My goal to read four books a month this year is nearing completion. I just finished reading Absolute Power by Daniel Baldacci as number 46. With two more to go It’ll be close. The weather here just turned nasty, and the daytime temperature is minus four degrees Farhrenheit with wind chills below -20 degrees. Not that that means I stop moving, but the world seems to slow down when it is cold. Our library closed because of yesterday’s snowstorm, and the upcoming Christmas holiday. Getting something to read is going to be difficult. Additionally, the weather has caused my internet service to slow down to zero. The only thing I can still watch is Youtube. My e-mail, news, and WordPress are all down, and I can’t even go online to ask them for help. Anyway, let me tell you about Absolute Power.
For sure, the best mystery story I read this year. Baldacci crafted a fiction that kept me, the reader, on the edge of my seat from page one through page 469. There was never a dull moment in this story. The characters were real, believable, and likeable, well, that is except for the two protagonists who were despicable. The fact that the plot revolves around a crooked President made it even better for me. I hate politicians and love conspiracy theories. This story is loaded with both. Many stories begin to finalize twenty pages from the end, Baldacci chose instead to take the mystery into the final pages, and I couldn’t tell how the culprits were going to be dealt with until the very last sentences.
I recommend this book to anyone who loves mystery stories, or to anyone who just loves a good story.
I haven’t bashed Obama in quite awhile so I think I must do it now so you will not think I have fallen in love with him. I received this piece from a friend in Arizona, but I had read it before so it has been around for awhile.
Ugh! If only some of this is true, how low have we sunk to call this man the President of the United States of America?
Any one of these ‘coincidences’ when taken singularly appear to not mean much, but when taken as a whole, a computer would blow a circuit if it had to calculate the odds they have occurred by chance alone.
Sit back, get a favorite beverage, then read and ponder the Obama-related ‘coincidences’, then superimpose the bigger picture of most recent events i.e., Fast and Furious, Benghazi, the IRS scandal, the NSA revelations, favoring a nuclear Iran over our allies like Israel, but ignoring Ebola, Hamas and ISIS
Obama
just happened to know 60s far-left radical revolutionary William Ayers, whose father
just happened to be Thomas Ayers, who
just happened to be a close friend of Obamas communist mentor Frank Marshall Davis, who
Obama compared to Frank Marshall Davis
just happened to work at the communist-sympathizing Chicago Defender with Vernon Jarrett, who
just happened to later become the father-in-law of Iranian-born leftist Valerie Jarrett, who Obama
just happened to choose as his closest White House adviser, and who
just happened to have been CEO of Habitat Company, which
just happened to manage public housing in Chicago, which
just happened to get millions of dollars from the Illinois state legislature, and which
just happened not to properly maintain the housing which eventually
just happened to require demolition. *** Not to mention that this is the property that would have been the grounds that hosted the Olympics, had Obama’s efforts been successful****
Valerie Jarrett
Valerie Jarrett also
just happened to work for the city of Chicago, and
just happened to hire Michelle LaVaughan Robinson (later Mrs. Obama), who
just happened to have worked at the Sidley Austin law firm, where former fugitive from the FBI
Bernardine Dohrn also just happened to work, and where Barack Obama just happened to get a summer job.
Bill Ayres with Bernadine Dohrn
Bernardine Dohrn
just happened to be married to William Ayers, with whom she
just happened to have hidden from the FBI at a San Francisco marina, along with Donald Warden, who
just happened to change his name to Khalid al-Mansour, and Warden/al-Mansour who
just happened to be a mentor of Black Panther Party founders Huey Newton and Bobby Seale and a close associate of Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, and al-Mansour
just happened to be financial adviser to a Saudi Prince, who
just happened to donate cash to Harvard, for which Obama
just happened to get a critical letter of recommendation from Percy Sutton, who just happened
to have been the attorney for Malcolm X, who
just happened to know Kenyan politician Tom Mboya, who
just happened to be a close friend of Barack Hussein Obama, Sr., who
just happened to meet Malcolm X when he traveled to Kenya .
Barack Obama Sr with Jr.
Obama, Sr.
just happened to have his education at the University of Hawaii paid for
by the Laubach Literacy Institute, which
just happened to have been supported by Elizabeth Mooney Kirk, who
just happened to be a friend of Malcolm X, who
just happened to have been associated with the Nation of Islam, which was later headed by
Louis Farrakhan, who
just happens to live very close to Obama’s Chicago mansion, which also
just happens to be located very close to the residence of William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, who
just happen to have been occasional baby-sitters for Malia and Natasha Obama, whose parents
just happened to have no concern exposing their daughters to bomb-making communists.
Obama
After attending Occidental College and Columbia University, where he
just happened to have foreign Muslim roommates, Obama moved to Chicago to work for the
Industrial Areas Foundation, an organization that
just happened to have been founded by Marxist and radical agitator Saul (the Red) Alinsky, author of Rules for Radicals,
Saul Alinsky
who
just happened to be the topic of Hillary Rodham Clintons thesis at Wellesley College, and Obamas $25,000 salary at IAF
just happened to be funded by a grant from the Woods Fund, which was founded by the Woods family, whose Sahara Coal company
just happened to provide coal to Commonwealth Edison, whose CEO just happened to be Thomas Ayers, whose son William Ayers
just happened to serve on the board of the Woods Fund, along with Obama.
Ayres Stands on US Flag
Obama also worked on voter registration drives in Chicago in the 1980s and
just happened to work with leftist political groups like the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and Socialist International (SI), through which Obama met Carl Davidson, who
just happened to travel to Cuba during the Vietnam War to sabotage the U.S. war effort, and who
just happened to be a former member of the SDS and a member of the Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism, which
just happened to sponsor a 2002 anti-war rally at which Obama spoke, and which
just happened to have been organized by Marilyn Katz, a former SDS activist and later public relations consultant who
just happened to be a long-time friend of Obama’s political hatchet man, David Axelrod.
Axelrod advises Obama
Obama joined Trinity United Church of Christ (TUCC), whose pastor was Reverend Jeremiah Wright, a fiery orator who just happened to preach Marxism and Black Liberation Theology and who delivered anti-white, anti-Jewish, and anti-American sermons, which Obama
Rev Wright with his Student
just happened never to hear because he just happened to miss church only on the days when Wright was at his most enthusiastic, and Obama just happened never to notice that Oprah Winfrey left the church because it was too radical, and just happened never to notice that the church gave the vile anti-Semitic Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan a lifetime achievement award.
Obama
Although no one had ever heard of him at the time, Obama
just happened to receive an impossible-to-believe $125,000 advance to write a book about race relations, which he just happened to fail to write while using the cash to vacation in Bali with his wife Michelle, and despite his record of non-writing he just happened to receive a second advance, for $40,000, from another publisher, and he eventually completed a manuscript called Dreams From My Father, which just happened to strongly reflect the writing style of William Ayers, who just happened to trample on an American flag for the cover photograph of the popular Chicago magazine, which Obama just happened never to see even though it appeared on newsstands throughout the city.
Obama was hired by the law firm Miner, Banhill and Galland, which just happened to specialize in negotiating state government contracts to develop low-income housing, and which just happened to deal with now-imprisoned Tony Rezko and his firm Rezar, and with slumlord Valerie Jarrett, and the law firms Judson Miner
just happened to have been a classmate of Bernardine Dohrn, wife of William Ayers.
Obama
In 1994 Obama represented ACORN and another plaintiff in a lawsuit against Citibank for denying mortgages to blacks (Buycks-Roberson v. Citibank Federal Savings Bank), and the lawsuit just happened to result in banks being blackmailed into approving sub-prime loans for poor credit risks, a trend which just happened to spread nationwide, and which just happened to lead to the collapse of the housing bubble, which just happened to help Obama defeat John McCain in the 2008 presidential election.
Obama
In 1996 Obama ran for the Illinois State Senate and joined the New Party, which just happened to promote Marxism, and Obama was supported by Dr. Quentin Yong, a socialist who just happened to support a government takeover of the health care system.
Obama
In late 1999, Obama purportedly engaged in homosexual activities and cocaine-snorting in the back of a limousine with a man named Larry Sinclair, who claims he was contacted in late 2007 by Donald Young, who just happened to be the gay choir director of Obamas Chicago church and who shared information with Sinclair about Obama, and Young just happened to be murdered on December 23, 2007, just weeks after Larry Bland, another gay member of the church just happened to be murdered, and both murders just happened to have never been solved.
Sinclair
Young/Murdered
Bland/Murdered
In 2008 Sinclair held a press conference to discuss his claims, and just happened to be arrested immediately after the event, based on a warrant issued by Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden, who just happens to be the son of Joe Biden.
Obama
Rashid Khalidi dine with the Obamas
In 2003 Obama and his wife attended a dinner in honor of Rashid Khalidi, who just happened to be a former PLO operative, harsh critic of Israel, and advocate of Palestinian rights, and who Obama claims he does not know, even though the Obamas just happened to have dined more than once at the home of Khalidi and his wife, Mona, and just happened to have used them as occasional baby-sitters. Obama reportedly praised Khalidi at the decidedly anti-Semitic event, which William Ayers
just happened to also attend, and the event Obama pretends he never attended was sponsored by the Arab American Action Network, to which Obama
just happened to have funneled cash while serving on the board of the Woods Fund with William Ayers, and one speaker at the dinner remarked that if Palestinians cannot secure a return of their land, Israel will never see a day of peace, and entertainment at the dinner included a Muslim childrens’ dance whose performances just happened to include simulated be-headings with fake swords, and stomping on American, Israeli, and British flags, and Obama allegedly told the audience that Israel has no God-given right to occupy Palestine and there has been genocide against the Palestinian people by (the) Israelis, and the Los Angeles Times has a videotape of the event but just happens to refuse to make it public.
Obama
In the 2004 Illinois Democrat primary race for the U.S. Senate, front-runner Blair Hull just happened to be forced out of the race after David Axelrod just happened to manage to get Hulls sealed divorce records unsealed, which just happened to enable Obama to win the primary,
so he could face popular Republican Jack Ryan, whose sealed child custody records from his divorce just also happened to become unsealed, forcing Ryan to withdraw from the race, which just happened to enable the unqualified Obama to waltz into the U.S. Senate, where, after a mere 143 days of work, he just happened to decide he was qualified to run for President of the United States.
There is always something extra to do on Christmas Eve. For instance, this year I published books for the three youngest grand children. They have sat on my desk for a month, but here I was at the last-minute rushing to wrap them. To get some work space I disappeared to my workshop in the basement. There I would have the space, materials, tools, and desire needed to wrap the gifts in solitude. The job took all of fifteen minutes, and I had peace knowing it was done. It was time to clean up, and to put the paper back in the pantry. Upon returning, I noticed a funny black rope like thing on the floor just five feet from where I stood wrapping. A closer look revealed the rope was alive. Oh S__t! ISIS has invaded Frankfort (Illinois Snake Inside Shop).
This is the fourth time in nine years I have had to deal with one inside. Each time it is in the winter, it is in the basement, and each time it rattles me. The previous three times the snakes were small, only about a foot long and the diameter of a pencil. This time the damn thing was two feet long and much bigger in girth. It was also much scarier. I am still in a quandary about how they get in. One theory is that they enter from the sump pump water storage hole. In the midwest we place a large plastic pipe filled with holes around the perimeter of the house foundation. It allows ground water to seep into the sump instead of seeping into the basement. There is a pump in the hole which lifts the water out into the yard away from the house. I envision the garter snake using this pipe system as a winter den and following the water into the sump. We had a heavy rain two days earlier and most likely the snake washed into the hole. At least, that is one plausible explanation.
My mind raced with solutions for getting the snake out of the house, and also from my mind. I recalled a story from my book Jun-e-or(available from Amazon in eBook format). I wrote a vignette titled “Scream” in which I describe my mother’s dislike for snakes, and how she dealt with them.
I made a quick trip to my tool box to find a weapon, and stealthily walked back to the slithery creature from behind. There was no way I wanted to scare this thing into some dark recess of scrap woodpiles scattered about my shop. I had visions of picking a piece of wood for a project and uncovering a mass of twisted yellow striped squirming bodies in a hibernaculum. The image of my mom’s method for dealing with a serpent played wildly in my mind, and in a second it was over. I used my putty knife to decapitate the poor thing. I walked away filled with pangs of guilt thinking I murdered one of God’s creatures on Christmas Eve.
By the time I got a dust pan and a bench brush to sweep the corpse up, he was coiled on his back exposing his under belly, a pool of blood oozed from his body, his head joined by a sliver of skin. It took a quick brush onto the pan and a dump into a plastic bag. I walked upstairs past Peg sitting on the couch reading. She looked up and said “what have you got in the bag?”
“Just a last minute gift for the kids,” I said. I took it immediately to the trash can in the garage and disposed the evidence.
Finally, I finished another book that is not political. I found this book in the Frankfort library using the same system I used in Arizona this winter; walk in, scan the new releases, and take the first book that catches my eye. This time it was the cover art for a book titled The Yellow Packard. I immediately knew it involved old cars, and probably was about the period in history that matched the car.
The Packard car remains in my memory as one of the classier cars on the road. The styling characteristic that turned me on was the grill. Packard spewed elegance, opulence, speed and class. One of the most popular customers for the Packard were funeral homes, they used them for hearses, flower cars, and limo’s. I guess having your last ride in a Packard meant one had finally made it to the big time.
Once I began reading, the book held my interest until I completed it two days later.
The author, Ace Collins is someone I never heard of, but upon reading his bio it surprised me to learn he has sixty published novels. Collins is a master of character development, and his writing allows the reader to see what is happening throughout. He does an amazing job with details about the depression era.
I won’t get into details about the plot, because it is a mystery and talking about the plot may spoil the mystery. The plot has many sub-plots expertly woven into the main story. The central theme of the story details how people’s lives changed after the yellow Packard enters their lives. Some of the changes are very positive, and others not so. Even though the Packard is an inanimate object, in this story the car has a life and becomes as central a character as the people who come to own it.
It was delightful not to read any foul language, nor be titillated by sexual content. Keeping true to form to the depression era the language and morals of the country were much different from what they are today. In fact, I enjoyed the story more because it was clean.
I thought Collins wrapped up the story in a comical way when he did a Perry Mason like ending with all the people who owned the Yellow Packard assembled in one place for a recap of the clues that allowed the FBI to solve the kidnapping, and to unveil of a surprise mystery.
This book is a must read for mystery fans, old car nuts like me, and those who want to learn what it was like during the First Great Depression, or for anyone who enjoys a genuine good story.
I tried to call your Washington office today but the call volume was too high and the system shut me out. Therefore, I write this e-mail.
I listened to your argument today during the Health Care Summit. I have to admit that you are very eloquent in your speaking ability. Your argument about the cost savings related to Tort Reform however, is flawed. I am sure the statistics you quoted on the amount of money awarded and the savings are correct. I do not refute you on that point. I do, however want to argue that you have left out the invisible cost of defensive medicine that the medical profession practices every day, in every office and every hospital in the country. Medical staffs are loaded with highly paid people whose sole function it is to document everything a doctor does, prescribes, and orders. Hospitals are loaded with staff sitting at terminals documenting everything that occurs with a patient. Why? They document in order to defend themselves against a possible lawsuit. None of this documentation comes cheap.
I do not argue that a doctor who operates on me and removes my right arm instead of my left should be punished and the patient compensated. I do argue that I should not have to be tested four times a year when, statistically, once would be enough. As for documentation needed for payment, why should I have to pay a premium for a failure on the part of government run Medicare and Medicaid’s inability to maintain a fraud free system?
It is my opinion that the hidden cost of Tort reform is a thousand times greater than the actual awards granted for real mistakes.
Do not support the Health Care Reform Bill for the following reasons:
The cost of one trillion dollars will bankrupt the country. The accounting trick you are proposing to collect money for six years and to offer services for four years is bogus. If a bank wanted to collect your mortgage payment for six years before it let you into the new house you just bought, you would be writing a law to prevent them from doing it. Why be a hypocrite on this matter to sell me the idea. It is morally wrong. I expect better from you. Do not support this bill.
I am positive that the Supreme Court will find the requirement that I purchase insurance by law is unconstitutional. Why do you insist on supporting legislation that is so obviously flawed? Do not support this bill
Say no, to a government takeover of the Health Care system. Why do you support a system that will give mediocre care to everyone in the country after openly admitting that we currently have the best system in the world? I also wish I could believe what I heard about this bill, giving me the same plan as the one you and Congress enjoy. What a dolt you must think I am. In addition, I did not hear anything in the discussion today that explained why federal funding for abortion is a basic right. Are you kidding me? Abortion is murder. If I came into your office and shot you dead, I would be arrested prosecuted and sentenced. Yet the bill insists that it is the basic right of a grammar school girl to have the federal government (me) pay for the murder of her unborn child. I would sooner pay for the prosecution of the abortionist. Do not support this bill.
