A Heapin' Plate of Conservative Politics and Religion
by Tom Quiner
A Heapin' Plate of Conservative Politics & Religion
by Tom Quiner
Big bad debt
By Tom Quiner [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3MouF8wKxw&feature=player_embedded] Former Governor Branstad ran an ad charging Governor Culver with being a big spender. Is this charge fair? Let me quote State Auditor, David Vaudt: “The Legislature’s Fiscal Year 2011 budget relies on over $700 million of one-time resources which will not be available for Fiscal Year 2012. In addition, nearly $90 million of General Fund costs are shifted to other funds. This creates a huge spending gap…
Read MoreHow to boost America’s economy now
By Tom Quiner This Labor Day, 2010, our economy is hurting. Everything the President and his party has tried has failed. Unemployment is way up. Economic growth is stagnant. Net job creation doesn’t exist. The stock market is going nowhere fast. The underlying premise of the President is that only government can get the economy back on track. I would suggest that, if anything, the federal government has made things…
Read MoreMilton Friedman explains the fallacy of a minimum wage
By Tom Quiner [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ca8Z__o52sk] The late Nobel Laureate economist, Milton Friedman, explains why minimum wage legislation is counterproductive. He explains it better than anyone. The clip above was made when the minimum wage was around $2.50, which dates the interview around 1977. Unemployment for teens, and especially black teens, has only gotten worse, as I highlighted in my previous post.
Read MoreThe mock-benevolence of “compassionate” legislation
By Tom Quiner [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyBcHUe4WeQ] The Americans with Disability Act (ADA) was a compassionate piece of legislation, right? It prevented discrimination against individuals with disabilities. Anyone who opposed that piece of legislation is considered mean-spirited, devoid of a drop of humanity. How about the extension of jobless benefits from a standard half year to closer to two years (99 months)? These are tough times, right? In the name of compassion, let’s…
Read MoreObamaCare hurts Health Savings Accounts
By Tom Quiner I am self-employed, the owner of a small business. In order to control health insurance costs, my wife and I purchased a policy with a high deductible supplemented by a Health Savings Account (HSA). The high-deductible policy reduced my premiums substantially. The HSA allows me to save up to $5000 of tax deductible dollars to be used toward medical expenses, including dental, eyeglasses, and over-the-counter medications. Because…
Read MoreIn praise of Dr. King and Mother Teresa
By Tom Quiner August 26th was a big day. That was the 100th anniversary of the birth of Mother Teresa of Calcutta. August 28th was another big day. That was the 47th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s epoch “I Have a Dream” speech. Mother Teresa didn’t know how to deliver a speech very well. She’d stand at a podium and read her speech without looking up at the audience. When…
Read MoreA voice of peace
By Tom Quiner Is there a single voice today who speaks for Christianity? Obviously the Pope speaks for the Catholic world. But in a sense he is the de facto Christian voice to the world on “big picture” issues even if all Christians don’t agree with all Catholic doctrines. So in 1985 when Pope John Paul II traveled to Morocco, the world paid attention. There in the Casablanca Stadium, he…
Read MoreA victory for the little people
By Tom Quiner Look at the photo of the human embryo above. It is about 33 days old. To simplify discussion of important recent events regarding its future, let’s give it a name. How about if we call it Jesus. U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth has stopped President Obama in his tracks in his desire to use Jesus for scientific experimentation. A little background: President Bush II established limits on…
Read MoreTwo reasons Obamanomics isn’t creating jobs
By Tom Quiner As many of you know, jobs are hard to come by. The unemployment rate continues to hover near ten percent despite stimulus spending by the Federal Government which will surpass the cost of the Iraq War (see previous post). Nothing the Democrats have done is working. In fact, the case can be made that it has made things worse. Why? It boils down to two big concerns…
Read MoreIs the Iraq War responsible for our deficits?
By Tom Quiner Voices on the left are clear: our fiscal problems are the result of an unnecessary war on Iraq forced on the country by former President Bush. Democratic Party strategist, James Carville, is blunt: “It was under Mr Bush that the deficit spiralled out of control as we fought an unnecessary and endless $3,000bn war in Iraq…” Writing in the Washington Post, Linda Bilmes (a member of Harvard’s…
Read MoreWhich art is more beautiful?
By Tom Quiner I stepped into the Cincinnati Contemporary Art Museum several years ago and got the shock of my life. The “art”, and I use the term loosely, was ugly. It was pornographic. It demeaned. It was the kind of art that pulls you down into the muck. What happened to beautiful art? I’m talking about the kind that lifts the soul, that thrills the senses, that simply “transcends.” …
Read More“The world will be won by beauty.” Part 1
By Tom Quiner [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7HoZGjle88] I am exactly like you. I love beauty. Every human soul is instinctively attracted to beauty. This modern world needs more beauty. To that aim, Quiner’s Diner will begin a regular feature titled “The world will be won by beauty.” We will occasionally post a work of art that transcends this world, that allows us to imagine the divine, namely God’s pure love. I heard the…
Read MoreStay in touch. SUBSCRIBE. (We recently moved our blog and lost our subscribers. Please re-subscribe here)