The United States supplies tons of taxpayer money to the IMF, and the IMF used it to bail out Greece from their own fiscal craziness.
Oh, she isn’t happy at all.
Here’s Paul Ryan with more details.
This is 23 minutes long.
Tag Archives: Europe
Obama budget proposal likely to decrease charitable giving by billions
Excerpt:
On the April 16 broadcast of Fox Business Network’s “Varney & Co.,” Rick Dunham, CEO of fundraising consultant Dunham & Company, weighed in on the new budget proposal that would scale back charitable deductions for families making over $250,000.
“Do you think you’re going to take a really big hit in terms of lower donations to charities? How big a hit?” host Stuart Varney asked.
“Well the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University did a study last year to look at the impact of the rise in the marginal tax rate and the capping of charitable deductions at 28-percent and they believe that it’ll be about almost a $4 billion hit based on 2006 dollars,” Dunham said. “So we’re probably looking at about a $5 billion hit.”
“That’s a sizable chunk of money,” Varney said. “There has been some talk that the administration wants to control charitable giving, and direct where your charitable gifts should go, therefore do it through the government and not through private charities. You think there’s anything to that?”
Dunham didn’t reject the idea out of hand. “I think all the actions kind of lead that direction. Part of the challenge charities are facing right now is they’re coming off of two years of a decline in giving to charities,” Dunham stated, citing the approximate $12 billion decrease in charitable giving the last two years.
“The government has always encouraged it through the tax incentive. And I think that’s been a huge part of giving in America – that the government has stood behind private philanthropy by saying ‘we want you to invest in charitable institutions for the good they do to our society.’ And I think that’s what they’re beginning to undermine.”
This is similar to what happened in Europe. As the secular leftists welfare states grew, people paid more and more in taxes. People had no money after the high taxes to give to charity, because they had “already given” to state. It was the state’s job to take care of people, not private charities. People became very selfish and hedonistic, and religious practice and charitable giving declined.
The problem with this for Christians is that the state never uses tax money to achieve Christian goals. With a Christian charity, the goal is usually to give the person with money, but also to help the person up and out of their current situation. Christians aren’t trying to give a man a fish, they want to teach him how to fish. It also helps to feel a little humble when someone is helping you.
Der Spiegel reports that just 42% of Germans believe in global warming
Fox News reports. (H/T Dad)
Excerpt:
Germans citizens are rapidly losing faith in global warming following the Climate-gate scandals, according to a new report in Der Spiegel.
The report indicates that just 42 percent of Germans are worried about global warming, down substantially from the 62 percent that expressed concern with the state of the environment in 2006.
German news site The Local analyzed the results from the poll, conducted by polling company Infratest for the German newsmagazine. Many people have little faith in the information and prognosis of climate researchers, The Local explained, with a third questioned in the survey not giving them much credence.
This is thought to be largely due to mistakes and exaggerations recently discovered in a report of the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said the site.
Der Spiegel is the New York Times of Germany, except further to the left, if that’s possible.
Meanwhile, the left-wing Guardian reports. (H/T ECM)
Excerpt:
Humans are too stupid to prevent climate change from radically impacting on our lives over the coming decades. This is the stark conclusion of James Lovelock, the globally respected environmental thinker and independent scientist who developed the Gaia theory.
It follows a tumultuous few months in which public opinion on efforts to tackle climate change has been undermined by events such as the climate scientists’ emails leaked from the University of East Anglia (UEA) and the failure of the Copenhagen climate summit.
“I don’t think we’re yet evolved to the point where we’re clever enough to handle a complex a situation as climate change,” said Lovelock in his first in-depth interview since the theft of the UEA emails last November. “The inertia of humans is so huge that you can’t really do anything meaningful.”
One of the main obstructions to meaningful action is “modern democracy”, he added. “Even the best democracies agree that when a major war approaches, democracy must be put on hold for the time being. I have a feeling that climate change may be an issue as severe as a war. It may be necessary to put democracy on hold for a while.”
It’s all about controlling other people.
WINTERY KNIGHT 