Studies Agree: A Sales Tax Increase Kills Jobs
Two studies on the impact of a proposed temporary one-cent sales tax increase in Kansas have drawn the same — and different — conclusions. Both say it would cost the state jobs, but one points to bigger long-term troubles. A study released Monday by John Wong indicates a one-cent sales tax increase generating $350 million in tax revenue would result in fewer job losses in 2011 than a comparable cut in state government spending.

The True Story of Planned Parenthood
BloodMoney is a documentary film that exposes the truth behind the Abortion Industry from the Pro Life perspective. This film will examine the history of abortion in America, from the inception of Planned Parenthood and the profitability of abortion clinics, to Roe v. Wade, to the denial of when life begins, to the fight to save the lives of innocent babies, and the devastating effects it has had on the women that have had them.

Nazis: First to Exploit Attack on Catholic Church
"There are cases of sexual abuse that are coming to light every day against a great number of the members of the Catholic clergy. Unfortunately, we are perhaps not talking so much about individual cases but rather a collective moral crisis that the cultural history of humanity may never have known at such a frightful and concerning level. Numerous priests and religious have confessed to the crime. There is no doubt that the thousands of cases that have come to be known to the authorities represent only a small fraction of the true number, since many molesters have been covered and hidden by the hierarchy." Although the above quote could have appeared in any number of editorials in recent weeks, the statement was made by Nazi propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels in 1937. History Repeateth!

Support for Handgun Bans at Record Low
Snapshots are easy-to-read statistical graphics that present information on various issues and trends in a visually appealing way. This weeks snapshot proves that American citizens do not want our 2nd Amendment rights abridged.

Kansas GOP Adopts Conservative Platform
“It states a lot of principles very clearly that Republicans need to stand for in order to show that there’s a very big difference between a Democrat and a Republican. Right now we have a very pro-life, pro-America, pro-military, pro-small government, low taxes platform.”

Time to Stop Obama’s Rush for "Amnesty"
The Obama Administration is pushing amnesty for illegal immigrants. The Administration has also reversed a number of policies that had improved enforcement. These changes have included ending work­place raids and a shift toward "catch and release" of illegal immigrants, instead of detaining them and deporting them. Rather than pursue comprehensive immigration reform, the Administration and Congress should ensure that the existing policies on border security, interior enforcement, and non-immigrant visas are working.

Godsey Editorial: School Board Election
An election in which fewer than 10 percent of registered voters go to the polls can hardly be called a mandate, but the outcome of last week's Kansas City, Missouri school board election bodes well for superintendent John Covington and his right-sizing plan. All three newly elected board members supported the plan to close 26 schools. Seven hundred school district employees will lose their jobs. But the plan saves $50 million and keeps the district out of bankruptcy.

Johnson County deputies change uniforms
Johnson County sheriff’s deputies are getting a new look, black uniforms instead of the French blue ones they’ve worn for a while now. The change comes after a more-than-a-year-long study in which the uniforms were put through tests in different environments on different people.

Yes We Can – Conservative Style
Yes, we can. Drain the swamp in November my friends.

Reagan on Obamacare!
Ronald Reagan speaks out against socialized medicine. A modernly relevant portion of a 1961 LP record.

The Humor of Ronald Reagan
The Humor of Ronald Reagan Ronald Reagan Republican Assembly of Central Florida.

Jack Cashill Endorses Patricia Lightner
Former State Rep. Patricia Lightner, Republican candidate for Congress in the 3rd District of Kansas, has received the endorsement of conservative author and producer Jack Cashill, who is also the Executive Editor of Ingram’s Magazine, Kansas City’s premier business magazine. In endorsing Lightner, Cashill cited her commitment to principle -- specifically, her belief in limited constitutional government as close to home as possible.

Gilyeat Picks Up Combat Veterans Endorsement
The Combat Veterans For Congress PAC is endorsing the 28th Combat Veteran For Congress in the 19th state; stating that Dan Gilyeat is a fiscally conservative candidate who will work to rein in the out of control spending by the Pelosi Congress.

Life 4 All Goes Radio!
Enjoy Sunday mornings with TKF friend Noelle Moll, president of Life 4 All on 710AM Radio! Her last radio show featured Father Frank Pavone of Priests for Life.

Attend Preserving American Liberty
Preserving American Liberty has announced Fred and Jeri Thompson, Liz Cheney and J.C. Watts will join Sarah Palin at the Independence Events Center, Saturday, May 1, 2010 for “Winning America Back”. Fred Thompson is a former Presidential Candidate, U.S. Senator and is a well-known Actor, Jeri Thompson is married to Fred Thompson and is a political commentator; Liz Cheney is with Keep America Safe and the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney; J.C. Watts is a former congressman and football star from the University of Oklahoma.

Britain Issues Apology to Pope
Britain's foreign ministry hastily apologized to Pope Benedict XVI after the publication of an embarrassing internal memo. The memo saw a junior British official joking that, during an upcoming visit, the Pope could open an abortion clinic or launch a line of condoms.

The Name of Muhammad Censored on 'South Park'
Comedy Central series, South Park, sparked a threat from a radical Islamic website. The network has cracked-down-for-their-own-good on creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone. But still OK to mock the pope.

Earth Day Campaign Celebrating Life Hits U.S. Cities
The human person is God’s greatest creation, and the Earth’s greatest resource. "Building up a culture of life is the single most important way to build a culture that respects the environment."

Baby Survives 'Global Warming Suicide Pact'
Sadly, her parents said they feared the effects of global warming in a suicide note discovered by police. The seven-month-old baby girl is recovering in a hospital after she was shot by her parents.

Dr. Death, Jack Kevorkian Portrayed as a Hero
A biopic of Dr. Jack Kevorkian that portrays the famous mass-murderer in a sympathetic light is set to air on HBO Saturday night. What a difference ten years makes! Has the media and culture desensitized us enough to accept a culture of death?

Has Noah's Ark Been Found?
There have been several reported discoveries of the remains of Noah's Ark over the years, most notably a find by archaeologist Ron Wyatt in 1987. But a group of Chinese and Turkish evangelical explorers are 99.9% convinced that wooden remains they have discovered on Mount Ararat in eastern Turkey is the actual artifact of Noah's Ark.

Tebow: Pro-Life Super Bowl Commercial Cost Him
Former University of Florida star quarterback Tim Tebow says his decision to record a pro-life Super Bowl commercial for Focus on the Family cost him endorsement deals. In a new speech, Tebow didn't name names but said the pro-life ad had a negative impact on potential endorsements.

College Students Protest American Apparel Ads
Students at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, are urging a boycott of American Apparel products because of the company's pornographic advertising material. American Apparel, which operates over 200 retails stores and touts all of its products as made in the USA, often advertises see-through clothing on models in explicit poses.

Jersey School Nixes 'Cross-dressing' Fashion Show
A public school's attempt at indoctrination has Maude Wilkins Elementary School in Maple Shade, New Jersey pleading dumb claiming it was just a simple "misunderstanding. The "misunderstanding" just "happened" to coincide with the homosexual "Day of Silence".

School: Fliers OK Except ‘Church-Related’ Ones
In October 2009, a 3rd-grade student and her mother requested permission to distribute fliers inviting friends and classmates to a church-sponsored swimming event the following month at a local pool. The student was barred because the event was sponsored by a church.

Stone’s Child Lover Says Raise the Age of Consent
Mandy Smith, the former child-lover and later wife of Rolling Stone bassist Bill Wyman, wants to help teenagers. A note from one of the nuns who taught her in school brought her back to the Church. The nun told her that Jesus does not look at mistakes made, or the times she had ignored him. Until then, she had felt a terrible guilt about the life she had led. Smith said, "I realized that there was another way.”

Ted Turner's "10 Commandments" Enforced by UN
Ted Turner said this about the Ten Commandments, "The rules we’re living under [are] the Ten Commandments, and I bet nobody here even pays much attention to ’em, because they are too old". Ted Turner who sees himself as the new "Moses" developed his own set of new ten commandments that he calls “Voluntary Initiatives" for the UN.

In Praise of Cheerful Men
Susumu Ito helped to lop 988 years off the Thousand Year Reich. He and 119 former comrades in arms were honored, during the annual Days of Remembrance, as liberators of Nazi concentration camps.

Ukraine: Proof That Communist Abused Catholics
Kokin says that historians have already declassified 240 documents of the workers of the security service of USSR, who watched priests, interrogated and tortured them, and wrote reports for Khrushchev on the basis of their testimonies. Six million Ukrainian Greek Catholics were persecuted and starved to death by Stalin’s holocaust because of their faith.

The National Day of Prayer: The Value of Offending
A federal judge in Wisconsin has ruled that the National Day of Prayer is unconstitutional as it is reported to violate the first amendment against the government’s establishment of religion. No, the lawsuit was not filed by the anti-Christian ACLU, but by an organization known as the Freedom from Religion Foundation. The Freedom from Religion Foundation, an organization of overbearing agnostics and atheists, has decided, as liberals often do, that it would be in the best interest of their minority to require the majority within America to live as they do, Godlessly.

Gospel of St. John 12:44-50

44 But Jesus cried out and said: “Whoever believes in me, does not believe in me, but in him who sent me. 45 And whoever sees me, sees him who sent me. 46 I have arrived as a light to the world, so that all who believe in me might not remain in darkness. 47 And if anyone has heard my words and not kept them, I do not judge him. For I did not come so that I may judge the world, but so that I may save the world. 48 Whoever despises me and does not accept my words has one who judges him. The word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him on the last day. 49 For I am not speaking from myself, but from the Father who sent me. He gave a commandment to me as to what I should say and how I should speak. 50 And I know that his commandment is eternal life. Therefore, the things that I speak, just as the Father has said to me, so also do I speak.”

Americans have less confidence and trust in government today than at any time since the 1950s. This is the conclusion of the Pew Research Center survey released in mid-April. Just 22 percent expressed trust in government to deliver effective policies almost always or most of the time. With the robust expansion of the economic role of the federal government under George W. Bush and Barack Obama, the Pew poll is evidence of an opportunity for advocates of freer markets. That Americans distrust their government is not unadulterated good news. An effective rule of law, one aspect of which is a government that can be trusted to act justly and equitably, is a necessary precondition of the free and virtuous society. Still, in the context of the extraordinary extension of government control in areas such as finance and health care, news of political skepticism offers an opportunity for those who recognize that both the moral and economic wellbeing of our nation depends more on the health of individuals, families, and other institutions than on the engineering of bureaucrats. The apostle Peter advised Christians to “always be ready to give an answer” to those who ask for “a reason of the hope that is in you” (I Pt 3:15). This advice is relevant for defenders of private sector reliance. We must not merely repeat slogans regarding private enterprise. We must express the reasons why we defend decentralized, voluntary organization of our economy over centralized control. Here are my top 10 reasons, in reverse order, for the hope that is within me.

10. Difference in competition. Competition is at work in both government and private markets, but the competition in markets is more civil and evenhanded. Business competition is similar to golf. Each competitor works to improve his own performance. Political competition—between parties, between candidates for office, and among legislators—is more like basketball. While a competitor works to elevate his own game, participants also attempt to undercut, debilitate, and intimidate opponents. It is common to see political advertising that is hostile, even to the extent of lying about the opponent. Combative ads are the exception in business appeals to consumers.

9. Enterprise expansion. In private markets, a business venture has to be profitable to expand, whereas expansion is “in the DNA” of government ventures and programs. Program beneficiaries and bureaucratic suppliers work in collaboration with elected politicians to expand particular government programs. The basic idea is this: If a government program is good, an expanded program would be even better.

8. Enterprise contraction or elimination. Business enterprises that incur chronic losses must either change or die. In contrast, “government program elimination” is almost an oxymoron. The political alliance that works to expand a government program can almost always fend off efforts for cutbacks or elimination. The market process, meanwhile, is a “sorting out mechanism” based on loss and profit. The life of any business venture is always tentative.

7. Gradations of success. Few industries are dominated by one or two firms. Instead, many participants compete, success is measured by small gains in profits and market shares, and there can be multiple winners. For political elections and legislative votes, however, it is “winner take all.” With a 49 percent vote in an election, you are a loser. The thin margins for many political outcomes make elections and legislative battles rather brutal affairs.

6. Product diversity. Product differentiation is pervasive as businesses try to appeal to new consumers. Different businesses try to cater to different market segments, resulting in wide consumer choice. Government provision of a product or service tends toward “one size fits all.”

5. Sources of evaluation and accountability. Market accountability is “bottom up” from consumers, with diverse criteria of evaluation. Government accountability is “top-down” based on the discretion of political authorities. Performance measures are rather narrowly defined, as with high-stakes testing for K-12 education in “No Child Left Behind.”

4. Consumer knowledge. Individuals tend to be more knowledgeable about their market choices than about their government choices—for both candidates and policy issues. The reason is that a consumer gets to make decisions for him- or herself. With government, a citizen just gets to “weigh in” with a vote, a contribution, or phone calls to legislators. A citizen’s influence on political outcomes is highly diluted and may be regarded as nil, diminishing citizen incentive to become informed. Moral responsibility is always enhanced by a close connection between actions and consequences; the political process weakens this connection. What economists call “rational citizen ignorance” is woven into the fabric of elections and public policy debates.

3. Influence of the ignorant. Rationally ignorant citizens are often decisive in politics. In a tight election contest, the ad wars in the days prior to the vote are focused on the less knowledgeable voters. The more informed citizens of the left, right, and middle have already decided. The stage is set for the ill-informed, perhaps a fourth of the electorate, to determine the election result. In contrast, private sector suppliers must cater to the more knowledgeable “voters.” For instance, a computer producer caters to computer geeks and purchasing executives at Walmart and Best Buy rather than attempting to take advantage of the poorly informed. Computer purchasers who know very little about gigabytes benefit from the dominant role of knowledgeable buyers.

2. Time horizon for decisions. Business management tends toward balanced consideration of short-term and long-term impacts. Even if a business owner expects to sell out shortly, the owner wants the enterprise to have healthy long-term prospects so as to fetch a high selling price. For our national government, elections can be no more than four years away for a president, two years for a representative, or six years for a senator. As a result, government decision-making tends to emphasize short-term costs and benefits relative to long-term impacts. Social Security and Medicare reform remains on the backburner because long-term solutions involve significant short-term sacrifice.

1. Cost control. Since we are in the grip of exploding federal deficits and debt, my No. 1 reason for concern about government is its inability to control costs. For the private sector, the profit motive means that managers are always in tune to avoiding unnecessary expenses and to controlling costs of production. Effective resource management translates to higher business profit. Profit is no part of the equation in the legislative process or in bureaucratic management. Rather than limiting costs, bureaucratic managers will spend every dime appropriated. And legislators are generally inclined to fund bloated budgets. “Cost-effective government” is an oxymoron.

Polling results show the tide is starting to turn against big government solutions to economic challenges. To intensify and solidify this shift, we must make the underlying case for decentralized market solutions. Preserving a sphere of action for private enterprise both makes economic sense and empowers individuals as actors with moral responsibility instead of relegating them to pawns in a high-stakes political game.

John Pisciotta is associate professor of economics at Baylor University.
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