stuffed

...and last.

nite.

Have a great move! May things go better than can even be imagined.

why is this story so popular?

Global warming fraud uncovered
http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/147725
Global warming fraud uncovered

It's about the hacked emails from the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, England.

The only fraud I see is their story. Nice pic though.

Which has nothing to do with the story which for them is a day late and a bit short on the research part.

The opening sentence
"Breaking news last week featured in the Wall Street Journal and Fox News has featured the story and ..."

==Any way I found it interesting that it would be so popular this evening on google news.

~`ordinary's just not good enough today - olp`~
Jamesbenet

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/north_east/8380412.stm

A controversial Scottish brewery has launched what it described as the world's strongest beer - with a 32% alcohol content.

Tactical Nuclear Penguin has been unveiled by BrewDog of Fraserburgh.
==
If I remember correctly -it's aged for 16 mos. in 2 different kinds of used whiskey casks and then they take it to a local ice cream factory, freeze it and every few days scrape the ice off. I heard him on npr, he said 'freeze' but it must be kind of a gentle freeze. And that is how the achl. content is raised.

~`ordinary's just not good enough today - olp`~
Jamesbenet

Diplomats: UN watchdog votes to censure Iran's nuclear defiance, urges a stop to enrichment

VIENNA (AP) — In a blow to Iran, the board of the U.N. nuclear agency on Friday overwhelmingly backed a demand from the U.S., Russia, China and three other powers that Tehran immediately stop building its newly revealed nuclear facility and freeze uranium enrichment.

LINK

toniD's Ya Think?

Obama Pushes Lobbyists Off Federal Advisory Boards

Updated: 11-27-09 09:47 AM

In a little-noticed blog post published on the White House website in September, President Obama's special counsel for ethics and government reform Norm Eisen announced that the administration no longer wanted federally-registered lobbyists appointed to agency advisory boards and commissions.

These appointees to boards and commissions, which are made by agencies and not the President, advise the federal government on a variety of policy areas. Keeping these advisory boards free of individuals who currently are registered federal lobbyists represents a dramatic change in the way business is done in Washington.

As has been reported, the President has made a commitment to close the revolving door that has in the past allowed lobbyists and others to move to and from full-time federal government service. In furtherance of this commitment, the President issued Executive Order 13490, which bars anyone appointed by the President who has been a federally-registered lobbyist within the past two years from working on particular matters or in the specific areas in which they lobbied or from serving in agencies they had lobbied. The aspiration we are announcing today builds on this commitment. While the letter of the President's Executive Order on Ethics does not apply to federally-registered lobbyists appointed by agency or department heads, the spirit does and we have conveyed that to the agencies who are responsible for these appointments.

On Friday, the Washington Post reported that the move "may turn out to be the most far-reaching lobbying rule change so far from President Obama," resulting in "hundreds, if not thousands, of lobbyists" being ejected from federal advisory panels.

Not surprisingly, lobby groups, corporations, and other K Street influencers are up in arms.

The reaction from the lobbying community has been swift and overwhelmingly negative. Some of the loudest criticism has come from the Industry Trade Advisory Committees (ITACs), a collection of more than a dozen panels that provide policy advice and technical assistance to the Commerce Department and the U.S. Trade Representative. The ITACs, whose roughly 400 members include at least 130 lobbyists, officials say, have taken the lead in attacking the White House policy as misguided and harmful to U.S. business interests; a letter to Obama from committee chairs last month included executives from Boeing, IBM, Harley-Davidson and International Paper.

"This action will severely undermine the utility of the advisory committee process," the letter read. ". . . The characteristics that make many Advisors valuable to the Administration [are] the same characteristics that are being used to artificially disqualify them from participation in the Committee system."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/27/obama-pushes-lobbyists-of_n_372...

Visually Micheale Salahi reminds me of Ann Coulter
Submitted by nora on Fri, 11/27/2009 - 12:55am.
---------

Submitted by nora on Fri, 11/27/2009 - 10:18pm.
Now that I look as Micheale Salahi and think Ann(Anthony?) Coulter, I see an Adam's apple on Micheale(Michael?) Salahi.

-------

Indeed Nora. That definitely looks like an Adam's Apple on Micheale. Your comparison of her to Ann Coulter is also right-on. However, Coulter's striking hair is a very expensive, lace-front wig.

Just saw the blind side....cried thru the whole damn thing...loved it...go see it!

& thank you for this blog... & thank you for you...
:)

nor want to. :( Well I know which Shows & channel never to watch, again, AFTER MONK...

can take Executives directly from the lobbying corporations and place them into high level cabinet positions....?

ex. Bill Lynn - Raytheon = DepSecDef

Monsanto & CropLife men have no place in government

Despite campaign promises to the contrary, President Obama has nominated to two key posts “Big Ag” industry insiders who come straight from the chemical pesticide and biotechnology sectors. 

Islam Siddiqui -- current VP of science and regulatory affairs at CropLife, and a former lobbyist -- has been nominated to the critical post of U.S. Chief Agricultural Negotiator. This position will enable him to keep pushing chemical pesticides, inappropriate biotechnologies, and unfair trade arrangements on nations that do not want and can least afford them.

Roger Beachy -- long-time head of Monsanto’s defacto nonprofit research arm -- has been installed as director of the USDA’s newly created National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA). This office comes with a $500 million budget, and therein control over the U.S. ag research agenda for years to come.

We need 50,000 signatures! To make this kind of impact, PAN is joining a broad coalition of partner groups from around the country in mobilizing to block Siddiqui's nomination. We join National Family Farm Coalition, Food & Water Watch, Farmworker's Association of Florida, Institute for Agriculture & Trade Policy, Food Democracy Now!, Greenpeace, and Center for Food Safety in calling on President Obama to live up to his promises.

Your name will be added to the following petition, which ends:
"As parents, farmers, advocates, scientists and people who eat food, we remember your promise on the campaign trail:

“We’ll tell ConAgra that it’s not the Department of Agribusiness. It’s the Department of Agriculture. We’re going to put the people’s interests ahead of the special interests.”

We, the undersigned, are writing to hold you to that promise."

Sign the Petition

No, Siddiqui is not a popular guy....unless, of course, you are a Monsanto stock holder.....

You know things are bass-ackwards when a pair of gate crashers can wander into the White House and party with the President....but they will strip search you at the airport just because you have a frown on your face...

Been hearing these radio spots lately from earthsky.org and went to see who they are and they do not appear transparent -- as I saw no way to find a list of their board of directors or their offer to disclose an annual report. They don't seem to be a nonprofit looking for support/contributions from the public, so do they get monetary support from the science industries they talk about? I find the lack of transparency troubling.

I got curious because two of the spots I heard were sort of strange. One seemed to be promoting Monsanto -- those natural seed monopolizing GMO Frankenfood inventors. Another was championing the practice of animal research in schools.

My view is that trustworthy nonprofit entities are proud to tell you who they are, where they get their funds, and who runs them and sits on their staff and board of directors. I know I'm a lousy researcher, but, at the same time, it shouldn't be that hard for so-called communications and science specialists to clearly reveal facts without requiring written requests.

Here's one of their pages about butterfly "research":

http://www.earthsky.org/interviewpost/biodiversity/nancy-moreno-follows-...

I think all this effort and cost would be better put to use preserving habitat and restoring habitat for butterflies, rather than -- just for the sake of curiosity -- seeing how limited, miserable, deformed, dead and without a future butterflies can be in a space station. The project smacks of desensitizing children to vivisection with the cache of space agey props and satellite transmissions. Just plain sad, creepy and wasteful, imo.

Vancouver Extends Corporate No Free Speech Olympic Zone: Amy Goodman Interrogated at Canada Border

Assholes.

The hacked climate science email scandal that wasn't:

http://scienceblogs.com/islandofdoubt/2009/11/hacked_emails_tree-ring_pr...

All the best to Sam and family. Happy moving day.

The Uber-Terrist Amy Goodman held at Canadian Border....
new
Submitted by cent on Sat, 11/28/2009 - 5:26am.
Vancouver Extends Corporate No Free Speech Olympic Zone: Amy Goodman Interrogated at Canada Border

Assholes.
*** ***
DITTO Cent ASSHOLES!!!

*** ***

We got decades of info ... ...
folks have GOT TO STOP believing the fantasy AND start reacting!
AGAIN this is for DEMS & GRNS
rethugs have to grumble amongst themselves -- rethugs are on probation...
they have given us ZERO VOTES, thus who needs them?
Not me!
LIEberman is INVALID.

I CALL FOR SENATE RECOUNCILIATION{sp}, thus WE ONLY NEED 51 VOTES! HARRY R. NEEDS MORE "HELL" bestowed upon him by WTP...ASAP!

I work for phantom of the opera.

Good Morming.

: )

~`ordinary's just not good enough today - olp`~
Jamesbenet

Weekly Tracking Poll: New Feature Paints Ugly 2010 Picture
by Steve Singiser

Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 03:14:05 PM PST

Research 2000 for Daily Kos. 11/22/2009-11/25/2009. All adults. MoE 2% (Last weeks results in parentheses):

--------------- FAVORABLE UNFAVORABLE NET CHANGE
PRESIDENT OBAMA 53 (55) 40 (39) -3

PELOSI: ........ 41 (40)....... 51 (51)..... +1
REID: ........ 31 (32)....... 59 (58)..... -2
McCONNELL: ..... 15 (14)....... 68 (68)..... +1
BOEHNER: ....... 13 (13)....... 66 (65)..... -1

CONGRESSIONAL DEMS: 41 (42)..... 54 (53)..... -2
CONGRESSIONAL GOPS: 14 (13)..... 70 (71)..... +2

DEMOCRATIC PARTY: 43 (44)..... 52 (50)..... -3
REPUBLICAN PARTY: 24 (23)..... 66 (67)..... +2

Full crosstabs here.
http://www.dailykos.com/weeklypoll/2009/11/25

This poll is updated every Friday morning, and you can see trendline graphs here.
http://www.dailykos.com/weeklytrends

There is a little bit that one can divine from the numbers above. The President's numbers continue to soften (a trajectory that has been confirmed by numerous other pollsters). Meanwhile, on balance, this is a weak tracking poll for Democrats and a strong one for Republicans. The exception to the rule is in the House leadership, where Nancy Pelosi continues her recent resurgence (with a seventeen point bump in her net favorability in less than two months). At the same time, John Boehner continues looking for the basement with his numbers, which drop a point today to a net minus 53 favorability. On the Congressional ballot test, the margin narrows incrementally, with the Democrats now staked to a five point advantage (37 to 32).

Two numbers, however, which are not listed in the graphic above ought to give the Democratic Party no shortage of concern.

The first indicator of potential peril is the right track-wrong track metric. With each passing day, the mood of the nation is going to be reflected on the current political leadership in Washington DC, rather than the transgressions and incompetencies of the past leadership. And the mood of the nation appears to be darkening, rather than growing more optimistic. After a meteoric rise in the opening few months of the new Obama adminstration, the RT/WT metric now sits at its worst level in months (-17: 40/57).

But a bigger indicator of peril comes from a new survey question added the DK tracking poll for the first time this week. The poll now includes a rather simple indicator of baseline voter enthusiasm for the year 2010. The question offered to respondents is a simple question about their intentions for 2010:

QUESTION: In the 2010 Congressional elections will you definitely vote, probably vote, not likely vote, or definitely will not vote?

The results were, to put it mildly, shocking:

Voter Intensity: Definitely + Probably Voting/Not Likely + Not Voting

Republican Voters: 81/14
Independent Voters: 65/23
DEMOCRATIC VOTERS: 56/40

Two in five Democratic voters either consider themselves unlikely to vote at this point in time, or have already made the firm decision to remove themselves from the 2010 electorate pool. Indeed, Democrats were three times more likely to say that they will "definitely not vote" in 2010 than are Republicans.

This enormous enthusiasm gap, as well as some polling analysis done by PPP (and analyzed well here by Nate Silver), seems to make passing legitimate health care reform an absolute political necessity for Democrats. This polling data certainly should be something for Congressional leadership to consider, as they move along the legislative path.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/11/27/808503/-Weekly-Tracking-Pol...
toniD's Ya Think?

The Biggest Dem Scandal You've Never Heard Of
Justin Elliott | November 27, 2009, 9:00AM

Three years after Dems rode Nancy Pelosi's promise to "drain the swamp" to a congressional majority, a potentially big scandal has been simmering that threatens to cause problems for the party going into the 2010 midterms.

It's a story involving what was one of D.C.'s biggest lobbying firms (until it was raided by the Feds and closed up shop), several powerful Democratic appropriators, and the defense industry. And it appears to be considerably more serious that the allegations of financial misconduct that have dogged Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY) -- allegations that have gotten the lion's share of press coverage focusing on ethical transgressions.

A federal criminal investigation has touched two House Dems, and another three, along with two Republicans, are under scrutiny by a pair of congressional ethics panels in matters related to the defunct lobbying firm, PMA Group.

The investigation appears to have two focal points, according to reports: that PMA may have funneled sham donations to members of Congress through so-called "straw donors" who would be reimbursed, and that there may have been a quid pro quo, exchanging defense earmarks for campaign donations.

PMA's lobbying activities centered on winning earmarks doled out by the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, chaired by John Murtha of Pennsylvania. It was founded in the late 1980s by a former Murtha aide on the committee, Paul Magliocchetti. And it was staffed over the years by ex-aides for Murtha, Rep. Pete Visclosky (D-IN), and Rep. James Moran (D-VA).

TPMmuckraker has kept a close eye on the case. Major newspaper editorial boards have voiced their concerns. The Times and the Post have each done solid reporting. So why, at this point, nine months after the FBI raid appeared in the news, aren't we hearing more about this? Why hasn't it stuck?

It's probably a combination of factors: the infrequent media leaks from the Feds; the complexity and diffuseness of the case; and the lack of a single high-profile figure who is the focus of investigators.

It's not for lack of color that the story hasn't taken off. Like many Washington influence peddlers, Magliocchetti was a boisterous figure known for wooing lawmakers with fancy meals and booze. His wine locker at the Capital Grille steakhouse was famously labeled "Mags."

The FBI raided PMA's offices last November, and its top lobbyists scattered after the episode became public (the Feds have also reportedly raided Magliocchetti's home). The firm went under this spring.

The amounts of money involved -- including plenty of taxpayer dollars -- are staggering. Seven lawmakers who are under scrutiny by two House ethics panels steered $200 million to PMA clients in the past two years, according to watchdog groups.

What kind of projects was the money for? This year, some of PMA's former clients received federal contracts for "next-generation precision-airdrop capabilities" and "submarine navigation decision aids."

The lawmakers received fistfuls of cash from PMA and its clients over the years -- reportedly $1.75 million to Murtha alone over the past three election cycles. And, the Washington Post recently noted, PMA's services didn't come cheap:

While lawmakers received generous contributions, PMA used its growing influence with the panel over the past decade to become one of the top 10 lobby shops in Washington and took in $114 million in lobbying fees, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a watchdog group.

Besides Murtha, the other lawmaker who appears most entangled with PMA is a little-known Democrat from Indiana named Peter Visclosky. A friend of Murtha who is also a member of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, he has been subpoenaed for documents in the probe, and his legal bills are soaring.

PMA isn't yet the Dems' Jack Abramoff, but it is certainly worth following closely. We plan to do just that.

http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/11/pma_group_biggest_demo...

toniD's Ya Think?

Stop The Injustice: Free Gary McKinnon
Jane Smiley

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-smiley/stop-the-injustice-free-g_b_37...

If you read the Guardian, then you know already that the screaming injustice that is about to be perpetrated on English computer hacker Gary McKinnon has taken another step toward the cruel and unusual. McKinnon is a 43-year-old man from North London who, in 2001 and 2002, hacked into US military computers, looking for evidence of visitors from other planets. He was extremely successful, not only because he was a smart guy, but also because, as he said in messages left on the victim computers, "Your security is crap." McKinnon, as one might assume of a guy who spends his time in his room looking for evidence of space aliens, has been diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome. He is terrified of coming to the US and being thrown into a high security American prison for sixty years. As well he should be. American officials have reassured his mother that he will be taken care of -- but hey, you know how reliable American officials are about taking care of the vulnerable, don't you? No wonder McKinnon is said to be suicidal.

But the mental illness does not belong to Gary McKinnon, it belongs to the US military, which has pursued McKinnon ruthlessly in order to punish and destroy him. They should have pursued him in order to hire him because, guess what? Their security was crap. He cost them $700,000! About one fifth the price of a nice apartment in Manhattan. Nothing! A day's pay for Blackwater! If they had hired McKinnon as a consultant, they might have learned something, and improved both their security and their international relations.

In Britain, the media dogs are barking because the English government has gone along with extraditing McKinnon like the sick puppies they are -- Iraq? Sure! You have no reason to invade? Well, make one up, we'll help ya! So even while the Iraq inquiry is going on, they are allowing the US to drag this guy kicking and screaming to the exact place where he most fears going.

You've got to ask yourself why the US thinks this is a big deal. It's because they don't care as much about security as they do about humiliation and embarrassment. Now that's what I call mental illness! We'll show this helpless little guy what the might of the US feels like! We can't win a war to save out lives, no matter how we try, but we sure can drive a guy with Asperger's to suicide. The US government from Obama on down should being falling over themselves to show this guy some mercy and put him on the payroll (he can work from home). But no. Why do people hate us? Well, take a look.

And do please sign the petition. http://freegary.org.uk/

Scoring an invitation to a White House state dinner is the height of social relevancy in Washington, so we thought we'd comb through the 300 plus guest list for Tuesday night's confab honoring India for K Street connections.
We could only find one obvious registered lobbyist on the list -- former Rep. Tom Downey, D-N.Y., and chair of lobbying firm Downey McGrath Group. Downey is also married to Carol Browner, chair of the White House Office of Energy and Climate Change Policy, who was invited to the dinner. She brought her husband as her guest.

Vernon Jordan, senior counsel at top law and lobbying firm Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer & Feld, was also on the guest list. Jordan however, isn't a registered lobbyist. His wife Ann was invited to the dinner.
On the list were also a few fundraisers for President Obama's presidential campaign. They included Mark Gorenberg, who helped round up money in Silicon Valley for Obama and Brian Mathis, a New York financier with Provident Group.
Labor unions were also a key support of Obama's campaign. Three guests from that world included Andy Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union, Anna Burger, chair of Change To Win and Richard Trumpka, president of the AFL-CIO.
Of course, Hollywood types were also invited. They included director Steve Spielberg, Michael Lynton, CEO of Sony Pictures, Jeffrey Katzenberg, CEO of DreamWorks Animation, and billionaire David Geffen. (National Journal colleague Jim Barnes notes that Geffen, Katzenberg and Spielberg all held an early and important Hollywood fundraiser for Obama in February 2007 just as the campaign kicked off. It was also there that Geffen said some snarky things to columnist Maureen Dowd about then candidate Hillary Clinton. We noticed that Geffen was not seated at Clinton's table for the state dinner. Hmmm)
Two other well known business types on the guest list: John Doerr, partner at Silicon Valley venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Jeffrey Immelt, CEO of General Electric. Both have been making big investments in green technology, a key issue of Obama's.
http://undertheinfluence.nationaljournal.com/

Ask your insurance company, "Whose God?"

I guess this "Act of God" clause proves ours is a Christian nation???

God must be really busy keeping track of all the accidents on his daily calendar....

That was pretty...um...dare I say it...

Funny (??)

;) :P

Just heard a spokesperson of United Poultry Concerns explain factory farmers' treatment of Turkeys. And it is torturous life for the birds, and a torturous death.

http://www.upc-online.org/

People want to see you. Come back and pay a visit here. I promise I won't harass you sexually anymore. :} :P

I will go through sensitivity training if I need to...

Not with you as the instructor...that would be a waste of time but...

With somebody. :)

I'd say something about the sequencing of those nora posts.

But I'm not so I won't. :)

And,many more !

**

Open mic:

http://www.samsedershow.com/node/5510

**
Ms_A has one too..

It's pretty cool.. :)

http://samsedershow.com/node/5509

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

I was gonna save this for the Ono but,
he hasn't been around lately..

http://hypem.com/#/track/964493/Oh+No+Ono+-+Internet+Warrior

*It kinda sounds like ABBA on Acid ! ;)

**

Read post & Video:

http://www.fensepost.com/main/2009/11/25/oh-no-ono-swim-video/

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

afterwards... the more whatever...
I told YOU - if you bloody well ever LOOKED. AIR-O
AIR-ONO you CUSPY DUDE ... I POSTED 2 U *
I Posted 2 U... COME BACK NOW ... I MISS U IN THE MIDDLE OF MY NIGHT - YOUR DAY...

IF U ONLY KNEW...
Get you dear sweet Aussie Ass back Here NOW!

CHEERS

;-)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

It a bright, sunny 43F.

Submitted by gloryoski on Fri, 11/27/2009 - 3:32pm.
Wow edna...
But they are human beings and, even if you don't care about that..
Also, I wonder why you feel it necessary to introduce irrelevancies like the physical appearance or presumed sexual behavior of those you don't like

------------------

It’s not that I don’t care about the south; after all, it’s where I was born. However, I’m tired of being held hostage to their ignorance. The only reason their narrative is echoed over ours- is they are supporters of corporate America. If the Klan preferred socialism over capitalism, they would have been smashed into oblivion a long time ago. Instead, they were welcomed to mainstream society. Let’s not forget that two of our Supreme Court justices were once members of the Klan.

My use of hyperbole when describing the right is mainly out of frustration. Sorry Glo, I love ya, but I have no plans to stop. As I've said, I have little sympathy for them. After all, their ignorance always lead to violence. The killings at the Unitarian Church come to mind. Here is a man, whose hatred of liberals was so intense- that he shot up a church. This as children performed. Then, there was George Tiller. Again, a killer walks in to a church and blows away a doctor. His crime, well, he assisted women in the practice of their constitutional rights.

Since the early nineties numerous murders have been committed by Right-Wingers. Their target, well, people like us! The Oklahoma Bombing, the Olympic Park Bombing, Matthew Shepherd, and James Byrd are a few of terror campaigns carryout by these nuts. And if you’ve heard the vicious rhetoric that is spew each day on conservative radio, there will be more.

--
Oh! About the sex talk. My post about the South’s high rate of sexual transmitted diseases was about hypocrisy. Since it’s the Bible belt, it was meant to be funny.

:-)

Sorry,Glory..Love ya both.. :)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

toniD's Ya Think?

More later...maybe. I'm not feeling very nuancey right now, at least not that way, cuz I'm in the middle of several pages of incredibly hot sex scenes written by my incredibly kewl profesora.

Sorry, no English verson...yet. ;)

Hi Uncle Maury! Please send money!

And weed!

Especially the weed!

I gave an example as to why NO NEED TO MURDER. IF ONE NEEDS MEAT, then know chicken & turkey CAN BE MADE INTO TASTING LIKE OTHER MEATS. I just want all to STOP &
HONOUR & GIVE THEM (4 now, Chicken & Turkey ONLY - & treat them as SACRED FOOD (food 4 now) whilst making that transition).
I did the EXACT TRANSITION ... IMMEDIATELY {if not sooner}
give chickens & turkeys a MOST HONOURABLE LIFE & DEATH!

With no cows nor Lambs nor Pigs ... we would have "much land" for the chickens & turkeys ... we need to grow HEMP so we can hire more Chicken/Turkey True Care Givers... One day to have "replicators"(sp?) as in Star Trek.
:D
BWTF

Sara Watkins - Long Hot Summer Day - Live

http://hypem.com/#/track/942036/Sara+Watkins+-+Long+Hot+Summer+Day

And,folks here having to deal with Winter..

Is it summer yet ? ;)

It's coming.. :)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

plus for some reason the next page is blurry.

Reload...

http://hypem.com/#/track/966096/The+Weepies-All+that+I+Want

A pretty voice & tune.. :)

**

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

;D

{maybe 9:00AM} SUNDAY ... on USA Channel ...
:):(

"It's A Jungle Out There"

http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/iVKCge9LK2s/-White-House-...

Conrad and his new bipartisan "gang" which includes Evan Bayh, Diane Feinstein, Joe Lieberman, and Mark Warner want to cede essential power over to this commission for writing tax law by creating a new permanent Senate rule, that any legislation created by it would be subject to an up-or-down vote; it could not be amended. Note that none of this gang is demanding that critical legislation like healthcare reform not be subject to cloture rules.

it. ;)

Saturday, November 28, 2009

EXCERPT:

"So, basically, what we're doing here is if we say that we recognize the unborn as persons, then a woman's right to choose or a right to privacy doesn't matter (just like) she doesn't have a right to kill her child after it's born," Kurka said.

The ballot measure he's sponsored seeks to put in law that "all human beings, from the beginning of their biological development as human organisms, including the single-cell embryo ... shall be recognized as legal persons in the state of Alaska."

Here we go again. This 22 year old kid, Christopher Kurka (A Mike Huckabee supporter in the last election), is introducing an initiative that will inflame the passions of the church going sheeple who receive their information about reproduction from the pulpit instead of the science book. And they will of course turn out en masse to defend the rights of a potentially Christian microorganism.

The idea of a single cell being considered a human being would be laughable if it were not so potentially destructive to the rights of women. Look EVERY SINGLE CELL IN YOUR BODY is a potential human being.

con't

http://theimmoralminority.blogspot.com/

http://www.adn.com/news/government/legislature/abortion/story/1031558.ht...

sam...hello all you out there

Why Aren't You Morons Showing The UCLA vs USC Game Today ? !

At Least In The So.Cal Market !

Let NBC televise the stupid Notre Dame vs Stanford game ! !
Notre Dame has a deal with NBC anyways..

Who Wants To See Stanford Run All Over Notre Dame ?
Except Bay Area Folks ?

No Wonder ABC Is Half Dead !
ESPN,Here's A Quarter,Now Go Buy A Clue !

From:One Very Unhappy Bruin Fan !

It's Good To Vent.. :)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

$20 MILLIONS???!

Sheesh.

What does this over-priced, over-commercialized college football have to do with genuine higher education anyway?

Looks to me like today's college football is just a place for training the pros for the pro teams. And the pro teams seem to be no more than the Oligarchy's hobby, like a hold-over from the gladitorial games, feeding many other profit centers like gambling/betting, alcohol sales and marketing, and the war industry (which requires a chest-thumping macho subculture (possibly purposely alienated from the conscious pursuit of nurturing ways?)). So, it boils down to bread and circuses like Romans, since it serves the oligarchical purposes mostly -- profit, distraction of the masses, displacement of social priorities (commercialized sports over higher ed, sitting around with the tube getting fat and plastered over getting out and actually enjoying a sports activity), and social engineering of priorities (macho brute force, the cult of winning over cooperation).

Sorry, that $20 million just irks me. It is such a symptom of how weirder this continues to get.

Sorry.

MRules, U know of the Monk Marathon starting {I think} at 8:00AM
Submitted by Ms_Anthrope on Sat, 11/28/2009 - 3:53pm.
{maybe 9:00AM} SUNDAY ... on USA Channel ...
:):(

"It's A Jungle Out There"

*******

I've been hearing about it..I thought I might have missed it..

First Opus now Monk ! Waaaaaaaaaaaa ! !

Why does everything I like get retired ? Suck !

Sorry,Ms_A..I'm still venting abit..

Deep breathes,Deep breathes.. ;)

**

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Submitted by nora on Sat, 11/28/2009 - 5:14pm.

What does this over-priced, over-commercialized college football have to do with genuine higher education anyway?

*******

;-) Just kidding Nora.. :)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Happy Bidet Sam!

http://hypem.com/#/track/965981/Joni+Mitchell-Harry%27s+House+--+Centerp...

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

I have Sara Watkins doing John Hartford's Long Hot Summer Days. I even have Hartford doing Hartford's Long Hot Summer Days. I like dem river songs.

I applaud u my friend... many more :)

good luck with the move

Happy Birthday Sam

http://dilettanteville.wordpress.com/2007/07/26/sam-seder-interviewed-in...

~`ordinary's just not good enough today - olp`~
Jamesbenet

"What does this over-priced, over-commercialized college football have to do with genuine higher education anyway?"

It's all about the MONEY!

Do you believe that great things are fantastic?

If so....this link is SO for you.

(thank me later)

http://www.hulu.com/watch/1487/saturday-night-live-tony-bennett

never watch Psych nor Burn Notice nor White Collar nor any of the other "new" shows they are plugging & I had on (in background to show when some one no longer watches..) U R in my ol' "stomp'n" grounds, correct? CUZ USA channel will be hearing from me this week! grrr

I will probably "sleep thru the morning" MONK, but I have hopes to NOT! I missed so very much MONK, in the past, since I barely turned on TV... NOW on, to "show" my votes".

MONK {u prob know} is a reshow on ch. NBC ...
"It's A Jungle Out There"

..more clips from Shannyn's local TV show

it looks like Crank has bragging rites over Annette..

Missouri beat Kansas..

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

he must be a liberal.....

of the Stanford v Notre Dame game.

PUKE.

It is beyond comprehension that a person who swore to uphold the Constitution but sat in the White House basement (or somewhere official) and decided the TORTURES with which to subject human beings -- that person is STILL allowed to participate in society as if she did nothing out of the ordinary. Is there a message in that -- like the Constitution is now in reality a worthless document and nothing but window dressing for the Military Industrial Complex/Militarist-Fascist-Imperialist administrators operating from the shadows/shadow government?

Are we ever going to make some headway to end the duplicity and cruelty of these scammers, profiteers, and predators?!

Condasleaza Vice I mean Rice flipped the coin at the start
new
Submitted by nora on Sat, 11/28/2009 - 8:23pm.
of the Stanford v Notre Dame game.
PUKE.
*******

Kiss My Irish Ass !

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

does anybody know if ronnie spector ever sang stay with jackson browne?

Maybe in concert.. ?

Have you tried Sir Google ?

That's a Good song..I always thought it was David Linley who was the one who sang the falsetto on that song..
But,there's a good chance that I'm wrong..

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

nora
Submitted by smcgee43 on Sat, 11/28/2009 - 6:38pm.
"What does this over-priced, over-commercialized college football have to do with genuine higher education anyway?"

It's all about the MONEY!

*******

The NCAA only cares about the Benjamins..

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Just press the arrows to play..

http://captainsdead.com/rolling-stones-live-in-perth-australia-2.24.73.h...

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

http://www.buy.com/prod/dreams-come-true-live/q/loc/109/60174119.html

but I have the feeling that's probably not what you had in mind.

----

Have you met Sir/Miss Google? (Reminds me of a song...)

These are some really great historical photo's, I love the one at the great wall.
___

Behind The Scenes White House Photos: Asia Visit, Great Wall Trip

First Posted: 11-28-09 03:10 PM | Updated: 11-28-09 03:26 PM

The White House has released new behind-the-scenes photos from President Obama's recent trip to Asia. See him tour the Great Wall, participate in a noodle-making demonstration, hold a baby, and more.

The pictures are at the link below, you can vote on your favorite:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/28/behind-the-scenes-white-h_n_372...

7 Foot Amazon Woman Modeling Shoot

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJhne91P2i0&feature=player_embedded

Did she say she was going somewhere this weekend?

Haven't seen since this morning.

I was just thinking that that 7 foot amazon model would be a great woman to run against Sarah Palin. She sure could beat her at any physical activity. :)

Can she dribble a Basketball ?

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Cool inside stuff that happened in the CIA, Amazing!

*

CIA secrets revealed -- like magic

November 27, 2009 | 1:33 pm

The Cold War made for strange partners -- including the CIA and a well-known magician named John Mulholland. In 1953, Mulholland was hired by the C.I.A. to adapt his craft for its agents. The documents he produced, long thought destroyed, were discovered in 2007 by two C.I.A. historians, who have recently published "The Official C.I.A. Manual of Trickery and Deception."

What could a magician teach spies? Much sleight of hand, apparently, that could be used for dosing drinks, passing pills and exchanging messages. And then there were the covert signals, including some that could be sent by tying your shoelaces in special patterns. The Boston Globe has illustrated some of the tricks in this marvelous slideshow.

In an accompanying piece at the Globe, Tom Scocca writes:

In the superpower struggle for power and influence around the world, the CIA was secretly funding and engineering everything from literary journals to coups and armed rebellions. It was total warfare, but with creeping breadth in place of nuclear intensity. Both the ideas and techniques of secret war pervaded the culture -- the corrosive belief in hidden conspiracy and the nifty thrill of spycraft itself, the codes and disguises and miniature cameras....

Today Mulholland’s account of real-world stagecraft amounts to an etiquette manual for a lost moment of history.

That moment is lost, as he says, because many of the methods used depended on the context of the tricks. In those days, men could be counted on to wear suit jackets, which had predictable internal and external pockets. Enough people smoked so that a matchbook could be used as a prop without attracting attention. If there might be contemporary cognates for these -- jeans, say, or Blackberries -- the social context back then was different as well. Performing a trick depends upon expected behavior, and how men and women interact has changed since 1953 -- in a few ways, at least.

If the tricks in this book no longer apply, exactly, they do illuminate a mysterious interlude in our country's past: When a guy who'd made his living pulling a rabbit out of a hat showed C.I.A. agents how to do their jobs.

-- Carolyn Kellogg

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jacketcopy/2009/11/cia-secrets-revealed-...

Should be a great show!
_______________________________

Coast To Coast AM Radio Tonight:

TOPIC: Muslim Mafia

Date: 11-28-09

Host: Ian Punnett

Guests: David Gaubats, Galen Cook

Attorney Galen Cook joins Ian Punnett in the first hour to discuss the D.B. Cooper mystery on the anniversary of the case.

Then, counter-terrorism specialist David Gaubats will share his insights into the Council of Islamic Relations and Muslim Brotherhood's plans to destroy American society from within.

Website(s):

http://www.muslimmafia.com/

Book(s):

# Muslim Mafia

Related Articles

Check out Ian's latest musings and insights at his blog site:

http://gabster.fm1071.com/fm107_ian/blog/

http://www.coasttocoastam.com/show/2009/11/28

My late Wife's Uncle..

The spy craft stuff is pretty interesting..
And,the fact that he enlisted Hollywood to help with developing quick change disguises..

**

Link to Amazon.com book discription..(Their link was Huge..)

http://tinyurl.com/ylp5ugq

**
Oh,plus He's involved with The International Spy Museum
in DC..

http://www.spymuseum.org/

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/space/article6934078.ece

Sounds interesting MMRules (the book)

I can't help but agree with u nora about
some of the issues u write about.

Us and them?
Submitted by gloryoski on Sat, 11/28/2009 - 10:45pm.

"Your pups?" ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Senator Bernie Sanders will be George Stephanopoulos’ guest Sunday on the ABC News program This Week to discuss the war in Afghanistan and the debate over health care reform.

Sounds interesting MMRules (the book)

*******

After he retired his second wife(His 1st wife passed away)
took over his job as head of that department of the CIA..
They are both retired now..

Their second book "Spy Dust"
talks alot about her career and heading that department..
*And,this Nasty dust that the Russki's would spread around Moscow to try & track suspected CIA agents..

It's interesting..If you don't freak on the politics,etc..

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

if I would ever see the year 2000.

Now I'm glad to see the 00's out of here, A decade of hell, indeed.

again, the GOP fucked everyone for generations.

HAHA! How is everyone in Sederville? Well I hope nobody got trampled on Black Friday! Da Kid stayed up all night to get an "on-sale" Play Station 3. I gave the O.K. because it happens to be one of THE BEST Blu-Ray players out there. So we bridge the Digital Divide from LPs, cassettes, VCR, CD and DVD. Crazy!

Here's one that makes you go "Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm."

The Memory Scrub About Why Ft. Hood Happened Is Almost Complete ... If It Weren't for Archives
By Mark Ames @ AlterNet. Posted November 23, 2009

That Maj. Hasan tried to get a military discharge before the massacre is largely being erased -- we're supposed to keep focusing on the Muslim part.

What happened to all the initial reports that accused Fort Hood killer Maj. Nidal Hasan snapped because he was distraught over the Army's refusal to grant him either a discharge or an exemption from being deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, wars which the Muslim psychiatrist abhorred -- and how it was this callous Army refusal to accommodate Maj. Hasan that led to his downward spiral into despondency, rage and mass murder?

~snip~
Instead, much of the blame for driving Maj. Hasan to crack would fall on his superiors in the Army, who held his fate in their hands. They could have shown some flexibility, but instead treated with the kind of callous bureaucratic insolence and nasty ethnic harassment you'd expect to find in a 19th century army, not 21st century America. If the Army really did fail to respond to a million-billion signals from Maj. Hasan, then it means we'd have to investigate more than just his evil little Muslim soul. We'd also have to look at the environment that changed him from a good loyal soldier into a cracked lunatic. That would mean examining just how screwed up the Army culture really is, how poorly it manages its resources and personnel, and why we went so long without knowing how bad things were…

SEVEN BIG PAGES! GO READ!

Meanwhile, we've been rehabbing a rental with its seemingly endless repairs, and so have so little time to read and blog. Catch at least the BIG corporate-run Sunday Talkies (sponsored in part by MIC supplier Boeing) at
Brick TeeVee Talking Turkey with Turkeys!
http://www.samsedershow.com/node/5512

Hope all is well in Sederville!

I remember wondering
new
Submitted by Fernando on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 2:03am.
if I would ever see the year 2000.

*******

And,I agree with your assessment of this decade..

Don't let the door hit u in the ass on the way out,decade !

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

http://www.box.net/shared/e3mxb9p5fo

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

http://www.box.net/shared/64v7vbr0j5

Not too shabby for 1972 or 73..

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

I've been wanting to get it for about 20years or more..
I guess I forgot to put it on my to do list.. ;)

That was a Good concert..
Thanks Leah..

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Tea Cheers Luv-ly Leah

WHERE THE BLOODY HELL R U... ?
U WILL FEEL BAD 4 NOT FORGIVING ME ... Yes U 2 will feel morose when U hear, YET I EVEN CALLED U "via this site/WEB.

AIR-ONO, AIR-ONO, Where For Art Thou, Air-O?
{sniff sniff}

kewl...blue-sy jazz
& "under my thumb..." remembering times of youth...

up early here too. stared at the ceiling for a bit and decided for day old coffee and a book.

am i late again? was it yesterday or today (what day's today, anyway? got no clue)

delayed or not, i love you and wish you the best for the move and for the b-day (who's that blasphemous bidet talker?) only the best for our seder!

U B "bob'n" whilst read'n ;)
Tres Kewl...
{I have on constant, yet at times Evanescense, 4 Non-Blondes, & PINK blast'n over ... hehehe
Super Tres Kewl.

Cheers 2 U & those U Love ...

6 days straight of having to get up 2 hours early and not really making up for it wears my tired ol' ass out. I can't do what I used to do but now I blame myself for doing that and making me old before my time. ;-)

still behind in blog-read, i just caught on toni's comment about the neglected boxes, the dilemma of the last few remaining boxes that end up languishing unopened for years

i am determined to avoid it, actually i have no choice because my new place has much less storage space than the previous, so

everything must go

but i do know exactly what toni is saying - you reach a point in the moving and unpacking where you are exhausted and you have just made enough progress that you don't bump into things and climb over obstacles just to move around - i am at that stage, you breathe relief and are so happy, sit down and look around; the rest of the boxes and clutter, unhanged pictures etc can wait!

good morn, you tired too? sit down, or just stay in bed and have some tea with me; that's what i plan to do today, just take it easy and drink tea

Naomi Klein has an hour long interview with Brian Lamb on Q & A. And Happy Birthday Southern Dragon, this squee’s for you.

Washington Journal: 7:30am – James Joyner, Outside the Beltway Blog, Editor in Chief, & Adele Stan, Alternet, Washington Bureau Chief. 8:30am – Max Brantley, Arkansas Times, Editor. 8:45am – Susan Young, Bangor Daily News, Editorial Page Editor. 9am – Jeremy Ben-Ami, J Street, Exec. Dir. 9:30am – Tim Brown, 9/11 Never Forget Coalition, Co-Founder.

ABC’s This Week: Afghanistan and health care reform. (R-SC) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT). Roundtable: George Will, Cokie Roberts, Paul Krugman, Matthew Dowd, and Dan Senor.

Amanpour: Push Button War – “Is the increasing reliance on drones to kill al Qaeda insurgents undermining U.S. efforts to win the hearts and minds of the people?” Cuba Shift – Europe’s policy toward Cuba in the future will place less emphasis on human rights in the island nation than now.

CBS’ Face The Nation: Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI), and Republicans Dick Armey, Dede Scozzafava, and Ed Gillespie.

Chris Matthews: Joe Klein TIME; Anne Kornblut The Washington Post; Andrea Mitchell NBC News; David Ignatius The Washington Post.

CNN’s State of The Union: Afghanistan: Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI), Sen. Richard Lugar (R-IN). Then, Patrick Byrne, Chairman & CEO of Overstock.com. Plus, Tony Blair on his latest efforts in the push for Middle East peace. And Rep. David Obey (D-WI) gets the “Last Word” on the health care debate.

Fareed Zakaria – GPS: More with Maziar Bahari, the Newsweek reporter who spent four months in a prison in Tehran. Plus, Eric Schmidt, the CEO of Google.

Fox News Sunday: Afghanistan: Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ)., and Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN). Health care, Afghanistan party politics: Howard Dean and Mike Huckabee. Fox News AllStars: Bill Kristol, Nina Easton, Dana Perino, Kirsten Powers.

NBC’s Meet The Press: Pastor Rick Warren on faith and charity. Then, Bill and Melinda Gates.

Newsmakers: Energy Sec. Steven Chu discussing U.S. preparations for the President & Cabinet members attending the summit in Copenhagen.

Q & A: Naomi Klein, author of the best-selling books “No Logo” and “The Shock Doctrine.” She is a journalist and activist who has written critically about globalization and the marketing practices of large corporations. The 10th anniversary edition of “No Logo” is being released this year.

Religion & Ethics: US Hunger on the Rise – A record number of Americans are receiving food stamp assistance. Health Care and the Elderly – What ethics issues are raised by trying to control health care costs? Wintley Phipps – Hope in the hallmark of this gospel singer’s career. Right War Gone Wrong – What do just war ethics say about the way forward in Afghanistan?

60 Minutes: Congo Gold – Five million people have died in the Democratic Republic of Congo in a war fueled primarily from gold mined in the country by warlords and smuggled out to be sold on the open market. The Great Explorer – Robert Ballard discovered the Titanic, the Bismarck and the PT 109 and now 60 Minutes cameras are there for his latest discovery, 1,500 feet down in the Aegean. Double length segment.

To The Contrary: Topics: 1- Female Gang of Four in Senate control fate of health care reform; 2- More men testing paternity of children they’re raising as their own; 3- Can mothers and daughters be best friends? Panelists: Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC); Center for Equal Opportunity’s Linda Chavez; PoliticsDaily.com Editor-in-Chief Melinda Henneberger; and former Labor Dept. Official Karen Czarnecki. Web exclusive: Crisis Pregnancy Centers – Are “crisis pregnancy centers” guilty of false advertising?

Univison’s Al Punto: Special Honduran Election Coverage from Tegucigalpa, Honduras. Rubén Blades, Legendary Panamanian Musical Artist.

C-SPAN’s Book TV.

FDL Book Salon: Helen Thomas with Craig Crawford, Listen Up, Mr. President: Everything You Always Wanted Your President to Know and Do. “Thomas and veteran journalist Craig Crawford hold nothing back as they use former occupants of the White House to provide a witty, history-rich lesson plan of what it takes to be a good president.” Hosted by Jeffrey Feldman, 5pm ET.

FDL Movie Night Monday: Director Peter Rodger joins Lisa Derrick to discuss the star studded film, Oh My God? “In every corner of the world, there’s one question that can never be definitively answered, yet stirs up equal parts passion, curiosity, self-reflection and often wild imagination: “What is God?”” Monday, 8pm ET.

Sunday Talking Head by Elliot at FDL
Come back toniD, I don't know how to get my own news

process of every weekend's day in mire's life (do i go to the gym today?) didn't take very long at all today - my body responded very strongly with every fiber in its being: a resounding NO! in fact don't even get up - well just barely enough to go into the new sparkling neat kitchen and make some tea

ya, we still have unopened boxes in the attic from 93'.

i have fantasies about having a house with no clutter, a japanesy zen ish tatami mat and one picture on the wall dream.

I thought "bidet" was Australian for birthday. You know how they shortened "good day" to "g'day" so I thought "biday" was Australian for "birthday"

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

and inclined to obey god's mandate to rest on the seventh day

plus i do have an unavoidable chore already lined up for the day

pay bills :(

Sade is comming out with a new album set to release Soldier of Love worldwide on February 8th, 2010..

First one in about 10 years..

http://hypem.com/#/track/966358/Sade-Cherish+The+Day

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

just watch out for that sticky (Australian) bidet

that sounds almost orgasmic in an after thanksgiving kitchen cleanup early morning semi sedate way.

this is a just moved-in clean up; i don't imagine my kitchen will ever be as clean again in the coming years, so better enjoy it and savor it now

yer new digs sound superb. what fun to have a place you really can love.

hypem.com link,right ?

Like that Sade song above..

Because,it just dawned on me that you might have to register there to use their player now..

You didn't have to register before..

Let me know if you can play that Sade song at the link I posted,Ok ? Thanks.. :)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

i so agree, sj! that would also be my ideal, but a little utopian maybe

as i dismantled my previous residence of all my personal traces, the walls started to show and the space started to breathe again; it was more and more restful and pleasant the more stuff i stripped out

while the inverse process was happening in my new place; restful and pleasant in the beginning as i walked through with my agent which was showing the place for sale (three months ago) - i should post the vid of that first walk through, well it actually already had some furniture but sparse and barely enough

as it gets more personalised it also gets more cluttered, it's unavoidable

marc maron, also moving, mentioned something to this effect in his last wtf episode, the one with Jeanine, the big tv screen dilemma etc

bottom line is, we need stuff, our stuff is us, ugly oprressive and obtrusive but we need it

6 plus years later & still boxes linger -- especially from mountains
{storage is a "brew'n over" nowadays}
...maybe one day when completed "certain things" ...
HaHaHa LOL ... or oneday someone will say, "Just "sentimental" Juke! Get rid of 'em...!" LOL
;)

They play just fine w/ no call to register.

I'm thinking about putting together a long set of long slow songs and go live on BlueRoots for an hour or so.

Stayed tuned if you want to hear some Sunday Morning Easy Listening for terminally hip peeps who survived the 60's.

That's a new genre I just created but doubt it will catch on with a name like that.

ya, but i do like the ambiance of the 1949 Triumph crankshaft in my N E office corner.

eya MB!

"Take 5"

Brubeck

Yep MMRules...
new
Submitted by maggiesboy on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 9:10am.
Stayed tuned if you want to hear some Sunday Morning Easy Listening for terminally hip peeps who survived the 60's.

*******
Good idea,MB..
But,aren't you worried that it might put us Old Geysers to sleep ? Ah..Nap time.. ;)

**

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Sunday Morning Coffee And Tea Tunes?

The Dave Brubeck Quartet - Take Five

http://hypem.com/track/943957/The+Dave+Brubeck+Quartet+-+Take+Five

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

lol

for me it's books, papers, photos (no matter i have them digitized in computers and countless diskettes - also clutter creating, i also keep them in printed version) and the most ugly and clutterish of all, computer junk, gadgets cables and wires, there's only so much under-bed and behind sofas space you can stuff them into.....

ok enough, let's move on to another subject

i'll make me some tea - hi ms_anth

Got me a cup of coffee & my Sunday paper
Now I have to just figure out what photos
I am going to enter in this photography
contest, the company that organized our
trips to Jordan & Egypt (OAT) they have a
photo contest every year - I wasn't going
to enter it ...... but I thought "what the
hell" what do I have to lose - nothing.

Hope ya all have a good Sunday :)
Cloudy, rainy & cool here in Chicago
area. Blah

did i forget to mention my doll collection?

i started buying dolls for my grandaughters at all occasions, bdays and xmas, only a few made it to them, the most beautiful ones i decided to keep! why waste them on a child who's just gonna trash them, undress them, pull hair, abuse them in any conceivable fashion?

who doesn't have CLUTTER -
I think we all do - I was just
looking around my house, thinking
to myself "jesus u have a lot of
SHIT" what do I do with it all?
I have separation issues with
giving away some stuff. I'm still
opening up moving boxes... ha-ha
Congrats on your new diggs.

one of the most absolutely perfect tunes ever written. takes me back to sitting under a domed ceiling in my friends 5th floor Venice beachfront penthouse apartment on a sunny sunday morning in 1966 where i first heard it.

"here’s how the story goes. Legendary jazz pianist Dave Brubeck’s long-time music partner and alto-saxophonist Paul Desmond came to Brubeck one day with a piece he’d written in 5/4 signature. That song, my friends, is the Dave Brubeck Quartet’s most famous song of all time: “Take Five”. Even if you don’t know what I’m talking about this second, take one listen and you’ll know exactly what I mean."

Have to type up the songlists to broadcast the tune info..

White House Plans To Step Up Pressure On Lenders To Help Homeowners

WASHINGTON (AP/HuffPost)-- The Obama administration, battling a foreclosure crisis that shows no signs of relenting, will step up pressure on mortgage companies to do more to help people remain in their homes, officials said Saturday.

The administration will announce its expanded program on Monday, Treasury spokeswoman Meg Reilly said.

"We are taking additional steps to enhance servicer transparency and accountability," Reilly said. She said the goal was to increase the rate that troubled home loans were converted into new loans with lower monthly payments.

So far, the program's numbers have been lackluster. When the administration rolled out the program, called Making Home Affordable, it hoped to save 3-4 million homeowners from foreclosure. The New York Times interviews a former Fannie Mae official who says that currently, the program will be lucky if it can save 1.5 million Americans from foreclosure.

According to Realtytrac, 2,631,158 foreclosure filings were reported in the first three fiscal quarters of 2009. Realtytrac expects that nationwide, 3.2-3.4 million properties will go into foreclosure in 2009, up from 2.3 million in 2008. About 10 percent of residential households nationwide, or about five million, were behind by at least one mortgage payment in the third quarter. Almost 4.5 percent of residential properties were in some form of foreclosure.

The New York Times reports on the program:

Last month, an oversight panel created by Congress reported that fewer than 2,000 of the 500,000 loan modifications then in progress had become permanent under Making Home Affordable. When the Treasury releases new numbers next month, it is expected to report a disappointingly small number of permanent loan modifications, with estimates in the tens of thousands out of the more than 650,000 borrowers now in the program.

More unsatisfactory data is likely to intensify pressures on the Obama administration to mount a more muscular effort to stem foreclosures beyond the Treasury's campaign this week. Populist anger has been fanned by a growing perception that the Treasury has lavished generous bailouts on Wall Street institutions while neglecting ordinary homeowners -- this, in the midst of double-digit unemployment, which is daily sending more households into delinquency.

Industry officials said the new effort would include increased pressure on mortgage companies to accelerate loan modifications by highlighting firms that are lagging in that area.

The Treasury is also expected to announce that it will wait until the loan modifications are permanent before paying cash incentives to mortgage companies that lower loan payments.

Under the $75 billion Treasury program, companies that agree to lower payments for troubled borrowers collect $1,000 initially from the government for each loan, followed by $1,000 annually for up to three years.

The government support, which is provided from the $700 billion financial bailout program, is aimed at providing cash incentives for mortgage providers to accept smaller mortgage payments rather than foreclosing on homes.

The program has come under heavy criticism for failing to do enough to attack a tidal wave of foreclosures. Analysts said the foreclosure crisis is likely to persist well into next year as high unemployment pushes more people out of their homes.

Rising foreclosures depress home prices and threaten the sustainability of the fledgling economic recovery. more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/28/white-house-plans-to-step_n_372...

toniD's Ya Think?

MMRules on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 3:04am
Submitted by Ms_Anthrope on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 7:29am.
kewl...blue-sy jazz

SJ, is this the "token" jazz ... yeh kinda this type of SF/CA/blue-sy jazz ... but still is great 2 study & read by... but I had too "pause' whilst I listen to Peter B {Collins}, as I work {both physical & mental, eye-roll) with lap puppy Scotty Toto Dog-usually {she's just a NEEDY baby} on my "lap", even when I need to do more laundry & Brew more Tea. Now she will be at my feet, as i travel downstairs-again to use SJ's "shuffle".}
*Poof* ;)

http://tristanclopet.com/media/music/#mp

"Ladies and gentlemen, presenting Tristan Clopet. Clopet’s debut EP Duende is an interesting conglomeration of good ol’ southern soul, funky rock, and a whole lot of heart. For one, Clopet’s vocal range is impressive, smoother than the other side of the pillow (and that’s smooth!) in both the higher and lower registers. The instrumentation here perfectly complements the clean and breathy vocals at every turn, showing a real rapport between Clopet and his bandmates."

it has always reminded me of a walk through Central Park on a Sunday morning in the Fall...

MMRules I got Sade...too
Submitted by Ms_Anthrope on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 9:48am

*******

Kewl,Ms_A..

We have a Scotty puppy here too..He's a cutie..

But,how do I get him to stop chasing cats ?

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Sorry,I forgot to mention it before..

It looks like it's in a very cool spot,too..

Many trees & very close to party central.. :)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

ya the brubeck version is superb.

i just realised i've forgotten the names of many of the tunes i love.

no biggie, i'm glad to have had a life full of exquisite music.

adopt a 'russian blue'.

give the dog a place to hide.

WASHINGTON – Saddam Hussein was telling the truth, this time. The United States just didn't believe him.

So it took the most powerful military in the world 18 years to find the remains of the only U.S. Navy pilot shot down in an aerial battle in the 1991 Gulf War.

Michael "Scott" Speicher's bones lay 18 inches deep in Iraqi sand, more or less right where a group of Iraqis had led an American search team in 1995.

The search for Speicher was frustrated by two wars, mysteriously switched remains, Iraqi duplicity and a final tip from a young nomad in Anbar province.

U.S. officials often were blinded by the same myopia that tainted prewar intelligence — the American conviction that Hussein's government lied about everything. As it turned out, the Iraqis lied, but sometimes they told the truth.

For more than a decade, speculation swirled that the 33-year-old Speicher, a lieutenant commander when he went missing, had been captured alive. That was disproved by the team that found and confirmed his remains.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091128/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_missing_pilot_h...

Just kidding,SJ..
I think I channeled Ono for a second or two there.. ;)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

..to stock up on groceries.

Indian Summer.....all piano...

I was just listening to it this weekend...even at 88 that old man still has the touch....

88, heh... interesting number for a jazz musician.

Sarah Palin will star as the keynote speaker at next February’s First National Tea Party Convention, which will take place in Nashville, TN. Also attending: Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN). The right-wing Minnesota congresswoman has previously asserted that Democrats are trying to “sabotage” both her and Palin “to make sure that we don’t have a prominent national voice.” The Washington Independent reports that tickets to see the Bachmann/Palin show “are available for the bargain price of $549.00.

http://thinkprogress.org/2009/11/27/bachmann-palin-tea-party/

we need a surtax on greed.

Submitted by Sunshine Jim on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 10:11am.

*******

He really only chases our youngest cat..

Our Calico Cat Angel,chases him around..Pretty funny to watch..

They other three just get in his grill if he(Max)
bugs them..

But,the youngest,Tuffy he power drives her to the floor when catches her..Not cool..

Oh..Did I mention I call this place,The Coronado Zoo ?

Critters everywhere.. :)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

I don't have my other computer running to be able to check.

The biggest mystery of the Dubai debt crisis is not why this desert dream has turned into a nightmare, but why it took so long. Ever since US homeowners started defaulting on sub-prime mortgages two years ago, the tightening of international lending conditions has put the squeeze on investment bubbles around the world. Some, like Iceland or the British housing boom, popped relatively quickly, but others have been slower to collapse.

The common feature is that an excess of cheap borrowing lulls investors into thinking that more permanent wealth is being created. Like any investment bubble, it works well as long as more money is sucked in to keep inflating asset prices, but fails when that new money disappears.

The key difference with a debt bubble like the one bursting around us now is that there can be a significant time lag between asset prices beginning to fall and investors acknowledging their losses. Unlike the dotcom share bubble, for example, which drove stockmarkets up and then quickly down again at the turn of the century, credit bubbles often take a while to fully deflate.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/dan-roberts-on-business-blog/2009/nov/27...

I love it!

..and it followed the other two around like a shadow. The other two started doing circus tricks and the puppy fell right in and joined them.

I woke up laughing, nice way to start the day.

perfect.

good tunes too!

with the Quicksilver Messenger Service ;-)

1. Bill Moyers Journal . Jane Goodall | PBS
... Jane Goodall. ... November 27, 2009. Dr. Jane Goodall is a familiar face to several
generations around the globe. The young woman patiently ...

2. Bill Moyers Journal . Watch & Listen | PBS
... When Jane Goodall walked into our building this week, faces lit up. Our security
chief told me she does animal rescue work after hours because of Jane Goodall. ...

Jane Goodall was on Bill Moyers this past friday
it was a very good interview.
She is my mentor & angel :)
I got to meet her about 5/6 years ago. It was
one of the best things that happened to me in my life.
I never, ever thought I would ever meet someone like her.

When the night wind makes the pine trees creak
And the pale clouds glide across the dark sky,
Go out my child, go out and seek
Your soul: The Eternal I.

For all the grasses rustling at your feet
And every flaming star that glitters high
Above you, close up and meet
In you: The Eternal I.

Yes, my child, go out into the world; walk slow
And silent, comprehending all, and by and by
Your soul, the Universe, will know
Itself: the Eternal I.

new bluerootsradio??
Marvin Gaye is playing now.

i wuz smoking some salmon but i can't keep it lit.

I'm tangled up in Blue.

..after Tangled up in Blue I'll be going back to the recorded show.

I need to watch the 2nd half of Jane on Moyers. I had to stop after I heard her read that poem. That's where they stopped the show at the web site.

Now there's a human being who gets it. The rest of us are only half human imho.

that snot what ur supposed to
smoke Sunshine Jim - u silly boy....

snot - he-he

A huge deficit,recession & 2 wars might have something to do with it,Buzz..

*******

By Buzz Aldrin

Imagine this scenario: you are a tourist coming home from a special vacation jaunt. Or maybe you're a researcher headed home from an assignment at a national laboratory. But instead of a nice gentle landing at an airport, you plunge into the cold waters of the Atlantic Ocean, bobbing about like a cork on a fishing line. Instead of a leisurely stroll to the airport concourse, you have to wait to be fished out of the drink by the U.S. navy.

Sound enticing? That's just the way future Americans will have to return from space visits to the International Space Station - whether you're a fancy high rolling space tourist or someone your government has sent to do space research - because space capsules - much like the tiny Gemini 12 and Apollo 11 capsules my colleagues and I flew more than 40 years ago - have been deemed the replacement shape for the craft that are to follow the winged and capable Space Shuttle fleet when it retires next year.

Space capsules?

Con't..

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/buzz-aldrin/in-search-of-a-real-space_b_37...

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

I've been listening, and lurkin' here
workin' through my brl blend coffee
that I still have.
Nice mix to start the mornin' with.

you silly!

if u no what i'm yakkin about you're as bad as i am.

...guess I have the Sunday Morning Coffee jitters. ;-)

...back later gators

Now there's a human being who gets it. The rest of us are only half human imho.

that I haven't heard in ages..

The Flirtations - Nothing But a Heartache

http://hypem.com/#/track/966426/The+Flirtations+-+Nothing+But+a+Heartach...

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

If anyone missed it -
Submitted by smcgee43 on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 10:48am.

*******

I use to watch all her documentaries..
They were the best..
Lucky you.. :)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

that ShadowWolf likes to "run" after. She is "mellowing"
the yipping at ex-ferals/strays...
I take credit, since "needless" yipping (at meows) is not allowed ...
{Wolves & W. Hybrids DON'T BARK & when they do they howl or "snort" or "dance" never needlessly - but I know dogs have certain needs -- but not at my ex-ferals/strays; however, there are 2-3 meows she loves to "play" & bark with a few "rounds" of downstairs.

MONK ON AT 9AM ... {just checked, cuz there is a Christian twit on...yipping

Just had to share that quote someone just sent me..

Submitted by maggiesboy on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 10:48am.

with the Quicksilver Messenger Service ;-)

*******

Was it"Take Another Hit Of Fresh Air" ?
Love that song..

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

check ur e-mail.. please & tank u

Submitted by MMRules on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 11:00am.

___________________________
I just read that.
We've spent 12 years building the ISS
so that we could shuttle to and from it,
only to retire a shuttle type craft.?

If nothing else they should boost the ISS into a higher
orbit, so that it doesn't fall to earth in a few years,
While they work on a new craft design.

.
.
.
_ _ _
BRR

1083 | brl vod | WTF

Submitted by Ms_A on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 11:17am.

*******
Thanks,Ms_A..

He (The Scotty)just plays way to rough with Tuffy..
All,she wants to do is play..She's a youngin..
But,that's how she got her name..From surviving Max's body slams..
I can't watch him all the time..
Hopefully,he will outgrow it..
I also call her the Second Story Cat..
Because,when he's around she heads for higher ground fast..
Just not fast enough sometimes..

Sorry,enough kitty trials & tribulations.. :)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Bob Dylan - Blood On The Tracks - Tangled Up In Blue
Marvin Gaye - Number 1's: Marvin Gaye - Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)
Dar Williams - My Better Self - Comfortably Numb
Quicksilver Messenger Service - Classic Roc: Rock Renaissance, Vol. 4 - Fresh Air
Nanci Griffith - Other Voices, Other Rooms - Boots Of Spanish Leather
Iris DeMent - The Way I Should - There's A Wall In Washington

ID/PSA - ID/PSA - BlueRootsRadio

Rickie Lee Jones - It's Like This - Low Spark of High Heeled Boys
Jackson Browne - Solo Acoustic Volume 2 - Something Fine
Patty Griffin - Flaming Red - Mary
Joan Baez - Ring Them Bells - Diamonds & Rust
Joni Mitchell - Shine - Shine
Bruce Hornsby - The Village - Darlin' Be Home Soon

Maybe it's the Holidays, but all of a sudden everyone wants to come for a visit.

My sister-in-law just left. She rarely comes to visit me. She was out shopping for the holidays and thought she'd stop by.

toniD's Ya Think?

One In Eight Americans On Food Stamps »

New York Times | JASON DePARLE and ROBERT GEBELOFF | November 29, 2009 at 10:41 AM

With food stamp use at record highs and climbing every month, a program once scorned as a failed welfare scheme now helps feed one in eight Americans and one in four children.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/29/us/29foodstamps.html?hp=&pagewanted=al...

toniD's Ya Think?

Boing Boing

Professor Alexander's Botanical Vasculum

Con't..

http://www.boingboing.net/2009/11/28/steampunk-terrarrium.html

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Marathon..

Get your OCD's here.. ;)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Bears, I hate 2 say it ...
they r gonna get their butts kicked.

Go Bears!!!! :)

Professor advises underwater homeowners to walk away from mortgages
Brent T. White, a University of Arizona law school professor, says that it's in the homeowners' best financial interest to stiff their lenders and that it's not immoral to do so.

By Kenneth R. Harney

November 29, 2009

Reporting from Washington

Go ahead. Break the chains. Stop paying on your mortgage if you owe more than the house is worth. And most important: Don't feel guilty about it. Don't think you're doing something morally wrong.

That's the incendiary core message of a new academic paper by Brent T. White, a University of Arizona law school professor, titled "Underwater and Not Walking Away: Shame, Fear and the Social Management of the Housing Crisis."

White contends that far more of the estimated 15 million U.S. homeowners who are underwater on their mortgages should stiff their lenders and take a hike.

Doing so, he suggests, could save some of them hundreds of thousands of dollars that they "have no reasonable prospect of recouping" in the years ahead. Plus the penalties are nowhere near as painful or long-lasting as they might assume, he says.

"Homeowners should be walking away in droves," White said. "But they aren't. And it's not because the financial costs of foreclosure outweigh the benefits."

Sure, credit scores get whacked when you walk away, he acknowledges. But as long as you stay current with other creditors, "one can have a good credit rating again -- meaning above 660 -- within two years after a foreclosure."

Better yet, homeowners can default "strategically": Buy all the major items they'll need for the next couple of years -- a new car, even a new house -- just before they pull the plug on their current mortgage lender.

"Most individuals should be able to plan in advance for a few years of limited credit," White said, with minimal disruptions to their lifestyles.

What kind of law school professorial advice is this? Aren't mortgages legal contracts? In so-called anti-deficiency states such as California and Arizona, mortgage lenders have limited or no legal rights to pursue defaulting homeowners' assets beyond the house itself, White said. In other states, lenders may decide that it is not worth the legal expense to pursue walkaways, or consumers may be able to find flaws in the mortgage documents, disclosures or underwriting to challenge the original contract.

The main point, he said, is that too often people's emotions get in the way of clear financial thinking about mortgages, turning them into what he calls "woodheads" -- "individuals who choose not to act in their own self-interest." Most owners are too worried about feelings of shame and embarrassment after a foreclosure, and ignore the powerful financial reasons for doing so.

Buttressing these emotions is a system that White labels "the social control of the housing crisis" -- pressures and messages continually sent to consumers by the "social control agents," namely banks, government and the media. The mantra that these agents -- all the way up to President Obama -- pound into owners' heads, White said, is that "voluntarily defaulting on a mortgage is immoral."

Yet there is an inherent imbalance in the borrower-lender relationship that makes this morality message unfair to consumers, White says: Banks set the rules during the housing boom, handing out home loans with no down payments, no income checks and inflated appraisals. Now that property values have dropped 20% to 50% in many areas, banks have been slow to modify troubled mortgages and reluctant to reduce principal debts.

Only when homeowners cut through the emotional fog and default strategically in large numbers, White argues, will this inequitable situation be seriously addressed.

How does White's 52-page manifesto go over with mortgage lenders? Predictably, not well. Officials at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- investors who fund the bulk of all new mortgages in the country -- disputed White's characterization of how quickly after foreclosure a walkaway borrower can obtain a new loan. It's not three years, they said, it's a minimum of five years, absent extenuating circumstances such as medical or employment problems that caused the foreclosure.

"Borrowers who walk away from their mortgage obligations face serious consequences," including severely depressed credit scores for extended periods, said Brian Faith of Fannie Mae.

In addition, he said, "there's a moral dimension to this as homeowners who simply abandon their homes contribute to the destabilization of their neighborhood and community."

http://www.latimes.com/classified/realestate/news/la-fi-harney29-2009nov...

toniD's Ya Think?

Senate Opens Health Care Debate: Dem Coalition Fracturing Already

WASHINGTON — The 60 votes aren't there any more.

With the Senate set to begin debate Monday on health care overhaul, the all-hands-on-deck Democratic coalition that allowed the bill to advance is fracturing already. Yet majority Democrats will need 60 votes again to finish.

Some Democratic senators say they'll jump ship from the bill without tighter restrictions on abortion coverage. Others say they'll go unless a government plan to compete with private insurance companies gets tossed overboard. Such concessions would enrage liberals, the heart and soul of the party.

There's no clear course for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., to steer legislation through Congress to President Barack Obama. You can't make history unless you reach 60 votes, and don't count on Republicans helping him.

But Reid is determined to avoid being remembered as another Democrat who tried and failed to make health care access for the middle class a part of America's social safety net.

"Generation after generation has called on us to fix this broken system," he said at a recent Capitol Hill rally. "We're now closer than ever to getting it done."

His bill includes $848 billion over 10 years to gradually expand coverage to most of those now uninsured. It would ban onerous insurance industry practices such as denying coverage or charging higher premiums because of someone's poor health. Those who now have the hardest time getting coverage – the self-employed and small businesses – could buy a policy in a new insurance market, with government subsidies for many. Older people would get better prescription coverage.

Most people covered by big employers would gain more protections without major changes. One exception would be those with high-cost insurance plans, whose premiums could rise as a result of a tax on insurers issue the coverage.
Story continues below

The public is ambivalent about the Democrats' legislation. While 58 percent want elected officials to tackle health care now, about half of those supporters say they don't like what they're hearing about the plans, according to a new Kaiser Family Foundation poll.

The Senate debate risks alienating more people because much of the discussion probably will revolve around divisive issues that preoccupy lawmakers.

"A large portion of the debate will be spent on issues that aren't important to the workability of health reform," said Paul Ginsburg, president of the Center for Studying Health System Change.

The debate should start off modestly, with each side offering one amendment. No votes are scheduled Monday.

But with more than 40 senators on the two committees that originated the bill, many more amendments are expected. Some likely subjects are limits on malpractice lawsuits, consumer choice, affordability, minority health and drug prices.

Reid wants to finish by Christmas; he may not get to.

He's hoping that Democrats will stick together on procedural matters, where Senate rules require 60 votes to advance. That would allow for different views to be heard on the underlying questions. But such an accommodation might not always be possible.

For example, the National Right to Life to Committee says unless there are big changes, it will count the procedural motion to allow a final up-or-down vote on the legislation as tantamount to a vote on abortion.

Of the many issues senators have to weigh, abortion funding and the option of a government insurance plan promise to be the most difficult.

On abortion, no compromise seems possible. On the public plan, a deal may yet be had.

The House adopted strict limits on abortion funding as the price for the support of anti-abortion Democrats. Abortion rights supporters are now backing Reid's approach, which tries to preserve coverage for abortion while stipulating that federal dollars may not be used except in cases of rape, incest or to save the life of the mother. Catholic bishops say they can't accept that because it would let federally subsidized plans cover abortion.

It might be easier to find a middle ground on the issue of a public health plan to compete against private insurers, though Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent, said Sunday he would be "very reluctant" to support legislation without "a strong public option."

Reid's bill would create a national plan, but give states the choice of opting out. In any event, the Congressional Budget Office now estimates that the government would not be the bare-knuckles competitor insurers had feared, but a relatively minor player in the market.

Several moderate Democrats have served notice they can't support Reid's approach. The lone Republican to vote for the Senate bill in committee, Olympia Snowe of Maine, has said she could accept a public plan if insurers are given one last chance to deliver lower premiums in a competitive market. Combining Snowe's "trigger" with Reid's "opt-out" might be the answer.

If that's the case, it still would have to pass a final test: 60 votes.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/29/senate-opens-health-care-_n_373...

toniD's Ya Think?

GOP Wages Internal Debate Over Tax Increase For Afghan War

Two former advisers to George W. Bush had a spirited debate on Sunday morning over the possibility of a surtax to pay for a troop escalation in Afghanistan.

Appearing on ABC's "This Week," Dan Senor, a neoconservative war hawk who served as Bush's spokesman in Iraq, called proposals for taxing the rich to pay for the war a backdoor effort to derail any surge in forces. He was opposed by another Bush hand, former communications honcho Matthew Dowd -- a GOP traditionalist -- who said it was unfair to have an increase in troops without a shared social sacrifice.

The whole exchange is worthwhile, but the below portion was particularly illuminating:

SENOR: Let's be honest about what this is about. It's about a campaign against President Obama's troops surge. It's not really about paying for it. It's about arguing against it.

GEORGE WILL: And there's going to be no surtax. We all agree on that. So everyone, relax.

DOWD: I agree with you. There is not going to be a tax. But I think this goes to a fundamental value that I think we lost, which is that we can get things for nothing. That we can go to war and not have to pay for it either by cutting the budget or doing something else. We have a war; we don't have a draft. All of these sorts of things, that we think, 'Oh, by way, we can go fight the most important war in the history of our country, but we're not going to have a draft, we're not going to pay for it, we're not going to do anything that causes anybody to sacrifice.'

SENOR: If [House Speaker Nancy] Pelosi and [House Appropriations Committee Chairman David] Obey were being intellectually honest about this they would wage a war against the President's surge policy Wednesday morning. As opposed to doing this via some proposed surtax.

[Snip]

DOWD: David Obey's idea I think underlines the problem that we don't ask people -- when we say these things are important -- we don't ask the country to come together for them.

Coming days before President Obama is set to announce an increase in roughly 30,000 to 35,000 troops in Afghanistan, the debate between Senor and Dowd provides a window into the Republican Party's internal divisions. While Democratic opposition to a troop escalation is well known, the disagreement inside the GOP seems to be primarily along the margins. Elsewhere on Sunday, for example, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) argued that it was a "sham" to insist that Congress had to be cautious and concerned about the costs of the Afghan war. But on another show, Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) -- the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee -- acknowledged the need to consider "the capacity of our country to finance this particular situation."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/29/gop-wages-internal-debate_n_373...

toniD's Ya Think?

UAE Will Back Banks Despite Dubai Debt Crisis

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The United Arab Emirates' central bank said Sunday it would offer additional liquidity to banks, signaling a push by the federal government to reassure investors worried about the country's banking sector and its exposure to Dubai's crushing debt.

Global equity markets were set to reopen Monday, and investors are worried about a routing similar to that seen last week after Dubai's chief engine for growth, Dubai World, announced it wanted more time to pay some of its roughly $60 billion in debts.

The UAE's official WAM news agency said the central bank issued a notice to Emirati banks and foreign banks with branches in the country saying it would make available "a special additional liquidity facility linked to their current accounts at the central bank." The statement said the facility can be drawn upon at a rate of 50 basis points – half a percent – above the three-month Emirates interbank offered rate.

International investors reacted with shock and outrage at Dubai World's announcement Wednesday that, as part of its restructuring effort, it would ask creditors to delay repayment of its debt and that of its real estate arm, Nakheel, until at least May. Nakheel has a $3.5 billion bond coming due in December.

The company's roughly $60 billion in debt makes up the brunt of the at least $80 billion Dubai owes as a result of a meteoric decade-long growth boom that saw the tiny city-state transformed into a Middle Eastern Las Vegas, New York and Los Angeles all wrapped into one. Dubai World was a key driver of that growth, with interests ranging from ports to real estate.

In the days since the announcement, Dubai officials have gone to neighboring Abu Dhabi, the oil-rich home to the federal government for a series of meetings. Some analysts have speculated that the timing of Dubai World's announcement – on the eve of a three-day Islamic holiday – caught even Abu Dhabi's rulers by surprise, putting them under pressure to act decisively in a bid to shore up confidence in the country's banks.

Emirati banks are believed to be shouldering a large chunk of Dubai's debts, and international ratings agencies have either downgraded the ratings of some of the country's banks – or at least placed them on review for further downgrades – citing exposure to Dubai World's debt.

The central bank's statement was also aimed mitigating any negative fallout on the country as a whole, with concerns that Abu Dhabi would be branded with the same iron of pessimism and skepticism that Dubai will likely endure for years to come. more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/29/uae-will-back-banks-despi_n_373...

toniD's Ya Think?

Jeremy Greenstock, UK Diplomat, Says US Was 'Hell Bent' On Iraq Invasion

LONDON — The United States was "hell bent" on a 2003 military invasion of Iraq and actively undermined efforts by Britain to win international authorization for the war, a former British diplomat told an inquiry Friday.

Jeremy Greenstock, British ambassador to the United Nations from 1998 to 2003, said that President George W. Bush had no real interest in attempts to agree on a U.N. resolution to provide explicit backing for the conflict.

The ex-diplomat, who served as Britain's envoy in Iraq after the invasion, said serious preparations for the war had begun in early 2002 and took on an unstoppable momentum.

As diplomats frantically attempted in early 2003 to agree upon a U.N. resolution approving a military offensive, Bush's key aides grew impatient – criticizing the process as an unnecessary distraction, he said.

Grumbling from Washington "included noises about 'this is a waste of time, what we need is regime change, why are we bothering with this, we must sweep this aside and do what's going to have to be done anyway – and deal with this with the use of force,'" Greenstock testified before the inquiry into the Iraq war.

Several nations had hoped to stall the invasion of Iraq to allow U.N. weapons inspectors more time to search for evidence that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction – the key justification for the war. No such weapons were ever found.

Yet Bush's inner circle cared little about what international allies thought and refused to halt plans to invade in March 2003, Greenstock said. He said even Blair was unable to persuade Bush, winning only a brief hiatus of two weeks.

"The momentum for earlier action in the United States was much too strong for us to counter," Greenstock said in a written statement to the inquiry, provided alongside his live testimony.
Story continues below

Britain's inquiry is the most exhaustive study yet into the war and will seek evidence from former Prime Minister Tony Blair, military officials and spy agency chiefs. It won't apportion blame or establish criminal or civil liability. But it will offer recommendations by late 2010 on how to prevent mistakes from being repeated in the future.

Greenstock told the five-person inquiry panel that the failure to win U.N. approval for the war had seriously undermined the legitimacy of the conflict. more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/27/jeremy-greenstock-uk-dipl_n_372...

toniD's Ya Think?

http://hypem.com/#/track/966469/Rascals+-+A+Beautiful+Morning

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Iranian Lawmaker: Iran Could Leave Nuclear Treaty
digg Share this on Facebook Huffpost - Iranian Lawmaker: Iran Could Leave Nuclear Treaty stumble reddit del.ico.us RSS

ALI AKBAR DAREINI | 11/28/09 09:14 PM | AP

TEHRAN, Iran — A conservative Iranian legislator warned Saturday that his country may pull out of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty after a U.N. resolution censuring Tehran – a move that could seriously undermine world attempts to prevent Iran from developing atomic weapons.

Iran's official news agency quoted a hardline political analyst who made the same point, another indication the idea could be gaining steam.

If Iran withdraws from the treaty, its nuclear program would no longer be subject to oversight by the U.N. nuclear agency. That in turn would be a significant blow to efforts to ensure that no enriched uranium is diverted from use as fuel to warhead development.

The lawmaker's threat came a day after the board of the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency passed a resolution demanding Tehran immediately stop building its newly revealed nuclear facility near the holy city of Qom and freeze uranium enrichment.

"The parliament, in its first reaction to this illegal and politically-motivated resolution, can consider the issue of withdrawing from the NPT," Mohammad Karamirad was quoted as saying by the official IRNA news agency, referring to the treaty. "The parliament ... (also) can block the entry of IAEA inspectors to the country."

Karamirad, a senior lawmaker and member of the Iranian parliament's national security committee, does not speak for the government but his statements often reflect the government's thinking. His threat could be a tactic to warn the West of possible consequences if it pursues further action against Iran, such as strengthened sanctions.

Another hardline lawmaker, Hossein Ebrahimi, was quoted by IRNA as saying that Iran's parliament will discuss the IAEA resolution on Sunday and will make a decision on how to react.

Iran's parliament has issued similar warnings in the past, most recently in 2006 when some lawmakers threatened to pull the country out of the nonproliferation treaty during another time of increased U.N. pressure over Tehran's nuclear program. Iran backed down, and the government has said that it has no intention of withdrawing from the treaty, which aims to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and weapons technology.

Iran's government insists its nuclear program is meant only for peaceful purposes, though the U.S. and other Western nations suspect Tehran is seeking to acquire atomic weapons.
more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/28/iranian-lawmaker-iran-cou_0_n_3...

toniD's Ya Think?

Senate Report: Bin Laden Was 'Within Our Grasp' In 2001 »

AP | CALVIN WOODWARD | November 28, 2009 at 11:33 PM

WASHINGTON — Osama bin Laden was unquestionably within reach of U.S. troops in the mountains of Tora Bora when American military leaders made the crucial and costly decision not to pursue the terrorist leader with massive force, a Senate report says.

The report asserts that the failure to kill or capture bin Laden at his most vulnerable in December 2001 has had lasting consequences beyond the fate of one man. Bin Laden's escape laid the foundation for today's reinvigorated Afghan insurgency

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20091128/us-tora-bora-bin-laden

toniD's Ya Think?

Submitted by toniD on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 1:03pm.
Senate Report: Bin Laden Was 'Within Our Grasp' In 2001 »

*******

Bushtard: besides being majorly responsible for our economic meltdown,spying on innocent Americans,lying us into a war & letting Bin Laden go..Amongst other poisonous things..

I wonder if the morons who voted for him would still want to have a Beer with him ?

Probably..The Rethug Delusional Kool-Aid is a very strong elixir for the weak minded & the insane..
Along,with the fact that they can never admit when they are wrong and,that many of them are a bunch of Greedy Fucks..

I better end this here..
This post could go on all day pointing out Bushtard & Republicans hatred of America..

Remember the Rethug Mantra: Party First,Corporations Second,America Third or Forth..

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Harvard ignored warnings about investments
Advisers told Summers, others not to put so much cash in market; losses hit $1.8b

By Beth Healy, Globe Staff | November 29, 2009

It happened at least once a year, every year. In a roomful of a dozen Harvard University financial officials, Jack Meyer, the hugely successful head of Harvard’s endowment, and Lawrence Summers, then the school’s president, would face off in a heated debate. The topic: cash and how the university was managing - or mismanaging - its basic operating funds.

Through the first half of this decade, Meyer repeatedly warned Summers and other Harvard officials that the school was being too aggressive with billions of dollars in cash, according to people present for the discussions, investing almost all of it with the endowment’s risky mix of stocks, bonds, hedge funds, and private equity. Meyer’s successor, Mohamed El-Erian, would later sound the same warnings to Summers, and to Harvard financial staff and board members.

“Mohamed was having a heart attack,’’ said one former financial executive, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of angering Harvard and Summers. He considered the cash investment a “doubling up’’ of the university’s investment risk.

But the warnings fell on deaf ears, under Summers’s regime and beyond. And when the market crashed in the fall of 2008, Harvard would pay dearly, as $1.8 billion in cash simply vanished. Indeed, it is still paying, in the form of tighter budgets, deferred expansion plans, and big interest payments on bonds issued to cover the losses.

So how did one of the world’s great universities err so badly in something so basic? It is a story with many actors, the story of an institution that grew complacent as its endowment soared ever higher - an institution that, when the crunch hit, was operating on financial auto-pilot, with many key players gone, and those remaining inattentive, in retrospect, to the risks ahead.

“Investing cash alongside the endowment was a long-held strategy that we didn’t decide to change until early 2008,’’ said James F. Rothenberg, Harvard’s treasurer - a part-time, unpaid role. He said the biggest mistake was not to have taken some of the cash off the table, and placed it in safer accounts, as trouble started brewing in the markets and the economy. “We all can look back now and say we wish we did something different,’’ he said.

In the Summers years, from 2001 to 2006, nothing was on auto-pilot. He was the unquestioned commander, a dominating personality with the talent to move a balkanized institution like Harvard, but also a man unafflicted, former colleagues say, with self-doubt in matters of finance.

Certainly, when it came to handling Harvard’s cash account, the former US Treasury secretary had no doubts. Widely considered one of the most brilliant economists of his generation, Summers pushed to invest 100 percent of Harvard’s cash with the endowment and had to be argued down to 80 percent, financial executives say. The cash account grew to $5.1 billion during his tenure, more than the entire endowment of all but a dozen or so colleges and universities.

Summers, now head of President Obama’s economic team, declined to be quoted on his handling of Harvard finances. A friend of his who is familiar with Harvard finances said Summers was warning of growing risks in the global markets by 2007, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. The friend, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of Summers’s current position, said, “In the years after Summers left, market conditions and Harvard’s liquidity changed dramatically. The university’s financial strategies could have and should have changed with them.’’

Investing cash from the general operating account in the endowment wasn’t new under Summers, nor was it unique to Harvard. It had been done as far back as the 1980s at the university, officials say, but on a smaller scale. The aggressive investment of cash accounts is part of how the university has long run its “central bank,’’ an account that holds funds from its various schools and pays them a modest US Treasury rate of return. The “bank,’’ in turn, has invested the lion’s share of that money with the endowment, generating returns that are used to pay for shared needs, like graduate housing and financial aid.

The strategy paid off handsomely for years, as the endowment reaped big gains, providing Harvard presidents with a checkbook for ambitious efforts. Under Neil Rudenstine, Harvard’s president from 1991 to 2001, cash was heavily invested in the endowment and surged from $290 million to $2 billion. Under Summers, the figure more than doubled again, according to a compilation of the data obtained by the Globe. The big project on Summers’s agenda: Harvard’s expansion across the river, into Allston.

Summers had a huge influence over Harvard money matters during his tenure, according to several people who worked with him. Known for his love of intellectual debate, he would hear out the opinions of others but ultimately was forceful in his own views. He was more financially sophisticated than most other Harvard presidents, and more deeply involved in decisions, from how to maximize returns on Harvard’s cash to using financial instruments called swaps, to hedge against the risk of rising interest rates - a hedge that would ultimately backfire.

In Harvard’s 2001-2002 financial report, Summers’s opening letter states, “During my first year as President, we took the opportunity to look anew at some of Harvard’s financial procedures to make sure we are making the most of our resources.’’ He closes the letter noting the need for “prudent fiscal management.’’

Despite the warnings from Meyer, Harvard Management’s chief for 15 years, Summers felt the cash risk was worth taking at the time, according to people who know him. He was not the sole decision maker on the matter: Members of the financial staff, a broader financial advisory committee, and the university’s elite six-member board all weighed in. But Summers was a powerful advocate, and with the returns so good for so long, there was little support for exercising caution.

And soon, Harvard would enter a period of upheaval. Meyer left in the fall of 2005, after clashing with Summers over the compensation of the endowment staff. And Summers announced his own resignation in February 2006 - as it happened, just days after the arrival of Meyer’s successor, El-Erian. A month later, Harvard’s top in-house financial official, Ann E. Berman, vice president for finance, also resigned.

Summers was gone by July that year, but not before El-Erian issued a new round of warnings about what he saw as an alarming amount of cash being put at risk in the endowment pool, according to several people who were there. El-Erian left Harvard after just two years, at the end of 2007, to return to his old bond firm, PIMCO. Both he and Meyer declined to comment on whether the cash concerns contributed to their decision to leave. more....

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/11/29/harva...

toniD's Ya Think?

Stanley Clarke - The Dancer

http://hypem.com/#/track/905986/Stanley+Clarke-The+Dancer

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

The Bears r on @ 3:00p.m.??
I have NO clue - they usually
play @ noon.

Levin: There Would Be No Afghan Dilemma If Bush Had Caught Bin Laden

Senate Armed Services Committee Chair Carl Levin (D-Mich.) insisted on Sunday that, had it not been for the Bush administration's failure to catch Osama bin Laden in 2001, there likely would be no debate about sending more troops to Afghanistan.

Addressing a new Senate Foreign Relations Committee report claiming bin Laden was nearly captured by U.S. forces at Tora Bora, Levin argued that had the capture taken place, "there would be a good chance we would not have forces or need to have forces [in Afghanistan]."

"This has been kind of well known for some time," Levin added. "We took our eye off the ball instead of moving in on him at Tora Bora, the previous administration decided to move its forces to Iraq. It was a mistake then. I think this report of the Foreign Relations committee just sort of reinforces that."

Released on Sunday, the SFRC report [pdf] provides a harsh indictment of the Bush administration's actions in the early stages of the search for bin Laden.

"Removing the Al Qaeda leader from the battlefield eight years ago would not have eliminated the worldwide extremist threat," reads the executive summary. "But the decisions that opened the door for his escape to Pakistan allowed bin Laden to emerge as a potent symbolic figure who continues to attract a steady flow of money and inspire fanatics world-wide. The failure to finish the job represents a lost opportunity that forever altered the course of the conflict in Afghanistan and the future of international terrorism, leaving the American people more vulnerable to terrorism, laying the foundation for today's protracted Afghan insurgency and inflaming the internal strife now endangering Pakistan. Al Qaeda shifted its locus across the border into Pakistan, where it has trained extremists linked to numerous plots, including the July 2005 transit bombings in London and two recent aborted attacks involving people living in the United States. The terrorist group's resurgence in Pakistan has coincided with the rising violence orchestrated in Afghanistan by the Taliban, whose leaders also escaped only to re-emerge to direct today's increasingly lethal Afghan insurgency."

Appearing on CBS' "Face the Nation," Levin also stressed that any increase in U.S. forces in Afghanistan had to be accompanied by an equal commitment within the country to bolster its own security.

"I think there's greater question on why the additional troops would help increase the size of the Afghan army," Levin said. "When I was in Afghanistan, I was told that the greatest need in Afghanistan is for more Afghan troops."

"I favor additional trainers, I favor a surge in equipment," the Michigan Democrat added, "but the key here is an Afghan surge, not an American surge."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/29/levin-there-would-be-no-a_n_373...

toniD's Ya Think?

MMRules - damn straight-

toniD - that was an interesting article
on Harvard. U just can't get enough money,
u want more & more & more & more! Greed

Senate Report: Bin Laden Was 'Within Our Grasp' In 2001 »

Did we not know this already?? ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

& did we not know this?? >>US Was 'Hell Bent' On Iraq Invasion

Ben Bernanke Makes Case For Strong Fed Role On Banks
digg Share this on Facebook Huffpost - Ben Bernanke Makes Case For Strong Fed Role On Banks stumble reddit del.ico.us RSS

EILEEN AJ CONNELLY | 11/29/09 03:31 AM | AP

NEW YORK — The chairman of the Federal Reserve is concerned that congressional efforts at financial reform could weaken the central bank's ability to handle future crises and may politicize monetary policy.

Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke made the comments in an Op-Ed piece to appear in Sunday's Washington Post, five days before the Senate Banking committee holds a hearing on his nomination for a second term. His current four-year term expires Jan. 31.

Bernanke wrote the nation is challenged to design a financial oversight system that will "embody the lessons of the past two years and provide a robust framework for preventing future crises and the economic damage they cause."

But two proposals being considered "are very much out of step with the global consensus on the appropriate role of central banks, and they would seriously impair the prospects for economic and financial stability in the United States," he said.

The first item in question is a bill before the Senate that would strip the Fed of its bank regulation authority and give the Senate a role in selecting the 12 regional Federal Reserve bank presidents, proposed by Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd, D-Conn.

Dodd says his measure would return the Fed to its core mission of setting monetary policy, claiming it proved itself "an abysmal failure" by not cracking down on risky lending practices that led to the financial meltdown.

Bernanke countered that the Fed played "a major part in arresting the crisis." more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/29/ben-bernanke-makes-case-f_n_373...

-------

Bernie Sanders: Bernanke Won't Get My Vote For Second Term (VIDEO)

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said Sunday that Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke would not get his vote for another five-year term.

"I absolutely will not vote for Mr. Bernanke," the Vermont senator said on ABC's "This Week." "He's part of the problem. If he's the smartest guy in the world, why didn't he do anything to prevent us from sinking into this disaster that Wall Street caused and which he was a part of? No, I will not vote for Bernanke to stay on as chairman."

In August, Sanders sharply disagreed with President Obama's decision to renominate Bernanke, saying the Fed chair had been "asleep at the wheel."

video at link

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/29/bernie-sanders-bernanke-w_n_373...

toniD's Ya Think?

Senate Report: Bin Laden Was 'Within Our Grasp' In 2001 »

Did we not know this already?? ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

& did we not know this?? >>US Was 'Hell Bent' On Iraq Invasion

*******

Everyone knows this but The M$M..
Or,should I say,
They think it's their little secret..
The pukes..

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Ben Bernanke Makes Case For Strong Fed Role On Banks
digg Share this on Facebook Huffpost - Ben Bernanke Makes Case For Strong Fed Role On Banks stumble reddit del.ico.us RSS

EILEEN AJ CONNELLY | 11/29/09 03:31 AM | AP

NEW YORK — The chairman of the Federal Reserve is concerned that congressional efforts at financial reform could weaken the central bank's ability to handle future crises and may politicize monetary policy.

Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke made the comments in an Op-Ed piece to appear in Sunday's Washington Post, five days before the Senate Banking committee holds a hearing on his nomination for a second term. His current four-year term expires Jan. 31.

Bernanke wrote the nation is challenged to design a financial oversight system that will "embody the lessons of the past two years and provide a robust framework for preventing future crises and the economic damage they cause."

But two proposals being considered "are very much out of step with the global consensus on the appropriate role of central banks, and they would seriously impair the prospects for economic and financial stability in the United States," he said.

The first item in question is a bill before the Senate that would strip the Fed of its bank regulation authority and give the Senate a role in selecting the 12 regional Federal Reserve bank presidents, proposed by Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd, D-Conn.

Dodd says his measure would return the Fed to its core mission of setting monetary policy, claiming it proved itself "an abysmal failure" by not cracking down on risky lending practices that led to the financial meltdown.

Bernanke countered that the Fed played "a major part in arresting the crisis." more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/29/ben-bernanke-makes-case-f_n_373...

-------

Bernie Sanders: Bernanke Won't Get My Vote For Second Term (VIDEO)

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said Sunday that Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke would not get his vote for another five-year term.

"I absolutely will not vote for Mr. Bernanke," the Vermont senator said on ABC's "This Week." "He's part of the problem. If he's the smartest guy in the world, why didn't he do anything to prevent us from sinking into this disaster that Wall Street caused and which he was a part of? No, I will not vote for Bernanke to stay on as chairman."

In August, Sanders sharply disagreed with President Obama's decision to renominate Bernanke, saying the Fed chair had been "asleep at the wheel."

video at link

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/29/bernie-sanders-bernanke-w_n_373...

toniD's Ya Think?

Jon Meacham: Dick Cheney Should Run in 2012, Because the 2008 Election Didn’t Count
By: Blue Texan Sunday November 29, 2009 11:30 am

Jon Meacham is reliably vapid, but this is a new low, even for him.

I think we should be taking the possibility of a Dick Cheney bid for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012 more seriously, for a run would be good for the Republicans and good for the country. [...] Why? Because Cheney is a man of conviction, has a record on which he can be judged, and whatever the result, there could be no ambiguity about the will of the people.

Cheney was judged — in 2006 and 2008. His favored policies (preemptive war, “deficits don’t matter”) have failed and been repudiated in spectacular fashion. As a result, he is one of the most unpopular vice presidents in history and his reeling party is at all-time lows. Where’s the ambiguity?

A contest between Dick Cheney and Barack Obama would offer us a bracing referendum on competing visions.

Is Meacham actually suggesting that there are no policy differences between McCain and Obama? Really? Then why isn’t McCain supporting Obama’s agenda? And while Obama has been a disappointment to progressives, the idea that McCain and Cheney are vastly different is absurd.

One of the problems with governance since the election of Bill Clinton has been the resolute refusal of the opposition party (the GOP from 1993 to 2001, the Democrats from 2001 to 2009, and now the GOP again in the Obama years) to concede that the president, by virtue of his victory, has a mandate to take the country in a given direction. A Cheney victory would mean that America preferred a vigorous unilateralism to President Obama’s unapologetic multilateralism, and vice versa.

But Bush did not have a mandate — he lost the popular vote in 2000, and won a single-state victory in 2004. And despite that, I would really like to know how the Democrats “refusal” to allow Bush to enact his agenda manifested itself.

Despite holding the Senate, Democrats passed Bush’s tax cuts and later gave him his war in Iraq. No Child Left Behind, the Medicare bill, the war supplementals — whatever Bush wanted, Bush got. It took Katrina and the unfolding disaster in Iraq to prevent him from reforming destroying Social Security.

Meanwhile, the GOP has party-line rejected Obama’s first two big initiatives, the stimulus and health care reform — even though he won a larger percentage of the popular vote than Ronald Reagan in 1980.

And I’d still like to know the difference between McCain’s foreign policy and Dick Cheney’s. And really — is Obama’s that different from Cheney’s at this point? Surge in Afghanistan, check. Troops still in Iraq, check. $700B in defense spending, check. Gitmo still open, check.

The difference Meacham is fetishizing is apparently about tone and symbolism, i.e., Cheney would say meaner things about Iran, wouldn’t bow to the Japanese Emperor and would be “tough” — unlike that sissy Obama who has launched more Predator attacks in 9 months than his predecessor did in 8 years.

I don’t think we need a third election to determine whether the American people have had enough of the Bush/Cheney administration, but I would be thrilled if Meacham got his way.

http://firedoglake.com/2009/11/29/jon-meacham-dick-cheney-should-run-in-...

toniD's Ya Think?

How are you doing ?
Good I hope.. :)

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

Just really tired today. Must be the weather. Overcast and damp and ugly day here.

Going to take a nap. BBL

toniD's Ya Think?

Submitted by toniD on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 12:21pm.
Professor advises underwater homeowners to walk away from mortgages
Brent T. White, a University of Arizona law school professor, says that it's in the homeowners' best financial interest to stiff their lenders and that it's not immoral to do so.

By Kenneth R. Harney

November 29, 2009

Reporting from Washington

Go ahead. Break the chains. Stop paying on your mortgage if you owe more than the house is worth. And most important: Don't feel guilty about it. Don't think you're doing something morally wrong.

That's the incendiary core message of a new academic paper by Brent T. White, a University of Arizona law school professor, titled "Underwater and Not Walking Away: Shame, Fear and the Social Management of the Housing Crisis."

White contends that far more of the estimated 15 million U.S. homeowners who are underwater on their mortgages should stiff their lenders and take a hike.

Doing so, he suggests, could save some of them hundreds of thousands of dollars that they "have no reasonable prospect of recouping" in the years ahead. Plus the penalties are nowhere near as painful or long-lasting as they might assume, he says.

"Homeowners should be walking away in droves," White said. "But they aren't. And it's not because the financial costs of foreclosure outweigh the benefits."

Sure, credit scores get whacked when you walk away, he acknowledges. But as long as you stay current with other creditors, "one can have a good credit rating again -- meaning above 660 -- within two years after a foreclosure."

Better yet, homeowners can default "strategically": Buy all the major items they'll need for the next couple of years -- a new car, even a new house -- just before they pull the plug on their current mortgage lender.

"Most individuals should be able to plan in advance for a few years of limited credit," White said, with minimal disruptions to their lifestyles.

What kind of law school professorial advice is this? Aren't mortgages legal contracts? In so-called anti-deficiency states such as California and Arizona, mortgage lenders have limited or no legal rights to pursue defaulting homeowners' assets beyond the house itself, White said. In other states, lenders may decide that it is not worth the legal expense to pursue walkaways, or consumers may be able to find flaws in the mortgage documents, disclosures or underwriting to challenge the original contract.

The main point, he said, is that too often people's emotions get in the way of clear financial thinking about mortgages, turning them into what he calls "woodheads" -- "individuals who choose not to act in their own self-interest." Most owners are too worried about feelings of shame and embarrassment after a foreclosure, and ignore the powerful financial reasons for doing so.

Buttressing these emotions is a system that White labels "the social control of the housing crisis" -- pressures and messages continually sent to consumers by the "social control agents," namely banks, government and the media. The mantra that these agents -- all the way up to President Obama -- pound into owners' heads, White said, is that "voluntarily defaulting on a mortgage is immoral."

Yet there is an inherent imbalance in the borrower-lender relationship that makes this morality message unfair to consumers, White says: Banks set the rules during the housing boom, handing out home loans with no down payments, no income checks and inflated appraisals. Now that property values have dropped 20% to 50% in many areas, banks have been slow to modify troubled mortgages and reluctant to reduce principal debts.

Only when homeowners cut through the emotional fog and default strategically in large numbers, White argues, will this inequitable situation be seriously addressed.

How does White's 52-page manifesto go over with mortgage lenders? Predictably, not well. Officials at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- investors who fund the bulk of all new mortgages in the country -- disputed White's characterization of how quickly after foreclosure a walkaway borrower can obtain a new loan. It's not three years, they said, it's a minimum of five years, absent extenuating circumstances such as medical or employment problems that caused the foreclosure.

"Borrowers who walk away from their mortgage obligations face serious consequences," including severely depressed credit scores for extended periods, said Brian Faith of Fannie Mae.

In addition, he said, "there's a moral dimension to this as homeowners who simply abandon their homes contribute to the destabilization of their neighborhood and community."

http://www.latimes.com/classified/realestate/news/la-fi-harney29-2009nov...

=================

I salute Professor White for speaking plainly.

The Corporatist Banksters even call the economics of their capitalism ammoral and yet they still pressure and hope to brainwash consumers into thinking it is imperative for the consumer to feel some kind of moral obligation to stick it out in unfair -- even crooked -- contracts with predatory lenders despite continued shortage of consumer protections!

If a mortgage holder has paid on a loan for five years already, the probability is the bank has already profitted nicely and certainly has lost nothing. The industry is just SO GREEDY and unethical. They specifically want to lock consumers into this scam and keep the gravy coming into the Banksters' pockets.

WHY do they talk to these charlatans and crooks like they are legitimate players??? I could NOT believe that these guys were introduced only by their highest government-related positions with no mention of their lobbying positions or crimes! Incredible. Sort of like having John Wilkes Boothe on a show and saying only that he is an acclaimed stage actor.

Shame on Face the Nation, and all others who facilitate the masquerade of these thugs and scammers.

Doing okay MMR
Submitted by toniD on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 3:47pm.
Just really tired today. Must be the weather. Overcast and damp and ugly day here.

Going to take a nap. BBL

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

another sunday....I can't believe these rethugs are getting airtime. I wonder if Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting is studying how much airtime the rethugs have versus dems when it's a dem majority and a dem admin. Disgusting

I hear you nora...

MTP was split today between Rev. Rick Warrren and Bill and Melinda Gates....

maybe not incredibly rethugular, but a far cry from Liberal....

spot on

him walking into the water ... LOL
now 3 MONKS
sorry, 1 more cat vs Scotty pup story ... I ALSO have a Tuffy type with a teen ex-feral female meow the one I found in a large box ... that's the one she, ShadowWolf, LOVES to run & play & run around downstairs...
but Labyrinth when bored "disappears".

wow 4 new MONKS nevermore {sniff sniff}

Thank You Randi...
It's A Jungle Out There...
I have to take puppy outside again {eye-roll}

US Soldiers: Afghan War More Challenging Than Iraq

FORWARD OPERATING BASE SHANK, Afghanistan — Veterans of Iraq recall rolling to war along asphalted highways, sweltering in flat scrublands and chatting with city-wise university graduates connected to the wider world.

Now fighting in Afghanistan, U.S. soldiers invariably encounter illiterate farmers who may never have talked to an American as they slog into remote villages on dirt tracks through bitterly cold, snow-streaked mountains.

"Before deploying here we were given training on language, culture, everything. I thought that since I was an Iraq combat veteran, I didn't need any of that stuff. I was wrong. Both countries may be Muslim but this is a totally different place," says Sgt. Michael McCann, returning from a patrol in the east-central province of Logar.

While their experiences in the two war zones vary, for many soldiers in the field – if not policy makers – the conflict in Afghanistan is one they think may prove harder and longer to win.

Soldiers and officers involved in combat operations all cite the more punishing geography and climate, those focused on development the bare-bones infrastructure, and intelligence specialists the even greater difficulties in identifying the insurgents as among the many sharp contrasts between Afghanistan and Iraq.

"The sheer terrain of Afghanistan is much more challenging: the mountains, the altitudes, severity of weather, the distances. That wears on an army," says Maj. Joseph Matthews, a battalion operations officer in the 10th Mountain Division. "You can flood Baghdad with soldiers but if you want to flood the mountains you are going to need huge numbers and logistics."

McCann, a military policeman from Enterprise, Ala., says that the highest he ever got during his Iraq tour was a five-story building. In Afghanistan, troops routinely cross passes 10,000 feet (3,000 meters) and higher, descending into valleys where they say villagers "hibernate like bears" for up to five winter months, cut off from the outside world by the snows.

This almost medieval isolation makes it far more difficult for the Afghan government and coalition forces to spread the aid and information needed to counter the Taliban push while the villagers – mostly illiterate and with little access to radios, never mind television – rely on religious leaders at Friday mosque prayers, or the insurgents, to shape their world view.
Story continues below

"When you have a society that can't read for itself and religious leaders are trusted, they can say whatever they like and people will believe them. It's hard for the U.S. to penetrate and influence this. In Iraq there are other ways to get the message across," says Chief Warrant Officer Daniel Weiermann, Jr., an intelligence specialist.

The U.S. effort in Logar has stressed bridging the chasms between villages, districts, the provincial capital and a central government in Kabul which has had little control over the country for the past 30 years of warfare. It hasn't been easy.

"This is not an interconnected society. There is a complete separation of ideas from Pul-i-Alam and Kharwar," notes Matthews, of Vero Beach, Fla., of the provincial capital and a district just 23 miles (37 kilometers) away. "The difference between a village and a city in this country is about 200 years," says the officer, who served for more than three years in Iraq and is on his second Afghanistan tour.

Although tribalism plays a major role in Iraq, U.S. troops find it even stronger in the predominantly rural Afghan society, making the forging of vital bonds between people and government harder. Loyalty is given first and foremost to the tribe, the government coming at best a distant second.

While counterinsurgency in Iraq had its unique complexities, Weiermann said that in Iraq – about 70 percent urbanized as opposed to 25 percent in Afghanistan – "you can meet and hopefully influence a lot of people in one day. In Afghanistan with its great distances, sparsely populated areas and rugged terrain you can do far less in the same amount of time." Hence, one reason for the prognosis that Afghanistan will be a longer haul.

Development – which absorbs the U.S. military more than combat and is regarded as key to victory – is also far tougher than in Iraq, which already possessed a solid infrastructure and once almost produced the atomic bomb. In Afghanistan at best a quarter of the population can read, compared to more than 75 percent in Iraq, which had functioning banking, medical and other systems, however imperfect, through which aid could be channeled.

"Iraq already had the foundation. They just needed the governance piece that would support not just the elite few. In Afghanistan, you are starting at the very beginning. It's like trying to take the American Indians in their purest form and put them into today's New York City. It's not going to happen," says Weiermann, of Ft. Hood, Texas.

"I worked with folks who had been to Oxford and been on projects in multiple other countries. There were homegrown NGOs and highly qualified women – all lacking in Afghanistan," says Les Garrison, a retired U.S. Marine officer from Arlington, Va., who serves as Logar's U.S. State Department adviser. more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/29/us-soldiers-afghan-war-mo_n_373...

toniD's Ya Think?

yes the propaganda has already begun - -- we can't just pull out, we have to stay in to help the afghans (umm..whose ocuntry is it?) Same argumests for Viet Nam redone

VIDEO REPORT: Eric Cantor Hosts Another Job Fair That Promotes Jobs Fueled By The Stimulus

On Monday, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) hosted a job fair in his district at Germanna Community College. Like his last job fair in August, Cantor used it as an opportunity to gain positive local press and launch attacks against President Obama.

At the fair, Cantor told reporters that the stimulus has been an “utter failure.” But as the Washington Post has noted, nearly half of the “30 organizations participating” in Cantor’s event “were recipients of the stimulus.”

ThinkProgress attended the event, which attracted more than 600 people. Victor Zapanta produced a video report on Cantor’s stimulus-fueled job fair. Watch it:

So far, the stimulus has injected over $5 billion into Virginia, creating or saving at least 5,900 jobs. The money has helped local governments avoid budget cuts and layoffs, while spurring private investment by funding infrastructure and other critical projects. Many of the employers at Cantor’s job fair were a clear demonstration of the success of the stimulus:

– The Culpeper County School system will have a total of $4.1 million in stimulus funding to work with for the fiscal year 2010. The school system is hiring 7 people and the stimulus is helping to retain the over 700 people employed by the system. In March the Culpeper School Board, which is not authorized to levy taxes, approved a $70.6 million budget. As the Culpeper Star-Exponent reported, “the school budget includes $2.2 million in recently approved stimulus money.”

– Higher education institutions at the fair were encouraging job-seekers to go back to school. Many of universities, like Grand Canyon University, touts federal TEACH and Pell grants as a way to attend. The stimulus provided $14 million in Pell Grants.

– The Orange County Public Schools received at least $340,000 from the stimulus and is hiring 7 people.

It’s worth noting that among the job fair participants, more than half were from the public sector, including the Department of Veterans Affairs, the CIA, FBI, Army and the FAA –- even though Cantor previously has criticized the stimulus plan for placing too great an emphasis on “preserving jobs in the public sector.” In Virginia alone, the Department of Defense has 83 projects totaling $75.7 million in stimulus money. It’s no wonder Cantor would feature the Culpeper Army recruiting center at his fair, especially since the Army in Virginia has received $61 million in stimulus money.

As the Washington Monthly’s Steve Benen observed, “the job fair at which Cantor trashed the stimulus wouldn’t have been possible were it not for the stimulus.”

http://thinkprogress.org/2009/11/25/cantor-second-job-fair/

toniD's Ya Think?

watch, how about if we point out the rogue B-52 with atomic weapons onboard flying from North Dakota to Louisiana? Did they find them all, by the way? Ask Liz about it.

Get your Christmas Special Leg on.

Why is it ok to speculate about President Obama's motives for the fed but not Tiger Woods car crash?

What if he called his wife the C word and she clubbed him? Or what if he was on his cell phone? What if his new knee has has it's own personality and decided not to hit the brakes?

Shouldn't we make sure none of that was the cause?

sounds like a cialis commercial...

its not atomic weapons, its nooklear weapons. big difference.

they are just rocket bras. Big diff :)

Man, that's a lot of legs.

They just did a fun house double mirror effect and the stage was like finding yourself between an infinite number of long legged dancers tossing around.

The Radio City Christmas Spectacular pop-up book is sold everywhere that sells books, including Barnes & Noble, Borders, Amazon, as well as at the Radio City Music Hall store, for $35.00. - Facebook

Submitted by toniD on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 5:41pm.
US Soldiers: Afghan War More Challenging Than Iraq

FORWARD OPERATING BASE SHANK, Afghanistan — Veterans of Iraq recall rolling to war along asphalted highways, sweltering in flat scrublands and chatting with city-wise university graduates connected to the wider world.

Now fighting in Afghanistan, U.S. soldiers invariably encounter illiterate farmers who may never have talked to an American as they slog into remote villages on dirt tracks through bitterly cold, snow-streaked mountains.

"Before deploying here we were given training on language, culture, everything. I thought that since I was an Iraq combat veteran, I didn't need any of that stuff. I was wrong. Both countries may be Muslim but this is a totally different place," says Sgt. Michael McCann, returning from a patrol in the east-central province of Logar.

While their experiences in the two war zones vary, for many soldiers in the field – if not policy makers – the conflict in Afghanistan is one they think may prove harder and longer to win.

Soldiers and officers involved in combat operations all cite the more punishing geography and climate, those focused on development the bare-bones infrastructure, and intelligence specialists the even greater difficulties in identifying the insurgents as among the many sharp contrasts between Afghanistan and Iraq.

"The sheer terrain of Afghanistan is much more challenging: the mountains, the altitudes, severity of weather, the distances. That wears on an army," says Maj. Joseph Matthews, a battalion operations officer in the 10th Mountain Division. "You can flood Baghdad with soldiers but if you want to flood the mountains you are going to need huge numbers and logistics."

McCann, a military policeman from Enterprise, Ala., says that the highest he ever got during his Iraq tour was a five-story building. In Afghanistan, troops routinely cross passes 10,000 feet (3,000 meters) and higher, descending into valleys where they say villagers "hibernate like bears" for up to five winter months, cut off from the outside world by the snows.

...

==================

I gotta ask, Why is the government allowing these military personnel to make these statements? And are the statements candid, or planned and possibly scripted or FILTERED?

Another similarity to selling the war in Vietnam: The indigenous peoples are described as so much "less than" their betters -- that is, the Americans. During the Vietnam Mess we heard about how unsophisticated the "villagers" were. They are just "villagers", nobody owns a car, no electricity. No one ever mentioned they were magnificent at intensive farming and tended the rich lands well for centuries, never depleted their natural rubber tree forests, that Vietnam exported great quantities of rice, etc. No. They were just backward villagers. And now we get the same framing from this piece. Are we to accept these 'look at these backward losers' non-stop 'observations' which seem intended as facts but sound to me to be put-downs of our fellow humanbeings -- like Afghans are illiterate (does that rate as 'backward'?) mountain "villagers"; There are Afghans who never talked to an American before (wow, that's a strike against them right there, huh? Sheesh.); Afghans "hibernate like bears"? Is that saying Afghans are non-human animals (and you know how Americans LOVE to decimate bear and other non-human animal populations! Grizzlies and Bison come to mind.)

To me, this is really a telling piece.

Stuff like this makes Americans look like snot-nosed punks with guns whose superiority complex is OUT OF CONTROL.

This is an odd article, like here are the reasons we are going to have a hard time (which can be used by any side, pro-war, anti-war, or prolong war), and ALSO can be used as the reasons Superior Americans shouldn't really care if the Militarist Imperialist Occupation wipes the Afghan people and their culture off the map.

Very disturbing.

Submitted by dan on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 7:09pm.
its not atomic weapons, its nooklear weapons. big difference.

========

My bad.

Let me practice: Nookleer, nookleur, knew-clee-or, nukkcleer, nookleer.

I'll get it. Give me a chance.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — President Asif Ali Zardari has ceded his position in Pakistan’s nuclear command structure to his prime minister, in a sudden political maneuver widely seen as a fresh sign of turmoil on the eve of President Obama’s strategy announcement for the region. - NYT

LA Times sports writer Mike Penner dead at 52

By JOHN ROGERS - AP

LOS ANGELES – Los Angeles Times sports writer Mike Penner, who announced two years ago he was a transsexual and was changing his name to Christine Daniels, has died at age 52, the newspaper reported Saturday.

Penner was pronounced dead Friday at a hospital, said Los Angeles County coroner's Lt. Brian Elias. He said coroner's officials hadn't yet performed an autopsy or issued an official cause of death.

The Times said in a story Saturday Penner was believed to have committed suicide. Penner had returned to using the name Mike Penner last year and was a Times columnist at the time of his death.

In 25 years with the newspaper, Penner covered Major League Baseball, the National Football League, the Olympics, World Cup soccer, tennis and other sports. A fluid writer with a sharp wit, he worked at various times as a reporter, columnist and the newspaper's Los Angeles Angels beat writer.

"Mike was one of the most talented writers I've ever worked with, capable of reporting on any number of topics with great wit and style. He was a very gentle man who will be greatly missed. This is a tragic ending and a difficult time for all of us who knew him," said Times Sports Editor Mike James.

Con't..

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091129/ap_on_sp_ot/us_obit_penner

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

According to the L.A Times it’s a suspected suicide. - Gather

I watched The Day The Earth Stood Still today. Precipice does come to mind for most of us daily in the modern world.

Under their masthead "Garden & Gun" has a line (product line magazine essence line) it says "Soul of the New South". Still sounds like the Old South to me.

Yup. After you're done pruning the Crape Myrtle and planting the Sweet Potatoes and Pansies, you can go out and kill something.

http://gardenandgun.com/

Rockettes Radiocity on PBS now
Submitted by Fernando on Sun, 11/29/2009 - 7:11pm.
Get your Christmas Special Leg on.

*******

I think that's what it was called..

It was about that cute kid with glasses who obsessed about
getting a BB Gun/Rifle for Christmas..

His father had that leg lamp..
And,had a possibly unhealthy obsession for it..

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

here.....

http://www.samsedershow.com/node/5515

toniD's Ya Think?

MB is trying to start it now

http://www.bluerootsradio.com/

toniD's Ya Think?