Sound and Fury

Veterans Day 2009

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:28:01 -0600

Those of you who know me will recognize that I tend to pull out my copy of President Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address for appropriate holidays and state occasions. I will continue to do so because I feel that it is perhaps the most remarkable statement by a political leader in my considerable library of history books. So bear with me as we are coming up to Veterans Day on November 11.

The Great War which, according to John Houseman in Three Days of the Condor, was how we referred to the War to end all wars before we knew enough to number them, officially ended with the signing of the Treaty of Versailles in France on June 28, 1919. But the fighting had actually stopped with a temporary truce or armistice agreed to the previous year with the cessation of hostilities at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month – November 11, 1918.

For those of you who are interested in the history of Veterans Day and how our government just cannot leave well enough alone, you may visit the Department of Veterans Affairs website for the details <link here>

Lincoln’s speech at Gettysburg on November 19, 1863, was remarkable in its simplicity (approximately two minutes) but was important for the complex political situation which existed at the time. The battle had occurred in July of 1863. While it was a Northern victory, it did not close the deal, so to speak. Under cover of darkness and heavy rain, Lee moved his army out of reach back into Virginia and the war would continue. Because of the casualties of the battle, Lincoln needed drafts to build up the strength of the army. Political support for the war was declining and the outcome of the war and the 1864 election were not certain at the time Lincoln presented his comments at Gettysburg to dedicate a new national cemetery to handle the internment of the soldiers who died at Gettysburg.

The words delivered by the President on that day at Gettysburg as he fought to complete the war and to campaign for re-election are simple, direct, moving and beautiful – then as now:

“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this
continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the
proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in
a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so
conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We are met on a great
battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of
that field as a final resting-place for those who here gave their
lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and
proper that we should do this. But in a larger sense, we cannot
dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground.
The brave men, living and dead who struggled here have consecrated
it far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will
little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never
forget what they did here. It is for us the living rather to be
dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here
have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here
dedicated to the great task remaining before us--that from these
honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which
they gave the last full measure of devotion--that we here highly
resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this
nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom, and that
government of the people, by the people, for the people shall
not perish from the earth.”

Adobe Releases a new Version of Photoshop Elements

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 09:18:47 -0600

Adobe has released a new and improved version of both Photoshop Elements (ver 8) and their video editing package, Premiere Elements (ver 8).

Photoshop Elements continues to be one of the greatest buys on the planet for image editing. It offers most of the powerful tools of big brother Photoshop but with emphasis on serioue home or pro-sumer markets. Its feature set happens to fit very well for the needs of the real estate profession. Tools to organize our images, improve and enhance our images and share or publish our photo images are provided with efficiency and cost-effectiveness. Elements always emphasizes the ease of use and Version 8 has enhanced the automatic functions that improve and correct your images with a single click.

Continuing the comparison between Photoshop and Elements, for example, Photoshop Elements offers output files in RGB color formats used on our laser and inkjet printers. Photoshop (the professional version) offers a wider range of choices including output in CYMK color formats that would be used by the commercial printing industry. Unless you are a professional fully engaged in the process of magazine production and pre-press at a commercial level, in my view, Photoshop Elements is the choice for you.

With each new version, Photoshop Elements gets a bit better and a lot smarter. The basic image editing tools are being improved, but remain similiar to the last several versions. The features that allow us all to adjust lighting, shadows, highlights and color intensity and restore vertical lines distorted by camera lens or position and recompose by cropping are still there to easily and quickly fix or improve our daily residential interior images.

But the “gee whiz” features that are added to each new version are getting better and better. And Version 8 is strong in the bells and whistles categories.

The intelligence of the computer is being applied to Elements tasks in new ways. The face recognition feature in the organizer now goes way beyond finding faces to actually recognizing faces. You can search for photos of cousin Jackson in your photo files. (shades of Homeland Security).

You can merge images to provide proper exposure for a wider range of the image – much like the HDR products like Photomatix. Take multiple shots at different exposure settings (tripod recommended) and find that the merged image can give proper view of the room and the bright window.

You can recompose images removing objects or closing the gap between your kids who won’t stand close to each other for the photo opp.

They have enhanced the integration of Photoshop Elements with its video brother Premiere Elements so it is easier to use still images from Photoshop Elements in the video editing process.

Pricing from Amazon.com is competitive. Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 is priced at $84.99 ( $89 for MAC users) with an after purchase send in rabate of $20. My preferred option is the combo package with Photoshop Elements 8 and Premiere Elements 8 for $123.99 and a send in rebate of $30.

With each new version of Elements, a flurry of new books are available for training and hand holding . The first available (again) is the excellent Barbara Brundage volume, Photoshop Elements 8 for Windows – The Missing Manual. ($23.75 from Amazon.com). I also recommend training books by Scott Kelby, President of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals ($31.49 at Amazon.com for Photoshop Elements 8 Book for Digital Photographers – written with Matt Kloskowski)

I still use Elements 6 – I did not opt-in to Version 7 whose major enhancement was the integration of their on-line services. But I expect I will order Version 8 shortly.

Enjoy

Take a break - A Remarkable Story for Veterans Day

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 06:45:08 -0600

This video was created in 2007 – but just came to my attention.

The story is about David Hall, a Texas resident, who owns a replica of the Liberty Bell. He brings his bell on a trailer to military funerals and tolls the bell to honor the fallen soldiers in the historic tradition of centuries past.

As we approach Veterans Day, I think his is a message we need to hear. (video less than 3 minutes)

Remember the sacrifices of nearly 2 million military servicemen and women and their families since the founding of this Nation.

my source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7j64VgM8-4

Day after Election Day 2009

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 05:36:51 -0600

Well, that is not bad. Strong conservative showings all around. A Republican Governor in New Jersey (despite strong support from the White House) and a Republican Governor, Lt Governor and Attorney General in Virginia.

The economy - with the profligate spending of the Democrats and the irrational accumulation of debt which is strangling the economy - is the issue. And conservative voters have served notice to the Congress:

"We're mad as Hell - and we're not going to take it anymore."

When the Congress considers trillion dollar expenditures like health care reform and energy bills like tax and trade - they would do well to remember that they will be held accountable in November 2010.

Even the NY 23 is a victory of sorts. Where the party establishment selected a candidate with liberal credentials, the conservative base isn't having it. Lets get back to the conservative principles. If the voters want to elect a Democrat, then we need to work harder. But we cannot support liberals even if they have an "R" after their name.

The Republicans in Congress that have voted as liberals, as well as the Democrats, need to pay attention to what they want to do in their next career.

And to Governor Charlie Crist in Florida who wants to be the next US Senator from my state - the footsteps you hear behind you are not just conservative candidate Marco Rubio - they are the conservative voters of the state. And we believe that the position of US Senator from Florida needs to be filled by a strong conservative with a demonstrated conservative record.

Sorry, Charlie.

Election Day November 3, 2009

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:44:51 -0600

It is Election in only a few States and localities, but there is a possibility that the voters in Virginia, New York and New Jersey will take advantage of an opportunity to send a message to Washington and to the individual state capitols around the nation.

To borrow from the movie, Network, “We’re Mad as Hell and we’re not going to take it anymore !”

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele was perhaps a bit more eloquent – but conveyed the same thought:

(Election day) …It’s my favorite day because the Republican Party’s message, when properly articulated, affirms faith in the individual. Americans are intelligent people who, when empowered to keep their own money and make their own choices, are best able to build a good life for themselves and their families. Election Day is an opportunity for Americans to elevate more representatives to public office that believe and represent this core principle.

Read Michael Steele’s full statement <here>

CNet Fall 2009 top Five FREE Downloads

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 08:09:08 -0600

CNet.com has a new list of the top five freeware downloads from their Download.com site.

Catch their three minute video presentation <here>

To take away from the suspense while you click on the link above and wait for the video to load, the top five free (and legal) programs include:

Gimp - the serious advanced image editor with the power of the full version of Photoshop (but a quirky interface)
Handbrake - one of the best video converters to bring DVD's and other video to your handheld device or other video application.
FireFox - Well, I use Chrome as my regular browser but use 4 or 5 other browsers (including FireFox) for special tasks. But FireFox is the reason we have choices in Browsers. FirFox commands 24% of the browser market. (Chrome is about 3.6%, by the way)
Open Office - this is a free download that packages much of the power of Microsoft Office Suite into a very cost-efficient system. Open Office can read and save Microsoft compatible file formats. A definate choice for the budget conscious - and with many features of its own to love.
VLC Media Player - This is a no-brainer. Excellent performance as a video player with a broad set of Codec files. This is the Swiss Army Knife of video player utilities (and it is free).

All are available at www.download.com

Enjoy

Free - one day only - replace the Clone tool

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 07:21:03 -0600

The site www.giveawayoftheday.com provides interesting utility programs for free. One program is offered each day and the downloaded program must be installed within the day. The software is licensed and free. It is fully functional and is not a limited time trial. The software vendors increase their installed base and get word of mouth publicity for their products long after the GOTD availability expires. Programs would typically cost $15 to $60 if you were buying them from the publisher but for one day they are free. Your license from the publisher does not include updates.

So the GOTD website is worth checking. You will find some of the programs are not ready for prime time – but there are comments from users who have installed the program to help you evaluate before you download. And there are, from time to time, some real gems on offer. I include a GOTD summary on my Yahoo! portal newspage so I see the daily offering each day.

TODAY’S GIVEAWAYOFTHEDAY is Inpaint 2.0

Inpaint 2.0 does one thing – it removes an object from a still photo and fills in the space with “intelligent” pixels from the surrounding area. Photoshop Elements users will recognize the Clone Tool application. But this program claims to be quicker and more automated.

I have not yet used the program, since I wanted to give readers the full 19 hour window to download and install. But the comments from users were quite positive. As you would expect, the larger the object, the less satisfactory the result – depending on the surrounding background. It sounds like it may be necessary to work on parts of a larger object at a time – which begins to sound like the time consuming Clone Tool in Photoshop. But the description sounds like the process can be more automated and the selection tool available can be a polygon ro accompdate an irregular shape. You can UNDO and you can run the process several times to improve a result, according to the description.

If you find yourself spending a lot of time with the Clone Tool to remove an object from an image, you may want to look at Inpaint 2.0. If you look today, the price is right.

New Magic Powers in Twitter

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 07:04:24 -0600

I have, in the past, characterized reading my Twitter feed as trying to drink from a fire hose. The flow of information is overwhelming. I have approximately 2,000 followers and the range of topics they discuss each and every day is unbelievable. I enjoy grazing a few times a day - but I am only sampling and I am missing the best stuff, I am sure.

So Twitter has now integrated Twitter lists into the standard interface.

What does that mean and why do I think it is important to you...

My group of followers all have separate interests. Some are interested in what I may have to say from time to time - most are just trying to build their follower lists as I did. But there are some real gems in there and I want to hear every word they have to say.

So what I can do with Twitter lists is group some of my followers who are likely to be interested in the same thing into a list or subset of my group of followers. So I can look at a filtered feed that will only contain those followers (or people I follow, by the way) that are likely to talk about a specific topic or set of topics. I have a list of techies who provide me with technical data on a wide range of topics. I have a filtered list of news and political folks. I have a list of MLM folks in some of the programs that I am in. I have a list of real estate leaders.

Are you beginning to get my drift ? Twitter lists can simplify your use of Twitter and bring targeted order out of the chaos. And it is still free.

Twitter lists are in beta test at the moment, so give them a little slack if you encounter a growing pain. But props to the Twitter folks for evolving and providing new tools that we are asking for in the standard interface.

Oh, Good Grief !

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 06:56:02 -0500

The announcement was made in Oslo, Norway, this morning. President Barack Obama has won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize.

It is a particularly interesting result since the deadline for nominations was February 1 – less than two weeks into Mr Obama’s Presidency.

According to the AP, “The Norwegian Nobel Committee lauded the change in global mood wrought by Obama’s calls for peace and cooperation but recognized initiatives that have yet to bear fruit: reducing the world stock of nuclear arms, easing American conflicts with Muslim nations and strengthening the US role in combating climate change.” (full text of article <here>)

While I do not doubt Mr Obama’s sincerity or intentions in the peace department (which I did with Al Gore’s award from the Nobel committee several years ago), I can only say I would have thought the committee could have waited until further into his Presidency when he actually did something.

Apparently the Nobel Committee has read the same press clippings as the American voters and used the same criteria for selection: no experience, no accomplishments but great expectations.

Great expectations indeed.

National Interest in Florida's Marco Rubio

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 19:29:04 -0500

I am finding that I get comfort from the political storm and my constant criticism of the Congressional leadership and the President’s administration by reading about Former Speaker of the Florida House and candidate for the US Senate from Florida, Marco Rubio.

I take refuge in the simple, logical positions of a true conservative. I read his speeches or watch his videos and I believe that there is hope for the future. My comment after attending my first live event with Marco as the speaker was.

“I was already a supporter – now I am a fan.”

So I was interested in several national endorsements this week for Marco.

The first is from syndicated columnist George Will, appearing in Townhall.com, who refers to Marco Rubio in the title of his article as a Principled Conservative. High praise. Will is critical of Governor Crist (challenging Rubio for the Republican nomination for Senate) for appearing at a rally with President Obama in support of the stimulus bill when no House Republicans and only 3 Senate Republicans voted for the stimulus. Crist favors cap and trade legislation and bothered many state Republicans by appointing a Crist political staffer and buddy to serve the balance of the Martinez Senate term. Finally Will is critical of the Crist support “public option” for property insurance which has driven some insurers out of the state and which may leave Florida citizens to foot the bill in the event of a major hurricane.

George Will speaks in glowing terms of Marco Rubio’s passionate conservative views, noting his endorsement in a recent cover article by the Nation Review. He applauds Rubio’s views including limited government, tax reform, spending restraint and removal of all impediments to entrepreneurship.

Read the George Will article in it’s entirety at: http://townhall.com/columnists/GeorgeWill/2009/09/27/a_principled_conservative

The second major endorsement last week came from Dick Armey, Republican Majority Leader in the House of Representatives from 1995 to 2003. Armey is credited, with Newt Gingrich, as author of the GOP Contract with America and with engineering the first Republican Majority in the House in 40 years in 1994. Armey had already endorsed Marco in July, but sent a fundraising letter on Marco’s behalf last week.

Armey stated in the current letter.

As I said when I endorsed him, Marco Rubio is a champion of freedom and an inspiring leader for the next generation of the conservative movement. His track record and conservative convictions are a breath of fresh air in a party looking for new leaders to advance the principles of limited government, lower taxes and economic liberty.

We need his energetic conservative leadership in the Senate. We need someone like him who will stand up for freedom no matter which party is placing it in jeopardy…

Governor Crist has lots of establishment money, but he doesn’t have Marco’s conservative vision, commitment to ideas, ability to deliver our message, or the support of thousands and thousands of citizens fed up with business as usual.”

See Dick Armey’s letter in full in David Weigel’s article for The Washington Independent at: http://washingtonindependent.com/60967/dick-armey-for-marco-rubio

Marco Rubio is polling at or above Governor Crist is areas where both candidates are known. He is consistently beating the Governor in straw polls at local county Republican events. But he still has a name recognition problem in many parts of the state. Marco held the highest legislative post in the state as Speaker of the Florida House – but has only run for election from his Florida House district of West Miami. Fundraising is his biggest challenge. Anybody who hears his message recognizes the differences between him and more liberal Charlie Crist. But he needs financial support to get that message out all over the state. Sitting governors tend to have fundraising power as well as state wide organizations. So Marco has his hands full. But Rubio has the message that the voters want to hear – and the track record to back it up.

Those of my readers who live in Florida or who value the presence of a true conservative in the US Senate in 2010 elections should support Marco’s candidacy at www.MarcoRubio.com. Immediate response is appreciated as the current calendar quarter ends in two days for current reporting requirements.

We all need to keep the energy and the message of the 9/12 TEA parties uppermost in our minds through the Congressional Elections of November 2010. Florida voters will also need to cast their votes for Marco Rubio for Senate in the Republican Primary in August of 2010 and again in the general election in November.

What ever happened to Liberty and Freedom of Expression

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 11:10:15 -0500

Humana, a major health care provider, has been ordered by the Federal Government to cease and desist from a program of mailings to their clients with negative information about the proposed health care legislation. I believe the actions of Senator Max Baucus and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) are despicable and are just another indication that the liberal majorities in Congress and the Administration will not tolerate opinions which are different than their agenda.

To state the obvious, the more government becomes involved in segments of the economy, the more those segments lose freedom to run their businesses and even to speak out against the abuse of power by the bureaucracies.

Humana and other health care vendors receive government money and the government thinks that means that they can muzzle these companies from voicing their opinions on pending legislation.

Despicable, unconstitutional and frightening to those who love this country and the freedoms upon which it was built.

NPR Health Blog (NPR is National Public Radio – hardly a right wing outlet) has an article today <link here> which describes the sequence of events. The Huffington Post – again not exactly a right wing source – has provided a copy of the Humana mailing which generated the controversy. <link here>

Different news accounts indicate that the President wants to cut out the Medicare Advantage plans (Medicare Part C) in order to save 100 to 500 billion dollars. The President has objected to the government subsidies paid to the providers, considering these subsidies in his category of waste and abuse. As usual, my only response is Horsepuckey. Don’t let me confuse you with these technical terms. I believe the President is misrepresenting the facts and merely wants to eliminate a partial privatization of the Medicare programs.

Most Medicare part A services (hospitalization) are provided to Medicare recipients without a premium charged for the coverages if the recipient has worked and paid Medicare taxes for 40 calendar quarters in their working life. A premium for coverage is charged for Medicare part B (doctors services) – typically less than $100 per month. These programs provide government paid services for approximately 80% of a patients costs. Most seniors purchase private insurance (medigap coverage) to help with the costs not covered by Medicare.

The Medicare Advantage plans were put in place by the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 – under President Clinton. The bill offered Medicare recipients the option of receiving their Medicare services through private insurance vendors. The government negotiated the benefits packages with the health care vendors and the Medicare Advantage plans replaced the Medicare A and B services. The government pays the vendors a premium contribution in addition to the premium charged to the recipient. (President Obama’s wasteful subsidy). The recipient pays a monthly premium (automatically deducted from Social Security payments – like the part B premiums) which is close to the part B premium that they were paying. The plans cover more of the costs than part A and B coverages, they offer additional service emphasizing preventive care (physicals, eye and dental coverages for example). Medigap coverages are not necessary. The Medicare Advantage plans provided prescription coverage before Part D was implemented. Most important they give recipients choices to fit their expected needs. Multiple providers and multiple plans from providers allow the recipient to shade their costs and coverages toward the needs they expect to have during the next year. The vendors renegotiate their plans with the government each year and the recipient makes new choices each year based upon their experience with the company.

The government gains from the part C programs by buying health coverage at a fixed and predictable cost per patient. They transfer the administration of the plans to private companies. The insurance companies offer plans which are specific to the county or regional needs and circumstances. They negotiate their contracts with doctors and medical providers locally and have an incentive to identify fraud and problem providers within each local area. My perception is that the Medicare Advantage plans offer value and cost control in an environment that does not prize these features. Most important they offer choice to the recipients. Not just a choice among the plans but a choice to accept the Part C programs instead of A and B. There is nobody in the Medicare Advantage plans who did not choose to be there.

But the plans represent a partial privatization of Medicare and is therefore an anathema to the President and the leaders of Congress. The left does not believe in free choice, you will remember. They believe that government knows better what each of us needs. The President who promised that nobody would be removed from their existing coverages wants to eliminate the Medicare Advantage plans impacting 20% of seniors on Medicare.

So the heavy hand of government has told Humana that they cannot tell their clients that they are going to lose services. They cannot tell their policy holders to speak up if they disagree with this outcome. The same government that fired CEOs of auto companies and banks and now must approve salary packages of banks is telling a major health care company that they can not voice their opinions to their own customers. This is WRONG - and it is getting worse by the day.

And by the way – do you think they would have silenced Humana if the company had agreed with them?

WAKE UP AMERICA !!

Here comes Trouble

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 17:07:34 -0500

The Obama Administration with little fanfare, through the Federal Communications Commission, announced today that they will move forward with a rulemaking proceeding to create formal net neutrality rules.

On the surface you might think that rules to prohibit internet providers from selectively blocking or slowing web content and applications – include mobile broadband providers – was a good thing.

In my view it is not. In fact it scares the Hell out of me.

Nobody has had any problem with the network providers doing any of these things. It is just another situation in which the Federal is moving to take over another major segment of the economy. The internet, like the economy has undergone amazing growth for 15 years (is that since Al Gore invented it?). Market functions and entrepreneurial forces have driven this growth. I see no good thing that can come out of government meddling and regulation.

Don’t these people understand yet that when government picks the winners and losers in the marketplace, our capitalistic system is dead?

Don’t they realize when they screw (excuse the technical terminology) the secured bond holders at General Motors to benefit the unions in violation of law that they stop major investors from buying what used to be considered secured debt in major corporations?

When the rules that govern our economic markets and traditional mechanisms for doing business can be altered at the whim of the political leadership from either party, then you are destabilizing the process and private investors will not be able to invest with faith in the system.

We are becomming a banana republic in an economic, if not a political, sense. Long term planning is becoming impossible for investors or major corporations because the basic landscape and rules of debt and equity are becoming unpredictable. And the cause is, in my view, is GOVERNMENT.

You may read some of the news articles today <here> and <here>.

In my view this is an answer to a question that nobody is asking. But the precedent of advancing FCC regulation of the internet is a problem and will not end well.

Another of our Freedoms started to die today.

A Parable for our Times

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:31:39 -0500

I received this in email and I am not able to properly credit the original source who is unknown to me. But the simple story does seem to have some relevance to the topics which occupy our minds these days.

So I present, without any assurances or warranties this Parable for our Times.

Barack Obama discovers a leak under his sink, so he calls Joe the Plumber to come and fix it. Joe drives to Obama's house, which is located in a very nice neighborhood and where it's clear that all the residents make more than $250,000 per year.

Joe arrives and takes his tools into the house. Joe is led to the room that contains the leaky pipe under a sink. Joe assesses the problem and tells Obama, who is standing near the door, that it's an easy repair that will take less than 10 minutes. Obama asks Joe how much it will cost. Joe immediately says, "$9,500." "$9,500?" Obama asks, stunned. "But you said it's an easy repair!" "Yes, but what I do is charge a lot more to my clients who make more than $250,000 per year so I can fix the plumbing of everybody who makes less than that for free," explains Joe. "It's always been my philosophy. As a matter of fact, I lobbied government to pass this philosophy as law, and it did pass earlier this year, so now all plumbers have to do business this way. It's known as 'Joe's Fair Plumbing Act of 2008.' Surprised you haven't heard of it."

In spite of that, Obama tells Joe there's no way he's paying that much for a small plumbing repair, so Joe leaves. Obama spends the next hour flipping through the phone book looking for another plumber, but he finds that all other plumbing businesses listed have gone out of business. Not wanting to pay Joe's price, Obama does nothing. The leak under Obama's sink goes unrepaired for the next several days. A week later the leak is so bad that Obama has had to put a bucket under the sink. The bucket fills up quickly and has to be emptied every hour, and there's a risk that the room will flood, so Obama calls Joe and pleads with him to return.

Joe goes back to Obama's house, looks at the leaky pipe, and says "Let's see – this will cost you about $21,000." "A few days ago you told me it would cost $9,500!" Obama quickly fires back. Joe explains the reason for the dramatic increase. "Well, because of the 'Joe's Fair Plumbing Act,' a lot of rich people are learning how to fix their own plumbing, so there are fewer of you paying for all the free plumbing I'm doing for the people who make less than $250,000. As a result, the rate I have to charge my wealthy paying customers rises every day. "Not only that, but for some reason the demand for plumbing work from the group of people who get it for free has skyrocketed, and there's a long waiting list of those who need repairs. This has put a lot of my fellow plumbers out of business, and they're not being replaced – nobody is going into the plumbing business because they know they won't make any money. I'm hurting now too – all thanks to greedy rich people like you who won't pay their fair share."

Obama tries to straighten out the plumber: "Of course you're hurting, Joe! Don't you get it? If all the rich people learn how to fix their own plumbing and you refuse to charge the poorer people for your services, you'll be broke, and then what will you do?"

Joe immediately replies, "Run for president, apparently."

Marco Rubio - speaking schedule

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 21:16:48 -0500

For those of you in Central to North Florida, Marco Rubio will be hosting a meeting in The Villages. Florida, on Thursday, September 17 (tomorrow) at 7pm.

Marco is the former Speaker of the Florida House who is challenging Charlie Crist for the Republican nomination for the US Senate in 2010. As we listen to the radical plans of the current Administration and the Congressional leadership, you will agree with me that it is crucial that we recover the majority in the US House of Representatives in 2010. In Florida it is important that we send a true conservative who shares your values to the US Senate in 2010. With respect to Governor Crist, in my view, he is not that man.

I am supporting Marco Rubio for the US Senate. Marco is young (38), accomplished, intelligent and articulate. He is a true conservative who speaks with passion on the critical issues of today. The son of Cuban immigrants, Marco understands what it is to lose your country. As I watch the actions of Congress and the President in the past year, we all may have an idea what he feels on this subject before too long. I hope the 2010 elections will not be too late to change the course of our history.

The address for the Thursday evening event is: 1526 Buena Vista Blvd, The Villages, FL at the Lake Miona Recreation Center in the Villages complex. Bring friends and family. I have met Marco and have listened to several of his speaking engagements. I promise you that hearing Marco Rubio speak at a live event will change your view of political candidates. I believe that Marco is the real deal. If you agree, we have just less than a year to spread the word. The Rubio campaign needs your contributions and Marco needs your active participation in the campaign.

I will continue to post Marco Rubio's schedule as he travels around Florida during the next year. You may visit his campaign website at www.marcorubio.com to contribute or to read current events. You can also sign up to receive campaign email newsletters. Additional political commentary from me may be found at www.WeSeeYou.us.

When will we ever Learn ?

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 11:06:13 -0500

This cartoon was created in 1948 by John Sutherland, a former colleague of Walt Disney. After the war, Sutherland made industrial and propaganda films, employing many animators when other studios were not using them during the 40’s and 50’s.

The clip is 9:30 minutes and addresses the benefits of capitalism over communism. The theme seems to speak directly to us today. Harding College, by the way is located in Arkansas.

My source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVh75ylAUXY

Supreme Court waking Up?

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 10:06:38 -0500

Campaign finance reform has always scares me. Any attempt to limit financial contributions or independent expenditures during a political campaign violates, in my view, the first amendment and always benefits the incumbent candidates. The only permissible means of controlling campaign finance, to me, is quick and full disclosure on the internet of all contributions or expenditures so that the public can understand who is supporting the candidates and what that may mean to their future representation in office. Anything else is a limitation on political speech - the protection of which should be fundamental.

To me the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (usually referred to as McCain-Feingold Act after its primary sponsors) was and is appalling and unAmerican. And those are its good points.

I was amazed and disappointed when several Supreme Court decisions upheld the constitutionality of provisions of the the act. In a nation which protects pornography or racially derogatory material as free speech it is beyond me how political opinion can be suppressed. We seem to have slipped a bit from our values and beliefs as provided by our founding documents.

Well there is still hope. The case Citizens United v Federal Election Commission came before the Court in 2008. Oral Arguments were heard in March, 2009. A decision was expected before the end of the current term of the Court in June of 2009. However, on June 29, 2009, the Court ordered that the case be reargued on September 9, 2009, after briefing wider Constitutional issues including whether the Court should overturn one or more of its previous decisions on the validity of the McCain-Feingold act.

The case involves a movie which presented then candidate Hillary Clinton in an unflattering light. The movie was to be released in advance of important primary elections during the presidential race of 2008. The United States District Court for the District of Columbia found that the movie and its promotional ads were electioneering communications and could be banned under the provisions of McCain-Feingold. When argued before the Court, the deputy Solicitor General speaking for the government suggested that the law would permit banning books which fall within the definitions of expressed advocacy

The case is important not only because it deals with fundamental Constitutional rights but also because it is unusual for the Court to reverse its own decisions since the weight and importance of previous decisions (called stare decisis – it stands decided) gives the legal system some predictability and much of its validity. Certainly the Court has changed its mind – Brown v Board of Education reversed generations of Court approved racial discrimination in schools. But this case could impact recent cases, including a 2007 case where the opinion of the Court was written by Chief Justice Roberts, himself. In order to attract five Justices to a decision in the present case, a narrow crafting of a “safe harbor” exclusion from regulation may be preferable to invalidating a section of the law.

But not to me.

George Will has a good article about the issue at Townhall.com today. link <here>.

Health Care and other Debates

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 15:09:08 -0500

The news media is devoting considerable coverage to what the President may or may not say in his address to Congress this evening on the subject of his legislative agenda on health care.

It has been disturbing to hear the President presenting a song and dance about Republican opposition and distortions which have been the subject of Fox News coverage for weeks. When I see an articulate spokesperson who has the dedication and direction of President Obama unable to make a coherent case for his plans for the health care industry, I feel that I am witnessing an attempt at deception.

From my point of view, so far every bit of legislation produced under the Obama administration has been a payoff to a special interest group that supported the President’s campaign. It would probably have been similar under a Republication administration – and I am not being critical of the President because he has not done what he promised in the campaign. Quite the contrary – he has been remarkably true to his agenda as announced in his campaign. That is why I opposed him last year – and that is why I am likely to disagree with him next year. But he is the President and elections have consequences. I am prepared to have President Obama support a legislative program from the White House with which I may not agree. And if the Congress in open debate with public input and honest discussion in the media passes bills which the President signs into law then the process established with the founding documents has been complied with. I am content. I may still dissent, contentedly.

So tell me, Mr President, exactly what you want, and be honest about the costs. Then let the issues be discussed in Congress and in the media. But do not ignore the voice of the people. 435 members of the House of Representatives and 1/3 of the 100 members of the Senate will stand for re-election in November of 2010. This is the source of the title of this blog – We See You.

Marco Rubio, candidate for the US Senate from Florida in 2010 posted the following video on the subject for our consideration in advance of the President’s speech this evening.

My source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=He9JdfOcDDU

New Technologies: Easy Capture Pages to go !

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 16:48:40 -0500

Now this is slick. Jeff Long of Sarasota now provides an on line service that will create an instant capture page that you can use in front of ANY website to capture name and email (optionally phone number) from anyone who visits your site.

A Landing Page or a Capture Page is a marketing device that is used to give your visitor a chance to give you contact information before you let them see the good stuff on your site. The beauty of this service is that it requires no HTML experience, no coding, no data bases to attach to your page – all the techie stuff is done for you by the easy capture page system.

Check it out at www.capturepagestogo.info – disclaimer – I am a paid representative for the company (but not nearly enough). Come back to this post and let us know in comments what you think of the presentation.

Now let me tell you how this system solved a problem for me.

You create the capture page in their system after you become a client. You can control page format, add photos and even add a video to the page. This page is intended to appear in front of any website you choose. So you drive traffic to the URL (address) they give you, or you point your own domain name to the URL of the capture page (for example my domain www.capturepagestogo.info is pointed to the presentation page for Jeff’s company). Then you specify in page setup the page you want to redirect the visitor to after they opt in with their information.

This will allow you to place this page in front of your MLS site or your company site pages. But you will get contact info on the visitor before they get into the site. Let me say it again. You can place this landing page in front of any website page – even pages you do not own. As long as the visitor enters through your gateway page address, you have the opportunity to get contact information.

Jeff’s site will automatically email you with the contact info, the page name (you named it) that gathered the information, and the date and time they opted in through the page. The information is also maintained in the back office of the system and can be exported to the contact manager or email client of your choice.

The capture page can be placed in front of real estate sites, direct marketing sites, social marketing sites, clickbank pages, blogs, MLM company replicated sites or any other internet page. You are not interfering with the operation of the site – because only visitors that enter through your gateway see the capture information. Not only do you capture contact information but you also present your message – and it can be a personal video - to visitors before they go through the gateway to your site.

This is a powerful step up for your internet marketing system. It helps you with personal branding of pages and it gathers vital contact information for you to follow up with personal contact. The concept of landing pages or capture pages is not new – but this is easy, non-technical and cost effective. It requires no coding, html or expensive consultant or designer. If you use the internet for marketing – and we all do – you need to see this system. Pricing is less than $100 per year and permits unlimited use.

Check it out. <link>

UPDATE

The material on the first page is mostly sales oriented. Enter your contact information to get to the good stuff on the second page (its a capture page, remember?) and view the video on the second page. It is about 20 minutes - but will explain the nuts and bolts of the system and the uses where you will benefit by the application of this new technology. (Patent Applied for, by the way)

Another End of an Era -Senator Edward Kennedy 1932-2009

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 14:04:35 -0500

As Shakespeare might have said, “I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him”.

Senator Edward Kennedy died last night, a victim of the brain tumor diagnosed a year ago, after a legacy of nearly 50 years in the United States Senate. There is little in Senator Kennedy’s political ideology that I would agree with. We did not share a common vision of the role of government. But I have to recognize his consistency, his persistence and his lifetime of accomplishment in the service of his Country.

There can be no doubt that Senator Kennedy was a voice in the Senate for people who lacked sufficient voice to be heard. And from all that I have read, he was viewed by his colleagues on both sides of the aisle as a man whose word could be trusted. I view both statements as high praise.

The youngest of the Kennedy brothers, he was kept from seeking the highest political office by a number of scandals in his personal life. So he rolled up his sleeves and went to work in the United States Senate as a life’s work. He gave his full attention to the needs of the people of his state and of the Nation for almost a half century.

John Fund, writer for the Wall Street Journal, described the caring showed by the Kennedy’s outside of politics and away from the lights in describing the personal support showed by the Senator and his wife for conservative columnist Robert Novak – who died last week of a similar brain tumor.

“In his last months, he and his wife Vicky also found time to come to the aid of a fellow cancer sufferer -- my old boss and friend Bob Novak. He died only a week ago from the same type of brain tumor that felled Senator Kennedy. When the conservative columnist was diagnosed last year, Vicki Kennedy reached out to Novak with the lessons they'd learned about treatment. "He and his wife have treated me like a close friend . . . and urged me to opt for surgery at Duke University, which I did," Novak wrote in one of his last published columns. "The Kennedys were not concerned by political and ideological differences when someone's life was at stake, recalling at least the myth of milder days in Washington."

Fare well, Senator Kennedy. You believed in what you did, you did it well for many years and the Country is better for it.

The Supreme Court Comes to C-Span

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 13:02:32 -0500

C-Span plans to air a special broadcast about the United States Supreme Court on October 4th at 9PM. The date is significant because the next day is the first Monday of October - the traditional beginning of the new Supreme Court term. The Court will actively sit until June of the next year.

Even while the Justices are not sitting during the Summer months, they continue to review petitions and take emergency actions as needed for the business of the Court. Each Justice is responsible for receiving petitions for a geographic area - one or more of the 13 Circuit Courts of Appeals.

I expect that the new term in October will begin with a newly confirmed Justice Sotomayor to replace retiring Justice Souter. I disagree with Judge Sotomayor on several points of judicial philosophy, but recognize her intellect and her experience and believe that she is qualified to be confirmed as President Obama's nominee for the Court.

The C-Span special will include comments by each of the Justices and a tour of the building which houses our highest Court.

There are those who feel that the Supreme Court is just another political institution in our flawed national government. I continue to hope that that is not the case. There are Court decisions in our history that I feel bowed to political pressures to our national detriment - but our Supreme Court remains our primary working monument to the Rule of Law and the remarkable document that is our Constitution.

If you want to participate in the debate about the Court and those nine Justices that make up the Court, don't pass up the chance to hear the Justices and to hear about the structural mechanisms and traditions that impact the decisions of the Court. I am embedding the C-Span promo piece for the October 4th Special in the hopes that those of you who see it will make time to view the complete telecast.

My source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4lo5STkx20

Telecosm - revisited

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 17:24:59 -0500

I wrote and posted the article quoted below 2 years ago on ActiveRain. As we pursue our daily agendas with Blackberry and I-Phone technologies and our use of distant databases and cloud computing is on the rise, I thought it would be worth revisiting. Technology continues to expand exponentially and the world around us is beginning to become a blur. Fasten your seat belts – more to come.

“You have seen several articles from me about Web 2.0 and web hosted applications. It may be useful if I try to put into perspective why I am talking about this particular direction in technology as it applies to our industry.

In 2000, George Gilder wrote the book “Telecosm” and changed my understanding of where we are headed with technology (of course I didn’t get around to reading it until around 2003 – but I haven’t stopped talking about it since). I had listened to Bill Gates talking about bandwidth for more than a decade before Gilder’s book – but I didn’t really get it until Telecosm.

Gilder's premise is that periodically major social changes occur as the direct result of technology changing in ways that drive the cost of a major factor in production to zero. In the late 19^th century in the industrial revolution – it was horsepower. In the 1950’s it may have been electricity. In the 1990’s it was personal computer power. Those of you who entered into personal computers when I did in the early 1980’s will remember the concept to time share computers with dumb terminals controlling large computer systems – sometimes at a hard wired distance. In the 1990’s we started to see more and more processing power and storage capacity being put into desktop computers because communications capacity (bandwidth) was costly and the most efficient model was to place the data and the applications together on the desktop.

Now at the dawn of the 21^st century, bandwidth is becoming plentiful and cheap and the distributed processing model of computing will rise again. We will see dumb terminals (read cell phones) accessing powerful computing applications and data from around the world. Data travels at the speed of light through fiber optic cables with practically unlimited capacity. Once the fiber optic infrastructure is in place – improvements in the transmission equipment at the ends continue to increase the capacity of the fiber optics with minimal increased investment. And nothing will be the same again.

By the way, when I was in school, the speed of light was a theoretical limit that was difficult to imagine (186,000 miles per second). Now it is an operational bottleneck that we have to get around. Communications satellites orbit the earth in geosynchronous orbits at approximately 26,000 miles. (their orbital speed matches that of the Earth’s rotation so the satellite seems to hold its position relative to a point on the surface of the Earth) You need only watch the news from Iraq to see the delay between the question asked in New York and the response from Baghdad. The signal which has to travel up to the satellite, down to Baghdad – back up to the satellite and back to New York is almost unusable for communications because of the delay that the signal which can only travel the speed of light experiences. The solution is apparently a new series of satellites orbiting at around 500 miles above the Earth to lesson the time lag in transmission.

So I believe that the remotely hosted applications accessible from any internet connected computer or cell phone are the wave of the future and the early applications are appearing now. Companies like Global Crossing have criss-crossed the globe with fiber optic cables under the oceans. These companies did not survive the changes they created (you can tell the pioneers – they are the ones with the arrows in their backs), But their legacy to us is virtually unlimited worldwide bandwidth that is fast, efficient and cheap – and is only beginning to be tapped to serve our needs.

Bill Gates – I understand now.

Mr Gilder’s book, Telecosm, is available from http://www.amazon.com/”

For Techies Only - HTML and CSS on demand

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 07:28:13 -0500

I have written recently about the advantages of using a Content Management System (CMS) such as Joomla! as the environment for creating your websites. <link here for previous article>

One of the benefits of using a widely distributed open source CMS like Joomla! or DRUPAL is the astounding variety of extensions, plug-ins and theme templates that are available at little or no cost from the user community of your favorite CMS. I note also that many of the CMS features that I am using in Joomla! are also available in WordPress. So I am finally understanding why so many of you switched to WordPress for your personal blogging sites some time ago. (OK Cheryl – I get it…)

But it takes time to find the exact template or theme that you may want – and there just may not be any author out there with the same twisted sense of style that I have. So the solution is to create your own HTML code and CSS files.

But wait a minute. I found the Joomla! solution because I am not proficient in coding or CSS creation. In my typical voyage of discovery (keep seeking and you shall find on the internet) method, I seem to have found an answer.

Website psd2cssonline.com gives you the capability to create your template as a Photoshop (or GIMP) file – that is the PSD part of the name (PSD is the file extension of a Photoshop file). By using particular layer names in Photoshop for the specific elements of your sytle sheet or web page, you can submit your completed PSD file to the PSD2CSSonline.com site and the service will automatically convert your PSD file into the necessary HTML code and CSS files to create your site. The system has Joomla! or WordPress specific layer names that permit you to use this powerful conversion site to create template files for your preferred environment.

I recommend that if you need to create template files with full HTML and CSS capability, that you go to psd2cssonline.com and view the tutorials and check out the documentation which includes the layer names available for template elements. I am at the beginning of the process, but I believe that this will be a much faster system for creating templates for Joomla! and other environments than HTML coding and CSS file creation. I also think that the system will help me learn the CSS system as I observe how my Photoshop designed pages are interpreted into Cascading Style Sheet files.

In addition to simple placement of content, menu and image elements, the system embeds a number of sophisticated and intellegent functions into your pages.

If you want total control of your on line image and, like me, you have limited background in coding – this website appears to be a powerful tool in your bag of tricks to help you create web pages that meet your needs and specifications.

Shaun McIntyre is the brain behind the site. He provides the following You-Tube video tutorial to explain the specifics of creating a Joomla! template from a Photoshop file.

Enjoy.

More info on TamPogo.com Site

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 20:29:46 -0500

I wrote on 7/15/09 (http://activerain.com/blogsview/1153647/tampogo-com-to-feed-a-child) about the TamPogo.com site. The premise was that the site would offer useful products at competitive prices which would benefit the childrens charity site www.feedmystarvingchildren.org.

I believe I may have been premature in sending you to the shopping site, as they were slow in populating the e-commerce site with useful products.

The site is improving and I direct your attention again to the site to see if the charitible benefits with a small thank you payment to you as representatives is a useful plan that will help the charity site as promised.

If you are interested in reviewing the offerings today, the site is TamPogo.com and my referring rep number is NP17579. Sign-up is free - only costs are purchase of products, so look at the products to see if they fit your needs and then decide if this is a good provider for you.

I received the following email message today discussing the newly listed products.

Dear iReps,

Fast Track products are being added every day in our BETA store. As we continue to grow, it is important that we feature a few of our very best products. These products, called Core Products will be listed in a separate category for your convenience. Core Products will make your first purchase in July a snap!

Today we feature OxyLift. Here is a testimonial from iRep, Jack Schacht. It is well worth your time to learn about this amazing Core Product. "A few days ago I picked up a book by Ed McCabe called 'Flood Your Body with Oxygen.' A dear friend of mine is suffering from emphysema and I wanted to learn more about the disease and how to treat it. In the book I read about an amazing product, not only recommended for those suffering from emphysema, but for everyone who wants to maintain optimum health. The product is called OxyLift. Studies have show that OxyLift is a powerful free radical scavenger that helps our cells 'breathe' better while rapidly detoxifying them at the deepest levels. After reading everything I could about this incredible product, and deciding to order a bottle for myself. You can imagine my surprise when I saw that it was just added to TamPogo! While finding the product on TamPogo was enough to blow my mind, I thought it would be interesting to check out the prices offered on other sites for the same exact product. First I went to http://threemax.biz. We beat them by 24%.

Next I went to http://healthsprings.net. We beat them by a full 34%. At two other sites we also beat them by similar amounts. Finally, I found them on Amazon. I thought this might be one site that would beat our price. That, however, was not the case. We even beat Amazon by 12.5%! I got so excited about my discovery that I feverishly started checking ALL of our other nutritional products. We have a line of Nutrisant products. TamPogo must have incredible negotiators because we beat all prices on all the Nutrisant products that are on THEIR OWN WEBSITE. Actually, we beat them by a “country mile” with savings of at least 17% and as much as 30%.

Finally, I went to weight loss products—Appetite Down and Thin Stat. We beat their prices by 27% and 50% respectively.

Thank you TamPogo! I have built three successful businesses in my younger years—each took a sizable investment and each required that I take a lot of financial risk for me and my family. TamPogo now looks like the best business opportunity yet---and it cost me nothing!

Let’s spread the word fast before someone else beats us to it. This is going to be an incredible ride. And, maybe we can, indeed, play a huge part in solving the biggest crisis of our time…ending world hunger!"

Ready. Set. TamPogo!

Florida can have a Conservative Senator in 2010

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 16:30:04 -0500

One of the unusual features of Florida politics is that the powerful positions of Speaker of the Florida House and Florida Senate President do not translate well into elections to state-wide offices. The legislative bodies select their leadership on merit – which, as we know, has nothing to do with elections. So the most powerful forces in the Florida legislature are only elected representatives of their local districts with little name recognition with the state wide voters. The news coverage of their deft management of legislation (we hope) and superb management and negotiation skills (well, sometimes) is not widely absorbed by the voter on the street.

So, as I have written in previous posts, former Speaker of the Florida House Marco Rubio has an uphill climb to beat current Florida Governor Crist in the Republican primary election for the US Senate seat being given up by current Senator Mel Martinez. He will face two problems: name recognition statewide and fundraising capability. But in all other ways, Rubio is an attractive and competent candidate. What make this an interesting race is that Marco Rubio brings an honest and consistent conservative record and values to his candidacy. While Governor Crist, popular though he may be, doesn’t seem to stand for anything. He is certainly a moderate, thought by many to be a liberal who seems to want to be the one-size fits all candidate in a State where diversity is a fact of political life.

I have frequently quoted articles from Larry Thornberry of Tampa who generally presents a thoughtful, if conservative, view of the world with particularly acute analysis of Florida politics. I agree with Larry that Florida needs a conservative voice in the Senate. And I believe that Marco Rubio is that voice. Larry’s article today in the American Spectator is a good analysis of where we are today and what needs to happen to bring a bright, articulate, conservative, Hispanic Senator to Washington to a position where he can do us all some good.

My Source: http://spectator.org/archives/2009/07/27/marcos-long-march/print

Marco's Long March

By Larry Thornberry on 7.27.09 @ 6:08AM

TAMPA -- The race for the Republican nomination to the U.S. Senate seat Mel Martinez is not seeking re-election to in 2010 -- which pits liberal Florida Governor Charlie Crist against conservative former Speaker of the Florida House Marco Rubio -- is not exactly heating up. But it's taking shape. There's good and bad news for the right.

The good news is that Rubio is demonstrating he can excite the conservative base of the Republican Party with his call to "take our country back" with policies that support family values, limited government, and leave stimulating the economy and creating jobs up to entrepreneurs. He did it again last weekend at several campaign stops across the Tampa Bay Area.

Hillsborough County Republican Chairman Deborah Cox-Roush was looking for about 150 to attend Friday night's "Issues and Ideas" dinner featuring Rubio at a hard-to-reach, auto-sclerotic location near the University of South Florida in north Tampa. What she got was 306 diners who cheered lustily when Rubio charged that "the stimulus package hasn't stimulated anything but the national debt." He said promiscuous government spending that goes under the name of the "stimulus," which Crist supports, is "based on short-term thinking that doesn't solve our current problems by spending money we don't have and giving the bill to future generations."

The crowd also liked it when Rubio said the best the proposed carbon cap and trade scheme, which Crist also fancies, could do would be to "make America a clean, third-world country." He calls it "nothing but a revenue source masquerading as an environmental policy that wouldn't do a thing for the environment." They clapped and whistled their agreement to Rubio's noting that "while we need to do a better job in health care, we don't need to turn 18 percent of the economy over to the federal government, as the legislation being considered now would do."

Rubio, whose parents came here from Cuba in 1959, said the way for the Republicans to attract Hispanic voters (as well as any other kind of voter) is not by adopting liberal policies or by having Mariachi bands at rallies, but by pursuing policies that assure future generations of Americans will continue to enjoy freedom, prosperity, and opportunity.

But the bad news for conservatives is that while Rubio has generated enthusiasm at events such as the one Friday night in Tampa, he's not generating much in the way of campaign contributions. Rubio is grotesquely behind Crist in dialing for dollars.

For the three months reporting period ending June 30, Crist set a Florida Senate race fund-raising record by collecting a gaudy $4.3 million, much of it out-of-town money collected by high-powered lobbyists in Washington and Tallahassee. Some of it even comes from swells who attended fund-raising dinners for Crist in the Hamptons (we all know how keen Hamptons swells are on Florida concerns). This haul by Crist was more than 12 times as much as the modest $340,000 the Rubio campaign fetched in over the same period.

Rubio and his campaign officials have tried to put the best possible face on the money disparity, and on the fact that the disappointing cash flow has forced them to cut paid campaign staff. They point out that as a popular sitting governor Crist is in a great position to shake the money tree. He's getting a great deal of help from silk-stocking corporate and legal circles. As for the Hamptons crowd, Florida media report dinner donors for Crist include such Florida enthusiasts as Donald Trump and Johnny Damon (of the New York Yankee Damons).

Rubio maintains that he doesn't have to match Crist's fund-raising, just get enough to get his story out. He's probably right about this. Most polls show Crist leading Rubio in the neighborhood of 20 to 25 points. But a Mason-Dixon poll earlier this month shows the race about even between Republican voters who are familiar with both candidates. Being speaker of the house doesn't lead to nearly as much name recognition as being governor does. So Rubio's challenge is getting known, which, if the Mason-Dixon poll is correct, would lead to a much more competitive race.

If he doesn't have to raise as much as Crist to succeed, Florida is a still huge state with 10 media markets. He'll have to do better than $340K per quarter. He'll have to get folks across the state, like the ones he inspired Friday night in Tampa, to stop clapping long enough to pick up their check books.

Rubio has a long time to do this. The Republican primary isn't until August 24, 2010. Rubio is campaigning full-time while Crist still has to at least appear to be paying attention to his job as governor. Crist has also been spending a fair amount of time in Washington and New York accepting campaign checks. And Crist won't have another quarter like this last one. Many of his contributors are maxed out, and so can't give more. Also, much of the money Crist has collected can't be used until the general election, so isn't available to use in the race against Rubio.

It's rare to see such a clear liberal vs. conservative contest in a Republican primary. The stands Rubio is taking in his campaign and his record during eight years in the Florida House mark him as a clear conservative.

Crist, who has held countless elected offices in Florida, none for very long, is something else again. He likes to be called a populist. (He's particularly fond of the treacly sobriquet, "the people's governor.") The fawning media mostly refer to him as a moderate. What he is is a liberal. This isn't entirely by design. Those who've followed Crist through the years can't detect any core political philosophy in him. It's just that in his desire to be all things to all people he's prone to supporting big, expensive environmental boondoggles.

Crist claims, and to an extent deserves, credit for holding the line on new or increased state taxes in Florida. But any savings Floridians may enjoy from tax increases that didn't take place on Crist's watch (not that his heavily Republican legislature has been eager to increase taxes anyway), are trifling compared to the expense of the mega-government policies Crist has whooped up. These have included pressuring the Florida Legislature to adopt a state carbon cap and trade system and to force Florida utilities to use 20 percent "renewable" fuels to generate electricity, a percentage anyone but a hard-core environmentalist would know is unreasonable. He also pushed for Florida to adopt California's expensive auto emissions standards. Any one of these three would cost Floridians a packet and not improve the environment.

Crist hasn't had a thing positive to say about any conservative social issue. And he recently appointed a liberal to the Florida Supreme Court. With finger to the wind, Crist announced last week that if he were in the Senate now he would likely not vote for Sonia Sotomayor because he says he fears "she would not strictly and objectively construe the Constitution." Rubio called Crist on this one, saying the guy Crist recently appointed to the highest Florida court, Justice James Perry, is more of an activist judge than Sotomayor.

This election will tell us a lot about what Florida Republicans are all about. About what national Republicans are about as well. (Most of the national Republican muftis have lined up behind Crist.) The race has been described in several quarters as "a battle for the soul of the Republican Party." It will also demonstrate whether a slow but relentless retail ground-game with limited media can succeed in a large state against a well-financed candidate the establishment is firmly behind.

If Rubio could pull this off and then get past the Democrat in November of '10, he would become one of the most conservative members of the Senate. And it wouldn't hurt the Republicans' prospects in Florida, and nationwide, to have an energetic, young, conservative Hispanic senator as a face of the party.

Larry Thornberry is a writer in Tampa.

TamPogo.com to Feed a Child

Ted Baker - Real Estate in Central Florida (Carmody and Associates LLC) — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 10:19:05 -0500

Every so often there is an intersection between commerce and charity. WWW.TamPogo.com seems to be just such an opportunity.

TamPogo.com is an online shopping site that is teaming up with www.feedmystarvingchildren.org to offer online products that we all use with a percentage of each purchase and a percentage of annual profit to feed starving children around the world.

The site is www.TamPogo.com. The sign-up if free. You only pay for products that you may decide to purchase online in the future. The shopping site is just opening today (15 Jul 2009) so you will be able to see the product selection soon.

To encourage you to share this mission with other people, there is a small compensation plan to pay you a small “thank you” when you invite other shoppers to join with you. But the purpose of the program is directed at creating charitable donations to feed children.

Please take a look at the program at www.TamPogo.com. My referring rep ID is NP17579. There are three videos on the site to explain how it works and who it helps.

This may fit the description “doing well by doing good”. Take a look at the program and you decide.

A description of “Our Cause” from the TamPogo.com web site.

“What if you could purchase great products at wholesale prices AND feed a starving child for one week with every purchase...would you do it? Welcome to Tampogo! We have built our company based on this exact concept. We contribute to a major non-profit organization that focuses on ending world hunger. They have scientifically designed a food and vitamin product that provides all of the essential nutritional support for undernourished children in second and third world countries around the world. The food is packaged by volunteers and shipped to volunteer run distribution sites around the world. Every item you purchase on Tampogo, feeds a starving child somewhere in the world for one week. Imagine a world in which you help end hunger, poverty and hopelessness. It is possible and Tampogo is dedicated to make this dream a reality. We have committed a percentage of every purchase as well as a percentage of our annual profit. You can be part of the solution by providing hope and nutrition for a hurting child.”

My source: www.TamPogo.com/cause