Bullheaded Texan's "Open Thread"

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Comment by Bullheaded Texan on April 24, 2018 at 11:51am

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The straight forward title of the president’s executive order, “Reducing Poverty in America by Promoting Opportunity and Economic Mobility” signals that he understands the challenge and the solution. He is for independence, not dependence.
The executive order makes clear that Washington’s role “is to clear paths to self-sufficiency.” Officials are to “examine Federal policies and programs to ensure that they are consistent with principles that are central to the American spirit—work, free enterprise, and safeguarding human and economic resources.” Programs which fail to do so are to be fixed or ended. (The term “ended” is rarely used in Washington circles, but the 1996 Welfare Reform, for the first time ever, repealed the crown jewel of the Great Society by replacing the ever-expanding Aid to Families with Dependent Children program with flexibility and finite funding to the states.)
The executive order instructs actions be taken to: strengthen and increase work requirements for benefits, assist vulnerable populations in finding employment, increase flexibility and accountability for state, local, and tribal governments, streamline government bureaucracy, target benefits to those in greatest need, consolidate wasteful and duplicative programs, spread information on successes and failures, and encourage private and community solutions.
This is an ambitious agenda for any administration but the president’s incentives already enacted to improve investment and entrepreneurship are yielding strong economic growth - growth that will provide welfare recipients with the employment opportunities they need.
Work requirements for federal programs are to be strengthened and increased “in order to move people to independence.” Moreover, the administration intends to review and improve workforce development programs to help people find and succeed at work.
The order also “allow[s] local entities to develop and implement programs and strategies that are best for their respective communities.” Washington really does not know best - that was proven in 1996. The administration wants to build on that earlier reform to provide greater flexibility for governments closer to local conditions and peoples “to design and implement programs that better allocate limited resources to meet different community needs.

Comment by Bullheaded Texan on April 24, 2018 at 11:50am

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And finally, there would be enhanced accountability for those spending federal—meaning the taxpayers’—money. Agencies would be expected to reduce fraud and waste, enforce laws barring aliens from collecting benefits, and “establish clear metrics that measure outcomes.” It will be up to those organizations to “increase program integrity.”
The Carleson Center for Welfare Reform identified 157 specific means-tested programs existing in 2012 from health care, to food, to housing, to employment and training, to free legal services and more. Last year federal welfare outlays were $700 billion; toss in state and local programs and the total exceeds a trillion dollars a year.
A well-functioning society needs for every able-bodied individual to earn their way and for limited resources go to the most vulnerable among us. So, we must restructure our welfare system to protect the truly needy and taxpayers alike. While the Swamp players – the bureaucrats, the poverty activists, the tax-and-spend politicians, and those who think the rest of us owe them a living—will put up a ferocious resistance, I have no doubt that President Trump is up to the challenge. He understands what’s wrong and how to fix it.

Comment by Bullheaded Texan on April 24, 2018 at 11:35am

Trump Positioned To Take Over This Notorious Liberal Court.
4/24/18 Fox News by: Barnini Chakraborty
The most liberal appeals court in America could soon be getting a Republican makeover if President Trump and Senate GOP leaders are able to fill seven open seats with conservative picks.
Standing in their way is a wall of Democrats hellbent on protecting the long-standing leftward lean of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.
The stakes are sky high because of the size, caseload and clout of the court. If Trump is successful in getting young, ideologically conservative nominees through the confirmation process, he could significantly alter the court’s DNA for decades to come.
“Adding seven conservatives to the court would very much affect its ideological balance,” Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley School of Law, told Fox News.
“It would push the court much further to the right.”

Comment by Bullheaded Texan on April 24, 2018 at 2:13am

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The Real-Life Story Behind The Great Escape From Alcatraz.
OMG! | Apr/1/18 | Asher Weber
Alcatraz was once known as the most menacing prison on the face of the planet. Escaping from it was deemed impossible. At least 36 inmates had attempted to escape in the past but none had ever survived. That all changed one day in June 1962. A group of three men plunged into the tumultuous waters of the San Francisco Bay on their route to escape “The Rock”. Their fates were unknown until the police received a mysterious letter in January 2018 that changed everything and forced the FBI to re-open their investigation. Read on to learn more about the amazing real-life great escape from Alcatraz and what really happened to those that managed to escape.
1. The Unthinkable Escape;
Was there any place more frightening than Alcatraz? The maximum-security prison was designed to make it impossible for America’s most hardened criminals to come in contact with the rest of society. Three prisoners broke past every security feature possible.
The case has become one of the most notorious unsolved cases in American history. While officials at the time said all three of them died in the icy waters, hints have shown up in recent years that the prisoners (who are now elderly) survived it all. A new letter has even made the FBI re-open its investigation of the case. So what happened?
2. Frank Lee Morris;
Frank Lee Morris was a mastermind. He was cunning, skilled and highly intelligent. Orphaned at the age of 11, he jumped from foster home to foster home and learned how to be independent and take care of himself.
But Morris was also a troublemaker, having been convicted of his first crime at the young age of 13.
He was destined for greatness, but not in the way anyone would have expected.
His name went down in history books for being the ringleader of the Great Escape from Alcatraz.

Comment by Bullheaded Texan on April 24, 2018 at 2:13am

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3. Not His First Time Behind Bars;
As an adult, Frank Lee Morris served prison time in multiple states and eventually landed in the Louisiana State Penitentiary, nicknamed “Alcatraz of the South.”
But as daunting as that sounds, Morris had something quite impressive in store for them. Frank Lee Morris was serving 10 years in the prison for bank robbery but then he did the unimaginable: he escaped.
Morris was on the run for around a year before he was caught committing a robbery again. From there, he was sent back to prison, but this time he was sent to infamous Alcatraz.
4. The Brothers;
As with any good escape though, you need a team.
Frank Lee Morris found that team when he landed at Alcatraz, known simply as, “The Rock.”
The team consisted of two brothers named John and Clarence Anglin, and a man known as Allen West.
The Anglin brothers were born in Georgia and their family moved to Florida for work. Their parents were seasonal farm workers, going wherever they were needed. Every June the entire family of the 13 children would go north for cherry picking.
5. The Anglin Brothers Bond;
John and Clarence Anglin were thick as thieves growing up, and even more so, literally, during their adult years. As children, their family would go north for cherry-picking season, occasionally going as far north as Michigan.
During those times, the brothers would swim in the waters of Lake Michigan and were reportedly very skilled at swimming in general. The skill that would certainly come in handy for the duo. As adults, they started robbing banks together. They were finally caught and arrested for bank robbery in 1956. But they were just getting started…

Comment by Bullheaded Texan on April 24, 2018 at 2:12am

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6. The Group Forms;
During their time at Atlanta Penitentiary, the Anglin brothers attempted to escape the prison numerous times, which resulted in them being sent to Alcatraz, a maximum security prison. There they met Frank Lee Morris, the mastermind of the group.
Together, along with one other inmate named Allen West, the group of four had amassed a lot of experience in escaping or attempting to escape prison. From there they started hatching a plan to pull off the impossible feat of escaping from “The Rock.”
7. The Plan;
The escape plan itself was simple. The means to do it, however, would be near impossible and require the coordination of an entire team to pull off. It was not the first time prisoners attempted something like this.
Dozens of inmates had tried to escape from Alcatraz before, so how would this be different?
In the past, none of the other inmates successfully pulled off their plans.
Out of the dozens of inmates to take the risk, 23 were caught, six were shot trying to get out, two drowned and another two were listed simply as “missing or presumed drowned.”
8. It Begins;
All four members of the group served time at the Atlanta Penitentiary and it is possible all of them knew each other from there. It is known that both John and Clarence Anglin knew Frank Lee Morris from Atlanta.
The four men had cells near each other during their time spent in Alcatraz and plenty of time to come up with a master plan to get out of Dodge. The plan would take all the courage the team could muster and all the resources they could get their hands on.

Comment by Bullheaded Texan on April 24, 2018 at 2:11am

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9. Collecting The Resources;
Luckily for the team, Alcatraz wasn’t just a prison, it was also a factory. At the federal penitentiary, inmates worked and at “The Rock” there was a substantial amount of resources to be had. The prison served the US military, making furniture, clothes and shoes.
The group of four was also lucky because they were among the very few criminals in Alcatraz that were incarcerated for non-violent crimes.
This meant that they were slightly under the radar and the ever-watchful prison guards paid less attention to them.
10. The Items;
The gang started putting their plan into action slowly. It was highly complex and even ingenious, some would even say. Not only were they going to escape from the impenetrable Alcatraz, they were also going to leave behind human-like dummies.
11. The Decoys;
The team members each had their own responsibilities, on top of making sure they were able to get out of their cells on the night of the escape. The Anglin brothers were in charge of making dummy heads to leave behind in the gang’s empty beds.They fashioned the heads crudely out of soap wax, toilet paper and real human hair stolen from the barber shop in Alcatraz. Morris was in charge of modifying an accordion-like instrument to inflate the raft and life vests.
12. The Dig;
Together, the team also had to make tools to dig out of their cells and unscrew bolts on the vents. They were amazingly able to make picks and wrenches out of everyday items they managed to steal, such as spoons from the cafeteria and wood from the workshop.
Every day from 5:30 PM until around 9 in the evening they would work away at chipping away holes large enough to crawl through. They removed the vents in their cells and used the picks to chisel the holes larger.

Comment by Bullheaded Texan on April 24, 2018 at 2:11am

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13. Good News;
Good news for the gang was that the prison was already old and crumbling in many places. Saltwater ran through pipes for showering and washing dishes but ultimately destroyed the pipes and leaked into the prison walls.
Over time, the salt water eroded the cement, which eventually made it crumble. The water was also slightly warm, so that the prisoners wouldn’t get used to the cold water, like the frigid waters in the San Francisco Bay.
4. The Noise;
You’re probably thinking that someone surely would have heard all that banging and chipping away. Well, they didn’t. Thanks to prison reforms in the early 1960s, inmates were allotted a music hour that created a cacophony of noise throughout the prison. Morris played his accordion loudly whenever possible and the noise was enough to cover up any sound the chipping away at the cement could make.
Behind the cells, where the holes led, was an unguarded utility corridor with pipes leading up and down.
15. A Jungle Gym;
The utility corridor was basically an unguarded jungle gym. If they could get the holes in their cells wide enough, they would easily be able to climb up three floors to the roof. From there they would just have to pray. Once at the top, they would have to get one of the large shafts open to get onto the roof. Many of the shafts, to their dismay, were cemented shut. But they eventually found one that wasn’t cemented and were able to use their wrench to get it open.
16. The Big Squeeze;
By May of 1962, both of the Anglin brothers and Morris had broken through the walls in their cells. The holes were barely big enough for them to squeeze through, but that was all they needed.
17. The Signal;
Now that everything was ready, all they needed was to wait for Allen West to finish his escape hole and the entire gang would be ready to go at a moment’s notice.
That signal finally came in June of 1962 but the plan wouldn’t work out like they thought it would.
18. The Plan Sets Into Action;
Promptly after lights out that same day, the gang set their plan of escaping from Alcatraz into action. But would any of them make it out alive? That was the question lingering in their minds. The prospect of living a free life, outside of prison was too enticing. They were prepared to do anything to get out of Alcatraz, even if that meant risking their lives. Adrenaline was pumping through their veins that night just at the thought of getting out. After the lights went out that night they quickly moved to set their decoys and get out of their cells.
19. The Plan Goes Awry;
The Anglin brothers and Morris got out of the cells easily but Allen West was having difficulty. Even though he informed the group that his hole was finally big enough to get out, he apparently misjudged the size and ease of making the hole bigger. Frank Lee Morris tried to help West all he could, but the cement just wouldn’t budge.
At around 9:30 PM, Morris asked for West to pass him a glass of water. Then they came to the conclusion that West would have to be left behind

Comment by Bullheaded Texan on April 24, 2018 at 2:07am

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20. One Left Behind;
Leaving a member of the team behind couldn’t have been an easy decision, especially after working together for months. But the group wasn’t left with many options. If they made too much noise trying to widen the hole in West’s cell, they would have certainly drawn the attention of the guards. So West took one for the team. And he might have even helped by making the raft lighter with one less person.
From there the group of now three men started their climb. They climbed up 30 feet of plumbing in the utility corridor.
21. Downward;
Morris and the Anglin brothers made it to the cell house roof rather easily. With their hearts pounding they continued and crossed at least 100 feet of rooftop and then started their descent. The three climbed down 50 feet of piping on the side of the building to the ground.
22. The Alarm;
That was the last anyone ever saw Frank Lee Morris or John and Clarence Anglin again. They set off in their makeshift raft at around 11:30 at night and were never heard from again.
It wasn’t until the morning that they were discovered missing.
23. Finally Out;
Allen West might have been left behind, but he still hadn’t given up. He continued to work on getting the hole in his cell large enough to squeeze through and he eventually succeeded. Delighted, he ran after the other three.
24. The Conclusion;
Allen West reluctantly came to the conclusion to return to his cell and wait until morning when it was discovered that the other three inmates had escaped.
In the morning the alarms were raised and the entire prison searched.
25.The Issue;
There was one issue with that though. No such car robbery had been reported in the area, not within a twelve-day period after the escape. So either they landed somewhere else, either by mistake or on purpose, or Morris and the Anglin brothers didn’t make it. West also told authorities that the entire scheme had been his idea and that he was the mastermind behind the genius escape.
The FBI was called in and a formal investigation was opened to look into whether the trio survived or not.
26. Freezing Waters;
After long searches, no bodies were ever found, although personal belongings were found floating in the bay waters the next day. The temperature of the waters during the night of the escape were around 50 to 54 degrees. The San Francisco Bay is known for its chilly waters no matter the time of year. Experts determined that a human adult male could have survived for around 20 minutes in the cold waters before body functions would begin to deteriorate. The inmates also wouldn’t have been acclimated to the icy waters, as the water in the prison is warmed.
27. A Cold Case;
The FBI investigation was eventually closed on December 31, 1979, 17 years after the escape. The results? The FBI states that the inmates most likely drowned in the San Francisco Bay. But the US Marshals investigation remains open.“There’s an active warrant, and the Marshals Service doesn’t give up looking for people,” the Deputy US Marshal told NPR back in 2009.
Indeed, there was more to be heard from the supposed people who managed to escape Alcatraz.
28. Calculating Currents;
Around one month after the escape, a Norwegian freighter reported the sighting of a body about 17 miles from the Golden Gate Bridge. The body was reportedly wearing clothing similar to those worn by Alcatraz prisoners. But the report was filed late and the body was never found.
In 2014, a team of researchers managed to calculate, by use of a computer model, that if the three inmates left around midnight then the water currents would have been working in their favor and they would have likely survived.

Comment by Bullheaded Texan on April 24, 2018 at 2:07am

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29. A Christmas Card;
In 2015 the History Channel made a documentary which presented further evidence that the Anglin brothers had successfully escaped. The family had received signed Christmas cards and the handwriting was confirmed to be theirs. But the date of their delivery couldn’t be determined.
The Anglin family also presented a photograph of the two brothers taken in Brazil in 1975. Forensic experts analyzed the picture and concluded that it was “more than likely” John and Clarence Anglin.
30. Close Contact;
Another piece of evidence that the escape was a success was a deathbed confession by one of the Anglin siblings, Robert. He confessed that he had in fact been in contact with John and Clarence from 1963 through 1987 but eventually lost contact.
Members of the Anglin family have been deterred from searching for their missing sibling in Brazil because the great escape from Alcatraz still remains an open Interpol investigation. Should they be found, the punishment would be severe.
31. The Letter That Changed Everything;
The case of the Alcatraz escapees was turned on its head in January 2018. That was when the Federal Bureau of Investigations announced it would be re-opening its investigation of the Alcatraz case due to new evidence.
The reason for this was a letter that the San Francisco Police Department received in 2013 claiming to be from supposed Alcatraz escapee John Anglin.
It’s unknown why the letter was kept under wraps for five years, but its information inside was nonetheless shocking to see.
32. Contact From John Anglin;
The letter read “My name is John Anglin. I escaped from Alcatraz in June 1962 with my brother Clarence and Frank Morris. I’m 83 years old and in bad shape. I have cancer. Yes we all made it that night but barely! Frank passed away in October 2008. His grave is in Argentina under another name. My brother died in 2011.”
So where was the supposed John Anglin living nowadays? The letter revealed all that.
33. Where Has He Been?;
Further down in the letter, the writer claiming to be John Anglin revealed where he had been living in since he allegedly managed to escape from Alcatraz. “This is the real and honest truth. I could tell you that for seven years of living in Minot, North Dakota and a year in Fargo”, North Dakota until 2003. Parts of the letter were illegible but a report by the BBC interpreted the writing to say that he had lived in Seattle “for most of my years after the Escape.”
The next piece of information in the letter proved to be a real bombshell.
34. California Dreamin’;
The letter supposedly by John Anglin ended by simply saying “Living in Southern California now.” Could it really be that a criminal who pulled off one of the most daring escapes in history was residing just a few hours away from San Francisco?
The letter writer, who claimed to be John Anglin, was in very poor health and was incredibly desperate to get help, even if it meant going back to jail.
After this, the letter tried to negotiate an extremely unconventional deal with law enforcement. Would they agree to the letterwriter’s terms?
35. Let’s Make A Deal;
The letter read:
“If you announce on TV that I will be promised to first go to jail for no more than a year and get medical attention, I will write back to let you know exactly where I am. This is no joke…”

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