Fitz2B --

ACORN to do census? Out of Afghanistan?

2009-02-08T11:28:00.000-08:00

The answer to the census question may be decided by the Supreme Court, but watch Obama’s clandestine maneuvers to assign “responsibility” for the census from the Secretary of Commerce to the White House.

Here’s the law:

The Congress, by law directed that:

“The Secretary [of Commerce] shall perform the functions and duties imposed upon him by this title, may issue such rules and regulations as he deems necessary to carry out such functions and duties, and may delegate the performance of such functions and duties and the authority to issue such rules and regulations to such officers and employees of the Department of Commerce as he may designate.”

Credit those folks over at Samizdata ….

As I read it, the Director of the Census must, by law, be within the Department of Commerce and under the direction of the (Senate approved) Secretary of Commerce who then reports to the president. Am I missing something?
Correction: From reading through Title 13, Chapter 1 it appears obvious to me that the POTUS has no role in the census whatsoever beyond, with Senate approval, selecting the Secretary of Commerce and, also with Senate approval, selecting the Director of the Census who ” shall perform such duties as may be imposed upon him by law, regulations, or orders of the Secretary.” Hhmmm… No president mentioned.

The Secretary of Commerce is the only authority the law recognizes. Since as commenter Laird points out, the Constitution did not place the census function in Article II - the Executive branch but in Article I - the Legislative branch, it is not at all within the President’s reach unless the legislature places it there.

And watch for Obama to still try and put ACORN in charge of the census ….

Any question about WHY there are so many Obama-watch sites on the web???

More blurbs from the blogs:

– Stimulus Plan (Porkarama) updates are here ….

Biden: Ignore the voters

HERE’S a good question: why doesn’t Obama tell us specifically HOW this money will resolve his “now or never” crisis? We won’t see any jobs outta this political payback package for years.

– Obama has again voted “present” on this bogus stimulus plan. How to hype a crisis in two steps …. So where exactly is the change we (?) hoped for??? Forget it. It’s the same ole way with a Chicago twist ….

– BREAKING: Obama tells Gates to “stand down” on the troop surge in Afghanistan …..

Is he looking for ‘out‘ in Afghanistan???

– World opinion on Obama is fading ….

From London to America: What have you done?

Pakistan to the US: Show us the money!!!

Russia forms Alliance with six central Asian nations: Take THAT, America.

Ecuador expels US Embassy official: South America rejects the “Chicago way” …

– USS Cole mom is disgusted with Obama …. article and video

Pending: More and more parents and (retired) naval personnel are speaking out about the way the killers of their loved ones are being released ….

more pending …..

Not so fast, Al ....

2009-01-06T07:58:00.000-08:00

Let's let the system finish finishing before you scoff the drink George Soros has mixed for you ....

Then if this is, indeed, the magic potion Soros has brewed -- swig deeply, swill, and may you be bloated with the lixor of liberal lunacy.

Georgie Soros what a guy,
Bought the libs and made them sigh,
When the truth came out to all,
Georgie Soros took a fall.

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Obama Talks Racism and Class Warfare

2008-10-26T10:16:00.000-07:00

Please tell me why the media has not grilled this man on the topics of class warfare, racism and socialism.

Nevermind.

We saw what happened to the Orlando station when they dared to ask tough questions ....

Here's the video, anyway.

Step up to the ballot box and stop this guy from destroying our nation!!!!

OBAMA: 9/11 was a "failure of empathy"

2008-09-10T22:10:00.000-07:00

Eight days after the tragedy of September 11, 2001, Obama -- the man who would be Commander in Chief -- blamed the terrorist attacks on "a failure of empathy."

The July 20 issue of the New Yorker magazine got a lot of attention for its cover, which carried a "satirical" cartoon depicting Michelle and Barack Obama that Obama supporters found tasteless and offensive. Buried inside that issue's feature story, however, was a reaction by Obama to 9/11 that all voters should find even more tasteless and offensive.

The article reprised a piece published in Chicago's Hyde Park Herald on Sept. 19, 2001, and written by a then-unknown and otherwise undistinguished state senator from Illinois. The senator, a former community organizer, wrote that after tightening security at our airports and repairing our intelligence networks, we "must also engage . . . in the more difficult task of understanding the sources of such madness."

According to Barack Obama, the madness that drove terrorists to turn passenger jets into manned cruise missiles aimed at our centers of finance, government and military power "grows out of a climate of poverty and ignorance, helplessness and despair."

As if the answer to the attacks should have been food stamps for al-Qaida.

Sen. Obama advised caution and warned of overreacting. "We will have to make sure, despite our rage, that any U.S. military action takes into account the lives of innocent civilians abroad," he wrote. "We will have to be unwavering in opposing bigotry or discrimination directed against neighbors and friends of Middle Eastern descent."

We should also be just as concerned, he felt, with American anger and bigotry as we were about al-Qaida.

In an opinion piece in Commentary magazine, writer Abe Greenwald commented on Obama's belief that the 9/11 attacks were rooted in poverty and despair. "Strange," he called it, "considering our attackers were wealthy and educated, connected and ecstatic."

As Greenwald put it, Obama "could have asked (terrorist and colleague) Bill Ayers, 'Bill, did your 'failure of empathy' stem from your impoverished upbringing as the son of the CEO of Commonwealth Edison?" Did poverty and despair also cause the Weather Underground member and host of Obama's first fundraiser to bomb government buildings?

Fact is, the roster of terrorists and their handlers reads like a list of of Ivy Leaguers:

Osama bin Laden, the son of a Saudi billionaire, studied engineering. Khalid Sheik Mohammed, architect of 9/11 and other major attacks, has a degree in mechanical engineering. Mohammed Atta, who flew a jet into the World Trade Center, is the son of a lawyer and earned a master's degree in urban planning at Hamburg University. Ayman al-Zawahri is an eye surgeon. Seven doctors were involved in the London-Glasgow bomb plots.

You get the idea, even if Barack Obama doesn't.

In a speech before a joint session of Congress on Sept. 20, 2001, President Bush pointed out the real reasons Islamofascists hate us: "They hate what they see right here in this chamber — a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms: our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other."

Bush aptly called the 9/11 terrorists and their ilk "the heirs of all the murderous ideologies of the 20th century."

"By sacrificing human life to serve their radical visions, by abandoning every value except the will to power, they follow in the path of fascism, Nazism and totalitarianism," he said.

Knowing the nature of your enemy is the key to victory. On the seventh anniversary of 9/11, we should all thank President Bush for keeping America safe. Along the way, he brought freedom and democracy to the Middle East, draining the terrorist swamp.

Bush gets it. So does John McCain. This is one thing we shouldn't want to change.

I have no idea how Obama's comments have failed to resonate with the American people. Hopefully, those words will resonate before it's too late.

credit: Gull

Ohblahma does Bible School

2008-09-07T14:44:00.000-07:00

Ummmm ... errrr .... Sermon on the Mount?

Guess this means that the Ten Commandments don't count either, huh.

And here is an over-view the Sermon on the Mount (for those not as familiar with it as The One). You may want to particularly note the section on false prophets ....

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McCain: Reporting for Duty, Sir!!!

2008-02-01T20:37:00.000-08:00

John McCain's focus on his war record reminds me of the John Kerry campaign back in '04 .... It didn't work then. True conservatives hope it doesn't work now.

It shouldn't. Unless the doting Clinton-media's elderly poster-boy continues to receive a "pass" on his less-than-conservative voting record for the last 30-something years.

Plus -- watching the Republican party initiate it's protocol of selecting the next candidate for POTUS is not sitting well with the grassroots .....

Conservatives are not buying the "heir apparent" mantle being draped around John McCain comb-over locks. And they have good reason.

McCain does not reflect the conservative interests of his party. Never has. Likely never will.

Here's Salon's take on the scuttle-butt:

On Wednesday, we brought
you some of the more apoplectic reactions from conservatives after Sen. John McCain's victory in
Florida's Republican primary. Well, the tenor of the debate on the right over
McCain's candidacy has by no means cooled over the past couple of days. If
anything, as we get to the key primaries of Super Tuesday, the anger over the
prospect of Republican presidential candidate John McCain has grown. Some
prominent conservatives are even threatening drastic action.

Take Ann Coulter. In
an appearance on Fox News' "Hannity and Colmes" that's now been
widely remarked upon, she told the two hosts that if McCain was nominated, and
running against Sen. Hillary Clinton, she'd
vote for Clinton.

The brothers Limbaugh -- Rush and lesser-known sibling David -- have been
hitting McCain hard in recent days. On Rush's Web site, in a list of quotes from his Thursday broadcast he includes, among
others, "McCain's kind of like the Clintons in a sense: you tell the truth about
them and they think it's a personal attack" and "Lindsey Graham is certainly
close enough to John McCain to die of anal poisoning." (We hope there's some
sort of legitimate reference in that second one that we're just not getting, but
we doubt it.) Then David, in a column on Townhall.com Friday, wrote, McCain "is the
anti-conservative. He instinctively sides against conservatives and relishes
poking them in the eye.

"He enjoys cavorting and colluding with our political enemies and basks in
the fawning attention they give him. Adding insult to injury, he now pretends to
be the very thing he is not: an across-the-board Reagan conservative."

Then there's Michelle Malkin, last seen implying that perhaps there was
something amiss with the voting in Florida that led to McCain's win, who was set off again by California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's
appearance with McCain Thursday. "So, Arnold Schwarzenegger endorsed John
McCain. He extolled McCain for 'reach[ing] across the political aisle to get
things done' ...

"To which I say: When did it become the Republican Party's top priority to
'get things done?'" Malkin wrote.

She continued: "'Get things done' is mindless liberal code for passing
legislation and expanding government.

"And as McCain's ample legislative record demonstrates, 'reaching across
the political aisle' never entails pulling opponents to the right. It always
entails selling out the right.

"How about defending our side of the political aisle?"

In a column, Thomas Sowell went after McCain's prized reputation as
a "straight talker." "We have been hearing for years that Senator John McCain
gives 'straight talk' and his bus has been endlessly referred to as the
'Straight Talk Express.' But endless repetition does not make something true,"
Sowell wrote. "... When confronted with any of his misdeeds, Senator McCain
tends to fall back on his record as a war hero in Vietnam.

"Let's talk sense. Benedict Arnold was a war hero but that did not exempt
him from condemnation for his later betrayal."

Meanwhile, McCain's chief remaining rival on the Republican side, former
Massachusetts Gov. Mitt
Romney, is quickly racking up endorsements from influential conservatives.
Sean Hannity, previously a barely closeted supporter of Rudy Giuliani's, was one
of the first to jump. Hannity's fellow radio host Laura Ingraham endorsed Romney on her show Friday morning; joining her for
the broadcast was former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum. Santorum, who has
been outspokenly anti-McCain, made his endorsement of Romney official on Ingraham's show.

In a conference call with conservative bloggers on Friday, Romney
acknowledged the support he's gotten, saying: "When Sean Hannity says he's voting for me, when Laura
Ingraham says she's endorsing me ... Rush has been going after McCain pretty
aggressively. Michael Reagan has been pretty aggressive. The world of
conservatism is pretty solidly behind my effort."

Hang in there, Mitt. We need you.

More at Perish the Thought, Over-the-Hill Oracles and Elderscapes.

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Romney on Washington Needs

2008-01-07T11:35:00.000-08:00

He has my support.

What Washington needs is Mitt Romney. And so does the rest of America!!

The Huckabee Hoax

2007-12-11T20:38:00.000-08:00

Why is anyone surprised about Mike Huckabee's appeal with the religious right?

Gull has collected several links which clarify the attractions, including a few alarming ones.

Every candidate wants endorsements, but being endorsed by a man accused of bilking thousands of dollars from the Minuteman border patrol and and who hangs with Skin Heads and white Supremacist groups are not an endorsement conservatives need.

.... Fitz2b and the Huckster were to get the nomination -- I would have to find another political party. Or a 3rd party candidate.

Folks such as me who are turned off by greed, hypocrisy and corruption are not going to vote for Hillary Clinton. I won't support Mike Huckabee for the same reasons.

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Buchanan on Rudy and Hill's Quest for the GreenHouse

2007-10-27T09:47:00.000-07:00

Ouch. Pat Buchanan is NOT a Rudy-fan ..... I'm not either, but for reasons a bit softer than the sore-spots left by blustery B's bite.

As for biting someone -- I'd much prefer that MSM and liberal-leaners chewed on the Clintoons and made them comply with the principles (if not the regs) of campaign financing. I'm not optimistic, however. Those two have gotten away with more than any figures in recent American history.

As someone suggested this morning during poker --- the Clintoons will continue to get a free pass on graft and corruption (ala, their China-Connection) until the judges Bill appointed are run out of office. And I particularly enjoyed Gull's post on the latest (can we hope??) campaign funding blunder that Hillary "crooked" up.

If that unethical, power-crazed non-achiever wins the White House with those illegal contributions, we'll have to change its color and name.

And "Greenhouse" is already taken.

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Bubba to Restore U.S. Reputation????

2007-10-05T11:25:00.001-07:00

Bill Clinton? THE Bill Clinton? Former President of the United States? The one caught getting a blow job under his WH desk from a gal young enough to be his daughter? THAT Bill Clinton? Married to whatz'er name .... ehhhh, Shrillary? Com'mon, Gull. You gotta be kidding!!

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The TRUE DC Protest Message

2007-09-16T08:17:00.000-07:00

THIS is the message (and photo) you won't see in the MSM.

It's the message hired protesters wanted to convey this weekend in Washington.

Message received.

Now, take your Soros-funded anti-America protest-for-hire money and return to the rock you crawled out from under.

God bless our troops and their families.

Thanks to the thousands of Eagles and GOE III participants who confronted the cowards in Washington this weekend.

hat tip to Gull.

Fitz2B: It's Gotta Be Romney

2007-08-05T11:36:00.000-07:00

Romney shines at today's 8am debate in Iowa.

Victory, Purity, Loyalty

2007-07-04T11:03:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday, America -- Today we celebrate your true colors and what they represent: victory, purity, loyalty ... RED, WHITE and BLUE!!

An "Over-the-Hill" Coalition Tribute -- July 4, 2007

Iraqi Kids Go a'Scouting

2007-06-10T16:47:00.000-07:00

Thanks to our troops and US funding, Iraqi youth are going camping again, via a revival of Scouting.

Armed with rakes and wheelbarrows, a group of Iraqi Scouts and Guides is
clearing a patch of Baghdad woodland. For many it is their first “normal” outing
with friends in more than four years of violence.
The concrete bunker and
taped cordon that guard them from unexploded bombs give this Scout camp a
slightly edgier feel to jamborees in Britain, where a grazed knee or getting
lost represent some of the biggest hazards.
For 13-year-old Fahad Abdul
Sammed, however, it offers a rare chance to leave his house and play with his
friends. “For the last few years I have not had any fun. This is the first time
I have gone away from my family,” Fahad said.
He is one of about 40 Iraqi
boys and girls who teamed up yesterday to clear away dead branches and shrubs
from the unused land in Baghdad’s fortified green zone — the slightly more
secure area of the city that also houses Iraqi government buildings and foreign
embassies.

The clean-up is part of a drive to revive Iraq’s esteemed Scouting past — introduced to the country by the British military in 1921. Participation has risen from zero to approximately 150,000 over the last four years.

“We want to teach the children about team spirit and how to be a good person,”
Abdul Salam, chairman of the Iraqi Scouts, said.
Joining the Scouts provides
an opportunity for children to come together, whatever their ethnic background,
he said, hoping that this would eventually help to ease the sectarian tensions
that have fuelled the chaos in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion.
“We would
like every boy and girl in Iraq to join the Scouts — whether they are Shia,
Sunni, Christian or Kurd,” Mr Salam added.

At the prospective campsite in Baghdad, the Iraqi girl Scouts clambered out of a
minibus and stood in a line wearing brand-new blue shirts and skirts topped off
with a bright-green necktie and a baseball cap — worn on occasion over a
headscarf.
The boys were less well turned out because there were not enough
new uniforms to go around but once all the children had assembled the Scout
leaders instructed everyone to change into cleaning gear — namely football
shirts.
“We are going to have lots of fun today,” First Lieutenant Sharon
Burns, one of the American military volunteers, shouted through an Iraqi
translator.
“We have rakes and we are going to use them to clean up this
place so we have somewhere to play. This is your camp so let’s make it the best
we can.”
The boys marched off to one corner of the site — which was about
the size of a football pitch — and the girls took their rakes to another. Within
minutes clouds of dust puffed into the air as the children dragged branches,
picked up leaves and raked twigs.
About ten American soldiers also pitched
in with the effort — made particularly tough by the punishing morning sun.
Leaning on her rake, 14-year-old Batoul al-Timimi said that she was glad to
be part of the action. “I decided to join the girl Scouts because I did not want
to stay in my house during the summer,” she said.
Many parents in Baghdad
are afraid to let their children play in the street — even inside the green
zone, where these children live — because of the threat of bombs and kidnapping.
Woroud al-Kanani, another 14-year-old girl, said: “I would prefer for the
camp to be outside the green zone. It would be more dangerous but I think it
would be more fun.
“Unfortunately the other girls are scared because of the
bombs and explosions.”
There are two other Scout campsites in Baghdad, but
they have been “borrowed” by the Ministry of Interior to use as land to train
the Iraqi security forces.

During Saddam Hussein’s time, however, many
Scout camps were used to train boys to use weapons rather than to do a good deed
every day, while girl Scouts were largely neglected.
As a result Iraq was
ejected from the World Organisation of the Scout Movement in 1999.
With
clubs re-forming across the country — holding twice-weekly meetings at schools
and arranging camping trips when possible, depending on the security — Iraq
hopes to regain its full membership to the movement next year. It also plans to
send ten Scouts to England next month to take part in the World Scout Jamboree
in Chelmsford, Essex.
Despite the progress, there are setbacks, as is often
the case in Iraq since the invasion.
By lunchtime there was mutiny among the
boys at the green zone Scout camp.
Instructions about the day’s activities
had been lost in translation and everyone thought that they were supposed to be
on the camping trip for four nights — rather than spending only a morning
clearing up a plot of land to build a campsite next month.
“They are big
liars. This is just a game for them,” Ali Haider, 13, said with tears in his
eyes. He had been left stranded as a result of the mix-up because his entire
family had gone away to Hilla, south of Baghdad, and left him on his own.
Saef Mohammed, 16, vowed never to go on another Scouting trip. “This is very
bad. I will not come back,” he said.
First Lieutenant Burns said that the
boys had unfortunately been misinformed by their Iraqi Scout leader about the
plan but assured them that the site would be up and running in a couple of
weeks.
Crisis resolved, the girl Scouts picked up their rakes again and went
back to work, while the boys decided to have a game of football, using orange
plastic cones as goalposts, until it was time to go home.

credit: The Anchoress

Romney: Tested, Proven

2007-05-23T19:23:00.000-07:00

Mitt's new campaign ad -- on target.

http://mitt-tv.mittromney.com/?showid=63511

Tested. Proven.

You gotta like what this man represents -- a strong voice for America.

Did Dean Prompt Kansas Gov. to Lie???

2007-05-13T10:00:00.000-07:00

I'm disgusted with Howard Dean and his cohorts anyway. This is not their first attempt to mischaracterize natural disasters or George W. Bush's administration or in effect, the Iraqi War.

If the following scenario contains any element of truth -- Dean, Pelosi, Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius and every person involved in this miscarriage of truth should be removed from office.

Gull has a summation of the incidents, with transcripts and links.

I stand tall with all who demand that the liars and cronies be revealed for betraying the confidence and security of the American people.

Lighting the Belly-Fire -- I mean, Belly-Laugh

2007-05-05T18:09:00.000-07:00

The Over-the-Hill gang has been posting about Fred Thompson this weekend. It's my turn.

I agree in theory with Gull. I also share Wiz and Rhet's impatience, Whim's and Goodie's apprehensions. I don't know whether or why or when Fred Thompson will make his decision. But he better hurry before the crowd becomes restless .... For every fantasy-hope his followers conjure, moonbats will spin three negative realities.

So while Fred practices his lines in the wings, I'll speculate a bit.

--- What if .... after the wanna-bees have left the campaign .....

--- Either McCain or Rudy dropped out.

--- Would Fred be more eager to run? Maybe. Maybe he never intended to run for President.

--- But Romney has been and is in it for the full race.

--- What if Fred agreed to join Romney as his Vice-President?

--- They would form the perfect conservative team ....

Listen to Thompson's "loaded" words in this new video. He repeatedly refers to the need for change .... new directions ....

What better option for America than to let voters know in advance that THIS is the team that will lead them into the future? Two great minds --- one united effort.

More entertaining than this speculation, however, would be the fun in watching moonbats scurry to circle their wheel-less wagons!

Responding to Reid

2007-04-27T19:12:00.000-07:00

This is a new video circulating by email. Everyone who supports the troops should see it. On second thought, every American should see this.

Response to Harry Reid

Lieberman as Senate Majority Leader?

2007-04-25T20:21:00.000-07:00

This may very well be the ONLY way our troops and our nation receive the Congressional support and Senate leadership that it desperately needs.

Harry Reid is NOT the answer for America.

Gull's two recent posts at Perish the Thought share the links and the rationale.

Contact Senator Lieberman. Ask him to either switch parties OR to caucus with Republicans.

America needs his leadership.

Here are Senator Lieberman's addresses and numbers:

Washington, DC Office
706 Hart Office BuildingWashington, DC 20510
(202) 224-4041 Voice (202) 224-9750 Fax

Connecticut Office
One Constitution Plaza 7th Floor Hartford, CT 06103
(860) 549-8463 Voice (800) 225-5605 In CT (860) 549-8478 Fax

You can e-mail Senator Lieberman from his official website at: http://lieberman.senate.gov/

1900 Predictions Miss Mark, But Not By Much!

2007-04-22T12:16:00.000-07:00

Copied from Ladies Home Journal.

The Ladies Home Journal from December 1900, which contained a fascinating article by John Elfreth Watkins, Jr. “What May Happen in the Next Hundred Years”.

Mr. Watkins wrote: “These prophecies will seem strange, almost impossible. Yet, they have come from the most learned and conservative minds in America. To the wisest and most careful men in our greatest institutions of science and learning I have gone, asking each in his turn to forecast for me what, in his opinion, will have been wrought in his own field of investigation before the dawn of 2001 - a century from now. These opinions I have carefully transcribed.”

Prediction #1: There will probably be from 350,000,000 to 500,000,000 people in America and its possessions by the lapse of another century. Nicaragua will ask for admission to our Union after the completion of the great canal. Mexico will be next. Europe, seeking more territory to the south of us, will cause many of the South and Central American republics to be voted into the Union by their own people.”

Prediction #2: The American will be taller by from one to two inches. His increase of stature will result from better health, due to vast reforms in medicine, sanitation, food and athletics. He will live fifty years instead of thirty-five as at present – for he will reside in the suburbs. The city house will practically be no more. Building in blocks will be illegal. The trip from suburban home to office will require a few minutes only. A penny will pay the fare.

Prediction #3: Gymnastics will begin in the nursery, where toys and games will be designed to strengthen the muscles. Exercise will be compulsory in the schools. Every school, college and community will have a complete gymnasium. All cities will have public gymnasiums. A man or woman unable to walk ten miles at a stretch will be regarded as a weakling.

Prediction #4: There Will Be No Street Cars in Our Large Cities. All hurry traffic will be below or high above ground when brought within city limits. In most cities it will be confined to broad subways or tunnels, well lighted and well ventilated, or to high trestles with “moving-sidewalk” stairways leading to the top. These underground or overhead streets will teem with capacious automobile passenger coaches and freight with cushioned wheels. Subways or trestles will be reserved for express trains. Cities, therefore, will be free from all noises.

Prediction #5: Trains will run two miles a minute, normally; express trains one hundred and fifty miles an hour. To go from New York to San Francisco will take a day and a night by fast express. There will be cigar-shaped electric locomotives hauling long trains of cars. Cars will, like houses, be artificially cooled. Along the railroads there will be no smoke, no cinders, because coal will neither be carried nor burned. There will be no stops for water. Passengers will travel through hot or dusty country regions with windows down.

Prediction #6: Automobiles will be cheaper than horses are today. Farmers will own automobile hay-wagons, automobile truck-wagons, plows, harrows and hay-rakes. A one-pound motor in one of these vehicles will do the work of a pair of horses or more. Children will ride in automobile sleighs in winter. Automobiles will have been substituted for every horse vehicle now known. There will be, as already exist today, automobile hearses, automobile police patrols, automobile ambulances, automobile street sweepers. The horse in harness will be as scarce, if, indeed, not even scarcer, then as the yoked ox is today.

Prediction #7: There will be air-ships, but they will not successfully compete with surface cars and water vessels for passenger or freight traffic. They will be maintained as deadly war-vessels by all military nations. Some will transport men and goods. Others will be used by scientists making observations at great heights above the earth.

Prediction #8: Aerial War-Ships and Forts on Wheels. Giant guns will shoot twenty-five miles or more, and will hurl anywhere within such a radius shells exploding and destroying whole cities. Such guns will be armed by aid of compasses when used on land or sea, and telescopes when directed from great heights. Fleets of air-ships, hiding themselves with dense, smoky mists, thrown off by themselves as they move, will float over cities, fortifications, camps or fleets. They will surprise foes below by hurling upon them deadly thunderbolts. These aerial war-ships will necessitate bomb-proof forts, protected by great steel plates over their tops as well as at their sides. Huge forts on wheels will dash across open spaces at the speed of express trains of to-day. They will make what are now known as cavalry charges. Great automobile plows will dig deep entrenchments as fast as soldiers can occupy them. Rifles will use silent cartridges. Submarine boats submerged for days will be capable of wiping a whole navy off the face of the deep. Balloons and flying machines will carry telescopes of one-hundred-mile vision with camera attachments, photographing an enemy within that radius. These photographs as distinct and large as if taken from across the street, will be lowered to the commanding officer in charge of troops below.

Prediction #9: Photographs will be telegraphed from any distance. If there be a battle in China a hundred years hence snapshots of its most striking events will be published in the newspapers an hour later. Even to-day photographs are being telegraphed over short distances. Photographs will reproduce all of Nature’s colors.

Prediction #10: Man will See Around the World. Persons and things of all kinds will be brought within focus of cameras connected electrically with screens at opposite ends of circuits, thousands of miles at a span. American audiences in their theatres will view upon huge curtains before them the coronations of kings in Europe or the progress of battles in the Orient. The instrument bringing these distant scenes to the very doors of people will be connected with a giant telephone apparatus transmitting each incidental sound in its appropriate place. Thus the guns of a distant battle will be heard to boom when seen to blaze, and thus the lips of a remote actor or singer will be heard to utter words or music when seen to move.

Prediction #11: No Mosquitoes nor Flies. Insect screens will be unnecessary. Mosquitoes, house-flies and roaches will have been practically exterminated. Boards of health will have destroyed all mosquito haunts and breeding-grounds, drained all stagnant pools, filled in all swamp-lands, and chemically treated all still-water streams. The extermination of the horse and its stable will reduce the house-fly.

Prediction #12: Peas as Large as Beets. Peas and beans will be as large as beets are to-day. Sugar cane will produce twice as much sugar as the sugar beet now does. Cane will once more be the chief source of our sugar supply. The milkweed will have been developed into a rubber plant. Cheap native rubber will be harvested by machinery all over this country. Plants will be made proof against disease microbes just as readily as man is to-day against smallpox. The soil will be kept enriched by plants which take their nutrition from the air and give fertility to the earth.

Prediction #13: Strawberries as Large as Apples will be eaten by our great-great-grandchildren for their Christmas dinners a hundred years hence. Raspberries and blackberries will be as large. One will suffice for the fruit course of each person. Strawberries and cranberries will be grown upon tall bushes. Cranberries, gooseberries and currants will be as large as oranges. One cantaloupe will supply an entire family. Melons, cherries, grapes, plums, apples, pears, peaches and all berries will be seedless. Figs will be cultivated over the entire United States.

Prediction #14: Black, Blue and Green Roses. Roses will be as large as cabbage heads. Violets will grow to the size of orchids. A pansy will be as large in diameter as a sunflower. A century ago the pansy measured but half an inch across its face. There will be black, blue and green roses. It will be possible to grow any flower in any color and to transfer the perfume of a scented flower to another which is odorless. Then may the pansy be given the perfume of the violet.

Prediction #15: No Foods will be Exposed. Storekeepers who expose food to air breathed out by patrons or to the atmosphere of the busy streets will be arrested with those who sell stale or adulterated produce. Liquid-air refrigerators will keep great quantities of food fresh for long intervals.

Prediction #16: There will be No C, X or Q in our every-day alphabet. They will be abandoned because unnecessary. Spelling by sound will have been adopted, first by the newspapers. English will be a language of condensed words expressing condensed ideas, and will be more extensively spoken than any other. Russian will rank second.

Prediction #17: How Children will be Taught. A university education will be free to every man and woman. Several great national universities will have been established. Children will study a simple English grammar adapted to simplified English, and not copied after the Latin. Time will be saved by grouping like studies. Poor students will be given free board, free clothing and free books if ambitious and actually unable to meet their school and college expenses. Medical inspectors regularly visiting the public schools will furnish poor children free eyeglasses, free dentistry and free medical attention of every kind. The very poor will, when necessary, get free rides to and from school and free lunches between sessions. In vacation time poor children will be taken on trips to various parts of the world. Etiquette and housekeeping will be important studies in the public schools.

Prediction #18: Telephones Around the World. Wireless telephone and telegraph circuits will span the world. A husband in the middle of the Atlantic will be able to converse with his wife sitting in her boudoir in Chicago. We will be able to telephone to China quite as readily as we now talk from New York to Brooklyn. By an automatic signal they will connect with any circuit in their locality without the intervention of a “hello girl”.

Prediction #19: Grand Opera will be telephoned to private homes, and will sound as harmonious as though enjoyed from a theatre box. Automatic instruments reproducing original airs exactly will bring the best music to the families of the untalented. Great musicians gathered in one enclosure in New York will, by manipulating electric keys, produce at the same time music from instruments arranged in theatres or halls in San Francisco or New Orleans, for instance. Thus will great bands and orchestras give long-distance concerts. In great cities there will be public opera-houses whose singers and musicians are paid from funds endowed by philanthropists and by the government. The piano will be capable of changing its tone from cheerful to sad. Many devises will add to the emotional effect of music.

Prediction #20: Coal will not be used for heating or cooking. It will be scarce, but not entirely exhausted. The earth’s hard coal will last until the year 2050 or 2100; its soft-coal mines until 2200 or 2300. Meanwhile both kinds of coal will have become more and more expensive. Man will have found electricity manufactured by waterpower to be much cheaper. Every river or creek with any suitable fall will be equipped with water-motors, turning dynamos, making electricity. Along the seacoast will be numerous reservoirs continually filled by waves and tides washing in. Out of these the water will be constantly falling over revolving wheels. All of our restless waters, fresh and salt, will thus be harnessed to do the work which Niagara is doing today: making electricity for heat, light and fuel.

Prediction #21: Hot and Cold Air from Spigots. Hot or cold air will be turned on from spigots to regulate the temperature of a house as we now turn on hot or cold water from spigots to regulate the temperature of the bath. Central plants will supply this cool air and heat to city houses in the same way as now our gas or electricity is furnished. Rising early to build the furnace fire will be a task of the olden times. Homes will have no chimneys, because no smoke will be created within their walls.

Prediction #22: Store Purchases by Tube. Pneumatic tubes, instead of store wagons, will deliver packages and bundles. These tubes will collect, deliver and transport mail over certain distances, perhaps for hundreds of miles. They will at first connect with the private houses of the wealthy; then with all homes. Great business establishments will extend them to stations, similar to our branch post-offices of today, whence fast automobile vehicles will distribute purchases from house to house.

Prediction #23: Ready-cooked meals will be bought from establishments similar to our bakeries of today. They will purchase materials in tremendous wholesale quantities and sell the cooked foods at a price much lower than the cost of individual cooking. Food will be served hot or cold to private houses in pneumatic tubes or automobile wagons. The meal being over, the dishes used will be packed and returned to the cooking establishments where they will be washed. Such wholesale cookery will be done in electric laboratories rather than in kitchens. These laboratories will be equipped with electric stoves, and all sorts of electric devices, such as coffee-grinders, egg-beaters, stirrers, shakers, parers, meat-choppers, meat-saws, potato-mashers, lemon-squeezers, dish-washers, dish-dryers and the like. All such utensils will be washed in chemicals fatal to disease microbes. Having one’s own cook and purchasing one’s own food will be an extravagance.

Prediction #24: Vegetables Grown by Electricity. Winter will be turned into summer and night into day by the farmer. In cold weather he will place heat-conducting electric wires under the soil of his garden and thus warm his growing plants. He will also grow large gardens under glass. At night his vegetables will be bathed in powerful electric light, serving, like sunlight, to hasten their growth. Electric currents applied to the soil will make valuable plants grow larger and faster, and will kill troublesome weeds. Rays of colored light will hasten the growth of many plants. Electricity applied to garden seeds will make them sprout and develop unusually early.

Prediction #25: Oranges will grow in Philadelphia. Fast-flying refrigerators on land and sea will bring delicious fruits from the tropics and southern temperate zone within a few days. The farmers of South America, South Africa, Australia and the South Sea Islands, whose seasons are directly opposite to ours, will thus supply us in winter with fresh summer foods, which cannot be grown here. Scientist will have discovered how to raise here many fruits now confined to much hotter or colder climates. Delicious oranges will be grown in the suburbs of Philadelphia. Cantaloupes and other summer fruits will be of such a hardy nature that they can be stored through the winter as potatoes are now.

Prediction #26: Strawberries as large as apples will be eaten by our great great grandchildren for their Christmas dinners a hundred years hence. Raspberries and blackberries will be as large. One will suffice for the fruit course of each person. Strawberries and cranberries will be grown upon tall bushes. Cranberries, gooseberries and currants will be as large as oranges. One cantaloupe will supply an entire family. Melons, cherries, grapes, plums, apples, pears, peaches and all berries will be seedless. Figs will be cultivated over the entire United States.

Prediction #27: Few drugs will be swallowed or taken into the stomach unless needed for the direct treatment of that organ itself. Drugs needed by the lungs, for instance, will be applied directly to those organs through the skin and flesh. They will be carried with the electric current applied without pain to the outside skin of the body. Microscopes will lay bare the vital organs, through the living flesh, of men and animals. The living body will to all medical purposes be transparent. Not only will it be possible for a physician to actually see a living, throbbing heart inside the chest, but he will be able to magnify and photograph any part of it. This work will be done with rays of invisible light.

Prediction #28: There will be no wild animals except in menageries. Rats and mice will have been exterminated. The horse will have become practically extinct. A few of high breed will be kept by the rich for racing, hunting and exercise. The automobile will have driven out the horse. Cattle and sheep will have no horns. They will be unable to run faster than the fattened hog of today. A century ago the wild hog could outrun a horse. Food animals will be bred to expend practically all of their life energy in producing meat, milk, wool and other by-products. Horns, bones, muscles and lungs will have been neglected.

Prediction #29: To England in Two Days. Fast electric ships, crossing the ocean at more than a mile a minute, will go from New York to Liverpool in two days. The bodies of these ships will be built above the waves. They will be supported upon runners, somewhat like those of the sleigh. These runners will be very buoyant. Upon their under sides will be apertures expelling jets of air. In this way a film of air will be kept between them and the water’s surface. This film, together with the small surface of the runners, will reduce friction against the waves to the smallest possible degree. Propellers turned by electricity will screw themselves through both the water beneath and the air above. Ships with cabins artificially cooled will be entirely fireproof. In storm they will dive below the water and there await fair weather.

These are so close, it's eerie!!! Someone should have been working harder on #11, though.

Fitz2b .....

If It's To Be --

2007-04-22T11:52:00.000-07:00

That's me --- fitz2B. It's part of my last name and my first two initials!

It fits.

It's also my attitude toward life in general and in particular.

Fitz2B, it will ........

Welcome to Fitz2B!