First S.2433, now this:

Sens. Diane Feinstein D-Calif. and Mel Martinez R-Fla. authored a bill with 11 co-sponsors, including Sen. Barack Obama that was incorporated into a housing bill passed by the Senate Banking Committee 19-2 before the Memorial Day recess — a bill that creates a national fingerprint registry.

The outcry from the the mainstream media here in the United States — the very same people who complained about our privacy and liberties in the wake of the news that the NSA was listening in on phone calls involving known terror suspects — is where? Their silence is deafening.

Barack Obama is showing us through his actions exactly who he is. But are we paying attention?

You need to make your voice known. Use The Mailbox to contact your senators. Tell them since it is an affront to liberty and privacy, vote “no” on the SAFE Mortgage Licensing Act (S. 2595). And monitor the progress of this bill in our Action Center.

According to an article in the Wall Street Journal, taxpayers across the nation will foot the bill for federally-backed hurricane insurance.

Democrats in Congress, with the backing of insurance industry giants Allstate and State Farm, want to nationalize “reinsurance”, or insurance bought by insurance companies. This reinsurance would protect the insurance companies from “catastrophic losses” in the event of a natural disaster.

The legislation passed the House with a bipartisan vote of 258-155.

While it could save Florida homeowners as much as $500 annually in insurance premiums, the cost for the proposed legislation would be born by all taxpayers, even ones in states that are far from hurricane, earthquake, mudslide, and wildfire zones.

The end result of such legislation has two consequences:

1. With the lowered insurance premiums, people are more likely to do stupid things like build in hurricane zones and flood zones. For example, New Orleans bears witness to the catastrophic results of the National Flood Insurance Program. Such programs increase the likelihood that when a natural disaster occurs, there will be loss of property and life.
2. People far removed from the disaster zone, having already paid for federal agencies like FEMA with their tax dollars, are now getting taxed further to fund this kind of legislation. As a result they have less disposable income, which means in the event of  natural disaster they’re less likely to donate money to charities like the Red Cross and the Salvation Army.

Capitalism works. We need to remember this. Capitalism keeps people from doing stupid things because it makes the cost proportional to the risk. People are less likely to engage in risky behavior if there’s no one there to help pick up the pieces in the event something bad happens. This saves money, and in the case of natural disasters, it saves lives.

If people want to build in hurricane and flood zones, they should have the liberty to do so. No one should prevent them from it. But they should also bear the burden of financial responsibility on their own shoulders, not on ours.

Action to take: use The Mailbox to write your representatives. Tell them to vote no on  H.R.3355, the Homeowners’ Defense Act of 2007.

CNN is reporting that a true hero, Sergeant Merlin German, has passed away:

A Marine who survived being burned over more than 95 percent of his body in Iraq and established a charity to help burned children has died, the military has announced.

Sgt. Merlin German was 22.

He was severely wounded February 21, 2005, en route to Camp Ramadi when his Humvee hit a roadside bomb.

He was not expected to survive, but he was transported to Germany and then to Brooke Army Medical Center in Texas, which has the U.S. militarys top burns unit.

He spent nine months in intensive care and underwent more than 100 operations.

Sergeant German did not sit idly by and let his injury beat him down. Instead, he turned his injury into a mission, which he attacked with the same can-do attitude that served him well in the Marine Corps, and helped him fight his injuries for three years. His new mission: to establish a foundation to help burned children and their families.

Please consider making a donation to Merlin’s Miracles. According to the website:

The donations would be used to assist burned children and their families to take vacations, trips, outings or anything the families needed to make life a little easier. Merlin loved to travel and knew how difficult it was for him to endure long lines at amusement parks or the frustration of not being able to do certain things because of the heat or being able to go to certain places because of special transportation needed.   

Rest in peace, Sergeant German. Semper Fidelis.