

We've just had a cancellation of an INDOOR bell ringing spot at Boscov's tomorrow night (Thursday) from 6 to 9 p.m.

So many people have requested an indoor location, we feel certain one of your readers will quickly fill this spot.

Thanks so much,

The Red Kettle Campaign

410-749-7464