Today's Supreme Court ruling on the Second Amendment is going to decide the next President of the United States and that is John McCain.
The fact that the ruling was not 9-to-0 but only five-to-four means that one more leftist on the Supreme Court and the people's right to defend themselves would have been abolished.
If I were McCain, I'd run an ad day and night for the next 90 days saying simply: the Four leftist judges voted to take away your right to protect yourself. One more and they would have succeeded. The next president will nominate one, two or even three Supreme Court justices, your freedom -- and your family's safety -- lies in the balance.
I'd probably run another ad that said "the Liberals on the Supreme Court don't think child rapists should be eligible for the death penalty. Barack Obama is the single most leftist of all United States Senators. Do you want more judges like those who think child rape isn't so bad?"
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«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 348 of 348I wonder where "larry" is today. Maybe he went to get more back up, since you're such worthless ally, monkeyboy.
"Barack Obama unveiled another shift in his energy policy Monday, reversing his opposition to tapping the nation’s strategic petroleum reserve as a means of lowering gasoline prices."
lol
What's next? He already backed the NRA, Capital Punishment, the Faith-Based Initiative, declared that he would unilaterally bomb a sovereign nation (Pakistan), is anti-gay marriage, and even pranced around wearing a flag pin.
Wait, don't tell me: "I-i-it's the fifty state strategy!"
But what about the other seven?
Wow...as I said earlier, this is truly a psycho TO keep fucking with...he gives such (frighteningly) hilarious responses.
Really, though, I'm starting to have some qualms after the last day or two...I fear he might actually and genuinely be about to suffer some kind of breakdown. Did anyone notice ...well, I guess not...but it turns out that he said EVERYTHING first...what is this guy, two years old? Well, emotionally, that seems to be the case.
Messing with these dingalings is fun, but when they seem to be genuinely retarded, emotionally or intellectually, do you really want to keep that up?
On a more serious note, it's gratifying to see the military is increasingly awakening to who really supports them and to see who just wants to use them up for oil co. profits...then abandon them to the traumas they suffer in so doing.
The GOP thought they had them in their pocket and could treat them like used up trash without ever being held to account. You can thank the internet for the organizing and informing power necessary to have accomplished that.
Bush's Mental Health
By David Model
Created Aug 2 2008 - 3:03pm
George Bush’s denial is part of an overall pattern of behavior characterized as psychopathic. To be responsible for the deaths and suffering of so many people in Afghanistan, Iraq, secret prisons and in America itself, takes a special kind of person. His behavior can’t be explained by cognitive dissonance or self-denial since no mentally healthy human being would be able to live in peace with himself or function normally with so much guilt weighing him down.
I am not an expert in the field of psychiatry, but there is a test which can be applied to personality traits to ascertain the likelihood of psychopathy. Dr. Robert D. Hare, one of the foremost experts on psychopaths, developed the classical checklist of traits which determine the probability of a psychopathic personality. The test consists of 20 questions which can be answered either by “applies, “does not apply” or “applies somewhat” corresponding to an answer of zero, one or two. A score of 30 or higher is indicative of psychopathic tendencies.
One of the questions asks whether or not the person is a pathological liar. One obvious example of his lying relates to his emphatic insistence that Iraq had WMD. There are many other examples such as the time he appeared on Meet the Press with Tim Russert and falsely asserted that, “I got an honorable discharge and I did show up in Alabama” contrary to overwhelming evidence that he went AWOL.
Bush also scores a two on another trait, manipulative. Seymour Hersh, in an article in the New Yorker, referred to Bush’s intention to manipulate the public when he stated that, “The former intelligence official went on, ‘One of the reasons I left was my sense that they [Bush Administration] were using the intelligence from the CIA and other agencies only when it fit their agenda. They didn’t like the intelligence they were getting, and so they brought in people to write the stuff’.”
Lack of remorse or guilt is another trait which Bush possesses in great abundance. Professor Justin Frank, professor of psychiatry, notes in his book Bush on the Couch that “He disregards the pain he inflicts on Iraqi citizens, refusing to comment on civilian casualties”, and “Just before the March 20, 2003 speech announcing the commencement of bombing Iraq, Bush was captured on a White House monitor saying, ‘Feels good’.”
Bush also exhibits another trait, callousness or lack of empathy. One of the most disturbing example’s of Bush’s lack of empathy revealed itself when the about-to-be-executed killer Karla Faye Tucker, who had appealed to Bush for a stay of execution, appeared on the Larry King show. President Bush watched the show and, in discussing her appearance on the show, he responded contemptuously to King’s question about what would you say to Governor Bush with “please” Bush whimpers, his lips pursed in mock desperation, “don’t kill me”.
George W.’s inability to control his feelings is legendary. Many journalists, such as James Carney, Time Online Edition, Andrew Stephen, The Observer, Carole Coleman, EU Business, have referred to him as an “angry guy”, “short-fused”, and having a “fiery temper”.
Early behavioral problems are also indicative of psychopathic behavior. He once through a football through a grade three classroom window and often stuffed frogs with lit firecrackers and threw them in the air.
In Total, Bush scored a 32 out of 40 signifying that he may have psychopathic tendencies. Although most people have some of these traits, few people would score over thirty. There has been ongoing speculation about his intelligence but few comments about his mental health. I believe that his mental health is more relevant in explaining his actions as president.
"Wow...as I said earlier, this is truly a psycho TO keep fucking with...he gives such (frighteningly) hilarious responses."
A likely story, blivious. You're my puppet now and I'm going to make you dance.
"Really, though, I'm starting to have some qualms after the last day or two...I fear he might actually and genuinely be about to suffer some kind of breakdown."
I wouldn't hold your breath, larry. Seeing as how you're the one who can't make up his mind whether to cut your losses and just ignore me or risk more humiliation going for broke, you're the one who's going to be needing intervention (but don't look at monkeyboy; he's worthless and weak).
"Did anyone notice ...well, I guess not..."
Don't fool yourself, larry. Everyone here is watching the spectacle of me putting you in stocks and horsewhipping you in the public square for your subversive, anti-American activities. And I'll bet you that a lot of people are watching this and saying "It's about time."
"but it turns out that he said EVERYTHING first..."
"EVERYTHING?" That's not true. What I emphasized was "FIRST."
I never said "EVERYTHING." I listed the items you plagiarized.
That would be like me saying: "EVERYTIME blivious opens his big, FAT, mouth, he misspells a word or takes liberties with grammar that would make an elementary school teacher cringe and break out the yardstick."
But that's absurd, and simply isn't true, and, as I'm sure you'd agree, to speak an untruth--even if out of ignorance or by exaggeration-- is the same thing as being A LYING LIAR WHO TELLS LIES.
Hyperbole is de rigeur for lefty rhetoric, however, so I understand your mindless blurting of it.
It hyper-inflates the object of your derision or fear or the target of your agenda to justify the derision, fear, or acquisition of it and belittles or demonizes it in the process to make you feel like the bigger and/or better man.
It can be very, very effective when propagandizing to a crowd of virtual farmyard animals who are gullible, easily frightened, and willing to be controlled by the porcine propagandists.
You should of heard Clinton's rationale for bombing Iraq in Operation Desert Fox. You would have thought that Saddam was on the brink of having ICBMs with first-strike capabilities and with enough punch to take out a few states.
I assume you didn't hear it, because you had your lips planted on his big butt for almost two decades (until Obama came along, of course) while calling for Bush's Impeachment for saying essentially the same thing.
"what is this guy, two years old?"
That's what I'm talking about, larry. Come on. You can do better than that. That's just too absurd.
"Well, emotionally, that seems to be the case."
I think you're confusing my youthful elan with immaturity, blivins. Lighten up.
"Messing with these dingalings is fun, but when they seem to be genuinely retarded, emotionally or intellectually, do you really want to keep that up?"
That's right, larry. The grapes are sour. Now run along and go set up your own blog so you can delete and ban me after I come over, take over, and make fun of you and your moonbat friends.
Only then, perhaps, would you appreciate Mr. Sayet's incomparable tolerance and forbearance.
Oh, go ahead and finish him off, LB; now he's starting to blurt all over the page and then delete it...apparently just enough self control left to know how stupid he sounds.
You're a sadist, Brand...the guy is already finished. Look at the long, overwrought, shrill, high school dropout stuff he's putting out..."You should of (sic) heard Clinton's rational..." And the strained attempts at sounding sophisticated and educated...these poor, manipulated people all know what underlings they are at heart...which is where these insecurities and all this pathetic chest thumping comes boiling up from.
Then he goes to great length to explain how things work...tooo funny if it weren't so sad. It must take him an hour to put one of these demented screeds together. Then he follows it with all the out of control posts which he then deletes afterward when he finds his desperation hasn't been satisfied.
And, believe me, this poor boy is desperate to convince someone named John that he's not an idiot.
Oh, wait...I bet he said that -- and EVERYTHING else I have in here before I did...haha.
But worst of all, they don't even know the difference between a Marxist and a practical liberal...you can't debate deluded fools like that...you end up talking past each other about entirely different things.
Now, more on the most criminal regime in US history:
FBI was told to blame Anthrax scare on Al Qaeda by White House officials
BY JAMES GORDON MEEK
DAILY NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU
Saturday, August 2nd 2008, 6:32 PM
WASHINGTON - In the immediate aftermath of the 2001 anthrax attacks, White House officials repeatedly pressed FBI Director Robert Mueller to prove it was a second-wave assault by Al Qaeda, but investigators ruled that out, the Daily News has learned.
After the Oct. 5, 2001, death from anthrax exposure of Sun photo editor Robert Stevens, Mueller was "beaten up" during President Bush's morning intelligence briefings for not producing proof the killer spores were the handiwork of terrorist mastermind Osama Bin Laden, according to a former aide.
"They really wanted to blame somebody in the Middle East," the retired senior FBI official told The News.
On October 15, 2001, President Bush said, "There may be some possible link" to Bin Laden, adding, "I wouldn't put it past him." Vice President Cheney also said Bin Laden's henchmen were trained "how to deploy and use these kinds of substances, so you start to piece it all together."
But by then the FBI already knew anthrax spilling out of letters addressed to media outlets and to a U.S. senator was a military strain of the bioweapon. "Very quickly [Fort Detrick, Md., experts] told us this was not something some guy in a cave could come up with," the ex-FBI official said. "They couldn't go from box cutters one week to weapons-grade anthrax the next.
Talk Radio and the Conspiracy to Kill
By Rory O'Connor
Created Aug 3 2008 - 12:27pm
Now I know how the others feel.
Having written extensively about talk radio's right wing shock jocks and the hate speech [1] they regularly use to tar opponents - equating liberals with terrorists, homosexuals with child rapists and the Mafia, and political and media figures with the Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan (even calling on air for assassinations, as Michael Reagan, son of the late president, did last month [2]) - it was only a matter of time until the smear merchants took aim at me.
Still, it was a little surprising to hear that "O’Connor’s mentor in spirit, Josef Goebbels, must be laughing in his grave." And it was more than just disconcerting that the charge of Nazism was made as part of an attack on the Simon Wiesenthal Center [3], the award-winning tolerance group named for the late 'Nazi Hunter [4],' after the Center's New York office offered to host a launch party for my book "Shock Jocks: Hate Speech & Talk Radio [5]."
The allegation that Goebbels is my mentor came in an email forwarding a post by former Boston Herald writer Don Feder, which originally appeared on GrasstopsUSA.com [6] ("Give Your Values A Voice".) Feder, the email said, "believes that the Wiesenthal Center supports deceptive fools like O’Connor to appease its wealthy leftist supporters. If that is true (and of course no offical [sic] at the Center would own up to it), it is shameful."
What's really shameful, of course, is trotting out the ad hominem "You're a Nazi" meme when confronted with ideas that differ from your own. Feder's "exclusive commentary" was headlined "Obama and the Conspiracy to Kill Talk Radio," another false meme being consistently bruited about by the right. Its opening [7] made Feder's thesis clear: "Looking ahead, liberals are determined to derail potential opposition to their plans to accelerate the deconstruction of America. Consequently, they have targeted talk radio. Bringing back the Fairness Doctrine is just one facet of their scheme to eviscerate the only part of the media controlled by conservatives."
According to Feder & Company, "The jihad against talk radio" (I thought I was a Nazi, not an Islamofascist!) is this:
"The left will do anything to gag its opponents. From the college campus to the halls of Congress (think campus speech codes, think hate crimes legislation, think speech-suppression zones surrounding abortion clinics), liberals are the chief proponents of censorship in America.
On July 23, the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s New York Tolerance Center will host the launch of “Shock Jocks: Hate Speech & Talk Radio” by Rory O’Connor, a book which indicts talk radio as “highly politicized, overly partisan and often factually challenged” — unlike, say, The New York Times, AKA, Mainstream Media Hacks for Obama.
But that’s not all. According to its cover, this penetrating analysis (endorsed by Walter Cronkite, the dean of liberal media manipulators) exposes the “dirty secret” of radio talk shows — how “they use the guise of ‘not being politically correct’ to ratchet up their anti-gay, anti-woman and overtly racist language.” In other words, they’re against same-sex “marriage,” reject feminist mythology and oppose racial quotas. Oh, the venom! Oh, the malice!
The left uses allegations of hate speech to set the stage for censorship. In its invitation, the Wiesenthal Center hyperventilates: ‘Hate speech can lead to hate crimes. And hate speech has no role on the public airwaves.’ Apparently, the First Amendment doesn’t apply to anything the left deems “hate speech.”
FYI, a friend of mine — a Jewish conservative — noted the exquisite irony here: Conservative talk-show hosts tend to be the most outspoken defenders of Israel anywhere in the U.S. media, while their counterparts in the mainstream media are overwhelmingly anti-Israel. Like the Anti-Defamation League, the Wiesenthal Center carries water for the left in the guise of fighting anti-Semitism.
‘Shock Jocks’ is just the latest manifestation of the left’s obsession with talk radio."
Feder's unoriginal jeremiad - which he further promulgated on WABC’s Sunday morning “Religion on the Line” program with Rabbi Joe Patasnick — went to repeat what other right-wing media organs such as NewsMax and WorldNetDaily have already attempted to inject into the mainstream [8]--the ridiculous idea that there is a conspiracy afoot to "Hush Rush" and knock conservatives off the airwaves by requiring "fairness" and "balance" in our public discourse.
Normally I ignore such ignorant attacks on my person, along with absurd charges like the one that Barack Obama is somehow engaged in a stealth "conspiracy to kill" talk radio. I raise them now only because of a real conspiracy to kill - one that took two lives in a Tennessee church recently. After a troubled man named Jim Adkisson murdered two and wounded seven, it was reported [9] that he had books by shock jocks Michael Savage, Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly in his home. (What wasn't widely reported is that radio station WNOW-FM in Knoxville airs shock jocks Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Neal Boortz and Mark Levin every weekday. Given the killer's professed hateful attitudes [10] towards liberals and homosexuals, it's at least as likely that he was influenced by the hateful speech Savage and the others spew forth on the public airwaves as by their books….)
So when these and other shock jocks regularly employ and promote hate speech over the public airwaves aimed at women, minorities, immigrants, homosexuals, foreigners, Islam and its adherents, and anyone else they perceive as an opponent, dehumanizing them with terms like 'feminazis,' 'hos,' 'slanty-eyed gooks' and the like…and when they consistently blur the borders between news, opinion and entertainment, then quickly retreat when challenged, claiming it's just 'good fun,' asking why you're being so 'politically correct,' and demanding that you just 'change the channel'… and their audience is angry and armed — what do you expect to happen?
Are the shock jocks creating a climate where such acts are somehow deemed acceptable? Do they have blood on their hands if others - albeit a few, marginalized, desperate and deranged listeners — act on their poisonous rhetoric? Would Jim Adkisson have killed without prompting from extreme right wing talkers? We'll never know--but isn't it time to step back and think about the effect this sort of debased dialogue is having on our democracy and society? It's not 'just entertainment' any more--if indeed it ever was. Instead, it's now literally a deadly serious business, and we all need to examine our accountability--as well as to look for new strategies to contain the spread of hate speech in our media — before someone else gets killed.
In the last few months alone, Michael Reagan has called for murder on-air; Rush Limbaugh has hoped for riots in Denver at the Democratic National Convention and spoken about a non-existent tape of Michelle Obama castigating 'Whitey'; Bill O'Reilly has mentioned Michelle Obama and a lynching party in the same breath; Don Imus has (again) engaged in racially charged remarks; and Michael Savage has called autistic children ‘idiots’ and 'morons' and charged that both autism and asthma are 'rackets.'
As previously noted [11], the real racket is the shock jock racket. You know, the one where everyone gets paid--Savage, Limbaugh (to the tune of 400 million dollars), Hannity (100 million), etc.--but also local stations like WOR in New York City, which expressed 'regret' but took 'no responsibility' for Savage's remarks; national distributors like Talk Radio Networks -the second largest provider of syndicated talk shows– and its headman Mark Masters, who puts Savage on 350 stations reaching 8 million listeners every week; and of course their corporate advertisers and sponsors. So let's pressure the corporations who are using the public airwaves but not serving the public interest - and let's challenge the shock jocks whose dehumanizing talk may be leading to terror and hate acts such as that which played out so tragically in a church in Knoxville.
In remarks given at my recent book launch party at the Tolerance Center, I specifically warned about shock jocks' hate speech and the potential for some listener actually to take their advice literally, and to act on it in a real world "conspiracy to kill." Some attendees later told me "You called it." I hope not.
Typos, Brandy.
I try not to feed the animals when I'm at the zoo, and you primates rabidly foam at the mouth and go ape-shit if I insouciantly drop a banana peel or orange rinds behind me, so I do what I can to clean up after myself.
More than I can say for you grammatical slobs.
"...now he's starting to blurt all over the page and then delete it...apparently just enough self control left to know how stupid he sounds."
Another plagiarist. I said it FIRST, copycat:
"Hyperbole is de rigeur for lefty rhetoric, however, so I understand your mindless blurting of it."
And how do you know "how stupid I sound" if I have "just enough self-control left" to delete it before you read it, nitwit?
"Oh, go ahead and finish him off, LB..."
Yeah. That'll be the day.
You obviously haven't been paying attention. LB already threw in the towel:
"So, this little game is over, sicko..."
And no more "hahahahas" from monkeyboy, either:
"Don't waste your time with them."
So I guess it's just you and me, Brandy (if that's your REAL name).
I'm game, if you are.
Show me whatcha got.
"You're a sadist, Brand...the guy is already finished. Look at the long, overwrought, shrill, high school dropout stuff he's putting out..."You should of (sic) heard Clinton's rational..."
Oo. My bad. "Have heard," of course, you obsessive-compulsive nitpicking taskmaster.
"And the strained attempts at sounding sophisticated and educated..."
Which could only mean...
Why, thank you very much. :)
"...these poor, manipulated people all know what underlings they are at heart...which is where these insecurities and all this pathetic chest thumping comes boiling up from."
You sound like a feminist, "larry."
Or is it...
Heyyyy...Waitaesec...larry blivins...LB...
OMG!!!
LANAAAAA BANANAAAAAAAA!!!
LOL!!!
How romantic!
It's like a Shakespearian comedy!
I knew there was something missing in that shrill voice, lana!
Like testicles!
I suppose Blossom and suze are lurking around here wearing fake moustaches and fedoras, too!
Which means only one thing, ladies:
I'm the rooster in this hen house, and don't you forget it, capice?
"Then he goes to great length to explain how things work...tooo funny..."
Oh, laaaaaaana. :)
"...if it weren't so sad."
Well, I apologize, of course, for saying stuff to you earlier that I'd never say to a woman. Honest injun, I thought you were a dick.
"It must take him an hour to put one of these demented screeds together."
Pah. I'm an epic novelist. I can churn out ten pages before breakfast.
"Then he follows it with all the out of control posts which he then deletes afterward when he finds his desperation hasn't been satisfied."
Time out. Are you stalking me at Match.Com?
"And, believe me, this poor boy is desperate to convince someone named John that he's not an idiot."
Hmmm...
"Oh, wait..."
Too late. I hear ya loud and clear. :)
"I bet he said that -- and EVERYTHING else I have in here before I did...haha."
Not EVERYTHING, lana.
"But worst of all, they don't even know the difference between a Marxist and a practical liberal..."
"Practical" liberal?
No such thing.
"you can't debate deluded fools like that...you end up talking past each other about entirely different things."
Yup. One thing leads to another (if ya know what I mean).
Corporate Capitalism Equals Fascism
Capitalism (supposedly)Comes in Two Parts - Profit & Loss
By Jon Faulkner
Aug 3 2008
Republicans have preached about the Magical Free Market for so long they’re starting to believe it is magical - that profit comes automatically, as long as the government, with its suffocating rules and regulations, stays out of things. Conservatives seem to have forgotten there’s another side of profit, and that is loss. If profit is the soul of capitalism, then risk is its heart. Americans can have respect and admiration for a man who is willing to believe in his own ideas, and is willing to put his last nickel on the line because he believes in himself. Such a man is saying, in a fundamental way, here is my fortune. I’m willing to risk it, and by extension, the well being of my family and friends, and my reputation as an intelligent, discerning person, that I might profit from my idea. Without risk, there is no point in profit. What is there to admire about a man who puts a few dollars into this or that enterprise knowing it will be returned to him no matter the circumstances, no matter the inherent danger? Capitalism without risk is defined fascism.
Consider the republican response to the collapse of the Housing Industry. Taxpayers, only a few months ago, lent J.P. Morgan $30 billion to bail out the fifth largest investment house in the nation, Bear Stearns. The loan was a sweetheart deal. The interest was 2.5% - hardly a rate that’s available to a majority of Americans. If the deal goes sour, and J.P. Morgan is unable to recoup any of Bear Stearn’s losses, J.P. would only be responsible for the first billion of the $30 billion dollar loan. American taxpayers would bear the rest of the burden. They are being asked to accept most of the risk for their loan of $30 billion dollars, while J.P. Morgan gets the profit. Nice work. If you can get it.
Estimates for repairing the Housing catastrophe are in the $300 billion dollar range with most of the money earmarked for Fannie May and Freddie Mac, the nation’s two largest mortgage finance companies. The beginning of the housing debacle began with these two, spread to the nation’s investment banks, and wound up on Wall Street where housing debt was sold to foreign investors when the market was still hot, and interest rates were low. When the market cooled, the rug was pulled out from beneath investment houses like Bear Stearns, and strapped homeowners, by the millions, began walking away from their mortgage debt leaving foreign investors to twist in the wind. In turn, the investment banks refused to restructure their mortgage holder’s loans even though it was largely the bank’s fault that the mess happened in the first place. Their arrogance was breathtaking. While they begged taxpayers for hundreds of millions in bailout money, millions of their borrowers lost their homes. Those bastions of American finance, the investment banks and Wall Street, failed to anticipate the catastrophe when interest rates rose and home values sank. Or did they anticipate the disaster? And gambled on the government bailing them out? Dean Baker is the co director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research. He said, “The issue here is essentially the moral hazard problem that you had with the S&L’s. If you have the option of making a bet where the government covers your losses, you might as well make it a risky one.”
There’s a revealing contrast that demonstrates conservative priorities over the needs of ordinary Americans. Last month, the republicans, led by Tom Coburn, (R) Oklahoma, successfully kept the “Advancing America’s Priorities Act” from becoming law. The Act died in the Senate after it passed the House by 411 to 3. Conservatives said it would have added to the nation‘s deficit, and detracted from congressional efforts to lower gas prices. The Act would have funded stroke treatment and paralysis research, increased funding of services to women with post partum depression and psychosis, funded eye exams for children, increased the budget for existing homeless youth programs. It would have expanded the definitions used in crimes of sexual exploitation against children, and assisted victims of torture and many other measures aimed at making the U.S. a better place for all of its citizens to live. This Bill, said the republicans, is too expensive and besides, government has no place influencing the way Americans live.
However, Republican sentiment doesn’t apply to business. It was OK for taxpayers to bailout Lockheed Aircraft Corporation for a paltry $250 million. When Chrysler went belly-up the bill for taxpayer charity rang up at $1.2 billion. There was the $150 billion, courtesy of the American taxpayer, that bailed out the S&L’s when the Reagan Administration’s deregulation frenzy blew up in their faces. The airlines and the big three automobile makers had their turn too, slurping greedily at the public trough. Last week, General Motors reported a second quarter loss of 15.5 billion. It was also reported that unemployment was the highest it’s been in four years. While the rest of the world’s auto makers began producing smaller, more fuel efficient cars in anticipation of skyrocketing gas prices, G.M. foolishly kept turning out S.U.V.’s, and pickup trucks. All profit and to Hell with risk, until the bill came due. But the good ol’ American taxpayer is always there to pick up the pieces. Will he be there this time? After all, if G.M. is allowed to go under, unemployment will climb another point, and in an election year, that doesn’t look good for republicans.
The Free Market God’s, it turns out, need government to catch them when they fall. The republicans have long despised government. There’s Reagan’s well known axiom, “Government is not a solution to our problem, government is the problem.” There’s that quintessential hypocrite of right wing conservatism, Grover Norquist, who said of government “We must get it down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub." Republicans have long caroled their tiresome chorus “Get government off our backs!” They want government to lower their business risks by relaxing all regulations whether they be product safety, truth in advertising, or tort reform.
Tort reform is meant to put the personal injury, consignment lawyer out of business by imposing caps on plaintiff awards. When a corporate chain of hospitals amputate the wrong leg, there would be a definite limit of how much the leg was worth. With the amount of damages set, a large corporation will simply out litigate plaintiff’s attorney. If the cap is set at $250.000, and plaintiff’s attorney runs up legal bills in excess of half of that, the 40% of the final judgment he’s paid for a successful outcome would hardly cover his time and costs. It would be very easy for a corporation to simply out litigate a lawsuit. This would effectively end the average American’s chance for his day in court because most Americans don‘t have tens of thousands of dollars to risk on a lawsuit. Corporations could manufacture defective fuel tanks, tires … children’s toys - or amputate the wrong limb with no fear of legal reprisal. Another corporate strategy - geared to no risk profit.
Each time another corporation gets bailed out at government expense that’s money that won’t be used to build schools and pay tuitions, repair roads and bridges, conduct research into drugs that may help prevent cancer. In the past, taxpayers funded the research that led to cures for TB, Smallpox and Polio, to name but a few diseases. The many, many billions of dollars spent on corporate malfeasance would have paid for health care. Each time another U.S. Corporation is embroiled in a scandal, foreign investors get a little more shy about their U.S. investments. The banks, if the blunt truth were told, can’t successfully manage the money they’re entrusted with. Bankers simply can’t resist cutting corners so they can put more money in their pockets.
Alan Greenspan seemed to understand such people. Speaking about the booming Housing Industry he said, "The history of financial involvement in increasing home ownership is one of taking risks - of designing new financial instruments and financial products to make financial resources available so that more people can realize the goal of home ownership. Taking prudent risks in lending so that others may attain an objective is the essential role of a financial intermediary..." Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan. Another economist, John Kenneth Galbraith called the failure of the S&L’s “the largest and costliest venture in public misfeasance, malfeasance and larceny of all time.” Capitalism comes in two parts, as economics 101 shows. For many years U.S. Corporations have gradually changed from risking their money to risking the government’s. Corporations take the profits if the risks pay off. If they don’t, taxpayers eat the loss.
The energy traders, Enron, Reliant and Duke were the logical summation of a deregulated market place. So weren’t the S&L’s and today’s Housing crash. The common thread was that regulations controlling their profits and risks had been removed so that the last possible dollar could be squeezed out of the Banking and Housing Industries while the Energy Traders sacked California’s Treasury. This is what free market capitalism looks like, deregulated and come full circle, and with profit the only consideration.
So now she ignores me.
Wimmen.
Anyway, nice update of *Das Kapital,* Lana.
I suggest you start over with Adam Smith.
btw, didn't Faulkner write the companion pieces "The War on Terror Equals Militarism," and "Operation Iraqi Freedom Equals Imperialism," and "Holy Matrimony Equals Sexism," and "The Republican Party Equals Racism"?
What! No slobbering comments deleted today? Did he take his ritalin this time? I loved his explanation for all those.
Apparently, when the poor, overwrought buffoon gets done with one of his desperate screeds, he's still so wound up and agitated that he blurts more stuff out all over the page without the self control to type accurately or to do a little proof reading...then he has to delete it.
That's hilarious...you're right, LB,this is certainly a clown TO keep prodding.
White House ordered forgery
By: Mike Allen
August 5, 2008
A new book by the author Ron Suskind claims that the White House ordered the CIA to forge a back-dated, handwritten letter from the head of Iraqi intelligence to Saddam Hussein.
Suskind writes in “The Way of the World,” to be published Tuesday, that the alleged forgery – adamantly denied by the White House – was designed to portray a false link between Hussein’s regime and al Qaeda as a justification for the Iraq war.
The author also claims that the Bush administration had information from a top Iraqi intelligence official “that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq – intelligence they received in plenty of time to stop an invasion.”
The letter’s existence has been reported before, and it had been written about as if it were genuine. It was passed in Baghdad to a reporter for The (London) Sunday Telegraph who wrote about it on the front page of Dec. 14, 2003, under the headline, “Terrorist behind September 11 strike ‘was trained by Saddam.’”
The Telegraph story by Con Coughlin (which, coincidentally, ran the day Hussein was captured in his “spider hole”) was touted in the U.S. media by supporters of the war, and he was interviewed on NBC's "Meet the Press."
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"Over the next few days, the Habbush letter continued to be featured prominently in the United States and across the globe," Suskind writes. "Fox's Bill O'Reilly trumpeted the story Sunday night on 'The O'Reilly Factor,' talking breathlessly about details of the story and exhorting, 'Now, if this is true, that blows the lid off al Qaeda—Saddam.'"
According to Suskind, the administration had been in contact with the director of the Iraqi intelligence service in the last years of Hussein’s regime, Tahir Jalil Habbush al-Tikriti.
“The White House had concocted a fake letter from Habbush to Saddam, backdated to July 1, 2001,” Suskind writes. “It said that 9/11 ringleader Mohammad Atta had actually trained for his mission in Iraq – thus showing, finally, that there was an operational link between Saddam and al Qaeda, something the Vice President’s Office had been pressing CIA to prove since 9/11 as a justification to invade Iraq. There is no link.”
The White House flatly denied Suskind’s account. Tony Fratto, deputy White House press secretary, told Politico: “The allegation that the White House directed anyone to forge a document from Habbush to Saddam is just absurd.”
The White House plans to push back hard. Fratto added: "Ron Suskind makes a living from gutter journalism. He is about selling books and making wild allegations that no one can verify, including the numerous bipartisan commissions that have reported on pre-war intelligence."
Before “The Way of the World: A Story of Truth and Hope in an Age of Extremism,” Suskind wrote two New York Times bestsellers critical of the Bush administration – “The Price of Loyalty” (2004), which featured extensive comments by former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill, and “The One Percent Doctrine” (2006).
Suskind writes in his new book that the order to create the letter was written on “creamy White House stationery.” The book suggests that the letter was subsequently created by the CIA and delivered to Iraq, but does not say how.
The author claims that such an operation, part of “false pretenses” for war, would apparently constitute illegal White House use of the CIA to influence a domestic audience, an arguably impeachable offense.
Suskind writes that the White House had “ignored the Iraq intelligence chief’s accurate disclosure that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq – intelligence they received in plenty of time to stop an invasion.
“They secretly resettled him in Jordan, paid him $5 million – which one could argue was hush money – and then used his captive status to help deceive the world about one of the era’s most crushing truths: that America had gone to war under false pretenses,” the book says.
Suskind writes that the forgery “operation created by the White House and passed to the CIA seems inconsistent with” a statute saying the CIA may not conduct covert operations “intended to influence United States political processes, public opinion, policies or media.”
“It is not the sort of offense, such as assault or burglary, that carries specific penalties, for example, a fine or jail time,” Suskind writes. “It is much broader than that. It pertains to the White House’s knowingly misusing an arm of government, the sort of thing generally taken up in impeachment proceedings.”
Habbush is still listed as wanted on a State Department website designed to help combat international terrorism, with the notation: “Up to $1 Million Reward.”
Former CIA Director George J. Tenet says about the supposed forgery, in a statement: “There was no such order from the White House to me nor, to the best of my knowledge, was anyone from CIA ever involved in any such effort.”
NBC’s David Gregory reported on “Today” that Habbush passed his information in “secret meetings with British intelligence.”
Tenet says about Habbush in the statement: “In fact, the source in question failed to persuade his British interlocutors that he had anything new to offer by way of intelligence, concessions, or negotiations with regard to the Iraq crisis and the British – on their own – elected to break off contact with him.
“There were many Iraqi officials who said both publicly and privately that Iraq had no WMD – but our foreign intelligence colleagues and we assessed that these individuals were parroting the Ba’ath party line and trying to delay any coalition attack. The particular source that Suskind cites offered no evidence to back up his assertion and acted in an evasive and unconvincing manner.”
Asked about Tenet's statement by Meredith Vieira on “Today,” Suskind said it’s “part of George’s memory issue.”
“[B]y placing so much on its secret ledger,” Suskind writes in his final chapter, “the administration profoundly altered basic democratic ideals of accountability and informed consent.”
The book (HarperCollins, $27.95) was not supposed to be publicly available until Tuesday, but Politico purchased a copy Monday night at a Washington bookstore.
Suskind, an engaging and confident Washingtonian, writes that the book was “one tough project.” He won the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing as a reporter for The Wall Street Journal, where he worked from 1993 to 2000.
The White House said Suskind received no formal cooperation. He writes in the acknowledgments section at the end of the book: “It should be noted that the intelligence sources who are quoted in this book in no way disclosed any classified information. None crossed the line.”
Among the 415-page book’s other highlights:
--John Maguire, one of two men who oversaw the CIA’s Iraq Operations Group, was frustrated by what Suskind describes as the “tendency of the White House to ignore advice it didn’t want to hear – advice that contradicted its willed certainty, political judgments, or rigid message strategies.”
And Suskind writes that the administration “did not want to hear the word insurgency.”
--In the first days of his presidency, Bush rejected advice from the CIA to wiretap Russian President Vladimir Putin in February 2001 in Vienna, where he was staying in a hotel where the CIA had a listening device planted in the wall of the presidential suite, in need only of a battery change. The CIA said that if the surveillance were discovered, Putin’s respect for Bush would be heightened.
But Condoleezza Rice, Bush’s national security adviser, advised that it was “too risky, it might be discovered,” Suskind writes. Bush decided against if as “a gut decision” based on what he thought was a friendship based on several conversations, including during the presidential campaign. The CIA had warned him that Putin “was a trained KGB agent … [who] wants you to think he’s your friend.”
--Suskind reports that Bush initially told Cheney he had to "‘step back’ in large meetings when they were together, like those at the NSC [National Security Council], because people were addressing and deferring to Cheney. Cheney said he understood, that he’d mostly just take notes at the big tables and then he and Bush would meet privately, frequently, to discuss options and action.”
--Suskind contends Cheney established “deniability” for Bush as part of the vice president’s “complex strategies, developed over decades, for how to protect a president.”
“After the searing experience of being in the Nixon White House, Cheney developed a view that the failure of Watergate was not the break-in, or even the cover-up, but the way the president had, in essence, been over-briefed. There were certain things a president shouldn’t know – things that could be illegal, disruptive to key foreign relationships, or humiliating to the executive.
“They key was a signaling system, where the president made his wishes broadly known to a sufficiently powerful deputy who could take it from there. If an investigation ensued, or a foreign leader cried foul, the president could shrug. This was never something he'd authorized. The whole point of Cheney’s model is to make a president less accountable for his action. Cheney’s view is that accountability – a bedrock feature of representative democracy – is not, in every case, a virtue.”
--Suskind is acidly derisive of Bush, saying that he initially lost his “nerve” on 9/11, regaining it when he grabbed the Ground Zero bullhorn. Suskind says Bush’s 9 p.m. Oval Office address on the fifth anniversary was “well along in petulance, seasoned by a touch of self-defensiveness.”
“Moving on its own natural arc, the country is in the process of leaving Bush – his bullying impulse fused, permanently, with satisfying vengeance – in the scattering ashes of 9/11,” Suskind writes. “The high purpose his angry words carried after the attacks, and in two elections since, is dissolving with each passing minute.”
--Suskind writes in the acknowledgments that his research assistant, Greg Jackson, “was sent to New York on a project for the book” in September 2007 and was “detained by federal agents in Manhattan. He was interrogated and his notes were confiscated, violations of his First and Fourth Amendment rights.” The author provides no further detail.
Mind your own business, monkeyboy. I'm talking to Lana.
...or is that you, Blossom, in a gorilla suit?
I think I can see the zipper.
Come on, girls, step out of those silly costumes.
(and turn slowly, so I can check you out.)
McCrank Not Even Close:
With all the breathlessness over the minute movements in the irrelevant national polls, the one thing no one seems to be noticing is that the electoral map is still trending very poorly for John McCain (R).
I realize that it cuts against the media narrative right now to focus on anything that doesn't suggest a dead-heat, but it's quite instructive to see how the independent groups (and even right-leaning ones) currently see the state of the race through the only prism that matters -- the Electoral College:
Obama McCain Margin
Real Clear Politics 322 216 Obama +106
Electoral-Vote.com 316 209 Obama +107
FiveThirtyEight.com 303 235 Obama + 68
Pollster.com 284 147 Obama +137
AVERAGE 306 202 Obama +104
If you think about the reporting of the fluctuating state polls lately that show a tight race, all of them involve red states that McCain can't afford to lose: Colorado, Montana, Virginia, Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, Alaska, Georgia, etc.
Despite the media narrative that a number of blue states are competitive, the truth is none of the recent polling shows McCain making any significant inroads in the blue states. Consider:
In Michigan, McCain had not led in any poll since May;
In Pennsylvania, McCain has not led in any poll April, and a Republican poll released last week showed McCain trailing by 9, in line with the current Pollster.com average;
In New Hampshire, McCain has not led in any poll since April;
In Minnesota, while one recent poll showed McCain within the margin of error, no other poll in the past month (including one poll taken more recently) has him within 12 points.
So, while the media breathlessly reports the national tracking polls which shows a close race, the state polling is still showing a pretty significant Obama lead.
Sorry, Ava. They still haven't done reliable, comprehensive in-state polling. I suspect you'll be singing a different tune when they do.
Hey, did you girls hear Bill's ringing endorsement of Obama today?
911 Plotters Bury the Evidence of Anthrax
as their Follow-up Punch
by Michael Green,
Aug. 3, 2008
Copyright 2008 Michael Green
Bruce E. Ivins, a bioweapons researcher at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Disease, died Tuesday, July 29 2008, reportedly by suicidal drug overdose just as the Department of Justice was about to charge him with the 2001 anthrax attacks. The FBI had spent nearly seven years trying to railroad Steven Hatfill for the deeds, but failed miserably, and the Department of Justice recently settled a legal action with Hatfill by compensating him with over $5,000,000 so that it could turn its attention to easier prey. Ivins' attorney, Paul F. Kemp, who has represented him for over a year, has declared Ivins innocent, regrets that he cannot clear his name in court, even while Ivins' social worker therapist obtained a court restraining order against him stating that his treating psychiatrist Dr. David Irwin, "called him homicidal, sociopathic with clear intentions." These politically convenient diagnoses had not prevented the 62-year-old Ivins from enjoying a distinguished 33 year career with the Department of the Army.
I see little or no evidence implicating Ivins in the anthrax terrorism; if he has a link at all it will be minor and ancillary. Most likely, he has been chosen as the most vulnerable individual to serve as a patsy, unlike the formidable Steven Hatfill who has defended himself so very well. We should not forget the modus operandi of the FBI on political cases, say Brandon Mayfield and the Madrid train bombings. These are typically all-out frame-ups. Mayfield was an American attorney who had converted to Islam, married a Muslim woman, and provided legal help to Muslims who were being persecuted under the PATRIOT act. The FBI named Mayfield as the man whose thumb print matched the print on an unexploded detonator cap found near the train station bomb site with "100% certainty" even though the Spanish police had already told the FBI that it was not a match and that they had the actual person in custody to which the thumb print is a match. During a July 16, 2008 Q&A at the downtown Los Angeles Library with Mayfield's attorney, Steven T. Wax, I laid out the case for a deliberate and cynical FBI frame-up of Mayfield. Wax would not go so far in public, but he discreetly said that after the Spanish police announced their finding publicly, the FBI sent their agents to meet with them and then announced to the press, "The Spanish police agree with us." Wax said that he had spoken personally with the head of the Spanish police who was present at that meeting, and who advised Wax that the FBI had simply lied. I suggest that we not be deceived by the most recent presentation of "evidence" of Ivins' guilt.
What strikes me most is that this (probably genuine) suicide is designed to put a lid upon the conspiratorial facts. The August 1, 2008 Wall Street Journal reported and opined:
The Justice Department hasn't yet decided whether to close the investigation, officials said, meaning it's still not certain whether Dr. Ivins acted alone or had help. One official close to the case said that decision was expected within days. If the case is closed soon, one official said, that will indicate that Dr. Ivins was the lone suspect.
I assure you that the Journal is the ghost of our fascist future talking, with Dr. Ivins playing the role of lone nut so certified by both his social worker therapist and his psychiatrist. But the facts say otherwise.
Glenn Greenwald of Salon.com has been conscientiously tracking the anthrax terrorism for years. In his most recent essay of August 1, 2008, Greenwald details how immediately after the anthrax attacks four "well-placed sources" independently reported to ABC that preliminary lab results definitively linked the anthrax to Iraq by tell-tale traces of the compound bentonite. ABC's Brian Ross broadcast this news loudly and long, and thereby vastly influenced public opinion linking Saddam to 9/11, but there is not and never was an iota of truth to these reports: bentonite was never detected by those tests. ABC kept the secret of this false leak until 2007; ABC knows its "well-placed sources" and refuses to tell Greenwald, who opines:
...if they were really "well-placed," one would presume that meant they had some connection to the laboratory where the tests were conducted -- Ft. Detrick. That means that the same [Ft. Detrick] Government lab where the anthrax attacks themselves came from was the same place where the false reports originated that blamed those attacks on Iraq.
It's extremely possible -- one could say highly likely -- that the same people responsible for perpetrating the attacks were the ones who fed the false reports to the public, through ABC News, that Saddam was behind them. What we know for certain -- as a result of the letters accompanying the anthrax -- is that whoever perpetrated the attacks wanted the public to believe they were sent by foreign Muslims. Feeding claims to ABC News designed to link Saddam to those attacks would, for obvious reasons, promote the goal of the anthrax attacker(s). ...
ABC News already knows the answers to these questions. They know who concocted the false bentonite story and who passed it on to them with the specific intent of having them broadcast those false claims to the world, in order to link Saddam to the anthrax attacks and -- as importantly -- to conceal the real culprit(s) (apparently within the U.S. government) who were behind the attacks. And yet, unbelievably, they are keeping the story to themselves, refusing to disclose who did all of this. They're allegedly a news organization, in possession of one of the most significant news stories of the last decade, and they are concealing it from the public, even years later.
They're not protecting "sources." The people who fed them the bentonite story aren't "sources." They're fabricators and liars who purposely used ABC News to disseminate to the American public an extremely consequential and damaging falsehood. But by protecting the wrongdoers, ABC News has made itself complicit in this fraud perpetrated on the public, rather than a news organization uncovering such frauds. http://tinyurl.com/5mkgut
Greenwald hasn't yet understood that the media is under the general operational control of the intelligence agencies and under their full control when covert operations are involved -- that's when the actual agents with reporter's pads get the key assignments from management who is amongst, or serves the interest of, the plotters. And Greenwald may be missing an essential point, or not making his point so persuasively as he might. Whoever leaked the false news was not corrected publicly by the Fort Detrick lab that knew that there was no bentonite to implicate Saddam Hussein and Iraq because the Cheney/Bush administration was implementing their plans to attack Iraq that long antedated 911 and the anthrax theater to link him to terrorism on U.S. soil, as documented by Richard Clark, Paul O'Neill and Bob Woodward (see http://tinyurl.com/6fwhkw ). That means that the top laboratory personnel were complicit or they were ordered to shut up and they have stayed quiet for a very long while. Our government is organized so that such dissent from the facts cannot occur. Indeed, it would be impossible for our four so-called independent news sources to lie to ABC without full confidence that ABC would not check their story with someone who knew the truth, that no-one who knew the true Ft. Detrick laboratory results would speak out, and that no competing “news” agency would ever investigate or challenge their claims. The deed itself is evidence of full and long-standing complicity and cooperation between the intelligence community and the overall media for the purpose of misleading the public.
Greenwald notes that Richard Cohen of the Washington Post admits being advised by a high-ranking government official to start taking Cipro before the anthrax attacks -- but he apparently does not know that Cheney & friends began their Cipro on 9/11, several weeks prior to the outbreak -- and cannot understand the media resistance encountered, i.e., complicity at the highest levels, so takes the irrelevant moral high road flogging complicity posing as dereliction or cowardice (some of which are present as the plot later reveals itself to those who either play along or pay the piper).
Michael C. Ruppert did a fine job in Crossing the Rubicon, Chapter 16, "Silencing Congress," detailing how Senate Majority leader Tom Daschle and Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Pat Leahy, had their oral and written objections to the PATRIOT ACT -- Ashcroft had not even deigned a response to Leahy's letters -- were brought to an abrupt end by their receipt of anthrax letters that months later were quietly identified in the media as having originated "in CIA-run covert research programs." (pp. 269-271)
An especially clear integration of evidence for the anthrax being a state-sponsored false-flag operation occurs in an October 10, 2004 analysis by a blogger with the nom de plume of "Allie," who notes that targeting the necessary political enemies Daschle and Leahy provided the opportunity to take vengeance on several personal Bush enemies as well: the two newspaper editors responsible for exposing the drunken sluttish madcap behavior of the Bush twins, and NBC's Tom Brokaw for having Bill Clinton as a guest over White House objections September 18, 2001, the letter to Brokaw being mailed that very day that the White House's last-minute protests failed. http://tinyurl.com/2rjfmr As Allie summarizes, putting too much emphasis on Bush the individual:
The anthrax attacks were concurrent with the debate of Bush's Patriot Act by Congress and the media.
* The Senators who received anthrax letters were trying to amend the Patriot Act to protect civil liberties and the innocent.
* Two Senate democratic leaders received anthrax letters mailed the same day that Senator Feingold blocked an attempt to rush the bill through without discussion or amendments.
* Senator Leahy received an anthrax threat after he expressed reservations about the Bill. As Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, he managed the debate on the Bill.
* Senate Majority Leader Daschle received the first Senate anthrax letter as he led the opposition to the original version of the Bill.
* After receiving the anthrax letter, Daschle switched from supporting a 2 year limit on the Bill, later defending a 4-year sunset clause as the "appropriate balance."
* No Republican received an anthrax letter.
* The House and Senate buildings were closed and not reopened until after the Patriot Act was passed.
* The Supreme Court was shut down with an anthrax scare the day after the constitutionally-challenged Patriot Act was signed by President Bush.
* All the contaminated letters contained the Ames strain of anthrax, the DNA of which is traced to the original batch preserved in a university lab in Ames, Iowa. This strain was "weaponized" in Utah into a potent powder with an elaborate secret technique developed at Fort Detrick, http://tinyurl.com/6lhpab
Who had a motive? Who had a grudge against The Enquirer and The New York Post? Who had a grudge against Brokaw? Who wanted to frighten or manipulate Congress? First to get it to adjourn indefinitely, leaving Bush with the power of the purse. Second to get the Patriot Act Passed in all its fascist glory, without even being read. Who?
It's as plain as the nose on your face. Why is the major media pussyfooting around it? Are they still terrified? The anthrax attacks were almost certainly an attempted Operation Northwoods/Media Attack/Political Coup and its targets, as group, would only have been chosen by George Bush.
One cannot run a covert operation on the scale of 911, or even the second phase of persuading Congress to do the right thing without first controlling the media that are not merely the lapdogs of their imperialist masters, but an active branch of the intelligence community even though many of the news people themselves do not know it.
AUTHOR'S BIO: I am a retired forensic psychologist living in Los Angeles with enough time on my hands to have spent the past few years studying the deeds whose perpetrators pejoratively deride the correct analysis of which as "conspiracy theories," i.e., USG intelligence community domestic covert operations -- fascist politics by unconventional means. A professor of analytic philosophy in a former career, I no longer embrace the Lotus Land argument that if you can work on your abs, then it isn't fascism.
Don't forget Building 7 of the WTC, Mikey.
Oil falls to $118.00/barrel (lowest in three months).
Dow closes up more than 300 points.
One of you made an excited prediction on a Sunday in exulting anticipation that the market was going to tank into Depression the next day on Monday (last week).
Who was it? Step forth and own up to your words.
btw, YOU WERE WRONG.
where are all the wingbats who used to hang out here?
is this simple little cunt the only thing left?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
August 5, 2008
Chemical Traces of High Explosives in WTC Debris
By Josh Mitteldorf
The standard way to demolish a steel-framed building is to apply cutter charges to the supporting beams. The cutter charges consist of finely-powdered aluminum mixed with iron oxide, with added sulfur. This mixture contains both fuel and oxidant – it needs no air – and it burns hot enough to melt steel. The trade name for this product is “Thermate.”
There is a science to placing the charges in such a way that the building falls inward. It requires a great deal of expertise to keep a tall building from toppling over sideways.
Many scientists and engineers have looked at the way the WTC towers fell and remarked that it had the appearance of controlled demolition. The buildings collapsed symmetrically, and fell straight down. The speed of the fall indicated that the buildings were collapsing unimpeded. They must have had the “legs” simultaneously pulled out from under them, because a layered collapse from the top down would have taken several minutes, whereas the observed collapse took place in less than 20 seconds.
Another anomaly in the WTC collapse was the violent explosions. Firemen reported earthshaking blasts from the basement before collapse, and the impact areas in the upper floorss of the buildings exploded just at the onset of collapse. Jet fuel burns but cannot explode.
In an article published this week in the journal Environmentalist, chemical engineer Kevin Ryan collects evidence from EPA documents that suggest there was both Thermate and high-explosives in the debris from the WTC collapse. Ryan was formerly employed by Environmental Health Labs, a division of Underwriters Labs, before he was fired for raising these and other questions.
Fires at the WTC site persisted for weeks after 9/11, despite firefighters’ use of water and chemical extinguishers to smother the flames. This suggests that it was a fuel-oxidant mixture that was burning. Pools of red-hot molten iron could not have been caused by burning jet fuel or building materials, because these burn at a much lower temperature than steel melts.
Ryan’s evidence consists in traces of 1,3-diphenylpropane as well as sulfur and particulate matter, reported by the EPA to have appeared in spikes continuing as late as March, 2002. Ryan believes that these came from brief, intense fires ignited by the molten steel when it came in contact with yet-unburned plastic building materials during the clean-up process.
Link to Journal article full text
Authors Website: http://mathforum.org/~josh
Authors Bio: Josh Mitteldorf was educated to be an astrophysicist, and has branched out from there to mathematical modeling in a variety of areas. He has taught mathematics, statistics, and physics at several universities. He is an avid amateur pianist, and father of two adopted Chinese girls. This year, his affiliation is with the University of Arizona, where he studies the evolution of aging.
They're so beat down they don't even try anymore...this guy's gotto keep trying because he was beat down too bad...on his own blog
notice his own three little friends won't even stick their nose in
"is this simple little cunt the only thing left?"
Uh-oh. It's fathead, all pissed off and shit because he's Bluto, I'm Popeye, and Lana's Olive Oyl and he caught us having fun without him.
No worries. It always ends the same way.
"...this guy's gotto (sic) keep trying because he was beat down too bad...on his own blog"
RU on drugs, fathead? The insurgency there was put down hard and you little terrorists fled back here faster than al Qaeda fled from Iraq.
And I'm the master of my domain once again (which is now disinfected and terrorist-free).
How are you doing here, fathead? Are you still running the show?
Everything under control?
lol
Hey, nice "army." Like a typical terrorist, you're making your women hide behind veils and strap-on explosive vests (among other things) and do the fighting for you while you spew your venom and issue feckless fatwahs.
Give it up, fathead. You don't belong here. This is Mr. Sayet's blog. I suggest you gtfo.
Let me know if Sayet ever comes back...it's always fun to tear a new one in his morbid ass...I'm afraid they made him take "the cure" this time, though...probably got six months or a year plus three in the program.
Who cares where he is...this is just one more place to expose GOP morons...
Here's this weeks Top Ten Conservative Idiots...
John McCain
Midnight on "The M Floor," McCain Campaign Headquarters, Arlington, VA. John McCain is conferring with his closest advisers.
JOHN McCAIN: (putting on a stern face and speaking as if reading a teleprompter) Gentlemen, we have work to do. Here's the situation. The enemy has scored big victories in the Middle East and Europe, and we are surrounded and outnumbered. We need to get on the offensive, and fast. The best defense is a good offense, right Rick?
RICK DAVIS: You got it. (gives McCain the thumbs-up)
McCAIN: I thought as much. Now listen, friends. What the hell are we going to do?
STEVE SCHMIDT: It's simple. Karl Rove teaches us that in situations like this we must attack the enemy where he is strongest.
McCAIN: If only we had more troops. Damned deserters - (clenches fists)
DAVIS: Take it easy John, we'll deal with them later. They won't get away.
JOE LIEBERMAN: (jumping up and down in his chair) This is great! What can I do to help?
SCHMIDT: Er - how about grabbing us some coffee Joe, could you do that?
LIEBERMAN: Sure thing Steve! I'll be right back!
(he leaves)
SCHMIDT: (clears throat) As I was saying, we must attack Obama where he is strongest. So where is he strongest?
McCAIN: The economy?
DAVIS: Health care?
McCAIN: Iraq?
DAVIS: Afghanistan?
McCAIN: Gas prices?
DAVIS: The environment?
(they pause to think)
McCAIN: Taxes?
DAVIS: Education?
SCHMIDT: (slaps forehead) I was thinking more along the lines of his popularity. You see, senator, you are, how can I put this, not that popular with the American people any more.
McCAIN: What? Since when?
SCHMIDT: I can't recall exactly, sir, it was probably sometime between "make it 100" and "bomb bomb Iran." Forget it. My point is that we need to take that uppi... uh, that guy down a peg or two. He's way too popular.
McCAIN: That bastard. (wags finger at thin air) I see you, Barack Obama! I see your game! I used to be the one they liked. Me! And then you come along, Mr. Hoity-Toity High-and-Mighty, with your huge crowds and your winning smile and your good ideas! Bastard!
(McCain stares into space)
DAVIS: How do you propose we do this?
SCHMIDT: With a campaign ad. Here's the pitch. Ad opens with a shot of two hundred thousand people cheering Barack Obama in Germany. We then cut quickly to pictures of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears. Voiceover: "He's the biggest celebrity in the world." We cut again to video of Obama waving and smiling, looking presidential, as the crowd loudly chants his name.
DAVIS: I'm really not sure about this -
SCHMIDT: - and the rest of the ad is just the usual BS about him being inexperienced and wanting to raise everybody's taxes. The end.
(Davis considers the proposition for a moment)
DAVIS: That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard in my life.
SCHMIDT: I know, the media will love it!
(the door opens)
JOE LIEBERMAN: Did anyone want sugar?
SCHMIDT: No thanks Joe.
LIEBERMAN: You got it Steve! Coffee coming right up!
(he leaves)
DAVIS: (shaking his head) I dunno about this Steve. Won't the visuals just make Obama look good? Plus I think Paris Hilton's parents are donors to the campaign -
SCHMIDT: Ha ha! Yeah, sure. Nice try Rick. Next thing you'll be telling me ole grandaddy Hilton donated $50,000 to the RNC. As if.
McCAIN: (coming around) - and I'll follow him to the gates of hell. (smiles). What?
SCHMIDT: We were just talking about your new campaign ad where you compare Barack Obama to Paris Hilton and Britney Spears.
McCAIN: (immediately becoming crotchety) Hold on there my friends. From what I remember, I'm not supposed to be getting involed in shenanigans. I think I have it written down here somewhere. (pats pockets, draws out an envelope marked "Principles - Do Not Lose") Ah yes, here it is. (opens envelope, takes out paper, puts on reading glasses, squints, holds paper at arms length) "Overheated rhetoric and personal attacks on our opponents distract from the big differences between John McCain's vision for the future of our nation and the Democrats'. This campaign is about John McCain: his vision, leadership, experience, courage, service to his country and ability to lead as commander in chief from day one. Throughout his life John McCain has held himself to the highest standards and he will continue to run a respectful campaign based on the issues. We expect that all supporters, surrogates and staff will hold themselves to similarly high standards when they are representing the campaign." Didn't you write that, Rick?
DAVIS: Er -
SCHMIDT: (interrupting) Words, sir, just words. The media barely cares about what the campaign said last week, let alone four months ago. It won't be a problem.
McCAIN: And another thing, up until recently, didn't I refer to myself as a celebrity on my very own campaign website, which would open me up to charges of rank hypocrisy?
SCHMIDT: (appearing slightly frustrated) Well we can easily delete that. I'm sure nobody will notice.
McCAIN: And a third thing - won't this ad just make me look like a desperate political hack, lacking in ideas, and out of touch with the people?
SCHMIDT: (getting angry) Dammit, sir! Do you want to be a maverick all your life? Or do you want be president?
McCAIN: (sullenly) President.
SCHMIDT: I can't hear you, Senator! Do you want to be a maverick, or do you want to be president? You can't have it both ways!
McCAIN: President!
SCHMIDT: That's better. Now why don't you take a nap while Rick and I get started on this ad.
(they leave)
(McCain nods off)
(the door opens)
JOE LIEBERMAN: Coffee is served! Hello?
John McCain
Just one day after airing their spectacularly lame Hilton/Spears ad, the McCain campaign was flinging more poo in Obama's direction. According to the Washington Post:
Was it Barack Obama, who not so subtly pointed to John McCain and seemingly accused him of trying to scare voters by drawing attention to the fact that Obama doesn't look like (read: he is African American) all the other presidents? Or was it McCain's campaign, which cried foul over Obama's statements with such vehemence that race became the story of the day on all the networks, in all the papers and on all the blogs?
McCain campaign manager Rick Davis and Obama chief strategist David Axelrod continued to argue the question of who played the race card on the Friday morning shows. Davis blamed Obama; Axelrod blamed Davis.
"We were reacting to what Barack Obama himself said about John McCain," Davis said on NBC's "Today Show." "And I think we were perfectly within our rights to protect our candidate and to point out that we're not going to lay down for these kinds of tactics.
Gosh, it appears to be a simple case of he-said-he-said. How can we possibly know who is right? Let's just say they're both right!
Alternatively, we could look at the facts.
Last Thursday, the McCain campaign released this statement: ""Barack Obama has played the race card, and he played it from the bottom of the deck. It's divisive, negative, shameful and wrong."
How did he do this? According to MSNBC:
The statement refers to this Obama line yesterday: "So nobody really thinks that Bush or McCain have a real answer for the challenges we face, so what they're going to try to do is make you scared of me. You know, he's not patriotic enough. He's got a funny name. You know, he doesn't look like all those other Presidents on those dollar bills, you know. He's risky. That's essentially the argument they're making."
So where on earth did Obama get the idea that the McCain campaign wanted to make him look risky and not like "all those other Presidents on those dollar bills?" Oh, I dunno...
JUNE 2008
Gee... maybe it's because the McCain campaign actually put Obama on a dollar bill in one of their campaign ads.
Nah, must be the race card.
John McCain
The Britney/Paris ad wasn't the only dose of political ipecac dispensed by the McCain campaign last week - in fact, the campaign released several other "web videos" which cable news happily ate up and regurgitated every thirty minutes or so. Along with "Barack Obama Is A Celebrity" there was "The Media Loves Barack Obama," "Barack Obama Hates Latinos," "Barack Obama Doesn't Support The Troops," and "Barack Obama Can Part The Red Sea," among others. If this is McCain's idea of a respectful campaign, I'd hate to see him run a negative one.
So how did McCain's new strategy go over? Let's check the reviews...
Results of a national study conducted today among 320 Americans revealed that a majority of Republicans (61%), reported that they were disturbed, skeptical and saddened after viewing a new ad by John McCain, which likens Barack Obama to Britney Spears and Paris Hilton. -- HCD Research
As The Ticket noted previously, P.H.'s ma and pa, Kathleen and Richard Hilton, have donated the $2,300 maximum to the McCain operation. But there's a lot more Hiltons around apparently, including Gramps Hilton (William B.), who is the vast hotel empire's co-chair. And according to Martin Eisenstadt's blog, he's been quite the generous donor to the tune of more than $50Gs to Republican campaign operations.
Not only that, he reports, but members of the Blackstone Group, the private equity group that bought into Hilton Hotels last year, have also been generous GOP donors. And Marty says they've expressed themselves angrily to McCain representatives in recent hours. -- Los Angeles Times
"People complain about it -- they should just relax and enjoy it." -- Joe Lieberman
At a town hall meeting today, he was asked by a young woman if he had "flip-flopped" on his vow to avoid "mudslinging." "Comparing him (Obama) to Britney Spears and Paris Hilton? Like, I was like O-Kayyyy."
"There are differences and we are drawing those differences," McCain replied. "What we are talking about here is substance and not style. We are talking about who has an agenda for the future of America."
"Campaigns are tough," he added. "I am proud of the campaign that we have run... We're proud of that commercial." -- Wall Street Journal
Sen. John McCain may be "proud" of the Paris Hilton/Britney Spears ad released this week, but his feisty 96-year-old mother apparently disagrees.
Roberta McCain was a featured guest at a McCain campaign event on Thursday afternoon at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington DC. The Huffington Post obtained some audio of an exchange after the event where Mrs. McCain is asked about the Paris Hilton ad.
"Oh, well, I didn't see it -- I think it's kinda stupid," she says. "I'm just too old-hat for it. In fact, the other two, I didn't even know who they were." -- Huffington Post
John McCain
It was revealed last week that John McCain has been keeping a little secret about his campaign's response to Barack Obama's overseas trip. According to Business Week:
What the McCain campaign doesn't want people to know, according to one GOP strategist I spoke with over the weekend, is that they had an ad script ready to go if Obama had visited the wounded troops saying that Obama was... wait for it... using wounded troops as campaign props. So, no matter which way Obama turned, McCain had an Obama bashing ad ready to launch. I guess that's political hardball. But another word for it is the one word that most politicians are loathe to use about their opponents - a lie.
Elsewhere on the McCain campaign trail last week: we all know how fond the senator is of insisting that he will never raise taxes, never, not ever. But last week, McCain appeared on "This Week" and said, "I don't want tax increases. But that doesn't mean that anything is off the table."
Whoops! Conservatives were not happy. It's okay though because just days later McCain said, "I want to look you in the eye. I will not raise your taxes nor support a tax increase. I will not do it." So that clears that up. He's definitely not going to increase anyone's taxes, unless he does.
The Wall Street Journal
More signs that the media has way too much time on its hands... this was actually published in the Wall Street Journal last week:
Too Fit to Be President?
Facing an Overweight Electorate, Barack Obama Might Find Low Body Fat a Drawback
Speaking to donors at a San Diego fund-raiser last month, Barack Obama reassured the crowd that he wouldn't give in to Republican tactics to throw his candidacy off track.
"Listen, I'm skinny but I'm tough," Sen. Obama said.
But in a nation in which 66% of the voting-age population is overweight and 32% is obese, could Sen. Obama's skinniness be a liability? Despite his visits to waffle houses, ice-cream parlors and greasy-spoon diners around the country, his slim physique just might have some Americans wondering whether he is truly like them.
Really? Maybe Obama isn't old enough, bald enough, white enough, or angry enough to be president either. Oh, if only there was a candidate more like that in the race...
Ted Stevens
It seems you can't have an election these days without a big-time Republican getting himself indicted. Last week it was the turn of Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK). According to Reuters:
Veteran Republican U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens was charged on Tuesday with concealing more than $250,000 worth of gifts, including home renovations, that he received from an Alaska oil services company, the Justice Department said.
The Alaska politician, who has served 40 years in the Senate, was charged in a federal grand jury indictment with seven counts of making false statements on his Senate financial disclosure forms from 2001 to 2006, the department said.
Stevens pleaded not guilty to the charges and according to MSNBC, "received an unusually speedy trial date." How nice. Meanwhile his fellow Republican senators - including Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R-NC) and Sen. John Sununu (R-NH) were scrambling to return tainted money that they'd received from Stevens.
So how did the media react to all this? Let's just say that Fox managed to make their usual "mistake"...
Jim Adkisson And His Mentors
Last week Jim Adkisson walked into the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church during a children's play and opened fire with a shotgun, killing two people. According to the Associated Press:
A four-page letter found in Jim D. Adkisson's small SUV indicated he intentionally targeted the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church because, the police chief said, "he hated the liberal movement" and was upset with "liberals in general as well as gays."
And according to the Knoxville News Sentinel:
Adkisson targeted the church, (Knoxville Police Department Officer Steve) Still wrote in the document obtained by WBIR-TV, Channel 10, "because of its liberal teachings and his belief that all liberals should be killed because they were ruining the country, and that he felt that the Democrats had tied his country's hands in the war on terror and they had ruined every institution in America with the aid of media outlets."
Adkisson told Still that "he could not get to the leaders of the liberal movement that he would then target those that had voted them in to office."
Now where could he have gotten those crazy ideas?
Inside (Adkisson's) house, officers found "Liberalism is a Mental Health Disorder" by radio talk show host Michael Savage, "Let Freedom Ring" by talk show host Sean Hannity, and "The O'Reilly Factor," by television talk show host Bill O'Reilly.
Cast your minds back for a moment to the massacre at Virginia Tech last year. Here's what Michael Savage had to say at the time:
Mr. Savage, whose harsh comments about homosexuality resulted in his dismissal from MSNBC in 2003, sneered audibly as he referred to Mr. Cho as "a senior in English," drawing out the word for emphasis, and as "Comandante Cho." Mr. Cho, who was born in South Korea, moved to the United States with his family in 1992, when he was 8.
"This kid was brainwashed over there," Mr. Savage said. Later he added that "the only reason" Mr. Cho "was walking the streets was because liberal scum have for 30 years handcuffed the police and the people of this country and made us hostages in their drama."
And here's Bill O'Reilly on the same subject:
Bill O'Reilly could not bring himself to put aside his crusade against the left for even one day to allow all of us, united, to process the senseless tragedy at Virginia Tech. O'Reilly and Bernard Goldberg thought it was perfectly fine to connect Rosie O'Donnell and Liberals to the tragic event in a negative way. The slurs continued with Goldberg explaining his "Fox Derangement Syndrome" caused by FNC's fair and balanced policies.
O'Reilly showed a clip of Rosie O'Donnell discussing the need for stricter gun laws for non hunting weapons. Goldberg in a nasty tone claimed that "three seconds after the last shot was fired" liberals were talking about gun control. Then he made it seem like conservatives were being victimized because they want everyone to have guns to defend themselves not just the lunatics.
Yet after dedicating hours of TV and radio time to the reasons behind the Virginia Tech shootings, Savage, Hannity, O'Reilly, et al, remain curiously silent on Jim Adkisson's motives.
I wonder why?
John McCain
Ladies and gentlemen, it's official - just as Rudy Giuliani ran to become president of 9/11, so John McCain is running to become president of the surge. Last week, during a Q&A session with members of the National Urban League, McCain suggested that "military strategies currently employed by US troops in Iraq could be applied to high crime neighborhoods here in the US," according to ABC News.
McNUTS: And some of those tactics - you mention the war in Iraq - are like that we use in the military. You go into neighborhoods, you clamp down, you provide a secure environment for the people that live there, and you make sure that the known criminals are kept under control. And you provide them with a stable environment and then they cooperate with law enforcement, etc, etc.
Sounds great. Who needs better education and economic opportunities when a few tanks will do the job?
Presumably McCain will now be applying the surge strategy to other domestic issues. Look for new ads from the McCain campaign in the coming weeks...
John McCain and John Rich
Hey, remember when Barack Obama drew a crowd of 75,000 in Oregon a few months ago? Thanks to Newsbusters (mission statement: "Exposing & Combating Liberal Media Bias") we learned that:
From CNN to the New York Times, the media hyped Barack Obama's Portland, Oregon rally on Sunday, some comparing him to a rock star. Unmentioned in national reporting was the fact that Obama was preceded by a rare, 45-minute free concert by actual rock stars The Decemberists.
Meanwhile, according to the Chicago Tribune:
Some conservative bloggers have been circulating claims that a warm-up concert by a German band may have been partly responsible for the more than 200,000 people Berlin police estimated attended a Barack Obama rally in their city.
Which is odd, because John McCain has been going around telling everybody that Barack Obama is "the biggest celebrity in the world." But never mind that - let's turn our brains off for a moment and assume that these conservative bloggers are right. People don't go to political rallies to see politicians, they go to see musicians. And John McCain has been using this fact to his advantage. According to the Washington Post last week:
"Can I get a yee-haw?"
With that, country music star John Rich launched into a spirited "Country First" concert on behalf Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) tonight featuring his number-one hit "Lost in This Moment with You" and the debut of a song he had written especially for the presumptive GOP nominee, "Raising McCain."
Sounds great! So, given that McCain was supported by this bona fide, number-one-hit-having country music star, I expect the crowd was up there in the tens of thousands, right?
The free concert, sponsored by the Florida Republican Party, attracted several hundred people including a fan sporting a homemade T-shirt saying, "Don't let the USA become an Obama-Nation."
I see. Oh well, at least John Rich managed to give the conservative crowd a dose of straight talk during his performance.
Before playing Johnny Cash's "Walk the Line," he declared that the song was tantamount to a McCain endorsement.
"Somebody's got to walk the line in the country. They've got to walk it unapologetically," he said. "And I'm sure Johnnny Cash would have been a John McCain supporter if he was still around."
And now for the punchline...
Actually, Cash backed Democratic president Jimmy Carter.
Bill O'Reilly
And finally, say what you like about Bill O'Reilly - he's a man of the people. Always fighting for Joe Sixpack, that's our Bill. But don't just take my word for it - the Denver Post's blurb for O'Reilly's literary masterpiece Who's Looking Out For You? calls it, "An appealing and occasionally moving book. (O'Reilly) emerges here as a feisty ... defender of the little guy."
Bill continued to defend the little guy last week with a classy op-ed in the Washington Times.
If Sen. Obama becomes President Obama, my taxes will go up, way up. But I know neither Argentina nor anyone else will cry for me, because I am the rich guy Al Gore warned you about, the one who got all those tax cuts from the evil Bush administration.
Yes, I am part of the 1 percent of Americans that paid an astounding 40 percent of all federal income tax in 2006. According to recently released Internal Revenue Service figures, about 50 percent of my fellow Americans paid no federal income tax at all that year. My fellow 1-percenters and I covered for them.
Isn't that generous? I'm glad Bill wrote this op-ed, otherwise the underprivileged might never know the many ways in which he's looking out for them.
However, it seems that there is trouble brewing in paradise. Under a Barack Obama presidency, the top 1% - that's Bill's tax bracket, as he just reminded us - will have to pay more taxes.
But for some it is still not enough. Mr. Obama believes in "income redistribution," a concept practiced by Robin Hood of Sherwood Forest.
Good analogy, Bill! I think everyone can recall how, according to legend, the monstrous Robin Hood stole from the hapless Sheriff of Nottingham and his downtrodden buddy King John before "redistributing" their wealth to those greedy, ungrateful peasants.
While Mr. Hood was prancing around the forest in his tights, the hereditary aristocracy were generously providing small patches of dirt outside their castle walls for the little guy to grow vegetables in. And so what if that meant all the vegetables belonged to the top 1%, and the little guy was left with nothing but scraps? If those lazy peasants had stopped lounging around and pulled themselves up by the bootstraps then one day they might have been able to live in castle too.
Bill continues...
President Obama and a Democratic Congress will likely dole out entitlements like free health care, child care and cash payments to anyone who falls under a certain income level, no matter their circumstances. That means people who drink gin all day will get some of my hard-earned money. Folks who dropped out of school, who are too lazy to hold a job, who smoke reefers 24/7 all will get some goodies in the mail from Uncle Barack and Aunt Nancy, funded by me and other rich folks.
There will be no drug testing, no background checks, no accountability for those receiving the government's largess. If you're an American citizen (or even an illegal alien) who doesn't make much money, you'll get stuff.
There is something unsettling about that.
Really? There is something "unsettling" about the idea of providing health care and child care to poor people? I'd say there's something "unsettling" about the idea that this country - the richest country in the world - is home to millions upon millions of people who have to choose between medicine or food, while rich assholes like O'Reilly sit around in their mansions complaining about how they're being sucked dry.
But what the hell do I know. After all, I'm not a multi-millionaire with my own TV show and direct access to the Washington Times opinion page. So come on people, give Bill O'Reilly a (tax) break. Remember, he's not thinking about himself - he's looking out for you.
See you next week!
It's official. The presumptive repuke nominee has just been punk'd. By Paris Hilton.
By KamaAina
Venezuela's top court upholds candidate blacklist
By Zorro
Past GOP nominees offer up wives as Miss Buffalo Chip. Which is the hottest, from Mamie to Cindy?
I guess I was wrong about you being Blossom in a gorilla suit, simian.
That's not a suit.
And I really don't know why Paris Hilton got so mad at Johnny, and not B. Hussein.
I mean, Johnny felt her fit to put on the political map and on the lips of the literati who had hitherto thought it too lowbrow to even mention her name in tandem with topics of any real momentous newsworthiness (like campaigns for POTUS), while the outraged B. Hussein made it very clear that he felt insulted for being compared to her.
But Paris made a commercial blasting Johnny, anyway, to the benefit of B. Hussein and now adding and allying her star power to his own, causing McCain's ad to backfire.
...in a very ironic way.
(DOH!)
The Rotting GOP and Its Conservative Refugees
P.M. Carpenter
There is understatement, and then there's understatement.
For the latter, see Pat Waak, chairwoman of the Colorado Democratic Party, who recently told The New York Times: "I think nationally and here, people are kind of tired of the way [the Bush] administration has been conducting the policies of this country."
Yeah, we're just kind of tired of it. A bit fatigued. A trifle melancholy at a little unattractive behavior in pursuit of a few rather unappealing policies.
Now why, you ask, was the Times quoting Ms. Waak in her somewhat stoic, Zen-like appraisal of the last eight years?
Because the paper, you see, was engaged in asking various party poobahs and tuned-in academics why, in their opinion, "there has been a reduction in the number of voters who register with the Republican Party and a rise among voters who affiliate with Democrats." Which indeed there has been, going on several years now, with said reduction and respective rise being substantial.
What's more, reported the Times, "voting experts" -- now listen up, these are the experts talking -- "say the registration numbers may signal the beginning of a move away from Republicans that could affect local, state and national politics over several election cycles."
Lord, even you have no idea of the depth of my regret at not having become either a pollster or "voting expert" -- a select member of that narrow, political cognoscenti that spends it highly paid days either solemnly warning, for instance, that a candidate's statistical lead can go up, down, or level off, or that vastly lower Republican registration numbers may signal a move away from Republicans.
At any rate, one of these experts put an even broader spin on the shifting partisan landscape: "This is very suggestive that there is a fundamental change going on in the electorate," said a senior fellow and voting-pattern maven at the Brookings Institution.
And as for causation, those party poobahs were in general agreement: "Those in charge of state Democratic parties cite a national displeasure with the Bush administration as an impetus for the changing numbers." Such as our delicate Ms. Waak and her proffered suspicion that folks are "kind of tired" of the Bushies.
Yet I -- as well as the "tired" body politic -- are prone to put matters in a far less delicate way, with apologies to Ms. Waak and all her partisan colleagues who settle for eviscerated appraisals of mere "displeasure" at the Bush administration.
We are not "displeased," inasmuch as that prodigiously tepid characterization is a monstrous insult to outrage.
I recognize that to speak of "outrage" these days is to employ, itself, a tired word. It's nearly clicheish, and the poor thing has been worked almost to death. But what better, more appropriate, more accurate word is there?
For eight years we've suffered from the Bush administration's two exclusive and alternating modes of operation: When it wasn't engaging in prosecutable criminality, it was busy with impeachable incompetence.
You name it, from epic fiscal mismanagement to the usurpation of legislative authority, from illegal surveillance to two monumentally ill-conceived wars and occupations, from plutocratic thievery and unbridled corporatism to the wholesale disregard of working-class troubles, from medieval torture to the mangling of the public's trust -- it has all, all of it, occupied a corrupt, cavernous pit of a gothic horror story of unprecedented and lasting national shame.
Oh my, do I sound "displeased"? Well, if that's the genteel case, so also are those massive herds of conscientious conservatives who are fleeing formal affiliation with what was once their Grand Old Party. For, courtesy the Bush administration, it has rotted to the core, and they know it.
And that, I submit, is no overstatement.
NYT Reviews Jane Mayer's Extraordinary Book on the Bush Torture Regime (Available on BuzzFlash.com): "But Jane Mayer’s extraordinary and invaluable book suggests that it would be difficult to find any precedent in American history for the scale, brutality and illegality of the torture and degradation inflicted on detainees over the last six years; and that it would be even harder to imagine a set of policies more likely to increase the dangers facing the United States and the world."
Greg McKendry Posthumously Wins The Wings of Justice Award for August 6th. He Gave His Life Out of Love and a Sense of Responsibility, While a Right Wing Wacko, Egged on by FOX News and GOP Hate Radio Demagogues, Went on a Killing Spree in Tennessee
ABC News should reveal the sources of its false report that the anthrax attacks after 9/11 were tied to Saddam Hussein 8/6
Pathetic Old Fool Tries to Look Cool:
McCain Suggests Wife Participate In Topless Contest; Offers Her Up as "Buffalo Chip" Bimbo Contender. Anything for a Sexist Vote. 8/6
The Ron Suskind Book You've Been Hearing About on the News Today. Another Expose of the Betrayal of the American People by the Bush Administration, Released on August 5: Ron Suskind's "The Way of the World: A Story of Truth and Hope in an Age of Extremism" (Hardcover)
Quid pro quo?? Multiple Oil Company Executives Gave Huge Contributions To Electing McCain Just Days After Offshore Drilling Reversal 8/6
Sadly not surprising: 'In June, the second biggest rise in prices in nearly three decades muted the impact of billions of dollars in government stimulus payments, government figures showed Monday.' 8/5
AP-Ipsos pollThe Associated Press
Published: Tuesday August 5, 2008
Print This Email This
By ALAN FRAM
A new poll finds Barack Obama is leading John McCain nationally by 6 percentage points thanks to big leads he is enjoying among women, minorities and younger voters.
White Men Can't Think
The Associated Press-Ipsos poll shows that Obama is leading his Republican rival 47 percent to 41 percent. McCain has a 10-point lead among whites and is tied with the Democrat among men, but Obama is leading by 13 points among women and has huge leads with minorities and the young.
"Good analogy, Bill! I think everyone can recall how, according to legend, the monstrous Robin Hood stole from the hapless Sheriff of Nottingham and his downtrodden buddy King John before 'redistributing' their wealth to those greedy, ungrateful peasants."
The analogy goes like this, cupcake:
The elitist monarchy of the pretender-to-the-throne (Prince John) was oppressively taxing the populace through the IRS (i.e. the Sheriff of Nottingham) because he thought he knew how to spend their money better than they did. Robin Hood represents the Republican maverick outsider who cuts taxes and returns the pilfered money to the rightful owners.
The Maid Marion is Anne Coulter, and Friar Tuck is Rush Limbaugh.
"A new poll finds Barack Obama is leading John McCain nationally by 6percentage points thanks A new poll finds Barack Obama is leading John McCain nationally by 6 percentage points thanks to big leads he is enjoying among women, minorities and younger voters."
No, no, no. It goes like this:
"One of dozens of new daily tracking polls with a margin of error of 4 percentage points (and which disagrees with the others and changes from day-to-day, incidentally) has B. Hussein leading McCain by 6 percentage points (which might mean he's down 2 percentage points if you factor in the margins of error, but nevermind that) thanks to the monolithic mindset of liberal black women (the liberal white ones are still being hissy because of Hillary), racist liberal blacks who would never vote for a honky over a homey, and gum-chewing teeny-boppers who have stickers of Barack next to the stickers of the Jonas Brothers (and Paris and Britney, too) on their spiral-bound notebooks, because he's, like, omg, so cute.
Meanwhile, the anonymous smug poster of this junk analysis thinks nothing of implicitly praising the smarts of the majority minority support for another minority, but then sneers "White men can't think" when a similar dynamic is observed among white voters-- but to a much lesser degree of monolithic, herd-like (i.e. racist) behavior.
Finally, the anonymous fool apparently thinks that a majority of a minority counts for more than a majority of a majority in a one man-one vote system.
Or maybe that's why he has to triple the head-count of young, minority women when he says that B. Hussein enjoys majority support from minorities, women, and young people as if there's no overlap.
PMS Carpenter wrote:
"When it wasn't engaging in prosecutable criminality, it was busy with impeachable incompetence."
Yeah, right.
A congress--especially a rabidly partisan, opposition party one--can impeach a president over a ham sandwich--or even "just a blowjob"--if they had any REAL damaging evidence.
Either Democrats with Ivy League law degrees and determined, investigative reporters for the Washington Post who dream of being the next Woodward and Bernstein have been outsmarted by an "incompetent moron," or Bush is clean as a whistle.
It's the latter. That's why PMS has to engage in typically-lefty over-the-top-hyperbole to pad the frivolous charges to elicit gasps, using P.T. Barnumesque words like "epic" and "usurpation" and "monumentally" and "plutocratic," "unbridled," "wholesale," "medieval," and "mangling."
PMS did manage to sneak "illegal" in there--which would have sufficed as the singular adjective to warrant Impeachment and is all that really matters, i.e. It's not the shameless, disgraceful, adulterous, and monumentally inappropriate blowjob, stupid, it's the perjury--but PMS was just trying to pull a Toad from *American Graffiti* when that underage character quickly weaseled in liquor (a pint of Harp, if memory serves) during an order comprised of a whole bunch of distracting bric-a-brac (like gum, candy, a comb, *etc.*) hoping the contraband would be camoflaged in the parading order and the store clerk wouldn't notice it and ask for proof of age.
Well, he did, and so will I:
Yo, PMS, you can spout words like "usurpation" and "plutocratic" and "medieval" all you want. Go nuts. I'll even let you throw in "Manichaean" and "Christofascist."
It's just candy.
But I'll need to see some proof before I let you have "illegal," son.
What do you mean, fj? Is this blog a decoy?
If so...
lolololololololol!
btw, fj, simian was trash-talking you behind your back the other day:
"But if you think this guy is dim, you should read his friend FJ. There was an exchange between him and one of the guys which was such a classic of unintentional wingbat hilarity that we cut it and sent it around...probably making the rounds on the internet right now."
I can always use a good publicist.
Of course, simian's probably way too busy helping other clients...
Former Sen. John Edwards has a deadline to save his spot on the national stage.
With just two weeks before their national convention, a number of Democrats are saying Edwards needs to publicly address anonymously sourced National Enquirer stories that have claimed he had an affair with a campaign worker and fathered her baby.
Democrats gather in Denver on Aug. 25 and Edwards, as the 2004 vice presidential nominee and a presidential candidate who won delegates this year, ordinarily would be locked in as a speaker.
Instead prominent Democrats say convention organizers will try to avoid the lingering questions if Edwards himself doesn't talk.
"He absolutely does have to (resolve it). If it's not true, he has to issue a stronger denial," said Gary Pearce, the Democratic strategist who ran Edwards' 1998 Senate race. "It's a very damaging thing. ... The big media has tried to be responsible and handle this with kid gloves, but it's clearly getting ready to bust out. If it's not true, he's got to stand up and say, 'This is not true. That is not my child and I'm going to take legal action against the people who are spreading these lies.' It's not enough to say, 'That's tabloid trash.'"
So much work out there for good publicists... too bad the DNC's got nothin' but monkey volunteers.
In 1995, Illinois Gov. Jim Edgar balked at implementing the federal motor voter law out of concern that letting people register via postcard and blocking the state from pruning voter rolls might invite vote fraud.
A young lawyer, a community organizer himself, sued on behalf of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (Acorn) and won. The young lawyer was Barack Obama. Acorn later invited Obama to train its staff.
When Obama served on the board of the Woods Fund for Chicago with Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers, the Woods Fund frequently gave Acorn grants to fund its agenda and voter registration activities.
Acorn has been in the lead in opposing voter ID laws and other efforts to ensure ballot integrity. Acorn has been implicated in voter fraud and bogus registration schemes in Ohio and at least 13 other states. Acorn staffers will presumably be out registering voters again this year.
Obama also opposes voter ID laws. He believes they disenfranchise voters. Last year, Obama put a hold on the nomination of Hans von Spakovsky for a seat on the Federal Election Commission. It seems von Spakovsky, as an official in the Justice Department, had supported a Georgia photo ID law. Acorn espouses the leftist view that voter ID laws are racist.
In addition to subverting American democracy to promote a leftist agenda, Acorn's radical agenda amounts to "undisguised authoritarian socialism." wrote Sol Stern in the 2003 City Journal article, "Acorn's Nutty Regime for Cities."
Acorn opposed welfare reform and opposes securing American borders to stem the flow of illegal immigrants. Acorn was heavily involved a few years back in opposing Rudy Giuliani's efforts to privatize failing New York schools.
Well, well...now the second dumbest dink in wingoland is joined by the absolute dumbest.
hahahahahhaha...pathetic attempt.
Boys, boys, boys...that's not going to do it if you want the attention from us that you seem to crave with such touching, earnest neediness. Oh, damn, he said that first. Did not. Did too. Did not... hahahaha.
But, hey, give us a holler if Sayet ever gets out, will ya, now?
Or if some wingbats with more than one synapse still firing show up? Not that there are any of those left in the rotting reicho shithouse.
We're used to burning up the competiton...but for that, we need competition.
Hey...a bunch more of those comments deleted, huh?...hilarious...
He's been incontinent again, then he eats his own crap...like a dog...hahahahahahaha. Try to control yourself while typing and long enough after for a little proof read and you won't have that disgusting, little problem.
See you boys again if you ever bring in some respectable reinforcementation. Don't holdyobrefnow.
"The big media has tried to be responsible and handle this with kid gloves..."
That's funny. I could swear that the big media defined "being responsible" vis-a-vis these kinds of stories as taking the gloves off with no holds barred.
At least it seems that way when it involves Republicans.
A system set up in Chicago to enable voter fraud?
Who does he think he is?
John F. Kennedy?
Btw, fj, where have you been? You missed all the fun. The moonbats were coming at me like a swarm of screaming banshees and were reduced to sticking their fingers in their ears and going "Na-Na-Na! We-Can't-Hear-You! Na-Na-Na!" in no time.
And just after they turned tail and ran for their lives, their own general--fathead, aka Sick, or Sirk (whatever)--also shows up belatedly (but in anonymous disguise, like Saddam Hussein after bailing out of Baghdad) and asks:
"...where are all the wingbats who used to hang out here?"
Then he realized that he was the one who was by himself and vamoosed like a speedwalker wearing tight little yellow shorts and seeing Mr. T appear in a tank and shooting Snicker's bars at him.
"Well, well...now the second dumbest dink in wingoland is joined by the absolute dumbest."
"Nemesis"? Yikes. It's Lana, and she sounds really pissed...
Where've you been, cupcake?
I've been thinking about you all day. :)
"hahahahahhaha...pathetic attempt."
Now be reasonable, Lana. Put that frying pan down.
"Boys, boys, boys...that's not going to do it if you want the attention from us that you seem to crave with such touching, earnest neediness."
Oh no. Do I have to do THAT again?
"Oh, damn, he said that first. Did not. Did too. Did not..."
You really have to learn to make up your mind, Lana. "Yes? No? Stay? Go? I don't know!" Sheesh.
"hahahaha."
And I don't think I like the sound of that maniacal laugher.
"But, hey, give us a holler if Sayet ever gets out, will ya, now?"
What? Now you're leaving? You just got here.
"Or if some wingbats with more than one synapse still firing show up?"
One's never enough for you, is it?
"Not that there are any of those left in the rotting reicho shithouse."
Well. Someone had a bad day at the office, methinks. But there's nothing like unwinding at Sayet's Blog with a little candlelight and wine, some soft music playing in the background, and a wingnut like me giving you a massage to help you relax.
I really think you should stick around. That's right. lie down. Good girl.
"We're used to burning up the competiton...but for that, we need competition."
I know, baby. Whatever you say. Now try to relax...
"Hey...a bunch more of those comments deleted, huh?...hilarious..."
Yes baby. Stop fidgeting.
"He's been incontinent again, then he eats his own crap...like a dog...hahahahahahaha."
Yeah, that's hilarious (whatever). Wow. I can feel a knot of tension. I didn't realize how stressed you really were. No worries. They don't call me "magic fingers" for nothing...
"Try to control yourself while typing and long enough after for a little proof read and you won't have that disgusting, little problem."
Whoa! Speak for yourself. What the hell is THAT?!?
Oh. Nevermind. Just never saw one like that before.
"See you boys again if you ever bring in some respectable reinforcementation."
Alright. What's THAT supposed to mean?
"Don't holdyobrefnow."
I won't. I just wear a snorkel.
Mr. Sayet:
Mission Accomplished.
Riiight -- mission accomplished.
Now, I know why they were all laughing at you all the time.
You're like the little mutt who waits til the big dog is leaving, then runs behind him,pretending to be chasing him away.
Now that the mutt is spanked, we turn to serious business:
The New York Times: "The need for a criminal inquiry into the Crandall Canyon mine disaster is shockingly clear now that investigators have detailed how greedy mine operators concealed danger warnings and literally chiseled underground pillar supports to the breaking point. The roof of the Utah mine collapsed last summer, killing six miners and leading three would-be rescuers to their deaths."
We must work harder and harder to save corporations like this from from the heavy hand of Marxist regulation.
The gay father who fled with his son to Israel after a bitter year-long custody fight insisted Thursday their clandestine trip was done to protect the boy.
"I left because Jed was the one who was suffering," Eric Hyett told the Daily News in a call from Tel Aviv, where 23-month-old Jedidiah was audible in the background.
Fathead is gone, ava, So's boil, lana, blossom, and suze, who were the nucleus of the anmoebic insurgency.
Monkeyboy still swings in from time to time to screech, andv you're like the Japanese submarine sailor on Gilligan's Island who thinks WWII is still being fought.
Give it up. The big ones were dropped on you a long time ago.
And you're all alone.
Ooooh, all alone and surrounded by mutts...oh, wait, make that singular.
They were here for the same reason I am...they like putting a harpoon in Evan's grotesque posterior. When he gets out, they'll slap him around a little more.
Did you really think they'd spend a lot of time on a garden variety simpleton like you?
By the way, what does anmoebic mean...is that a real word in wingding land?
It's a Class War, Stupid: Election season will be packed with distractions, but the real issue is a matter of life and death
"I am a single mother with a 9-year-old boy. To stay warm at night my son and I would pull off all the pillows from the couch and pile them on the kitchen floor. I'd hang a blanket from the kitchen doorway and we'd sleep right there on the floor. By February we ran out of wood and I burned my mother's dining room furniture. I have no oil for hot water. We boil our water on the stove and pour it in the tub. I'd like to order one of your flags and hang it upside down at the capital building... we are certainly a country in distress."
— Letter from a single mother in a Vermont city, to Senator Bernie Sanders
The Republican and Democratic conventions are just around the corner, which means that we're at a critical time in our nation's history. For this is the moment when the country's political and media consensus finally settles on the line of bullshit it will be selling to the public as the "national debate" come fall.
If you pay close attention you can actually see the trial balloons whooshing overhead. There have been numerous articles of late of the Whither the Debate' genus in the country's major dailes and news mags, pieces like Patrick Healy's "Target: Barack Obama. Strategy: What Day is it'" in the New York Times. They ostensibly wonder aloud about what respective "plans of attack" Barack Obama and John McCain will choose to pursue against one another in the fall.
In these pieces we already see the candidates trying on, like shoes, the various storylines we might soon have hammered into our heads like wartime slogans. Most hilarious from my viewpoint is the increasingly real possibility that the Republicans will eventually decide that their best shot against Obama is to pull out the old "He's a flip-flopper" strategy — which would be pathetic, given that this was the same tired tactic they used against John Kerry four years ago, were it not for the damning fact that it might actually work again. (I'm actually not sure sometimes what is more repulsive: the bosh they trot out as campaign "issues," or the enthusiasm with which the public buys it.)
Naturally we'll also see the "Patriotism Gap" storyline whipped out and reused over and over again. There will also be much talk emanating from the McCain camp about "experience," although this line of attack will not be nearly as fruitful for him as it was for Hillary Clinton, mainly because the word "experience" in McCain's case also has a habit of reminding voters that the Arizona senator is, well, wicked old.
The Obama camp, playing with a big halftime lead as the cliché goes, is going to play this one close to the vest, sticking to a strategy of using larger and larger fonts every week for their "CHANGE" placards, and getting the candidates' various aides and spokesgoons to use the term "McCain-Bush policies" as many times as possible on political talk shows. Obama will also use this pre-convention period to do what every general election candidate does after a tough primary-season fight, i.e. ditch all the positions he took en route to securing the nomination and replace them with opinions subtly (or sometimes not-so-subtly) reconfigured to fit the latest polling information coming out of certain key swing states. Both sides as well as the pundit class will describe this early positioning for combat over swing-state electoral votes as a "race for the center" (AP, July 3: "Candidates Courting the Center"), as if the "political center" in America were a place where huge chunks of the population tirelessly obsessed over semi-relevant media-driven wedge issues like stem-cell research and gay marriage, even as they lacked money to buy food and make rent every month.
The press, meanwhile, is clearly flailing around for a sensational hook to use in selling the election, as the once-brightly-burning star of blue-red hatred seems unfortunately to have dimmed a little — just in time, perhaps, to torpedo the general election season cable ratings. They are working hard to come up with the WWF-style shorthand labels they always use to sell electoral contests: if 2000 was the "wooden" and 'condescending' Al Gore versus the "dummy" Bush, and 2004 featured that same 'regular guy' Bush against the "patrician" and "bookish" John Kerry (who also "looked French"), in 2008 we're going to be sold the "maverick" McCain against the "smooth" Obama, or some dumb thing along those lines. Time has even experimented with a "poker versus craps" storyline, feeding off the incidental fact that Obama is a regular poker player while McCain reportedly favors craps, which apparently has some electorally relevant meaning — and if you know what that something is, please let me know.
We're also going to be fed truckloads of onerous horseshit about the candidate wives. The Michelle Obama content is going to go something like this: the Fox/Limbaugh crowd will first plaster her with Buckwheatesque caricatures (the National Review cover was hilariously over-the-top in that respect) and racially loaded epithets like "baby Mama" (that via Fox News spokeswhore Michelle Malkin, God bless her) and "angry black woman" (via self-aggrandizing, cop-mustached Chicago-based prune Cal Thomas). Next, the so-called "mainstream" press, the "respectable" press, which of course is above such behavior, will amplify those attacks 10 million-fold via endless waves of secondary features soberly pondering the question of whether or not Michelle Obama is a "political liability" — because of stuff like the Thomas column, and Malkin's quip and the endless rumors about a mysterious "whitey" video. Cindy McCain, meanwhile, will generally be described as a political asset, as the pundit class tends to applaud, mute, stoned-looking candidate wives who have soldiered on bravely while being martyred by rumors of their mostly absent husband's infidelities. It will help on the martyrdom front that McCain launched his political career with her family money and drove her into an actual, confirmable chemical dependency. As long as she keeps gamely wobbling onstage and trying to smile into the camera, she's going to get straight As from the political press, guaranteed.
Some combination of all of these things is going to comprise the so-called "national debate" this fall. Now, we live in an age where our media deceptions are so far-reaching and comprehensive that they almost smother reality, at times seeming actually to replace reality — but even in the context of the inane TV-driven fantasyland we've grown used to inhabiting, this year's crude cobbling together of a phony "national conversation" by our political press is an outrageous, monstrously offensive deception. For if, as now seems likely, this fall's election is ultimately turned into a Swan-esque reality show where America is asked to decide if it can tolerate Michelle Obama's face longer than John McCain's diapers, it will be at the expense of an urgent dialogue about a serious nationwide emergency that any sane country would have started having some time ago. And unless you run a TV network or live in Washington, you probably already know what that emergency is.
A few weeks back, I got a call from someone in the office of Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. Sanders wanted to tell me about an effort his office had recently made to solicit information about his constituents' economic problems. He sent out a notice on his e-mail list asking Vermont residents to "tell me what was going on in their lives economically." He expected a few dozen letters at best — but got, instead, more than 700 in the first week alone. Some, like the excerpt posted above, sounded like typical tales of life for struggling single-parent families below the poverty line. More unnerving, however, were the stories Sanders received from people who held one or two or even three jobs, from families in which both spouses held at least one regular job
— in other words, from people one would normally describe as middle-class. For example, this letter came from the owner of his own commercial cleaning service:
My 90-year-old father in Connecticut has recently become ill and asked me to visit him. I want to drop everything I am doing and go visit him, however, I am finding it hard to save enough money to add to the extra gas I'll need to get there. I make more than I did a year ago and I don't have enough to pay my property taxes this quarter for the first time in many years. They are due tomorrow.
This single mother buys clothes from thrift stores and unsuccessfully tried to sell her house to pay for her son's schooling:
I don't go to church many Sundays, because the gasoline is too expensive to drive there. Every thought of an activity is dependent on the cost.
Sanders got letters from working people who have been reduced to eating "cereal and toast" for dinner, from a 71-year-old man who has been forced to go back to work to pay for heating oil and property taxes, from a worker in an oncology department of a hospital who reports that clinically ill patients are foregoing cancer treatments because the cost of gas makes it too expensive to reach the hospital. The recurring theme is that employment, even dual employment, is no longer any kind of barrier against poverty. Not economic discomfort, mind you, but actual poverty. Meaning, having less than you need to eat and live in heated shelter — forgetting entirely about health care and dentistry, which has long ceased to be considered an automatic component of American middle-class life. The key factors in almost all of the Sanders letters are exploding gas and heating oil costs, reduced salaries and benefits, and sharply increased property taxes (a phenomenon I hear about all across the country at campaign trail stops, something that seems to me to be directly tied to the Bush tax cuts and the consequent reduced federal aid to states). And it all adds up to one thing.
"The middle class is disappearing," says Sanders. "In real ways we're becoming more like a third-world country."
Here's the thing: nobody needs me or Bernie Sanders to tell them that it sucks out there and that times are tougher economically in this country than perhaps they've been for quite a long time. We've all seen the stats — median income has declined by almost $2,500 over the past seven years, we have a zero personal savings rate in America for the first time since the Great Depression, and 5 million people have slipped below the poverty level since the beginning of the decade. And stats aside, most everyone out there knows what the deal is. If you're reading this and you had to drive to work today or pay a credit card bill in the last few weeks you know better than I do for sure how fucked up things have gotten. I hear talk from people out on the campaign trail about mortgages and bankruptcies and bill collectors that are enough to make your ass clench with 100 percent pure panic.
None of this is a secret. Here, however, is something that is a secret: that this is a class issue that is being intentionally downplayed by a political/media consensus bent on selling the public a version of reality where class resentments, or class distinctions even, do not exist. Our "national debate" is always a thing where we do not talk about things like haves and have-nots, rich and poor, employers versus employees. But we increasingly live in a society where all the political action is happening on one side of the line separating all those groups, to the detriment of the people on the other side.
We have a government that is spending two and a half billion dollars a day in Iraq, essentially subsidizing new swimming pools for the contracting class in northern Virginia, at a time when heating oil and personal transportation are about to join health insurance on the list of middle-class luxuries. Home heating and car ownership are slipping away from the middle class thanks to exploding energy prices — the hidden cost of the national borrowing policy we call dependency on foreign oil, "foreign" representing those nations, Arab and Chinese, that lend us the money to pay for our wars.
And while we've all heard stories about how much waste and inefficiency there is in our military spending, this is always portrayed as either "corruption" or simple inefficiency, and not what it really is — a profound expression of our national priorities, a means of taking money from ordinary, struggling people and redistributing it not downward but upward, to connected insiders, who turn your tax money into pure profit.
You want an example' Sanders has a great one for you. The Senator claims that he has been trying for years to increase funding for the Federally Qualified Health Care (FQHC) program, which finances community health centers across the country that give primary health care access to about 16 million Americans a year. He's seeking an additional $798 million for the program this year, which would bring the total appropriation to $2.9 billion, or about what we spend every two days in Iraq.
"But for five billion a year," Sanders insists, "we could provide basic primary health care for every American. That's how much it would cost, five billion."
As it is, though, Sanders has struggled to get any additional funding. He managed to get $250 million added to the program in last year's Labor, Health and Human Services bill, but Bush vetoed the legislation, "and we ended up getting a lot less."
Okay, now, hold that thought. While we're unable to find $5 billion for this simple program, and Sanders had to fight and claw to get even $250 million that was eventually slashed, here's something else that's going on. According to a recent report by the GAO, the Department of Defense has already "marked for disposal" hundreds of millions of dollars worth of spare parts — and not old spare parts, but new ones that are still on order! In fact, the GAO report claims that over half of the spare parts currently on order for the Air Force — some $235 million worth, or about the same amount Sanders unsuccessfully tried to get for the community health care program last year — are already marked for disposal! Our government is buying hundreds of millions of dollars worth of Defense Department crap just to throw it away!
"They're planning on throwing this stuff away and it hasn't even come in yet," says Sanders.
According to the report, we're spending over $30 million a year, and employing over 1,400 people, just to warehouse all the defense equipment we don't need. For instance — we already have thousands of unneeded aircraft blades, but 7,460 on the way, at a cost of $2 million, which will join those already earmarked for the waste pile.
This is why you need to pay careful attention when you hear about John McCain claiming that he's going to "look at entitlement program" waste as a means of solving the budget crisis, or when you tune into the debate about the "death tax." We are in the midst of a political movement to concentrate private wealth into fewer and fewer hands while at the same time placing more and more of the burden for public expenditures on working people. If that sounds like half-baked Marxian analysis... well, shit, what can I say' That's what's happening. Repealing the estate tax (the proposal to phase it out by the year 2010 would save the Walton family alone $30 billion) and targeting "entitlement" programs for cuts while continually funneling an ever-expanding treasure trove of military appropriations down the befouled anus of pointless war profiteering, government waste and North Virginia McMansions — this is all part of a conversation we should be having about who gets what share of the national pie. But we're not going to have that conversation, because we're going to spend this fall mesmerized by the typical media-generated distractions, yammering about whether or not Michelle Obama's voice is too annoying, about flag lapel pins, about Jeremiah Wright and other such idiotic bullshit.
Bernie Sanders is one of the few politicians out there smart enough and secure enough to understand that the future of American politics is necessarily going to involve some pretty frank and contentious confrontations. The phony blue-red divide, which has been buoyed for years by some largely incidental geographical disagreements over religion and other social issues, is going to give way eventually to a real debate grounded in a brutal economic reality increasingly common to all states, red and blue.
Our economic reality is as brutal as it is for a simple reason: whether we like it or not, we are in the midst of revolutionary economic changes. In the kind of breathtakingly ironic development that only real life can imagine, the collapse of the Soviet Union has allowed global capitalism to get into the political unfreedom business, turning China and the various impoverished dictatorships and semi-dictatorships of the third world into the sweatshop of the earth. This development has cut the balls out of American civil society by forcing the export abroad of our manufacturing economy, leaving us with a service/managerial economy that simply cannot support the vast, healthy middle class our government used to work very hard to both foster and protect. The Democratic party that was once the impetus behind much of these changes, that argued so eloquently in the New Deal era that our society would be richer and more powerful overall if the spoils were split up enough to create a strong base of middle class consumers — that party panicked in the years since Nixon and elected to pay for its continued relevance with corporate money. As a result the entire debate between the two major political parties in our country has devolved into an argument over just how quickly to dismantle the few remaining benefits of American middle-class existence — immediately, if you ask the Republicans, and only slightly less than immediately, if you ask the Democrats.
The Republicans wanted to take Social Security, the signature policy underpinning of the middle class, and put it into private accounts — which is a fancy way of saying that they wanted to take a huge bundle of American taxpayer cash and invest it in the very companies, the IBMs and Boeings and GMs and so on, that are exporting our jobs abroad. They want the American middle class to finance its very own impoverishment! The Democrats say no, let's keep Social Security more or less as is, and let that impoverishment happen organically.
Now we have a new set of dire problems in the areas of home ownership and exploding energy prices. In both of these matters the basic dynamic is transnational companies raiding the cash savings of the middle class. Because those same companies finance the campaigns of our politicians, we won't hear much talk about getting private industry to help foot the bill to pay for these crises, or forcing the energy companies to cut into their obscene profits for the public good. We will, however, hear talk about taxpayer-subsidized bailouts and various irrelevancies like McCain's gas tax holiday (an amusing solution — eliminate taxes collected by government in order to pay for taxes collected by energy companies). Ultimately, however, you can bet that when the middle class finally falls all the way down, and this recession becomes something even worse, necessity will force our civil government — if anything remains of it by then — to press for the only real solution.
"Corporate America is going to have to reinvest in our society," says Sanders. "It's that simple."
These fantasy elections we've been having — overblown sports contests with great production values, decided by haircuts and sound bytes and high-tech mudslinging campaigns — those were sort of fun while they lasted, and were certainly useful in providing jerk-off pundit-dickheads like me with high-paying jobs. But we just can't afford them anymore. We have officially spent and mismanaged our way out of la-la land and back to the ugly place where politics really lives — a depressingly serious and desperate argument about how to keep large numbers of us from starving and freezing to death. Or losing our homes, or having our cars repossessed. For a long time America has been too embarrassed to talk about class; we all liked to imagine ourselves in the wealthy column, or at least potentially so, flush enough to afford this pissing away of our political power on meaningless game-show debates once every four years. The reality is much different, and this might be the year we're all forced to admit it.
_______
"Did you really think they'd spend a lot of time on a garden variety simpleton like you?"
No I did not. I knew I'd have them packing up shop and bolting in no time at all.
"By the way, what does anmoebic mean...is that a real word in wingding land?"
Still nitpicking over typos, eh? In between childish ad hominems and the posting of lengthy, imported propaganda meant to shout down?
You're ass is mine, too, Ava.
Former Sen. John Edwards has a deadline to save his spot on the national stage.
With two weeks to go before their national convention, a number of Democrats are saying that Edwards needs to publicly address National Enquirer stories that have alleged he had an affair with a campaign worker and fathered her baby.
If Edwards fails to clear up the story in short order, he risks party officials deciding not to have him speak or, if they do, creating a distraction from a week focused on Barack Obama accepting the nomination.
"If there is not an explanation that’s satisfactory, acceptable and meets high moral standards, the answer is 'no,' he would not be a prime candidate to make a major address to the convention," said Don Fowler, a former Democratic National Committee chair.
Democrats gather in Denver on Aug. 25 and Edwards, as the 2004 vice presidential nominee and a presidential candidate who won delegates this year, ordinarily would be locked in as a speaker.
"He absolutely does have to (resolve it). If it's not true, he has to issue a stronger denial," said Gary Pearce, the Democratic strategist who ran Edwards’ 1998 Senate race. "It's a very damaging thing. …
A magistrate today set a new bond for Democratic Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick in connection with four felony assault charges filed by the Michigan Attorney General's office.
Magistrate Renee McDuffee of the 36th District Court ordered the mayor must post 10% of a $25,000 bond, or $2,500 for release on the new charges.
McDuffee said she could impose conditions only on the case before her, the four assault charges stemming from an altercation with Wayne County law enforcement officers trying to serve a subpoena.
McDuffee ordered Kilpatrick to have no contact with witnesses in the assault case.
Kilpatrick, who spent the night in Wayne County Jail on an unrelated criminal case, appeared on a television screen in 36th District Court to face the four felony assault charges.
McDuffee entered a not guilty plea for the mayor, who is being held in the Wayne County Jail. Kilpatrick made no comment. McDuffee then scheduled a preliminary examination for Aug. 15.
Kilpatrick attorney James Thomas argued for leniency in the terms of the mayor's bond, saying that he has already posted bond at considerable personal expense in relation with a perjury case against the mayor.
Kilpatrick was charged with two counts of felonious assault for allegedly shoving a sheriff’s deputy into his partner last month.
"We are charging defendant Kwame Kilpatrick with assaulting ... police officers in the furtherance of their duties," Attorney General Mike Cox announced in a news conference this morning.
The latest charges pose yet another threat to the livelihood of the 38-year-old mayor, who has steadfastly remained in office while battling eight other felony charges and possible removal hearings by the City Council and Gov. Jennifer Granholm. The other criminal charges all relate to the text message scandal exposed in the Free Press in January.
After Cox announced the charges, Thomas said the mayor's side would fight the new charges as they fought in Circuit Court ealier today with “law and common sense.” He said of the new charges, “it’s just an allegation, let’s take it step by step.” At the suggestion the latest case was on the fast, track, he laughed and said, “Mike Cox could dismiss it in one day.”
Cox said he will push for the case to go to trial within 90 days.
“Yesterday, Defendant Kilpatrick stood in the 36th District Court and stated he doubted ‘that there had ever been a person who had gone through the legal process who respects it more than I do.’ “ Cox said, quoting the mayor. “His actions of July 24th make a total mockery of his statement yesterday. The actions of the defendant here are really an assault on the judicial system. These officers were victims of an assault against them, but our judicial system is no less a victim.”
The charges against Kilpatrick each carry a penalty of up to two years in prison upon conviction. If he is convicted of a felony, he would automatically be removed from office.
"This is a very straightforward, simple case" that prosecutors hope to bring to a preliminary hearing within two weeks, Cox said.
"It is a very serious case. ... I cannot recall, ever, seeing, let alone hearing, of a situation where a police officer trying to serve a subpoena was assaulted," Cox said, adding that he has been a prosecutor for 20 years.
The new charge stems from a July 24 altercation with Wayne County Sheriff’s Detective Brian White, who testified that Kilpatrick shoved him into his partner at the mayor’s sister’s house in Detroit. Kilpatrick’s lawyers said the mayor gently escorted White away from the house.
White said he was trying to serve the mayor’s friend, Bobby Ferguson, with a subpoena for a hearing in the text message case against Kilpatrick and his former chief of staff Christine Beatty, who also is facing multiple felonies in that case.
White testified in a bond hearing the day after the altercation that he saw a truck from Ferguson’s contracting company in front of the house on LaSalle Boulevard on the city’s west side. He and JoAnn Kinney, a former Detroit police officer who now works as an investigator in the prosecutor’s office, approached the house to ask whether Ferguson was there.
Kinney testified that Kilpatrick burst through the door, hurled expletives at her and White, then shoved White into her. Kinney, who is black, also said that the mayor made a racial remark to her about White, who is white.
It was never explained why the mayor was at his sister’s house during the altercation, which happened about 4 p.m. on a weekday. The home is next door to the home of his mother, U.S. Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick.
Cox announced the following day that his office would review the case after state police concluded their investigation.
Few people are more likely to need a holiday than Barack Obama. Yet as he heads off on Friday for his first week-long break since he launched his presidential bid 19 months ago, Mr Obama is dogged by rising angst about his campaign’s direction.
Although he has run what is widely acclaimed to be one of the most impressive campaigns in years, Democrats live in fear of Mr Obama falling prey to the kinds of accident that derailed predecessors in earlier cycles.
With polls showing him neck-and-neck with John McCain at a stage at which many Democrats expected he would be in the clear lead, they worry about the kind of stray image that helped to defeat John Kerry in 2004.
In a piece of footage endlessly recycled to mock his supposed elitism and even foreignness, Mr Kerry was caught on camera windsurfing off Massachusetts. Since Mr Obama is taking his holiday at a private beach house in Hawaii, surrounded by the secret service, campaign officials worry less about his exposure to the paparazzi. Besides, they say, most Americans will be tuned into the Olympics.
With friends like these, who needs scandal?
A lot of people were confused when Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) who has stood apart from his party with respect to oil and energy policy publicly reversed himself on the subject of offshore oil drilling, came out in favor of the practice despite its known environmental consequences. Public Campaign Action Fund's Campaign Money Watch project got curious as well and starting digging--surprise, surprise it all led back to campaign contributions. The moment McCain changed his position on offshore drilling the money from the oil industry--not usually inclined to give to the Senator--started pouring in. McCain received hundreds of thousands of dollars from oil executives and their families right after his reversal. It's all detailed in this recently released report which shows that the McCain campaign's ties to Big Oil run deeper than previously expected. His campaign staff has lobbied for the oil industry and some of his biggest bundlers also have ties to the industry.
This is all part of a larger research project into the overwhelming presence of lobbyists and ex-lobbyists that are staffing and funding McCain's presidential campaign, a subject we've been following for quite some time. This new Campaign Money Watch website, McCain's Lobbyists, lays out months of extensive research in a user-friendly format to show the connections between McCain, his lobbyist staff, and their clients who have directed large campaign contributions to McCain's campaign. The site also has a blog that will be updated regularly as stories develop.
In an election year when stories of corruption, inappropriate influence, and out-of-control campaign fundraising and spending are popping up left and right we continue to do what we have always done: educate voters about where candidates are getting their money, how that money could be influencing the positions they take on issues, and why full public financing of elections is so vital to ending this influence of big money and restoring accountability to voters.
Initiative in the Face of Indictments
Will the latest development in the long-running bribery scandal in Alaska put a Clean Elections ballot measure over the top? Last week saw Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK), the longest serving Republican in the Senate, indicted on seven counts of making false statements on his financial disclosure forms in connection with a quarter-million dollar remodel of his home. The work was done by Veco Corp., an oil services company whose CEO has already admitted to bribing several members of Alaska's legislature in an effort to win favorable policy decision. Stevens reported only about half of the value of the total work Veco did on the Senate financial disclosure forms he is required to submit. Stevens, who is facing a tough re-election fight, pleaded not guilty to the charges, and should face trial in September.
Meanwhile, Alaska voters have the opportunity to vote in just a few short weeks on a Clean Elections ballot initiative that would create a full public financing option for state legislative races. The initiative comes as the wide-ranging Veco scandal continues to unfold, catching more state legislators--along with Stevens and Alaska Rep. Don Young (R) in its web. Think Alaskans will be ready for Clean Elections instead of an ongoing scandal? We'll know when they vote on August 26th.
Mutt yaps...No I did not. I knew I'd have them packing up shop and bolting in no time at all.
I'm sure that happens constantly to a boring little chihuahua like you. You can't even attract friends on your own "blog" which is why you hang out over here all the time whining for attention.
Now, why don't you quit climbing my leg, you smelly little cur? Nothing turns me off like abject stupidity.
John Edwards repeatedly lied during his Presidential campaign about an extramarital affair with a novice filmmaker, the former Senator admitted to ABC News today.
Democratic presidential candidate former U.S. Senator John Edwards (D-NC) speaks to supporters during a campaign event at the Keene State University in Keene, New Hampshire January 6, 2008.
More PhotosIn an interview for broadcast tonight on Nightline, Edwards told ABC News correspondent Bob Woodruff he did have an affair with 44-year old Rielle Hunter, but said that he did not love her.
Edwards also denied he was the father of Hunter's baby girl, Frances Quinn, although the one-time Democratic Presidential candidate said he has not taken a paternity test.
Edwards said he knew he was not the father based on timing of the baby's birth on February 27, 2008. He said his affair ended too soon for him to have been the father.
A former campaign aide, Andrew Young, has said he was the father of the child.
According to friends of Hunter, Edwards met her at a New York city bar in 2006. His political action committee later paid her $114,000 to produce campaign website documentaries despite her lack of experience.
Edwards said the affair began during the campaign after she was hired. Hunter traveled with Edwards around the country and to Africa.
Edwards said he told his wife, Elizabeth, and others in his family about the affair in 2006.
Edwards made a point of telling Woodruff that his wife's cancer was in remission when he began the affair with Hunter. Elizabeth Edwards has since been diagnosed with an incurable form of the disease.
When the National Enquirer first reported the alleged Edwards-Hunter affair last October 11, Edwards, his campaign staff and Hunter vociferously denounced the report.
"The story is false, it's completely untrue, it's ridiculous," Edwards told reporters then.
He repeated his denials just two weeks ago.
Edwards today admitted the National Enquirer was correct when it reported he had visited Hunter at the Beverly Hills Hilton last month.
The former Senator said his wife had not known about the meeting.
Sayet's trolls are a bunch of spineless...
Ava said:
"Mutt yaps...No I did not. I knew I'd have them packing up shop and bolting in no time at all.
"I'm sure that happens constantly to a boring little chihuahua like you."
You don't sound bored to me, Ava. I think I have your full attention.
Now, how can you be so "sure that always happens" when you're still here engaging me?
Does that make sense to you?
Why are you still here if that "always" happens?
"You can't even attract friends on your own 'blog' which is why you hang out over here all the time whining for attention."
That's not true. I have the best friends a blogger can ask for on my blog. And the diversity is a testament to the individuality of conservatives. There's a Mormon mother of five from Utah, a Libertarian from Texas, and a Deist from Maryland who form the nucleus of my excellent guests.
Others freely come and go, including real women like Nanc, Alice, and Berty from Maryland, who blow away Lana, Blossom, and Suze aesthetically and in intellectual firepower.
They each have their own unique voices but all demonstrate openness, intelligence, thoughtfulness, fairness, tolerance, flexibility, good humor, and the courtesy and decency of the majority of the good American people, characteristics you and your fellow masked, anti-American terrorist zombies are utterly bereft of.
You have no blogs of your own to link to, which only makes you resemble stateless terrorists that much more.
And I'm not "hanging out here whining for attention." The only whining I see here are from you neurotic lefties.
I'm here to assist the others in taking back this blog, and the surge is working.
Look around.
This place has come under new management.
"Now, why don't you quit climbing my leg, you smelly little cur?"
I'm not "climbing all over it." I'm humping it, and there's nothing you can do about it.
"Nothing turns me off like abject stupidity."
Could've fooled me, with the crowd you run with.
Now bend over and be my little bitch. I've got a bone for you.
Engaging you?...I check this site out once a day or so, mutt, in a list of blogs...if your little doggie butt is sticking up in the air, I kick it around a little...is that "engaging you?" I see it as an amusing fringe benefit.
Management!? ...you've got to be the silliest, little dink around...if Sayet ever get's out and is still able to put out one of his insane diatribes, your "management" will be back to yapping on the sidelines.
No, Fido, you're here trying to retrieve your balls. They took them away from you, and now you just can't live with it. Forget aboutem...I happen to know Blossom fed them to her nice, little kittie. She does that to a lot of eager, little fools.
You've got the worst case of whipped puppy syndrome I've ever seen. It's a lot like Stockholm syndrome...that's why you're still here hoping to please your tormentors. But all your doing is becoming a bigger loser with every encounter.
As long as you've got someone to whine to, you'll still have some misbegotten hope. But, when I take that away from you, you'll just crawl under a chair and whimper til you grow up and accept what a mediocre, little piece of crap you are. That's the very best you can hope for.
So, try real hard, puppy...Ava's going back to grad school, soon. Ask yourself, how much time do you have before the despondency sets in?
Stick a fork in John Edwards.
He's well-done.
His elimination conveniently shrinks the pool of B. Hussein's potential veep selections to a couple of other knuckleheads and...
Billary.
Makes you wonder who tipped off the National Enquirer.
Of course, I should point out that calling B. Hussein the "presumptive nominee" is indeed presumptuous at this juncture, since he doesn't have the number of delegates needed to secure the nomination.
For that, the rest need to be released by...
Billary.
"Engaging you?..."
Yeah. Like you are now.
"I check this site out once a day or so, mutt, in a list of blogs..."
"Once a day or so?" This is the third or fourth time today that you came stomping in here huffing and puffing with your fists clenched and a scowl on your face.
And I know why.
"if your little doggie butt is sticking up in the air, I kick it around a little..."
That's why. You're obsessed with my little butt.
"...is that 'engaging you?'"
Yes.
"I see it as an amusing fringe benefit."
No surprise. It's not the first time I was told that my little butt was a benefit.
"Management!? ...you've got to be the silliest, little dink around..."
Please don't equate my little butt with a little dink. Thank you very much.
"if Sayet ever get's (sic) out and is still able to put out one of his insane diatribes, your 'management' will be back to yapping on the sidelines."
Right. Because he'll be center stage (duh).
"No, Fido, you're here trying to retrieve your balls."
I beg your pardon.
"They took them away from you, and now you just can't live with it."
You're sadly mistaken. My boys are where they're supposed to be. It's fathead, boil, Swiftie, Frankie, and simian who lost their marbles.
blivious, of course, never had any.
"Forget aboutem...I happen to know Blossom fed them to her nice, little kittie."
Yeah, right. She wishes. It's her nice little kittie that's going to get eaten.
"She does that to a lot of eager, little fools."
I'll take a number.
"You've got the worst case of whipped puppy syndrome I've ever seen. It's a lot like Stockholm syndrome...that's why you're still here hoping to please your tormentors."
You're projecting, Ava. I told you what happens every time you project, and now you must be punished.
But that's the point, isn't it?
You enjoy the punishment.
"But all your doing is becoming a bigger loser with every encounter."
sp. "you're"
"As long as you've got someone to whine to, you'll still have some misbegotten hope."
Who'd you plagiarize that from? Your last boyfriend?
"But, when I take that away from you, you'll just crawl under a chair and whimper til you grow up and accept what a mediocre, little piece of crap you are."
Now you sound like Dr. Phil.
"That's the very best you can hope for."
"Crawl under a chair and whimper?"
And "accept what a mediocre, little piece of crap" I am?
Maybe if I was really, really shit-faced.
"So, try real hard, puppy...Ava's going back to grad school, soon."
I really hope it's not to become a Motivational Speaker and Life Coach.
"Ask yourself, how much time do you have before the despondency sets in?"
I'll tell you how much time you have: Three months.
Only I don't think it'll be despondency you'll experience when John S. McCain III becomes the 44th elected POTUS on November 8.
I'm afraid it'll be a more a collective psychotic breakdown.
Did you notice the difference in tone, there? I think the little mutt has just learned who his master is. Though he's still just the tiniest bit grudging in his complete submission, he'll soon be taking to the leash quite naturally.
After all, the greatest need these weak, little wingdings have in life is for a strong, authoritarian figure to show them their place at the bottom of the heap. That's the secret to why they worship the corrupt corporations which kick them into submission. They're like serfs grovelling at the feet of their masters...and loving every degrading moment of it.
They just hate the strong, progressive rebels who stand up and make them look like whining, needy curs by comparison. "How dare they be so uppity with the master?"
As for McCrank;I'm kind of hoping he does win. There's a big breakdown coming and the GOP needs to own it... lock, stock and rotten, oily barrel.
Is the corrupt and worthless msm finally coming around?...is the evidence finally too much for even them to ignore?
Mike Barnicle: If True, Bush Is Accessory to the Murder of 4,000 Americans; If Barnicle can say something like this, maybe the rest of the MSM will listen 8/9
Tape: Top CIA official confesses order to forge Iraq-9/11 letter came on White House stationery John Byrne
Published: Friday August 8, 2008
In damning transcript, ex-CIA official says Cheney likely ordered letter linking Hussein to 9/11 attacks
A forged letter linking Saddam Hussein to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks was ordered on White House stationery and probably came from the office of Vice President Dick Cheney, according to a new transcript of a conversation with the Central Intelligence Agency's former Deputy Chief of Clandestine Operations Robert Richer.
The transcript was posted Friday by author Ron Suskind of an interview conducted in June. It comes on the heels of denials by both the White House and Richer of a claim Suskind made in his new book, The Way of The World. The book was leaked to Politico's Mike Allen on Monday, and released Tuesday.
On Tuesday, the White House released a statement on Richer's behalf. In it, Richer declared, "I never received direction from George Tenet or anyone else in my chain of command to fabricate a document ... as outlined in Mr. Suskind's book."
The denial, however, directly contradicts Richer's own remarks in the transcript.
"Now this is from the Vice President's Office is how you remembered it--not from the president?" Suskind asked.
"No, no, no," Richer replied, according to the transcript. "What I remember is George [Tenet] saying, 'we got this from'--basically, from what George said was 'downtown.'"
"Which is the White House?" Suskind asked.
"Yes," Richer said. "But he did not--in my memory--never said president, vice president, or NSC. Okay? But now--he may have hinted--just by the way he said it, it would have--cause almost all that stuff came from one place only: Scooter Libby and the shop around the vice president."
"But he didn't say that specifically," Richer added. "I would naturally--I would probably stand on my, basically, my reputation and say it came from the vice president."
"But there wasn't anything in the writing that you remember saying the vice president," Suskind continued.
"Nope," Richer said.
"It just had the White House stationery."
"Exactly right."
Later, Richer added, "You know, if you've ever seen the vice president's stationery, it's on the White House letterhead. It may have said OVP (Office of the Vice President). I don't remember that, so I don't want to mislead you."
Suskind says decision to post transcript unusual
Suskind posted the transcript at his blog, saying, "This posting is contrary to my practice across 25 years as a journalist. But the issues, in this matter, are simply too important to stand as discredited in any way." It was first picked up by ThinkProgress and Congressional Quarterly's Jeff Stein.
Suskind's new book asserts that senior Bush officials ordered the CIA to forge a document "proving" that Saddam Hussein had been trying to manufacture nuclear weapons and was collaborating with al Qaeda. The alleged result was a faked memorandum from then chief of Saddam's intelligence service Tahir Jalil Habbush dated July 1, 2001, and written to Hussein.
The bogus memo claimed that 9/11 hijacker Mohammed Atta had received training in Baghdad but also discussed the arrival of a "shipment" from Niger, which the Administration claimed had supplied Iraq with yellowcake uranium -- based on yet another forged document whose source remains uncertain.
The memo subsequently was treated as fact by the British Sunday Telegraph, and cited by William Safire in his New York Times column, providing fodder for Bush's efforts to take the US to war.
The Sunday Telegraph cited the main source for its story on Iraq's 9/11 involvement as Ayad Allawi, a former Baathist who rebelled against Saddam and was appointed a government position after the US occupation.
Nothing in the story explains how an Iraqi politician was privy to the fake memo, but the New York Times column alluded to Allawi and described him as "an Iraqi leader long considered reliable by intelligence agencies."
"To characterize it right," Richer also declares in the transcript, "I would say, right: it came to us, George had a raised eyebrow, and basically we passed it on--it was to--and passed this on into the organization. You know, it was: 'Okay, we gotta do this, but make it go away.' To be honest with you, I don't want to make it sound--I for sure don't want to portray this as George jumping: 'Okay, this has gotta happen.' As I remember it--and, again, it's still vague, so I'll be very straight with you on this--is it wasn't that important. It was: 'This is unbelievable. This is just like all the other garbage we get about . . . I mean Mohammad Atta and links to al Qaeda. 'Rob,' you know, 'do something with this.' I think it was more like that than: 'Get this done.'"
Magazine asserts Feith created bogus document
Today, The American Conservative also published a report saying that the forgery was actually produced by then-Defense Undersecretary Douglas Feith's Office of Special Plans, citing an unnamed intelligence source. The source reportedly added that Suskind’s overall claim “is correct."
"My source also notes that Dick Cheney, who was behind the forgery, hated and mistrusted the Agency and would not have used it for such a sensitive assignment," the magazine wrote. "Instead, he went to Doug Feith’s Office of Special Plans and asked them to do the job. … It was Feith’s office that produced the letter and then surfaced it to the media in Iraq. Unlike the [Central Intelligence] Agency, the Pentagon had no restrictions on it regarding the production of false information to mislead the public. Indeed, one might argue that Doug Feith’s office specialized in such activity."
More of Suskind's transcripts are available here.
US stocks surge on ‘watershed’ dollar jump
By Peter Garnham in London and John Authers in New York
Published: August 8 2008
"US stocks soared on Friday as the dollar saw its biggest one-day jump against the euro in eight years and oil prices plunged."
Have a nice weekend. Everyone.
The punchline is this: the more seriously he took himself, the more Barack Obama has become a laughing matter.
Only a month ago American comedians and satirists were complaining that they found it hard to get people to laugh at the first black presidential nominee. A New Yorker cover cartoon showing him as a Muslim extremist was roundly denounced.
But growing Obama fatigue among voters after his pseudo-presidential visit to Europe and the Middle East has unleashed a wave of satirical fire, mocking Mr Obama for his apparent belief that he has the election in the bag.
Last month Jon Stewart, host of the satirical news programme The Daily Show, had to tell his audience that they were allowed to laugh at Mr Obama after a joke fell flat.
But Mr Stewart made comedic hay during the Illinois Senator's international trip, mocking his progress through the Holy Land, where he said the candidate stopped "in Bethlehem to see the manger where he was born."
Late night comic Jimmy Kimmel also cracked a joke at Mr Obama's expense: "They really love Barack Obama in Germany. He's like a rock star over there. Impressive until you realise that David Hasselhoff is also like a rock star over there."
The jokes are important because they increasingly draw on evidence that voters are tiring of Mr Obama's elevated opinion of himself, the wall to wall coverage of his pronouncements, and the feeling that he should concentrate on voters back home.
My little pumpkin is projecting in overdrive, now.
She just learned who her master is and begrudges her complete submission, though she's taken to the leash quite naturally.
Look how fast her little tail is wagging. That's a GOOD girl! YESH!
I understand your need for a strong, authoritarian figure to show you who's boss. You're usually very open to them, and willing to try new things. That's the secret to why you worship the Big Government commissariats who kick you into submission. You're like a serf grovelling at the feet of your master...and loving every degrading moment of it.
You just have this love/hate thang for the stronger, free spirited conservatives who stand up to them and make you look like a whining, needy bitch by comparison.
"How dare they be so uppity with the master?"
You ask, biting your lip and twirling a strand of your hair.
"As for McCrank; I'm kind of hoping he does win."
lol
Hedging your bets now, eh Ava?
"There's a big breakdown coming and the GOP needs to own it..."
Still in projection mode.
I said it FIRST:
Only I don't think it'll be despondency you'll experience when John S. McCain III becomes the 44th elected POTUS on November 8.
I'm afraid it'll be a more a collective psychotic breakdown."
"...lock, stock and rotten, oily barrel."
That too, further up:
"Shame on you, fool. You swallowed that pill hook, line, and sinker and think it was just another day at the beach."
"If Barnicle can say something like this..."
"IF Barnicle?" Yeah, Barnicle has been an erstwhile Bush supporter.
Here Ava, FETCH!
Oooh, now, all the poor, old mutt can do is recycle my material...at great and overwrought length.
You can just feel the earnest, desperate striving.
Well, I guess he knows he just has to keep jumping and jumping and jumping to retrieve his balls...held just a little out of reach for such a scrawny, old dog.
You're projecting again. I know what you want, and you can't have them.
(unless you're a hottie, politics be damned, but I seriously doubt that.)
Now if you'll excuse me, much, much more important matters than wasting time with you beckon (like working on my tan by the pool, something I suggest you avoid, since you're already BURNED).
My, my, there goes the last of the mutts running off in a panic and, whaddya know, hiding behind that tired, old "wasting time" thing!
These guys are trite, little, walking cliches in everything they do.
Are you sure you don't mean you have to spend more time with the family?
And he was just strutting around here claiming to be the "manager." Haha...ooh, sorry, I know how sensitive you are about being laughed at.
Well, those are the kind that always fold easiest...typical chickenhawk coward.
Anywaze. someone let me know if the real psycho ever comes back. From what I've heard, that aina gonna happen.
Yes, dear. Whatever you say. Buh-bye now.
THE COMING REPUBLICAN FALL
Pay no attention to the national polls, an analysis of state voting trends shows Obama's the guy
Barack Obama's tour of the Middle East and Europe looked like the Second Coming. Barack sermonizes on a Jerusalem mount. U.S. troops cheer as Barack shoots a three-pointer with nothing but net -- the loaves and fishes. Jordan's King Abdullah personally drives Barack to the airport. A crowd of 200,000 applauds Barack's Berlin speech. Barack speaks to reporters in front of 10 Downing Street, with English bobbies on guard.
The media were seduced by the great pictures, but frustrated by a lack of gaffes. Meanwhile, in order to keep their ratings high, they are desperately trying to make the November election seem tight. Good luck.
National polls are irrelevant. Focus on the Electoral College. For instance, the West Coast map should not show Washington and Oregon as close. They went Democratic the last two elections, the polls show Obama well ahead and a recent Obama rally in Portland drew an astounding 75,000 people. California and Hawaii are even more solidly Democratic.
In the Midwest, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan also should not be counted as swing states, having voted Democratic even when the uninspiring John Kerry was the candidate. As for Iowa, George Bush won narrowly in 2004. But Obama has a powerful organization there that won him the primary, while John McCain did not even try to compete on the Republican side. Count Iowa for Obama, plus his home state of Illinois.
Obama will win the Northeast, as Democrats usually do, except perhaps New Hampshire (only 4 electoral votes). Forget maps that show Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland and Delaware as doubtful -- they are consistently Democratic.
Pennsylvania is a key swing state. It voted for Kerry and Al Gore, recent polls show Obama ahead by double digits and Democratic Gov. Ed Rendell has a strong organization. Give Pennsylvania to Obama.
In other words, Obama will win all the states that usually go Democratic. That gives him 255 electoral votes. It only takes 270 to win.
What about other swing states? Obama is slightly ahead in Ohio and Florida. In Ohio (20 electoral votes), job losses and political scandals have resulted in Republican losses and a Democratic governor. In Florida (27), Obama is registering many new voters and recently struck a chord by criticizing Bush's restrictions on family visits and remittances to Cuba. Either Ohio or Florida would put Obama over the top.
Meanwhile, Virginia and Colorado are trending from Republican to Democratic. Virginia (13) has thousands of new residents who helped elect a Democratic senator and two Democratic governors. Obama has 28 campaign offices there and is currently ahead. Colorado (9) has elected a Democratic senator, governor and state legislative majority. It is currently dead even. In New Mexico, Obama leads by 7 percent. Even North Dakota, Montana, Nevada, Missouri and Indiana are close. Do you see why Republicans are so worried?
Also favoring Obama is public worry and anger about the economy, where McCain is clueless. McCain famously said he doesn't know much about economics and recently called the current pay-as-you-go Social Security system a "disgrace." He now supports Bush's tax cuts for the rich and has proposed tax cuts for corporations. His economic adviser, Phil Gramm (husband of Waialua's Dr. Wendy Lee Gramm), recently said that we have become a "nation of whiners" who are in a "mental recession." Stand by for more damaging economic stands.
Other Obama advantages:
» Most voters don't know that McCain is anti-abortion. They'll find out soon enough.
» Many seniors think McCain is too old to be president. They ought to know.
» McCain admits he doesn't know how to use a computer.
» People blame foreclosures and high gas prices on Republicans.
» Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki agreed with Obama on a timetable for a U.S. pullout. McCain belatedly agreed with Obama that we need more troops in Afghanistan. And Bush implicitly agreed with Obama about negotiating with our enemies by sending a high-level diplomat to talk to Iran.
» Obama's speeches are the best we've heard in 40 years.
» On energy, welfare reform, capital punishment, faith and national security, he has moved toward the center, where the votes are.
» Obama's campaign is an awesome machine, registering record numbers of new voters, training and deploying record numbers of volunteers to turn out record numbers of people on election day, and using the Internet to self-organize supporters and raise record amounts of money -- $52 million last month. McCain's campaign is always fighting, changing its message, reorganizing and running out of money, despite George Bush's stealth fundraisers. The Bushies now running McCain's campaign are going negative. Too late -- people already know Obama.
» The Obama campaign has enough money for a 50-state strategy, forcing McCain to defend everywhere. For instance, Obama's people are registering large numbers of new black voters in normally Republican Georgia and North Carolina.
» Hillary Clinton is supporting Obama. Jesse Jackson attacked him, which probably helped with white voters.
» Less than 10 percent of voters are undecided (far less than usual at this stage) and women, Latinos, youth and blacks heavily favor Obama. His support of faith-based initiatives and a vigorous religious outreach campaign mean he will also peel off some evangelicals and Catholics.
Congress looks even worse for Republicans. Twenty-nine incumbents are retiring. Democrats have won three special elections in Republican House districts and will probably gain five to seven seats in the Senate.
And the inevitable disappointment after the election? Guess again. There are almost 2 million names in Obama's database. Imagine if they all e-mailed Congress on the same day. Terrified lawmakers might actually do the right thing.
Even worse for Republicans: the voter registration shift is "a generational change, and it will not be reversed."
And it just keeps going downhill:
Voters in Valley fleeing the GOP
Republican Party rapidly losing its advantage in registration after reaching its peak in 2004.
By John Ellis / The Fresno Bee
The Republican Party, which overtook Valley Democrats in voter registration totals eight years ago, is losing ground for the first time in at least a decade..
The challenge of turning it around may be formidable, as the Republican Party appears to be struggling not just locally but also across California and the nation.
"This is happening all over the country, wherever we can measure it, in blue, red, and purple states," said University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato, referring to the colors designated for Democrat, Republican and swing states.
Even worse for Republicans: Sabato -- who recently published a study on the issue -- called the voter registration shift "a generational change, and it will not be reversed."
He said young voters are overwhelmingly registering as Democrats because Republicans have become too identified with divisive social issues such as abortion and gay rights.
The Republican Party, Sabato said, also has lost its image of fiscal conservatism and is being dragged down by both the Iraq war and Bush's unpopularity.
"Naturally," he said, "there are consequences."
State Democrats are giddy at the turn of fortunes, as they hope not only to win back the White House this November, but also to capture more seats in Congress and in the state Legislature.
Bob Mulholland, campaign adviser to the California Democratic Party, points out that Democrats picked up almost 75% of the more than 411,000 new voter registrations statewide between voter-registration reports filed Jan. 22 and May 19.
During that same time, close to 21% of new registrations were decline-to-state. Republicans picked up just 3.6% of the new voters.
In a memo, Mulholland compares the recent Republican performance to a six-month period around President Richard Nixon's August 1974 resignation from office. During that time, Republicans gained more than 19% of new voters in California.
"It's worse than Watergate," he crowed of the GOP's current fortunes.
Don't forget that Iraq is a "Disastrous Debacle" and "on the verge of civil war." And that "Rove is gonna frog-march because of Valerie Plame." And "Bush will be impeached before he leaves office."
And, of course, "Kerry-Edwards are gonna win."
Funny how you shameless schemers screamed theft when Bush "stole" the election in 2000 because he won the electoral vote but lost the popular and for months we hear a shrieking chorus from you buffoons about how the electoral college has to be abolished because "It'th un-democratic!"
Then Bush is swept into a seciond term riding the crest of the tidal wave of the largest amount of popular votes in the history of democracy.
"Homineh-homineh-homineh...THOSE @#@#@ RED-STATE CHRISIANS SHOULD BE DISENFRANCHISED!!!"
Now:
"Okay, nix the 'Fifty-State Strategy.' And maybe 60% of all the friggin' white guys are going to vote for the friggin' white guy, and there's more of them than all the black guys who are going to vote for the black guy (like, 95% of all the black guys).
But who cares? We can win the electoral!"
Dollar at crossroads amid brighter US outlook
By Peter Garnham in London
Published: August 10 2008 18:55 | And don't forget "The economic meltdown."
Someone should tell that to the friggin', uncooperative economy:
"This week will be crucial in determining whether the dollar has broken free from its six-year downward trend, as speculation mounts that the US is in the best position to emerge quickly from the economic downturn."
But there's hope: It'll take a week for the verdict to come in, so cross your fingers.
Nothing left in the GOP but fascist and idiots:
Eisenhower would have quit the GOP long ago.
Ike's Granddaughter Calls Obama "Future of America"
Monday 11 August 2008
Susan Eisenhower has endorsed Barack Obama for president.
Does Susan Eisenhower's support suggest a political realignment?
"You'll have to forgive me for being an Eisenhower Republican," joked Susan Eisenhower, granddaughter of the former five-star general and two-term Republican president. The man who had helped lead America to victory over the forces of Axis darkness during World War II, then oversaw a period of unprecedented prosperity and suburban satisfaction during the 1950s.
Speaking on the telephone on Aug. 7 from her Washington office at The Eisenhower Institute, a think tank where she serves as president emeritus, the journalist-turned-foreign policy wonk explained her decision to publicly support Barack Obama after a lifetime in the Republican Party.
"I don't know how much you know about my grandfather's administration," Eisenhower said. "But that administration stood for multilateral engagement, balancing the budget. They were the party of civil rights, they were the party of environmental progress. That was the Republican Party of the 1950s. I think you can make the case that doesn't sound like the Republican Party we know today. If you look at the way Obama's run his campaign, to how Hillary Clinton ran her campaign, or even how John McCain's campaign is shaping up - you can definitely say that Obama's running his campaign in a way an Eisenhower Republican would have run his campaign.
"He raises a lot of money," Eisenhower, 56, said, by way of explaining the similarities she sees between her grandfather and the likely Democratic nominee. "He has very little debt. I just love it. Anybody who wants to make him out as this wide-eyed liberal - I just don't see any evidence for that, not in the way he runs his campaign. And this tells you a lot about how he can administer things, how he manages things, how he deals with situations.
"This race is very similar to the 1952 campaign that brought my grandfather to power," Eisenhower said, continuing the comparison. "He was an outsider who was nominated by the Republican Party - but it was not an easy process at all. He was an outsider who threatened to shake up the party itself."
As a surrogate for the Obama campaign since her declaration of support in February, Eisenhower could be on the frontlines of something bigger. As we approach the Democratic and Republican National Conventions of 2008, we do so as the coalitions of both parties appear ever more fractured. And it is the GOP coalition that could be in greater disarray.
True, the Democrats are still scarred by the divisions of a hard-fought primary season. Democrats, of course, have been used to intra-party fights since Chicago in 1968. But in the Republican Party, the fissures might mean something more long-term. These could be the fault lines of a new sort of national realignment. Fiscal conservatives, in addition to many foreign-policy pragmatists, are dissatisfied with Bush administration policies. And they might flee the party as well as its leader. Should Obama win in November, he might do so with the aid of moderate Republicans like Eisenhower, whose power within the GOP has been diminishing for decades.
In many ways Eisenhower and Republicans like her are at a pivotal moment. They can see a new chance for relevancy should Obama win, for they could then become part of a new majority coalition. In this light, Eisenhower is not an aberration. She is part of a vein within the Republican Party that still pumps. But not as hard, for moderates are being driven out of the party - even with a supposed centrist like McCain as the likely nominee.
Indeed, this group has been losing power since Sen. Barry M. Goldwater's nomination in 1964. But it now seems acutely at a loss, as its members find themselves unwanted, without a real champion to fight for their cause. This GOP faction is less concerned with eliminating gay marriage or sustaining what many economists have viewed as crippling tax cuts, than with the pragmatic aspects of how the party sees itself and what that means for the United States and the world. Whatever say this group once had in the GOP is fading.
"It is this very weird moment where Republicans are very divided," said Julian E. Zelizer, a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University. "It's accurate to say that you don't have a dominant set of ideas or a figure the party can really rally behind. What you simply see are factions who aren't forming to create a coherent vision."
Bruce Shulman, a professor of history at Boston University and author of "The '70S: The Great Shift in American Culture, Society and Politics," explained the situation. He sees the factions' dissatisfaction, but cannot see a full realignment in the offing.
"Since the Reagan Revolution," Shulman said, "you've seen this amazing united front by different factions that are much more at odds ideologically than the factions within the Democratic Party. They've all managed to put their feelings about one another aside to defeat a common enemy. I don't think the fracturing you're seeing now will result in large numbers of Republicans voting for Obama. But I do think you'll see people willing to sit on their hands instead of work towards that common goal as they have in the past."
As a practice, Eisenhower has always made it a point to meet with candidates or their staffs regardless of the party, and did so then. She was impressed by what she'd seen out of his people, and by the inquisitiveness of the man himself. Over the next few months, the two met three or four more times, and she grew to respect his ability to think about issues in a nuanced, post-Cold War fashion.
After initially telling Obama that she wouldn't endorse anyone, Eisenhower decided to say something in the middle of the gritty Democratic primary - with a February op-ed article in The Washington Post, headlined, bluntly, "Why I'm backing Barack Obama."
"We have to go back to my own tradition," Eisenhower said last week. "My grandfather thought there were three things that comprised our national security: One, our ability to address our adversaries. Second, he put economic security as absolutely essential to our national security. Thirdly, he valued the state of our moral authority. Never has that three-pillared way of looking at our national security been more crucial. By his own admission, John McCain says he doesn't know that much about economics, and from a national-security perspective I think that's noteworthy. The third issue of our moral authority has to examine the reasons for why we went into Iraq.
"By temperament and genetics, I do recognize that we're already there," Eisenhower said of the current U.S. occupation. "But we have to understand that my grandfather, a five-star general, understood that staying in Korea wasn't a sustainable operation either - and got the United States out of there.
"Asking whether something is viable or not has nothing to do with patriotism," she emphasized, "You can conclude you're damaging your long-term national interests by holding the status quo. One of the great expressions I grew up with as a child is 'Perfect is the enemy of good.' We have to move forward in a good way because we're never going to see a consensus on anything."
Now, with all three of her grandfather's national-security legs wobbling, Eisenhower saw no great carpentry skills offered by any of the Republicans running for the Oval Office. But in Obama, Eisenhower said she saw both promise and a real understanding of what was needed to repair the stunning damage done to those components of national security over the past eight years. Moreover she scoffed at the shots McCain's taken at his rival's patriotism and the recent television attacks labeling the 47-year-old junior senator as a man without substance because of his celebrity and the grand nature in which he often talks.
"For people who are being critical about Barack Obama talking about hope," Eisenhower said, "I don't think they understand the first thing about American rhetoric and moving this country forward. We now have another figure right now who has brought all sorts of people into the political process, who has convinced a significant number of people that they were welcome on his team, and has offered a crisp new chance to turn the page internationally."
And what would Ike think?
"I can't speak for my grandfather," Eisenhower said, but clearly felt she could speculate. "First of all, what's not to love? This is one of the great American stories. About a year-and-a-half ago, I said to Sen. Obama, 'I really welcome you into this race, because it helps underscore to people at home and abroad that in America anything is possible. I was beginning to worry that we were a country that were beginning to look at the political process as something for the select few.' And he said, 'Oh Susan, you must never worry about this country. This is a great country.'"
But now as the party conventions in Denver and St. Paul draw close and the general election begins, one must ask how a factional party shakeup - experienced in different ways on both sides - will play out when people are faced with the drawn curtain and blank ballot. In many ways, Eisenhower represents a group which stands on the verge of great opportunity, to possibly become part of an Obama-led coalition to remake the nation. But with his defeat would comes theirs, one where they are subjugated to irrelevancy, left to their silent screams in a party that has abandoned them.
Oh, you'd REALLY would have loved Ike the way he chewed through Europe during WWII shocking, awing, shooting first and asking questions later, and losing 5,000 troops on any given Sunday for a war your ideological forebears--and Kennedy patriarch Joe Sr., no less-- said we should have stayed out of and then spent eight yeas as president lavishly funding the Military Industrial Complex he warned about in his Farewell Address (a warning that has been misinterpreted to mean that he believed it was bad per se).
Of course he was for Civil Rights and championed the enduring plight of African Americans. It was the Republican thing to do since the first Republican--Lincoln--launched the party on that platform.
Republicans were still the ones who pushed for Civil Rights into the sixties.
It was the Democrats who obstructed that at every turn.
Read a history book for once.
The less he knows: McCain campaign lifts Georgia speech from Wikipedia 8/12
Ethics for McCain?? Abramoff ally, Ralph Humping for Dollars Reed, to host fundraiser for John McCain -- the same McCain who investigated the Abramoff-Reed connection 8/12
Since discovering most troops are Democrats, Bush Veterans Affairs Department bans voter registration drives at veterans facilities; Veterans die for the right to vote, and they make it harder for vets to vote? 8/12
U.S. Surges $11 Billion in Arms Sales to Iraq 8/12
McCain’s attacks on rival fall flat with vets group 8/12
As the U.S. economy teeters on the brink of recession, the biggest question mark has been the health of the consumer, whose hunger for cellphones, superhero movies, designer jeans and other goods and services accounts for about two-thirds of the nation's gross domestic product.
But some economists are increasingly worried about a slowdown in capital investment by businesses, which spend vast sums on everything from office buildings and fleet vehicles to software programs and telecom equipment.
Recently there has been a parade of sobering announcements: JetBlue abandoning markets and delaying aircraft orders, Starbucks closing 600 outlets, retailer Mervyns filing for bankruptcy protection and J.C. Penney scaling back next year's store openings.
Total planned capital spending by U.S. business declined on a year-over-year basis for four straight months through June, according to the Conference Board, the New York-based economic research firm. The Commerce Department reported Thursday that investment in software and equipment -- which accounts for two-thirds of business capital spending -- fell again in July.
Business investment, which sends out ripples of financial stimulus like a pebble tossed in a pond, is a leading indicator of the nation's economic well-being. So the recent run of bad news bodes ill for the future, some experts say.
"Almost universally, business spending is being scaled down to the absolute bare minimum," said economist Ken Goldstein of the Conference Board. "A few months ago, all those people were talking about a second-half recovery. If there's a second-half recovery, it's the second half of '09."
"This is liable to get very ugly," says one analyst from Global.
The Wheels of the GOP Bus Keep Falling Off, Falling Off
The GOP Bus is looking mighty shaky. Several folks have been kicked from it, as we’ve noted in the case of former GOP Senate candidate Ting in Delaware. Now the bus is breaking down. The best indicator might be in that Republican stronghold of the California Central Valley, where they are losing their lead in voter registrations.
Commentary By: Steven Reynolds
Hey, let’s make a bus the new metaphor for the John McCain and GOP campaigns this fall. (Not so new, since the McCain camp likes to make us think he’s on a perpetual bus tour.) They routinely throw their campaign staffer/lobbyists under the bus, like this guy who lobbied for Georgia - not the Peach State - but the one that’s had such difficulties with democracy and corruption since the Soviet Union fell apart.
And as we previously noted,Jan Ting, a former Senate candidate for the GOP from Delaware, recently got thrown under the bus.
McCain sure has trouble with his own bus, the Straight Talk Express. The thing can’t seem to turn left without hitting a handicapped vehicle. But those are minor bus-related stories that merely show that the wheels of corruption and incompetence and ugly campaigning are still going round and round.
Today’s stories are a bit different, and include two instances where the wheels of the Republican bus seem to be falling off. The first story is about US Rep. Candice Miller, a two term Republican representing Michigan, a key state in this upcoming election. Seems Ms. Miller has sharpened her anti-Iraq war stance even more. Nope, she’s not flip flopping to survive in this year’s elections. This time we have a Republican who sounds sincere in her call for us to get out of Iraq. Sure, Candice Miller has a lot to answer for concerning her early enthusiastic support for Bush’s war, but the interesting stuff here is that in a battleground state, at least one Republican, from the suburbs, is talking loudly in direct opposition to the stances of her party’s nominee for President. That can’t be good for John McCain.
The second story concerns the Central Valley in California. It’s always been a stronghold of Republican support, though California is so solidly Democratic that it is not earthshaking that Democrats are nearing equal registrations to Republicans for the first in a very long time. The Central Valley, let me repeat, is moving towards lean Democratic. This is an area of the country that’s not gone Democratic since before Tom Joad went out there to work, is my guess. Again, this will not shatter the earth or anything, but it is telling. The way to figure out how to take advantage of this situation is to figure out why Republicans are turning away from their party and why 75% of new voters are registering as Dems.
Let’s see, there must be some reason the Republican brand is losing so much of its luster in the Central Valley of California, mustn’t there? They do a lot of agriculture, you say? And they have a whole bunch of immigrants, now citizens, who were once illegals? I suppose one reason the GOP is losing sway might be their disastrous take on the the immigration issue these last two and a half years. While McCain tried to carry the issue for Bush on the issue, the true nature of the xenophobic GOP came forth and demonized immigrants, passing a law to erect a ludicrous fence and giving no thought to accommodating those illegal aliens already in this country.
Sure, the Republicans didn’t think that those illegals all had relatives who are citizens, employers who are citizens, etc. Big miscalculation there. But it’s the demonization thing in general that might be the main failing of the Republicans in the long run. The Republican demonization of gays has come close now to the end, I predict, as young voters are registering as Democrats. You see, young voters know gay people are good citizens, and they know so from experience, just as Latinos know that they themselves are good citizens. The GOP strategy of demonization is beginning to backfire on them big time.
This isn’t an insignificant issue. If the Central Valley of California is in play because of the immigration issue backfiring on the GOP, then that makes much of the West in play, as AZCentral.com notes. Sure, the AZCentral.com story also attributes the changing Western politics to internal immigration, a switch from “lassos to lattes,” but the Obama campaign sure doesn’t undervalue the Latino vote. How about the dedication of $20 MM in campaign dollars to capturing the Latino vote and getting them to the polls? That’s a lot of dollars focused on a single constituency, but if it brings 80% of the Latino vote, then it is money well spent.
No, it isn’t just doves like Candice Miller, calling for an end to our role in Iraq, who signal the wheels of the GOP Bus are falling off. The real signs are in the demographics.
Word has spread thoughout the military.
THEY FINALLY LEARN WHO SUPPORTS THEM
ONE in FOURTEEN will vote McCain:
McCain's Attacks on Rival Fall Flat With Vets Group
http://www.truthout.org/article/mccains-attacks-rival-fall-flat-with-vets-group
In The Las Vegas Sun, J. Patrick Coolican and Michael Mishak report: "Sen. John McCain, speaking to disabled veterans Saturday in Las Vegas, attacked his Democratic opponent, Sen. Barack Obama, for his foreign policy record, while also proposing a program that would allow veterans to acquire health care at private hospitals and not just through the Veterans Affairs Department. The veterans, at Bally's for their national convention, gave him a tepid reception, especially considering McCain's life story. The Arizona senator was a Navy pilot shot down over Vietnam, tortured and held as a prisoner of war for 5 1/2 years. Just one of 14 veterans interviewed by the Sun after his speech said he is a certain McCain voter, and the nonpartisan group's legislative director expressed concerns about McCain's proposed 'Veterans' Care Access Card.'"
Bush Makes US Most Powerful Third World Nation:
Today's FT reports that the Olympics also are taking place as US economic power declines:
China is set to overtake the US next year as the world's largest producer of manufactured goods, four years earlier than expected, as a result of the rapidly weakening US economy. The great leap is revealed in forecasts for the Financial Times by Global Insight, a US economics consultancy. According to the estimates, next year China will account for 17 per cent of manufacturing value-added output of $11,783bn and the US will make 16 per cent.
Last year the US was still easily in the top slot and accounted for a fifth of the total. China was second with 13.2 per cent. John Engler, president of the National Association of Manufacturers, a Washington-based trade group, played down the effect of the projections. It was "inevitable" that China would take over on account of its size, he said. "This should be a wholesome development for the US, for it promises both political stability for the world's largest country and continuing opportunities for the US to export to, and invest in, the world's fastest-growing economy." As recently as last year, Global Insight economists predicted that the US would retain the top position until 2013, but a large downward revision in likely output this year and next is expected to cause the US to slip more quickly than had been expected.
HOW BAD IS THE MORTGAGE CRISIS? VERY BAD SAYS UPI's MARTIN WALKER
Put it this way: Anybody who thought the news from the U.S. mortgage front was terrible ain't seen nothing yet. The ratings agencies are downgrading at an ever-increasing pace. They downgraded $85 billion in mortgage securities in the third quarter of 2007, $237 billion in the fourth quarter, $739 billion in the first quarter of this year and $841 billion in the second. The next two quarters could be worse, given the falling U.S. employment numbers. (The official unemployment figures, it should be noted, severely underestimate the true jobless figure. It excludes those who have stopped looking for work and also those 150,000 youngsters who arrive onto the labor market each month who have yet to be employed.)"
"As the U.S. economy teeters on the brink of recession..."
So now it's "teetering on the brink?"
I thought we were already in the Greatest Depression Of All since 2001.
BIG TIME REPUBLICANS FOR OBAMA
A group of prominent Republicans supporting Barack Obama took to a conference call Tuesday morning to tout their preferred candidate, make the case for other GOPers to cross party lines, and warn about the dangers of John McCain's foreign policy.
Hoping to fill a void in news with Senator Obama on vacation, former Rep. Jim Leach, former Sen. Lincoln Chafee and Rita Hauser (a national intelligence expert who served in the Bush administration), offered at times sharp lines of criticism for the presumptive Republican nominee.
"I served with Sen. McCain, and he and I were the only two to vote against the Bush/Cheney tax cuts," recalled Chafee. "During this campaign it is a different John McCain. He is saying he would make the tax cuts permanent. He is advocating more drilling whereas he voted against drilling in ANWR. It goes to his credibility. And that is such an important issue for this country... plus his foreign policy has been consistently with Bush/Cheney and I know from my perspective that is a huge issue for the United States."
Hauser, meanwhile, pivoted off current events to highlight why Republicans like her viewed McCain's foreign policy as shortsighted and, quiet possibly, at odds with international interests.
"I think the little flare up we are witnessing in Georgia is another illustration of the different approach these two men are taking," she said. "McCain is bellicose: threatening to kick Russia out of the G8, use force if it is required. Obama is far more of the traditional position: turn to international institutions, call for reconciliation, call for an end of hostilities, but also be firm in his words. And that's the kind of leadership we need."
Reflecting disenchantment over the Bush/Cheney years, Leach, Chafee and Hauser all touted Obama's pledge of post-partisanship as a defining aspect in why they were crossing party lines. As for the true test of Obama's bipartisanship -- whether he would appoint a Republican official as vice president or to his cabinet -- the officials on the call deferred to the candidate. But Leach did give a nod to Sen. Chuck Hagel, a prominent Republican who seems tailor made to endorse Obama.
"There are a number of very impressive vice presidential candidates and this is a singular decision for one person and that is Sen. Obama. But I would be hopeful that among the serious list of people to be considered would be Chuck Hagel," said the Iowa Republican. "I think Chuck would be the type of Republican who will represent well this country."
As part of their Republicans-for-Obama effort, the group said they would be launch a website in the next few days that would, primarily, contrast Obama's positions against McCain's through a Republican lens. "It will encourage others to come on because they will see that there is a growing number of Republicans around the country that support him," said Hauser.
The imperative was there, said Leach. It was simply a matter of showing Republicans the shortcomings of the current administration and convincing them that Obama was within their political mainstream.
"This is not a time for politics as usual," said the former congressman. "The portfolio of issues passed on to the next president is as daunting as any since WWII. The case for inspiring new political leadership and the social ethic has seldom been more evident. Barack Obama's platform is a call for change, but the change that he is articulating is more renewal than departure. ... It is rooted in very old American values that are very much part of the Republican as well as the Democratic tradition. ... The national interest requires a new approach to our interaction with the world -- including the recognition that a long-term occupation of Iraq is likely dangerously destabilizing."
BIG TIME DEMOCRAT FOR MCCAIN
Joe Lieberman (2000 Vice Presidential nominee).
The national embarrassment that is our president once again raises its reddened face. In photographs from the Olympics in China, it appears that recovering souse, George W. Bush, is relapsing.
In one picture his face is flushed, his eyes droop, and his expression is dopey. In all fairness, that may be his normal expression. However, the bloody scrape on his arm suggests that he has recently taken a less than normal fall.
In the other picture, Bush appears to be having trouble remaining upright without considerable help. It takes three men to prop up the wobbly boozer-in-chief.
Don't it make ya feel proud?
This is not the first evidence of Bush's backsliding. First and foremost, the high bar for American journalism, the National Enquirer, wrote about it three years ago.
EOnline reported last year that Bush's return to drinking drove Laura to move out of the White House and to a possible split-up. Other rumors had her house hunting in Dallas for a post-presidency home away from George.
Both the Globe and Examiner covered Laura's "eruption" at her hubby's imbibing.
This is a president who can't stay upright on a bicycle and who nearly chokes to death on pretzels. Maybe we'll get a better picture of the man when Oliver Stone's movie "W" is released in a couple of months. Stone's script reportedly has Bush Sr. telling his no-good progeny that...
"You never kept your word once...you're only good for partying, chasing tail, driving drunk...You deeply disappoint me."
The ENQUIRER has uncovered bombshell new details about the John Edwards sex scandal after the former presidential candidate finally admitted he'd cheated on his cancer-stricken wife Elizabeth!
Edwards' headline-making admission confirmed The ENQUIRER's blockbuster world exclusive reports detailing his affair, in articles Edwards brazenly called "completely untrue" and "tabloid trash" while running for president and afterward.
And now The ENQUIRER has uncovered that Edwards' political operatives are still paying his mistress Rielle Hunter - and she was whisked away on a private jet two days before he confessed their extramarital affair on national TV!
The ENQUIRER has also confirmed that Edwards secretly visited Rielle and their love child three separate times at the Beverly Hilton hotel in Los Angeles this year - a fact that proves he is still lying to America and his wife.
ENQUIRER reporters caught Edwards, 55, making a late-night visit to 44-year-old Rielle and their daughter at the hotel on July 21 - which prompted us to release the first-ever photograph of him with his love child last week.
NOW, The ENQUIRER has uncovered more blockbuster information, including:
After Edwards confessed the affair to his wife, he restarted it, and was sexually involved with Rielle when she became pregnant.
Despite his denials, Edwards WAS aware that his former finance committee chairman, Fred Baron, was funneling money to Rielle.
Experts are now calling for a federal investigation into Edwards' use of campaign funds.
In an interview with ABC's Nightline correspondent Bob Woodruff on Aug. 8, the former North Carolina senator admitted for the first time that he engaged in what he called a "short" extramarital affair with campaign worker Rielle Hunter.
Edwards told ABC the affair was limited to 2006, before he confessed "the mistake" to wife Elizabeth, 59, who is battling a recurrence of breast cancer.
But Edwards denied he's the father of Rielle's daughter, who was born on Feb. 27, 2008. The ENQUIRER reported last December that Hunter had told close confidantes that he was the father.
In denying he fathered Rielle's baby, Edwards told ABC that he would "be happy" to take a paternity test to prove he's telling the truth. (He has refused numerous previous requests by The ENQUIRER to take a paternity test.)
Edwards claimed he ended the affair in 2006, but sources say he restarted the illicit romance after confessing to his wife.
Rielle soon became pregnant after the affair was rekindled, say sources.
The ongoing ENQUIRER investigation has also confirmed that he has been with Rielle and the baby three times this year in California.
"John Edwards is still lying!" a close source told The ENQUIRER.
"He lied to his wife Elizabeth, he's lying to Rielle and he lied all the way through his TV interview!"
For THE FULL STORY pick up this week's ENQUIRER - on sale tomorrow!
Alan Keyes Says:
It’s clear that as a matter of good, and most especially of Christian conscience, Dr. Dobson was right to reject McCain’s candidacy. On the fateful moral issues of our time, McCain is the archetype of political expediency. Christ emphatically rejected such expediency for principled moral decisions. (”What shall it profit a man …” etc.) Relative benefits cannot justify actions that violate the absolute standard of God’s will.
Dr. Dobson and leaders like him have many times declaimed against and rejected the moral relativism and “situational ethics” that masquerade as moral reasoning these days. If they now express support for McCain they not only promote a candidate who represents this corruption of moral conscience, by their actions they represent it themselves. The sequence of events in Dr. Dobson’s case makes this clear. He said he could not vote for McCain as a matter of principle, but may do so now because McCain is the better choice when compared to Barack Obama. Since Dobson and others denounce Obama as evil, this makes evil the standard of comparison. The true standard disappears. This is an example of moral relativism, pure and simple; a bad example offered to their fellow citizens in the context of the weightiest public responsibility most Americans ever face, their vote for president of the United States. Christians of old chose suffering and death precisely in order to make it clear that they stood with Christ when it mattered most. By their surrender to relativism in presidential politics, these leaders stand Christian witness on its head. Their message is clear: When the world is at stake, vote as if Christ isn’t part of it.
McCain’s stand on national security is dangerously self-contradictory
Nations have more often been undone by unskilled or treacherous defenders than by irresistible conquerors. The flaw in the “lesser of evils” arguments being used to promote John McCain and others like him is that even a lesser evil may be evil enough to kill. Such leaders are like the wound that took the life of Romeo’s friend Mercutio: “not so deep as a well, or so wide as a church door; but ’tis enough, ’twill serve.” To a city under siege, the noisy army that lies in wait upon the surrounding plains may seem the greater evil, but the postern gate quietly left open by treachery or ignorant neglect more often proves to be its real undoing. In this respect, Sen. McCain represents danger in the very area of national security that Dr. Dobson cites as a possible reason for preferring him over Obama. On the one hand, he takes a firm line against policies of withdrawal, appeasement and accommodation in the war against terrorism. On the other, he has been in the vanguard of those who promote policies that neglect the security of our national borders and encourage the tide of illegal immigration that will inexorably subvert the sovereignty of the American people. He seems ready enough to defend the ramparts, and even come to grips with our enemies, but then he wants to swing the back gates wide open and keep defenders away from the areas where enemy sappers can be heard busily working to tunnel beneath the walls.
EXPLOSIVE NEWS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Former Dem Candidate Had Heterosexual affair!!!!!!!!!!
yaaaaaaaaawn........zzzzzzzzzzz
Barry and John:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dioQamJC5vw
Well, it has finally happened. The crisis born of unilateralism, strategic overreach and bravado has come to pass. With U.S. forces tied down in two protracted wars, American credibility on the international stage at a record low and our dependence on foreign oil painfully obvious, a revitalized Russia is on the move. And the blow has fallen where most analysts expected it would: on America's closest ally in the Caucasus, the tiny Republic of Georgia.
Fox News suffers another debate snub; bloggers take a bow
by Eric Boehlert
Coveted assignments for presidential debate moderators were handed out last week, and guess who was left off the list ... again.
After suffering the bitter, and unprecedented, blow during the Democratic primary season of having candidates refuse -- twice -- to appear in Fox News-sponsored forums when bloggers raised hell about the news organization's lack of legitimacy, Rupert Murdoch's news channel was again left off the list of news anchors tapped to moderate the must-see TV events in the fall.
While many eyes are focusing on the housing meltdown and its hugely negative effect on an economy clearly moving into recession, few are paying attention to the next bubble expected to burst: credit cards. You would never know it by watching those slick VISA card ads on the Olympic TV broadcasts.
Combined with the subprime losses, such a credit card nightmare has the potential, experts say, of bringing down the entire financial system and global economy.
You and your credit card have become key players in the highly unstable financial crunch.
Mortgage lender cupidity and bank credit card greed, wedded to financial institution deregulation supported by both political parties, have been made manifestly worse by Bush administration support-the-rich policies. It has brought us to a brink not seen since just before the Great Depression.
^^^Kool-Aid.^^^
Third-rate propaganda by dogs with reverse potty-training (i.e. they go panting from blog to blog with lolling tongues, squatting and taking a dump in each one before moving along, as their masters ordered).
"The national embarrassment that is our president once again raises its reddened face. In photographs from the Olympics in China, it appears that recovering souse, George W. Bush, is relapsing."
This only means that the flag-waving, cheerleading, church-going, and playful President Bush represented America well at the games. But don't believe your eyes!
If Bush walked on water, they'd heckle "Look! He doesn't know how to swim!"
"(Left-wing) Bloggers take a bow"?
For what? When not preaching to your unholy choir, intimidating Democrat politicians who need Soros' money, or manipulating simple-minded farmyard animals, you only cause multitudes of people with any decency and good sense and who are paying attention to vote for a candidate they otherwise wouldn't vote for (i.e. McCain) if only to keep you shameless sleazebags (who obviously rely on people's stupidity when peddling your drugs, insulting their intelligence in the process) out of power.
Because you're liars.
As dear Ava projected off the bat, however:
"There are enough simple dicks in America who would buy this idiot's babbling points to make some difference."
Not enough, though, I'm afraid.
B. Hussein should be running away with all this at the polls right now (if, that is, it were all true).
According to the tabloids...always ahead of the cycle...GW's drunken escapades at the Olympics have confirmed her decision to leave her family values marriage after the election.
Not as bad as Alaska, but typical of GOP political corruption
Republicans' Fortunes Falling in Nevada
Governor's Scandals Top A List of Woes
By Steve Friess
Special to The Washington Post
Thursday, August 14, 2008; A03
LAS VEGAS -- The scandal-plagued Republican governor is so politically toxic that few of his party's prominent candidates will be seen with him. The GOP's most powerful state senator survived a tough primary after 36 years of never even facing a credible opponent. And the party may quickly be losing its grip on a state that could be critical to the outcome of the presidential election.
If Republicans are hurting nationally this election year, there may be few places where the pain is quite as acute, or has arrived as quickly, as Nevada, where a confluence of problems has left a once-potent state party in tatters. Just two years ago, Republicans occupied all six statewide constitutional offices. Today, they hold only the posts of governor and lieutenant governor.
Democrats now enjoy a 60,000-voter registration edge in a state where the parties were virtually tied a year ago. The state GOP raised less than one-third of the $1.3 million the Nevada Democratic Party's central committee took in during the first half of 2008. And the Republicans who hold two of the state's three U.S. House seats are in danger of losing them.
A Republican primary race between the state Senate majority leader, Bill Raggio, and a former assemblywoman was emblematic of the trend. Raggio, 81, won a six-point victory on Tuesday after being forced to campaign actively for the first time since his initial race in 1972. His opponent is a hero of Nevada's hard-core fiscal and social conservatives angered by Raggio's compromises on such things as a large 2003 tax increase.
Former governor Kenny Guinn and Reno Mayor Bob Cashell walked Raggio's district with him earlier this month but the current governor, Jim Gibbons, did not.
Nor, say several prominent Republicans, have many GOP candidates asked for Gibbons's help, preferring to avoid association with the former five-term congressman, who is the subject of an unceasing barrage of negative publicity.
The Republican chief executive's troubles began in 2006 when a cocktail waitress accused him of assaulting her in a parking lot after a night of drinking three weeks before Election Day.
Then came reports in the Wall Street Journal that the FBI was investigating Gibbons and his wife, Dawn, in a public corruption probe
This year, Gibbons has been mired in controversy over allegations by his now-estranged wife that he has had an affair, and revelations that he sent a married woman 850 text messages in one month on his official cellphone. The Gibbonses are divorcing, but Dawn Gibbons refused to move out of the governor's mansion in Carson City for two months, a further embarrassment. And last month Elko County Assessor Joe Aguirre, a Republican, went public with accusations that the governor pressured him for a property tax break on 40 vacant acres Gibbons owns there.
Gibbons has become so politically isolated that Sen. John McCain's presidential campaign turned to Lt. Gov. Brian K. Krolicki rather than to the governor to chair the Republican candidate's Nevada effort.
Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) has associated with some pretty shady characters during his presidential run, but the latest addition to his crew surprised even us.
On August 18, McCain is scheduled to attend an Atlanta fundraiser that will include none other than Ralph Reed — the man who helped Jack Abramoff scam American Indian tribes out of tens of millions of dollars and lobbied against protecting workers in the Northern Mariana Islands from forced abortions and prostitution.
Sign our petition today and tell John McCain to cancel this fundraiser, or reject Reed's money, immediately.
Here's the link: http://ga3.org/campaign/mccain_reed
ALL decent citizens will want to do this...
We've been all over this story since we helped to break it earlier this week. As the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported today, "The first hint of controversy came Monday when Campaign Money Watch, a Washington group that monitors campaign finance, called on McCain to cancel the event." (1)
It's clear to us: Hob-nobbing with someone like Ralph Reed makes it evident that McCain is no maverick or reformer. Not only was Reed a close associate of one of the most corrupt lobbyists of all time — one McCain investigated as chair of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee — but he was also reportedly behind nasty rumors that played a role in McCain losing his bid for the GOP nomination in 2000.
And now McCain is ready to take money from Reed? While every candidate is forced to raise money under our broken campaign finance system, they don't have to take it from people like Reed.
Sign our petition today to tell McCain to drop Reed and reject his money.
Then, after you sign the petition, forward this email and the petition on to everyone you know. We have only a few days before the event — act now!
Sincerely,
David Donnelly
Campaign Money Watch
(1) "Ralph Reed's link to McCain brews storm of criticism," Atlanta Journal-Constitution, August 14, 2008.
Uh, this ain't happening either, say wingo retards...commie scientists want to destroy our industries...
Oceans on the Precipice: Scripps Scientist Warns of Mass Extinctions and 'Rise of Slime'
Threats to marine ecosystems from overfishing, pollution and climate change must be addressed to halt downward trends
Scripps Institution of Oceanography/UC San Diego
Human activities are cumulatively driving the health of the world's oceans down a rapid spiral, and only prompt and wholesale changes will slow or perhaps ultimately reverse the catastrophic problems they are facing.
Such is the prognosis of Jeremy Jackson, a professor of oceanography at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, in a bold new assessment of the oceans and their ecological health. Publishing his study in the online early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), Jackson believes that human impacts are laying the groundwork for mass extinctions in the oceans on par with vast ecological upheavals of the past.
Jeremy Jackson, Scripps Professor of Oceanography
He cites the synergistic effects of habitat destruction, overfishing, ocean warming, increased acidification and massive nutrient runoff as culprits in a grand transformation of once complex ocean ecosystems. Areas that had featured intricate marine food webs with large animals are being converted into simplistic ecosystems dominated by microbes, toxic algal blooms, jellyfish and disease.
Jackson, director of the Scripps Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation, has tagged the ongoing transformation as "the rise of slime." The new paper, "Ecological extinction and evolution in the brave new ocean," is a result of Jackson's presentation last December at a biodiversity and extinction colloquium convened by the National Academy of Sciences.
"The purpose of the talk and the paper is to make clear just how dire the situation is and how rapidly things are getting worse," said Jackson. "It's a lot like the issue of climate change that we had ignored for so long. If anything, the situation in the oceans could be worse because we are so close to the precipice in many ways."
In the assessment, Jackson reviews and synthesizes a range of research studies on marine ecosystem health, and in particular key studies conducted since a seminal 2001 study he led analyzing the impacts of historical overfishing. The new study includes overfishing, but expands to include threats from areas such as nutrient runoff that lead to so-called "dead zones" of low oxygen. He also incorporates increases in ocean warming and acidification resulting from greenhouse gas emissions.
Jackson describes the potently destructive effects when forces combine to degrade ocean health. For example, climate change can exacerbate stresses on the marine environment already brought by overfishing and pollution.
"All of the different kinds of data and methods of analysis point in the same direction of drastic and increasingly rapid degradation of marine ecosystems," Jackson writes in the paper.
During a recent research expedition to Kiritimati, or Christmas Island, Jeremy Jackson and other researchers documented a coral reef overtaken by algae, featuring murky waters and few fish. The researchers say pollution, overfishing, warming waters or some combination of the three are to blame. Photo credit: Jennifer E. Smith
Jackson furthers his analysis by constructing a chart of marine ecosystems and their "endangered" status. Coral reefs, Jackson's primary area of research, are "critically endangered" and among the most threatened ecosystems; also critically endangered are estuaries and coastal seas, threatened by overfishing and runoff; continental shelves are "endangered" due to, among other things, losses of fishes and sharks; and the open ocean ecosystem is listed as "threatened" mainly through losses at the hands of overfishing.
"Just as we say that leatherback turtles are critically endangered, I looked at entire ecosystems as if they were a species," said Jackson. "The reality is that if we want to have coral reefs in the future, we're going to have to behave that way and recognize the magnitude of the response that's necessary to achieve it."
To stop the degradation of the oceans, Jackson identifies overexploitation, pollution and climate change as the three main "drivers" that must be addressed.
"The challenges of bringing these threats under control are enormously complex and will require fundamental changes in fisheries, agricultural practices and the ways we obtain energy for everything we do," he writes.
"So it's not a happy picture and the only way to deal with it is in segments; the only way to keep one's sanity and try to achieve real success is to carve out sectors of the problem that can be addressed in effective terms and get on it as quickly as possible."
The research described in the paper was supported by the William E. and Mary B. Ritter Chair of Scripps Institution of Oceanography.
Barack Obama is not a left candidate. This fact has seemingly surprised a number of progressive people who are bemoaning Obama’s “shift to the center.” (Right-wingers are happy to join them, suggesting Obama is a “flip-flopper.”) It’s sad that some who seek progressive change are missing the forest for the trees. But they will not dampen the wide and deep enthusiasm for blocking a third Bush term represented by John McCain, or for bringing Obama by a landslide into the White House with a large Democratic congressional majority.
A broad multiclass, multiracial movement is converging around Obama’s “Hope, change and unity” campaign because they see in it the thrilling opportunity to end 30 years of ultra-right rule and move our nation forward with a broadly progressive agenda.
This diverse movement combines a variety of political currents and aims in a working coalition that is crucial to social progress at this point. At the core are America’s working families, of all hues and ethnicities, whose determination to move forward does not depend on, and will not be diverted by, the daily twists and turns of this watershed presidential campaign. They are taking the long view.
Notably, the labor movement has stepped up its independent mobilization for this election. It is leading an unprecedented campaign to educate and unify its ranks to elect the nation’s first African American president. Last week, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka told the Steelworkers convention that there is “no evil that’s inflicted more pain and more suffering than racism — and it’s something we in the labor movement have a special responsibility to challenge.”
If Obama’s candidacy represented nothing more than the spark for this profound initiative to unite the working class and defeat the pernicious influence of racism, it would be a transformative candidacy that would advance progressive politics for the long term.
The struggle to defeat the ultra-right and turn our country on a positive path will not end with Obama’s election. But that step will shift the ground for successful struggles going forward.
One thing is clear. None of the people’s struggles — from peace to universal health care to an economy that puts Main Street before Wall Street — will advance if McCain wins in November.
Let’s keep our eyes on the prize.
John Edwards lawyer pals...
Wow...you guys are really kicking ass, here...
The idea of turning a really sick reicho blog into a liberal outlet is brilliant!
The best part was that "John" character...having a guy pretend to be a right wing moron in order to discredit the right is inspired.
You need to get Ava back though. Talk about neutering a wingbat -- even if it was a set up.
Gaaaaaawd what a bloody nose Pooty Poot gave the US idiot administration.
Ga has to sign a humiliating agreement with the Rooskies after GW moron got them to poke them in the eye for him.
It will be a long time before any one in that region trusts the US again.
One more step into the pit by this team of execrable morons.
We already know it's the Dems who support the troops...now we learn that the troops also support the Dems:
According to an analysis of campaign contributions by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, Democrat Barack Obama has received nearly six times as much money from troops deployed overseas at the time of their contributions than has Republican John McCain, and the fiercely anti-war Ron Paul, though he suspended his campaign for the Republican nomination months ago, has received more than four times McCain's haul.
Despite McCain's status as a decorated veteran and a historically Republican bent among the military, members of the armed services overall -- whether stationed overseas or at home -- are also favoring Obama with their campaign contributions in 2008, by a $55,000 margin.
How does that stack up against previous years?
"That's shocking. The academic debate is between some who say that junior enlisted ranks lean slightly Republican and some who say it's about equal, but no one would point to six-to-one" in Democrats' favor, said Aaron Belkin, a professor of political science at the University of California who studies the military. "That represents a tremendous shift from 2000, when the military vote almost certainly was decisive in Florida and elsewhere, and leaned heavily towards the Republicans."
In 2000, Republican George W. Bush outraised Democrat Al Gore among military personnel almost 2 to 1. In 2004, with the Iraq war underway, John Kerry closed the gap with President Bush, but Bush still raised $1.50 from the military for every $1 his Democratic opponent collected.
The real question is this - is this indicative of a trend in support for Obama across the armed services (enlisted and officers)? And if so, does it translate into votes? It certainly does go along way towards disproving Republicans' claims to speak for (and have the backing of) the troops.
Poor lana.
First she's a banana but slips on her own peel and lands on her butt. Embarassed, she leaves and comes back wearing a fedora and fake moustache as "larry." Exposed, stripped naked, and mercilessly horsewhipped in the public square, she disappears for a while to nurse her smarting hiney and now comes back--"Wow"--as "faro."
"The idea of turning a really sick reicho blog into a liberal outlet is brilliant!"
Yeah, that's what Zarqawi thought, turning Baghdad into an al Qaeda cell.
"Yeah, we're really kicking ass here," he gloated.
Shit-for-brains exulted:
"We already know it's the Dems who support the troops...now we learn that the troops also support the Dems:
'According to an analysis of campaign contributions by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, Democrat Barack Obama has received nearly six times as much money from troops deployed overseas."
Firstly, "non-partisan" my ass.
Secondly, equating the sum of contributions with the quantity of contributors either demonstrates how dumb and/or desperate you scoundrels are, or how dumb you think your readers are in your sleazy attempt to artificially inflate support for the light-weight gimmick that is B. Hussein, essentially stuffing socks down his crotch (that after the crowing of "laaaaaanslide!!!" turned into a whimper before falling dead silent).
Just wait until Massuh Bill and Miss Hillary hijack the Convention and remind everyone who REALLY is in charge, who's just a gimmick, and just how FULL OF SHIT the Left is.
Which one of you is doing this guy?
Miming a retarded wingbat is difficult...yet you're right on the money!!
What an array of ez to push buttons you've put on the poor, hyper-reactive buffoon.
Having him pretend to ignore all the studies showing a new Dem majority in the military...and all the embarassing snubs McCain has had from vet groups lately is exactly like them...
How can I contact you guys...any ideas?
In other words: "Haaaaaaalp!"
Sorry, "faro." Everyone else ran for their lives.
It's just you. All alone. Against me.
Now I'm going to ask you a simple question:
If ten people contribute $25.00 each to Candidate A, and two people contribute $150.00 each to Candidate B, which candidate receives the most money?
That's right, Candidate B--despite losing the head-count 5-1.
Now if you think being able to raise more money and outspend the opposition is what it's all about, I now ask you how the richly-endowed B. Hussein got pasted by Miss Hillary in the home stretch of the Primary season, and how, despite Miss Hillary forced to have a yard-sale of campaign junk (i.e. "memorablia") to pay off her campaign debts, and even went tin-cupping to B. Hussein himself to have him foot the bill (or else), how is it Massuh Bill and Miss Hillary managed to convince him not only to have "his" convention week showcasing themselves and Chelsea to boot, but to have a roll-call of delegates (which sounds a lot like a recount of sorts)?
As for military support, do you really think that B. Hussein is going to win the military vote on November 7, bozo?
"It will be a long time before any one in that region trusts the US again."
It was France's fault, imbecile.
BTW, it turns out B. hussein did recieve contributions from more overseas troops, as well as more contributions (the article you posted didn't clarify that).
Doesn't matter. Mac has the military vote.
Obama got 44 contributions worth about $27,000 and Paul 23 for about $19,300. Republican John McCain, an Iraq war supporter and Vietnam prisoner of war, was third with about $18,500 from 32 donors.
As of June 30, 2008, about 1,427,546 people are on active duty in the military with an additional 1,458,400 people in the seven reserve components.
~100 out of 3,000,000. 0.003%
Wow. The insignificant self-selected sample has spoken!
Obama's Biggest Advantage Yet: Early Voting: 'Yesterday, Ohio instituted same-day voter registration and an early voting window effective this year. Doing so has created a serious problem for John McCain (R) since his campaign doesn't have the infrastructure, organization, or enthusiasm to take advantage of this opportunity, particularly among college students.' 8/16
Believe it or not, Faro...this dink is a real wingbat...follow the link to its "blog." We destroyed him so badly over there that he finally gave up and deleted the comments...since then, he's followed us around like a beaten puppy trying to get its self esteem back...boy, you're right about the buttons ...all we have to do is make a statement like the one I just made and he'll go into the most laughable, desperate, little macho mutt screed you can imagine...wait for it...1..........2..............3.........
Insane wingbats are going blood thirsty all over the place...desperation and frustration over veeeeeeeeeeery early demise of the permanent Fourth Reich Majority...
Death Threats Against Obama and 'Traitorous Liberals' Posted On Right-Wing O'Reilly Contributor's Web site 8/16
The Tragic Arkansas Shooting and Conservative Hate Speech
Posted by Steven D., Booman Tribune at 3:52 PM on August 14, 2008.
Conservatives have long called for the heads of prominent liberals. Looks like they got their wish. Post Tools
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I've waited to make my first comments about the murder of the Chair of Arkansas' Democratic Party. I wanted to make sure that there was no personal connection between the shooter and Bill Gwatney, and apparently there wasn't one. Instead, there are some initial eerie similarities between the shooter Timothy Dale Johnson, and the man who massacred members of the Unitarian church in Knoxville, Tennessee last month. Both, for example had just lost their jobs, and both were very, very angry about that fact:
Wreaths and flowers lined the sidewalk in front of Arkansas' Democratic Party headquarters Thursday while police and others tried to explain why a man who lost his job at a Target store drove more than 30 miles and fatally shot the party's chairman.
Until Wednesday morning, when he wrote profanity-laced graffiti on a store wall, Timothy Dale Johnson had been a good employee in a stockroom, a Target spokeswoman said.
Johnson apparently lived alone and had never married. Under most circumstances he probably would have continied this isolated, but not all together unproductive life. He probably had certain emotional difficulties with people. According to neighbors he kept to himself, yet was considered a model employee at target. Yet, after losing his job, the first action he decided to take was to murder a prominent liberal and Democrat, much like Jim David Adkisson decided to take his rage and anger at his personal situation out on the "liberal" church in Knoxville. Both chose to use firearms to murder innocent people they did not know personally. It is logical to assume that they both chose their targets to make a statement. Indeed, we know for a fact that Adkisson, the church shooter, wrote a specific hate filled manifesto detailing his reasons for targeting the most prominent "liberal" church in Knoxville for his massacre.
I don't think it is a coincidence that within a few weeks, another disturbed individual who had lost his job (at least by his own perception -- Target is denying they terminated him), chose to shoot someone associated with "liberals" and "Democrats." The right wing bloggers and talk show hosts can deny their complicity in these "random" actions, and, indeed, legally they are not responsible for the criminal actions of a few "rogue" individuals. However, their writings and commentary, widely disseminated has spread a culture where violence against liberals, Democrats, feminists, gays, blacks, immigrants, Muslims and any other out group is frequently expressed as "comedy" or in fantasies of wish fulfillment. They can claim all they like that they cannot be held accountable for the aura of hatred they have engendered in American society, but their protestations ring hollow.
People too young to have lived through the Civil Rights era might not remember that much of the same hate speech was prominent among conservative, racist and nativist circles. The result was a wave of violent attacks on prominent liberals and activists, and I am not just referring to the Kennedy brothers and Dr King. A whole host pf people were murdered by those who felt entitled to take the lives of those who threatened their political ideology. The bombings in Birmingham, church burnings, Medgar Evers assassination and many other acts of violence.
Since the rise of talk radio and Fox News in the 1990's we have seen the slaughter of hundreds of people at the Murrah Federal building in Oklahoma City by individuals with right wing leanings. We have seen reports of numerous arrests of right wing "terrorists" (though they are never labeled as such in the media or by the Bush administration) who have planned massacres of "illegal immigrants" and other violence. We have experienced another wave of African American church burnings. We have seen numerous murders of gay men and women, where the defendants raise the ludicrous excuse of "gay panic" as a defense for their evil, premeditated killings.
It's past time for members of the the right wing wurlitzer to apologize for their hate speech and to renounce any further use of the language of extermination with respect to their political, religious and ideological adversaries, as well as their demonization of minorities. I don't expect them to do so, but it would be the right thing to do, and aren't they always preaching about how much more moral and decent their movement is compared to us "Leftards' with our evil gay agendas, our eco-terrorists, our traitorous failure to "support the troops" and a myriad of other imagined sins?
All I know is no prominent liberal spokespersons have made the following statements:
"I tell people don't kill all the liberals. Leave enough so we can have two on every campus -- living fossils -- so we will never forget what these people stood for." -- Rush Limbaugh
"I would have no problem with [New York Times editor Bill Keller] being sent to the gas chamber." -- Melanie Morgan
""[T]he day will come when unpleasant things are going to happen to a bunch of stupid liberals and it's going to be very amusing to watch." -- Lee Rogers
"And if Al Qaeda comes in here and blows you up, we're not going to do anything about it. We're going to say, look, every other place in America is off limits to you, except San Francisco. You want to blow up the Coit Tower? Go ahead." -- Bill O'Reilly
"Howard Dean should be arrested and hung for treason or put in a hole until the end of the Iraq war!"-- Michael Reagan
"Some liberals have become even too crazy for Texas to execute, which is a damn shame. They're always saying -- we're oppressed, we're oppressed so let's do it. Let's oppress them." -- Ann Coulter
"We need somebody to put rat poisoning in Justice Stevens' creme brulee. ... That's just a joke, for you in the media." -- Ann Coulter
My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times Building." -- Ann Coulter
"We need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals, by making them realize that they can be killed too." -- Ann Coulter
And Joe Wilson has no right to complain. And I think people like Tim Russert and the others, who gave this guy such a free ride and all the media, they're the ones to be shot, not Karl Rove. -- Rep. Peter King (R)
Where does George Soros have all his money? Do you know? Do you know where George Soros, the big left-wing loon who's financing all these smear [web]sites, do you know where his money is? Curaçao. Curaçao. They ought to hang this Soros guy. -- Bill O'Reilly
"Has there ever been a more revealing moment this year?" Mr. Rove asked. "Let me just put this in fairly simple terms: Al Jazeera now broadcasts the words of Senator Durbin to the Mideast, certainly putting our troops in greater danger. No more needs to be said about the motives of liberals." -- Karl Rove
Miller is not alone, though some are more sanguine when it comes to evaluating the roster of contenders. Here's a note I got recently from a friend and former Delta Force member, who has been observing American politics from the trenches: "These bastards like Clark and Kerry and that incipient ass, Dean, and Gephardt and Kucinich and that absolute mental midget Sharpton, race baiter, should all be lined up and shot." -- Kathleeen Parker
Right now, even people sitting on the fence would like George Bush to drop a nuclear weapon on an Arab country. They don't even care which one it would be. I can guarantee you -- I don't need to go to Mr. Schmuck [pollster John] Zogby and ask him his opinion. I don't need anyone's opinion. I'll give you my opinion, because I got a better stethoscope than those fools. It's one man's opinion based upon my own analysis. The most -- I tell you right now -- the largest percentage of Americans would like to see a nuclear weapon dropped on a major Arab capital. They don't even care which one. They'd like an indiscriminate use of a nuclear weapon.
In fact, Christianity has been one of the great salvations on planet Earth. It's what's necessary in the Middle East. Others have written about it, I think these people need to be forcibly converted to Christianity but I'll get here a little later, I'll move up to that. It's the only thing that can probably turn them into human beings. ... Because these primitives can only be treated in one way, and I don't think smallpox and a blanket is good enough incidentally. Just before -- I'm going to give you a little precursor to where I'm going. Smallpox in a blanket, which the U.S. Army gave to the Cherokee Indians on their long march to the West, was nothing compared to what I'd like to see done to these people, just so you understand that I'm not going to be too intellectual about my analysis here in terms of what I would recommend, what Doc Savage recommends as an antidote to this kind of poison coming out of the Middle East from these non-humans. -- Michael Savage
Funny, but I have never heard of Michael Moore or Phil Donahue or Keith Olbermann or Al Franken or Nancy Pelosi or Barack Obama or Dennis Kucinich or Howard Dean or (name your favorite liberal here) making public statements recommending the murder of of conservatives, media figures, politicians, or judges. They blame us for 9/11 and Katrina but as Jesus said: And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
That's a pretty big beam, my conservative friends. Start doing something about it before we see any more innocent people killed.
"Obama's Biggest Advantage Yet: Early Voting:...particularly among college students."
Right. The Britney and Paris crowd.
"Anonymous" said:
"Believe it or not, Faro...this dink is a real wingbat..."
The Origin of "Wingbat":
Lefty loons were called moonbats FIRST.
The copycatting loons came back with "wingnuts."
However, "wingnut" has a practical denotation and connotations (e.g. it holds things together), and "moonbats" sounds a lots worse, so, pathetically plagiarising in spiteful overdrive, "wingnuts" became "wingbats."
(Which still sounds better than "moonbats," anyway).
Mimickry (as well as "I-Know-You-Are-But-What-Am-I" projection) is an important survival tool of the moonbat.
They'll even wear a flag-pin they once mocked if it'll help them blend in with the normal, patriotic people they also mock but need the support of in a democracy to gain power (because normal patriotic people--i.e. "wingnuts"-- greatly outnumber them).
"...follow the link to its 'blog.'"
Go ahead. I dare ya.
"We destroyed him so badly over there that he finally gave up and deleted the comments..."
She's lying. All they did was import Kool Aid, insult my guests, and threaten me with persistent harrassment (pretty much the same thing you see here). They got pummeled and humiliated for it.
Then I got bored and decided to exterminate them like cockroaches.
They kept trying to get back in but they had about as much luck as an al Qaeda terrorist trying to sneak past Marines to get into the liberated Iraq.
Just like the terrorists, it got to the point where one of them had to dispatch their dim-witted little brother to keep cut-&-pasting in the hopes of wearing me out (because the elder sibling already was), as the big-mouthed little brat blurted.
He gave up trying after 2-3 days.
The historical revisionism (i.e. lies): "We destroyed him so badly over there..."
Right. The grapes are sour.
"since then, he's followed us around like a beaten puppy trying to get its self esteem back..."
That's a lie. I invaded your little terrorist cell here first and sent fathead, boil, Swiftie, monkeyboy, Blossom, suze, lana/"larry" and Ava running.
They followed ME back to my blog trying to get THEIR self-esteem back, fully confident that their sleazy tactic of trying to overwhelm and "shout down" the Right would work.
It didn't. They left there, too, and are now nowhere to be seen--except as "anonymous" masked terrorists blowing themselves up with shoddy i.e.d.s.
Meanwhile, I'm still here. And so's Republicus.
And there's nothing you can do about it.
"boy, you're right about the buttons ...all we have to do is make a statement like the one I just made and he'll go into the most laughable, desperate, little macho mutt screed you can imagine...wait for it...1..........2..............3........."
Idjoot.
Finally, you sniveling, sleazy little tool, you writheing worm, you lying sack of shit, you blow your little tin-horns across the blogosphere because of the two murderers who killed the Unitarians and the Arkansas Democrat, trying to connect them to conservatism as if they represent some "Culture of Corruption" bred by the Right-Wing.
Meanwhile:
"Chicago's murder total topped those of all U.S. cities last year. More significantly, Chicago's murder rate -- total homicides divided by the population of 2.9 million -- was the highest of the nine U.S. cities with populations above 1 million.
Chicago's murder total topped those of all U.S. cities last year. More significantly, Chicago's murder rate -- total homicides divided by the population of 2.9 million -- was the highest of the nine U.S. cities with populations above 1 million."
Those ain't conservatives doing the killing, I'd wager.
Looks like someone's "communuity organizing" in Chicago has made Chicago a much more dangerous place to live in than Bush's community organizing in Baghdad.
Go back to hell, imp.
It's August.
It's early.
But for Democrats, it's over.
Over. Done. Fini.
At the risk of sounding like I've snapped...allow me this snap judgment.
The Democrats have just lost the presidency this week.
For them, a horrible week.
So horrible...so discombobulated. So inconsistently communicated and messaged, that they've lost their message.
And I think, this election too.
Because here's the deal as we end this week, my friends.
The Dems...are done.
I know. Laugh all you want. And I will conveniently destroy this message in the event I'm wrong.
But here's why I don't think I am.
During this crucial defining period that brought a Russian bear out of hibernation and a befuddled Nancy Pelosi into drilling reality...allow me to drill home this point.
Democrats lost a lot of mojo this week, their only saving grace that it's an August week.
I don't think that will save them.
Not when Russia threatens a new Cold War and the best their presumptive nominee can do is offer hope warring parties could put aside their hostilities...
While his opponent calls Russia what it clearly was and is: a bully. And a bully that must be dealt with.
And if his presidential metal wasn't tested enough...Barack Obama caves to Hillary Clinton and allows a roll call vote. He's doing it for all good and decent reasons. But nothing good or decent will come of it....her supporters still don't flip over him, no matter what he does to accommodate them.
He's given Hillary a prime time speech. Bill a prime time speech. Chelsea a prime time speech. Is Sox the Cat still around?
My god, who won this damn thing? Show some backbone, man!
Then in the middle of the week Obama's economic team comes out with this grand explanation of a tax cut package that reminds all again...not of cuts promised for the middle class...but serious hikes for those who don't much consider themselves above middle class.
And charges again that these new numbers "still" don't add up as we explored on this very show.
On the very same week Nancy Pelosi read the furor among her own members and decided to backtrack on that no-drilling vote thing.
Not good things for a party that said it would lead the charge.
It shouldn't be this way...with the slowing economy, democrats should be running away.
But they look weak on a military crisis.
Inconsistent on an economic crisis.
And impotent on their own brewing political convention crisis.
Things change. Tides ebb and flow.
But I think we will look back to this week in August as the time the party that had it all in the bag...just puked in it.
With the release of a 40-page “Unfit for Publication” report attacking Jerome Corsi’s new book, The Obama Nation, it should be obvious that the media-backed presidential candidate, Barack Obama, is terrified of having his carefully concealed communist and foreign connections exposed to public view.
However, the Obama campaign’s attack on Corsi’s book and Corsi personally acknowledges on pages 9 and 10 of its report that the mysterious “Frank” in Obama’s 1995 book, Dreams From My Father, is in fact the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) member Frank Marshall Davis. This identification by AIM and others hasn’t been disputed by the media, which has desperately tried to ignore the Obama-Davis relationship, but the Obama campaign has not responded to it until now.
The admission that Obama’s mentor was Frank Marshall Davis, an identified CPUSA member, can only add to growing public concern about Obama’s relationship with a Communist pawn of Moscow who was the subject of security investigations by the FBI and various congressional committees which examined Soviet activities in the U.S.
According to these official documents, cited first by AIM and also by Corsi in his book, Davis was a secret CPUSA member who became a member of an underground communist apparatus in Hawaii. As late as the 1970s, Davis was involved with a CPUSA front organization, the American Committee for Protection of Foreign Born, dedicated to keeping foreign communists such as labor leader Harry Bridges from being deported from the U.S. Davis, a friend of Bridges, a secret CPUSA member, became Obama’s mentor during the years 1975-1979.
But the Obama report makes no admission that Davis was a communist and doesn’t dispute anything Corsi documents about Davis’s membership in the Communist Party. Instead, the report picks and chooses from Obama’s book in order to try to put some distance between Obama and Davis. The report attempts to play down instances in which Obama soaks up Davis’s anti-American thoughts and pro-communist “poetry.”
But if the relationship were so innocent, why didn’t Obama identify Frank by his full name in his book and denounce his communist and anti-American views? Why doesn’t he denounce those views now?
At this point, it is clear that Corsi is to Obama what the National Enquirer is to admitted adulterer and liar John Edwards. The Enquirer exposed Edwards secret life when the rest of the media were refusing to investigate the candidate and making fun of the Enquirer.
Bravo.
As our host titled this thread: "Decision Made--McCain Wins."
(though I'm surprised that McCain hasn't talked about the Supreme Court much--nor Chicago's "community organized" record murder rate).
"faro," you mindless zombie. You petty propagandist. You useful idiot. You tried to make some kind of gloating point about Obama's fund-raising abilities (just think how much he can raise if he has the IRS helping him), as if that's some kind of testament to competence and popularity.
What, then, do you have to say about this, dummkopf:
"WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush's popularity has tanked, but boy can he still bring in the cash.
He's raked in close to a billion dollars, the political fundraiser in chief, during his White House tenure.
In all, Bush has personally raised more than $968 million for the Republican Party, GOP candidates and his own re-election campaign and inauguration during his two terms in office. And he's not finished."
You heckling hyenas made Clinton's fund-raising abilities front-page headlines, and giddily celebrated it, and now B. Hussein, too, but mum's the word on Dubya's multi-million dollar ka-chinging.
That's nigh BILLION dollar fund-raising abilities.
Though I just don't understand how both party players can raise so much money from voluntary contributions of the private citizenry when the economy is supposedly bankrupt, destroyed, and even worse than the Great Depression, according to you honest appraisers.
Woooow...like I said...uh one and uh two and uh three...that was about an eight on the Richter scale, John...even more amusing than most. Were you in stroke danger at all before you vented so voluminously and insanely?
You wingbats have got to take yourselves less seriously. Then you'll be able to restrain yourselves from all this frustration fueled murder of the opposition and ILLEGAL hacking ...all of which has serious repercussions for its perpetrators.
If this election is even close, the inability of middle of the road, white voters to overcome their racism will be the reason. That should be apparent even to reduced brain power wingbats when they see the disparities in the congressional and local races, voter reg., fundraising, and party identification.
Of course. "Racism" is why B. Hussein is doing so poorly, the snake hisses.
So predictable.
As is your intellectual unwavering knack for inverted projection.
Racism, fork-tongue, is why B. Hussein is doing so well.
It ain't 95% of whites who are voting for McCain.
It's 95% of blacks who are voting for B. Hussein.
Mum on Chicago being the new Murder Capital of the U.S.A., eh?
Your silence is more voluminous than anything I've said.
And this slithering troll is already preparing to play the race card on everyone who doesn't recognise the Annointed One's reparating entitlement.
Of course, Mondale was discriminated against because he had a woman on the ticket. Dukakis was a swarthy Greek. And Clinton never got 50% of the vote because he was "Too black."
And Kerry lost with the largest turnout of Democrat voters in history (not enough, I'm afraid, for the largest turnout of Republicans) because he was too...too..
Uhhh...Liberal?
Yes. Like Mondale. Like Dukakis. Like Clinton.
And Balack I mean Barack is more liberal than any of them.
So try to understand, "anonymous": "Uh One, uh Two, uh, THREE": Liberalism STINKS like the festering corns on Marx's gnarly feet, and Barack's a liberal, get it?
Conservatives would vote for a black AND a woman rolled up in one in a heartbeat, like Condy Rice, you rabble-rousing snake.
But I suppose Condy doesn't count, because, like every black conservative, she's not REALLY "black" (workin' for The Man and all).
...Unlike, of course, a half-white-half-African National Muslim from Hawaii who went to an Ivy League law school and had to join a militant, racist church in Chicago to get street cred.
Fool.
And Barack's a liar, too. He knows damn well that he was accusing McCain of preparing to exploit race when he said: "He don't look like the other president's on the dollar bills."
Instead of 'fessing up, he said he was talking about his "inexperience with Washington."
Well, if he was telling the truth, he would have had the presence of mind to exploit "the presidents on the bills" to his benefit:
Five Dollar Bill Abe Lincoln's Washington experience was his serving ONE term in the House of Representatives before becoming president (with a hiatus in between).
But it didn't occur to him to compare himself favorably vis-a-vis "Washington Experience" because he was preoccupied by accusing McCain of preparing to contrast him unfavorably vis-a-vis race.
You can't say he was ignorant about Lincoln, becase he used Honest Abe's Illinois roots as a launch pad for his own campaign and cited the similarities as "outsiders" when it suited him to make a favorable comparison.
And there's your proof that when he "explained" that he was talking about "Washington Experience," he LIED.
He was, IN FACT, accusing McCain of preparing to make race an issue (and himself making race an issue in the process).
Obama did well @ Saddleback tonight.
But so did McCain.
hahahahaha...a little too tightly coiled again, today?
hasn't this poor, hag ridden nutcase heard of protesting toooooo much?
see, simp, blacks ALWAYS vote over 90% Democrat...even when thaze all white boys on de ticket...O dasrite, dey gots Condi...and about three other token nigrahz...
i guess he also hasn't heard of the (very rare) exception that proves the rule.
uh wunannatewannathree
push another button on the little weenee
tooo fucking funny
whadda racist dink
Speaking of funny...watch him get all tangled up in the tubes:
AK-Sen: More Trouble for Stevens
by mcjoan
Sat Aug 16, 2008 at 07:01:08 PM PDT
This has been a very bad week for Ted. First there was his sorry fundraising and new evidence against him in his corruption case. Then late in the day yesterday came two more damaging stories.
First, prosecutors released new evidence that there was a quid-pro-quo in his relationship with VECO. While the case is build around the fact that he accepted gifts and failed to disclose them, the new information shows the favors went both ways.
But in new court filings last night, the feds laid out evidence from wiretaps and seized emails to show in detail some favors Stevens allegedly did for the company. Prosecutors made the disclosure in a motion seeking to introduce the information at Stevens' trial set for September.
When Stevens was indicted, the prosecutors were questioned why they weren't making bribery charges and they implied that the statute of limitations had passed, though they didn't say that explicitly. The release of this information, though, does fairly clearly show that this case is about the bribery.
But that wasn't the only bad news for Ted yesterday. In another set of court documents filed Thursday, prosecutors had an e-mail from Stevens to a "Person A," who turned out to be a witness that was to appear before the grand jury.
By mid-May 2007, Stevens learned that Person A had been subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury in D.C. On May 17, 2007, Stevens sent Person A two emails that discussed Person A's upcoming grand jury testimony. In the first email, Stevens told Person A that "I hope we can work something out to make sure you aren't led astray on this occasion."
In the second, Stevens was more explicit: "don't answer questions you don't KNOW the answers to."
Maybe he thought the Tubes wouldn't keep a record of the Internets he sent to try to influence a witness, something the judge in his case is likely to take a rather dim view of.
One of the knocks on Barack Obama is that his résumé is, so to speak, paper-thin. But that is not entirely accurate. Obama, in fact, has held some major job titles which are noteworthy all by themselves: United States Senator, Lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School, Harvard Law Review President-each of these titles puts him in rarefied company. Tack on a few Illinois State Senate terms, and his resume actually appears solid. Yet, in spite of these prestigious positions, Obama has increasingly resorted to making claims of accomplishment that are so patently inflated that even his cheerleaders at CNN and the New York Times are taking notice. Why?
It seems that Obama recognizes that while his résumé titles are impressive, his actual accomplishments are weak. It's as if he were jockeying to be the next company CEO with little to show for his prior high-profile management positions. So, he does what anyone else does who has spent years coasting on charisma without doing any heavy work: he pads his résumé--stretching the truth here, stealing credit there, and creating the illusion of achievement during his lackadaisical, undistinguished tenure in previous jobs.
A few examples? Take Obama's first general election ad. We are told that Obama "passed laws" that "extended healthcare for wounded troops who'd been neglected," with a citation at the bottom to only one Senate bill: The 2008 Defense Authorization Bill, which passed the Senate by a 91-3 vote. Six Senators did not vote-including Obama. Nor is there evidence that he contributed to its passage in any material way. So, his claim to have "passed laws" amounts to citing a bill that was largely unopposed, that he didn't vote for, and whose passage he didn't impact. Even his hometown Chicago Tribune caught this false claim. It's classic résumé-padding--falsely taking credit for the work of others.
Or take one of Obama's standard lines: his claim of "twenty years of public service." As pundit Michael Medved has pointed out, the numbers don't add up. Shall we count? Three years in the US Senate (two of which he's spent running for President), plus seven years in the Illinois State Senate (a part-time gig, during which time he also served as a law professor) equals, at most, ten. Even if we generously throw in his three years as a "community organizer" (whatever that means, let's count it as public service), that still adds up to just thirteen.
Obama's other activities since 1985 have included Harvard Law School, writing two autobiographies (including several months writing in Bali), prestigious summer law firm jobs, three years as an associate at a Chicago law firm, and twelve years part-time on the University of Chicago Law School faculty. As Medved notes, it takes quite the ego to consider any of those stints "public service." Which of them is Obama including?
Obama made yet another inflated boast last month during his visit to Israel. At his press conference in Hamas rocket-bombarded Sderot, Obama talked up "his" efforts to protect Israel from Iran:
"Just this past week, we passed out of the US Senate Banking Committee - which is my committee - a bill to call for divestment from Iran as way of ratcheting up the pressure to ensure that they don't obtain a nuclear weapon." (Emphasis added.)
Nice try. But as even CNN noted, Obama is not even on that committee. That is one peculiar "mistake" to simply have made by accident. Again, his claiming credit for the work of others just looks like clumsy, transparent résumé embellishment.
Would someone with Obama's stellar list of job titles resort to making stuff up? He seems to think he has to. In spite of the many impressive positions he's held, he's done almost nothing with them. If he wants to claim specific, relevant accomplishments, his only resort is to stretching the truth.
Look at his record: he's now completed over half of a Senate term; yet, is there even one signature issue he has taken hold of, other than his own presidential run? Similarly, as the New York Times recently pointed out, Obama spent twelve years on the University of Chicago Law School faculty--singularly famous for its intellectual ferment and incubator of scholarship--and produced not even a single scholarly paper. He was President of Harvard Law Review, but wrote nothing himself. Even as a state legislator for seven years-or community organizer for three years, there is little that shows his imprint. OK, to be fair, he did write two books. About himself.
For all his glowing job titles, Obama has never gotten much done. Is it any wonder that his spokesmen respond with sweeping generalities when asked what Obama has actually accomplished relevant to the presidency?
Obama has held several serious positions from which a serious man could have made a serious impact. But Obama made none. He remains a man of proven charisma, but unproven skill--and not for lack of opportunity. He's treated his offices as if they were high school student council positions-fun to run for, fun to win, affirmations of popularity, heady recognition from superiors, good resume-builders for stepping up to the next position of power, and…well, that's about it-actual accomplishments are not expected; heavy lifting is never on the agenda.
Obama's record of accomplishment is thin not because of lack of opportunity, but in spite of it. For twenty years, Obama has walked the floors of the most prestigious institutions in the nation, but has left no footprints other than those from his runs for whatever office came next.
It's been said that some people want to be President so they can do something; and some want to be President so they can be something. Obama has accomplished nothing noteworthy despite the golden opportunities and positions he's had; why should we believe he'd be a different man in the White House?
No company would hire anyone with Obama's empty track record, pattern of underachievement and padded résumé to be CEO. Is America really ready to hire him as President?
"Anonymous":
Your-- as usual-- overconfident "laaaaanslide!!!" is down the toilet, along with your credibility. So's your "50 state strategy" pipe-dream.
America doesn't want a white man, or a black man, or a woman per se to be president.
That's liberal bullshit.
And they ceertainly don't want someone with the middle-name of "Hussein," for that matter (per se).
They want a person of good character and with a conservative outlook.
It's that simple--albeit a very tall order for liberalism to provide.
Liberalism engenders character with envy, hate, racism, sexism, fascism, deviousness, and an undeserved sense of entitlement.
It enables that by obliterating logic.
The inherent racism and sexism in your vile mindset is blatant in such liberal outfits as N.O.W. and the N.A.A.C.P.
For example, for anyone to set up a shop called NOM (i.e. "The National Organization For Men") or the N.A.A.W.P. ("National Association For The Advancement of White People") would be unthinkable.
That liberals shamelessly allow the equivalents without a second thought is illogical (if not insane).
The only thing you deserve is to lose. Short of some character-altering epiphany by the Grace of God (Who you reject), it's the only logical outcome for your type.
Just try not to break anything or hurt anyone or get arrested on November 8 when your "reality" gets rocked by Reality.
Isn't it amusink how these funny, little semi-people have to spend so many long hours desperately denying their racism and bigotry in all areas of life?
And how they ignore the move to the democratic party in every area and almost every state.
Why do they think the presidential race is such an exception? With the worst crackpot in history as a candidate, they're still in a close race...duuuuuuuuuuuuh....and the other guy's black...
Their part of AmeriKKKa just can't abide the idea of them lil picaninnies on the Whitehouse grounds...unless they belong to the groundskeeper.
What truly sick freaks they are...
So you already see the writing on the wall and falling back to your predictable position: Obama will lose because of endemic racism!
Unfortunately, your credibility has been severely compromised by your erstwhile certitude that Obama will win in a "laaaaaaaanslide!!!!" so why should anyone believe anything that you assert now?
You're full of shit.
And if there is "a move to the democratic party in every area and almost every state" vis-a-vis congressional races, it won't be the first time the nation votes to counterbalance the executive branch by having a legislative branch controlled by the opposite party, naif.
And that has nothing to do with racism, dummy.
Again, the only thing you deserve is to lose. Short of some character-altering epiphany by the Grace of God (Who you reject), it's the only logical outcome for your type.
Just try not to break anything or hurt anyone or get arrested on November 8 when your "reality" gets rocked.
By Reality.
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