3200 years in one photo ... Thx Ramey H!

3200 Years in One Photo...

It takes a special kind of tree to have a nickname.  Not every tree has a nickname, but 'The President' has earned it. This giant sequoia stands at 247 feet tall, and is estimated to be over 3,200 years old. Imagine, this tree was already 1200 years old when Jesus walked the earth.

The trunk of the president measures at 27 feet across, with 2 BILLION needles from base to top.

Because of its unbelievable size, this tree has never been photographed in its entirety. Until now. A team of National Geographic photographers have worked along with scientists to try and create the first photo that shows the president in all its glory.

They had to climb the tree with pulleys and levers, and took thousands of photos.

Of those, they selected 126 and stitched them together, to get this incredible portrait of the President.

And here it is:

Incredible, is it not?

Tea Party and the Republicans ... SamKat

I am Tea Party much more than a Republican.  We have no alternative choice.  The secular progressive Democrats are more secular progressives that Democrats.  Charles Krauthammer touts Abraham Lincoln, FDR, and MLK as three of the greatest for leading important causes during their times on earth in his book "Things That Matter"and I agree.

I applaud Speaker Boehner's victory in the recent vote because he is Speaker of the House.  But I don't want anybody putting down the excellent people of the Tea Party.  Conservative, the TP people are, and Republicans are supposed to be.  At this time in history there is no other way.  Liberals are consistently putting politics ahead of our great country and ahead of the service people who have been wounded, killed, or otherwise injured in protecting our freedoms. 

God bless the Tea Party and, as Gary Burbank character Elmer Pitts used to say it:  "God Bless Amurica!"

SamKat

Krauthammer- GOP must keep B\enghazi hearings focused on facts ... Columbus Dispatch

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Columbus, Ohio • May 11, 2014 • 68° Partly Cloudy

Charles Krauthammer commentary: GOP must keep Benghazi hearings focused on facts

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Sunday May 11, 2014 8:18 AM

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The Democrats are portraying the not-yet-even-constituted House Select Committee on Benghazi as nothing but a partisan exercise. They are even considering boycotting the hearings to delegitimize them.
Fine. Although this would give the Obama-protective media a further reason to ignore Benghazi, it doesn’t matter. All that matters is whether the committee produces new, important facts. If it does, it will be impossible to ignore.
We’ve already seen what a single piece of new evidence can do in reviving interest in a story that many (including me) thought the administration had successfully stonewalled. The “PREP CALL with Susan (Rice)” email from Ben Rhodes, the deputy national security adviser, was withheld eight months until revealed by court order. It advises the U.N. ambassador to focus on an anti-Islam Internet video, thus contradicting the perennial White House claim that Rice’s blame-the-video five-show fable came just from intelligence-community talking points and not from a White House in full campaign mode.
The select committee will be headed by Rep. Trey Gowdy, a skilled 16-year prosecutor. He needs to keep the hearings clean and strictly fact-oriented. Questions only, no speechifying. Every sentence by every GOP committee member must end with a question mark. Should any committee Republican instead make a statement ending in a period, the chairman should immediately, by button, deliver an electric shock through the violator’s seat.
The areas of inquiry are obvious. They are three: before, during and after.
Before:
Where and to what extent was there dereliction of duty as memos, urgent pleas and mounting evidence of danger were ignored and the U.S. ambassador allowed to enter a deathtrap?
During:
What happened during the eight hours of the Benghazi attack, at the end of which the last two Americans (of four) were killed by mortar fire? Where was the commander in chief, and where was the responsible cabinet secretary, Hillary Clinton? What did they do?
The White House acts as if these are, alternatively, either state secrets or of no importance.
For President Barack Obama, we have three data points. At 5 p.m. EDT, he is briefed on the attack by the secretary of defense and chairman of the Joint Chiefs.
At around 8 p.m., Obama spends an hour on the phone with Benjamin Netanyahu to tamp down a breaking, politically injurious story that Obama had snubbed the Israeli prime minister. The White House then issues a readout saying the two leaders had agreed there had been no snub.
So the White House is engaged in campaign damage control quite literally in the middle of the Benghazi events — at a time when Ambassador Chris Stevens is still missing and the final firefight that killed two other Americans is still three hours away. We’ve just learned that Obama was not in the Situation Room that night. Then where, doing what?
We know, finally, that at 10 p.m. Obama called Clinton to get an update. What did they discuss, decide, order?
As former prosecutor Andrew McCarthy has pointed out, a half-hour later, State issued a statement deploring the video, setting the premise for the video excuse. Were Obama and Clinton working on a cover story — even before Glen Doherty had joined Tyrone Woods on the roof of the CIA annex where they were to die minutes later?
Yes, that’s speculation. Well, then, give us facts. After all, the White House provided a cascade of hagiographic facts about Obama’s involvement in the Osama bin Laden raid. Yet regarding Benghazi — the most serious operational challenge of his presidency — he is nowhere to be seen.
After:
We now know the White House was pushing the “video made them do it” cover-up, lest the blame be placed on administration policy. Who was involved in that decision, obviously designed to protect a president campaigning that al-Qaida was “on the run”?
These hearings are a big political risk for Republicans. Going into the 2014 election, they stand to benefit from the major issues — Obamacare, the economy, chronic unemployment — from which Benghazi hearings can only distract. Worse, if botched like previous hearings on the matter, these hearings could backfire against the GOP, as did the 1998 Clinton impeachment proceedings. On purely partisan considerations, the hearings are not worth the political risk.
But the country deserves the truth. They’ll get it if the GOP can keep the proceedings clean, factual and dispassionate. No speeches. No grandstanding. Gowdy has got to be a tough disciplinarian — especially toward his own side of the aisle.
Charles Krauthammer writes for the Washington Post Writers Group.
letters@charleskrauthammer.com

Taxes due to obmacare- HUGE! ... Thx Paul C and Jack H!

          Here is what happened on January 1st 2014:

Top Income tax bracket went from 35% to 39.6% Top Income payroll tax went from 37.4% to 52.2% Capital Gains tax went from 15% to 28% Dividends tax went from 15% to 39.6% Estate tax went from 0% to 55% Remember this fact: if you have money, the democrats want it. These taxes were all passed only with democrat votes, no republicans voted for these taxes. These taxes were all passed under the affordable care act, aka Obamacare.   If you think that it is important that everyone in the U.S.should know this, pass it on to everyone you know.

Trey Gowdy embarrasses our national media- or it should have but apparently did not. Thx Paul C and Ramey H!

skegley.blogspot.com

This one has been on the net for some time but in light of the recently appointed special committee to investigate Benghazi I believe it is timely.  Ramey

This is well worth your time to watch and pass on.

Congressman Trey Gowdy (R-SC) turned the tables on the media and asked them questions about Benghazi.  The silence was deafening.  Best video clip I’ve seen in months.  I hope you watch it ~ it’s only 3 minutes.  The Media should be embarrassed by Congressman Trey Gowdy’s questions.

Many Questions - No Answers

Good questions, all!

This is most certainly the most embarrassing event that has occurred in the last 16 months.  The burden falls on the media who have not done anything to investigate this.  If I were to measure BIG events the media touted in the last 40 years, I would rank this above the Nixon Watergate Scandal.  So - why has this gone for over a year without a peep from the media?  Click Here  After viewing this 3.5 minute video, I urge you to forward it to your sphere of influence.  KEEP THIS GOING.

 

Inner Peace ... Thx Nana & Marge R!

Inner Peace.

 

If you can start the day without caffeine,

 

If you can always be cheerful, ignoring aches and pains,

 

If you can resist complaining and boring people with your troubles,

 

If you can eat the same food every day and be grateful for it,

 

If you can understand when your loved ones
are too busy to give you any time,

 

If you can take criticism and blame without resentment,

 

If you can conquer tension without medical help,

 

If you can relax without alcohol,

 

If you can sleep without the aid of drugs,

 

 

 

Then You Are Probably The Family Dog!

 

 

And you thought I was going to get all spiritual ...

 

    Handle every stressful situation like a dog.    

If you can't eat it or play with it, pee on it and walk away.