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Selected News For Oct 2 – Oct 9

This thread is for the busy bees of S&L to post news items we might otherwise miss.

To make the articles as readable as possible, please stick to the format described here.

  • Only post ‘hard news’ from established media outlets.
  • Avoid editorials and ‘thought pieces,’ unless they are truly newsworthy.
  • Eschew ‘major news’ items that most people will likely have seen elsewhere.
  • Articles that fit under the topic of a recent thread should be posted as a comment there.

  • Always post less than a third of the original article.

Posts of articles that do not follow these guidelines are susceptible to being edited or deleted.

Related Articles:

 

This article was posted by Steve Gilbert on Saturday, October 3rd, 2009 at 12:00 am. You can leave a response.

97 Responses to “Selected News For Oct 2 – Oct 9”

  1. canary
    October 3, 2009 at 5:45 am

    Qaida man hid bomb in rectum
    The Times of India 1 October 2009

    … One of the terrorists who tried to assassinate a Saudi prince hid explosives and detonator in his rectum.

    Abdullah Asieri avoided detection by two sets of airport security and palace security, in his mission to eliminate prince Mohammed Bin Nayef, head of Saudi Arabia’s counter terrorism operations. Taking a trick from the narcotics trade – which has long smuggled drugs in body cavities – Asieri had a pound of explosives, plus a detonator inserted in his rectum, reports CBS News.

    The bomber persuaded the prince he wanted to leave al-Qaida, setting a trap. Al-Qaida has an animated movie showing the meeting between the bomber and the prince. Asieri says more senior Qaida figures want to surrender and convinces the prince to talk to them on a cellphone.

    In the conversation recorded by al-Qaida, one can hear a beep in the middle of two identical phrases that are repeated by the bomber and his handler. Explosives experts told CBS News that beep was likely a text message activating the bomb concealed inside Asieri. The Trojan bomber hands the phone to the prince. He’s standing next to him, and 14 seconds later, he detonates.

    http://timesofindia.indiatimes.....074016.cms

    • caligirl9
      October 3, 2009 at 12:26 pm

      I thought I’d seen some pretty strange things put up there back when I was still working in the ER.
      Must have taken a bunch of lube to get that placed. Unless it was built like a ship in a bottle …

    • proreason
      October 3, 2009 at 1:34 pm

      caligirl: “Unless it was built like a ship in a bottle”

      Barney Franks doesn’t usually accept questions from non constituents, but he might make an exception if you ask politely how this was done.

  2. canary
    October 3, 2009 at 6:11 am

    AFP: White House slams Republicans on Afghanistan Sept 30 2009
    Stephen Collinson

    The White House accused Republicans Wednesday of “game-playing” over critical troop deployment decisions,…

    Republicans, however, accuse Obama of stalling,…

    “Time is not on our side, we need a decision pretty quickly,” Senator John McCain,..McCain said that Obama would put America in “much greater danger” if he decided not to deploy more soldiers.

    Obama, meanwhile, launched talks expected to last several hours… decisions.

    Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Defense Secretary Robert Gates were the top ranking civilian officials at a session on a war some supporters fear could swamp Obama’s presidency.

    Obama’s task in building political support for any troop increase is being complicated by the fraud-tainted Afghan presidential election and widespread mistrust in Washington over the government of President Hamid Karzai.

    The White House has cautioned it will be “weeks” before the president makes up his mind on a new strategy,….

    Gates has said he will only formally convey McChrystal’s request to Obama once the policy review is complete…

    http://uk.news.yahoo.com/18/20.....170b4.html

    Obama has to be in control, and has no respect for the General. Also, after Obama assured with out a doubt that the VA would get their funding at the beginning of the fiscal year, he is late. Obama’s too busy playing sports with health athletes. Maybe chronic jet lag?

    • Rusty Shackleford
      October 3, 2009 at 12:38 pm

      Why am I not filled with confidence when McCain speaks on behalf of the republicans?

      *sigh*….

    • canary
      October 3, 2009 at 2:46 pm

      I’m not impressed with McCain especially after the election when he’s more himself. He and Obama’s General should be complaining about how Obama has let the terrorists reinforce and build-up since taking office, Obama’s new rules of engagment which have had enough to time to show they failed, but then Obama fired the other General because he wanted a
      “yes man” General with shiny boots.

  3. BillK
    October 3, 2009 at 8:46 am

    From Denver’s KUSA Television:

    Fake Veteran will face charges

    DENVER – 9Wants to Know has learned the former head of the Colorado Veteran’s Alliance, who admitted to lying about his military service record, will face charges in federal court.

    Rick Strandlof faces a charge of “false claims about receipt of military decorations of medals.”

    Strandlof gave his first jailhouse interview to 9wants to Know in June and admitted he hadn’t been truthful about his military record.

    Strandlof had claimed he graduated from the Naval Academy and received a purple heart after being wounded in Iraq. …

    http://www.9news.com/news/arti.....;catid=339

    If you don’t remember who this idiot is, from CNN:

    Charismatic and inspiring, people seemingly couldn’t get enough of the compelling personal story he had spun – that he was a graduate of the Naval Academy, was at the Pentagon on 9-11, and was injured in combat in Iraq. For much of 2008, the people of Colorado believed this purported war hero — a forceful public advocate on behalf of veterans and a vocal critic of the Iraq War. He also worked tireless to elect anti-war candidates, appearing in several political ads.

    The only problem? It was all a lie – down to his name. Rick Duncan was really Richard Strandlof. …

    http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/200.....interview/

    • Steve
      October 5, 2009 at 5:27 pm

      Another Phony IVAW ‘Vet’ Gets Outed | Sweetness & Light
      http://sweetness-light.com/arc.....gets-outed

    • wardmama4
      October 7, 2009 at 4:00 pm

      For anyone who actually knows a real member of the Armed Forces and/or Veteran – the 2 dead give aways are 1) talking about all the heroic things that they have done and 2) being anti- Iraq war .

      Those two things alone should tip everyone off that this is a ‘phony’ soldier – so to speak. Sadly since the VVAW and Winter Soldier – the left continues to hype these liars, losers and ‘phony’ soldiers – and the media eats it up.

      I just can’t decide who is the more stupid – the phony soldiers or the msm for repeatedly buying the shtick.

  4. Gila Monster
    October 3, 2009 at 9:36 am

    The NY Slimes carries water for, and downplays Rangel’s criminal acts.

    Focus on Rangel, a Chairman Under Investigation
    By CARL HULSE
    Published: October 2, 2009

    WASHINGTON — Representative Charles B. Rangel of New York is increasingly in the spotlight these days and not just because he is in the thick of the health care debate as chairman of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee.

    Just as the health care fight heads to the floors of the House and Senate, Republicans are intensifying efforts to make Mr. Rangel a symbol of Democratic misconduct and institutional arrogance because of his belated disclosure of personal assets and other financial missteps.

    Belated disclosure..?? Sounds like Rangel was late giving someone a birthday card. Never mind that Rangel’s “miss-steps” date back more than ten years.

    Despite some unease, Democrats say they are willing to stand by Mr. Rangel and will resist efforts to topple him from his chairmanship pending the anxiously awaited outcome of an ethics investigation that Mr. Rangel himself requested last year.

    “My feeling, and I think it is widely shared, is that the process should be allowed to be completed,” said Representative Sander M. Levin of Michigan, a longtime Democratic colleague of Mr. Rangel on the Ways and Means Committee.

    Other factors are also at work in the decision by Speaker Nancy Pelosi and fellow Democratic leaders to allow Mr. Rangel, the fourth-most-senior member of the House and one of the nation’s best-known African-American politicians, to remain in his high-profile post for now.

    Plenty of Democrats are uncomfortable with the notion of Mr. Rangel’s being replaced in the middle of the health care fight by the lawmaker next in line, Representative Pete Stark, a very liberal Californian with a sharp tongue and an occasionally abrasive manner. Trying to leapfrog Mr. Stark and devise an alternative line of succession could touch off a bitter intramural fight at a highly inconvenient moment.

    In addition, the leadership is wary of alienating the 42-member Congressional Black Caucus. Many of those votes will be needed to push through health care legislation.

    Some black caucus members were angry when Ms. Pelosi forced former Representative William Jefferson of Louisiana off the Ways and Means Committee before he was formally charged in a corruption case that ultimately landed him in jail. Any move to sideline Mr. Rangel, a founding member of the caucus, before a finding against him could spark serious resentment.

    Mr. Rangel also has a reservoir of good will among his colleagues that is helping him fend off the Republicans.

    “I have not heard anyone in the caucus against him,” said Representative Elijah E. Cummings, Democrat of Maryland. “Mr. Rangel is a legend, and I think that people believe that the ethics folks will do their job, and all of us are hoping for the best.”

    But Republicans are not making it easy for Democrats.

    Representative John Carter, Republican of Texas and a former judge, said he intended to force a vote next week on a resolution requiring Mr. Rangel to step aside from the helm of the Ways and Means Committee at least until the internal investigation is finished. A similar effort by Mr. Carter was tabled on a party line vote in February, and the same result is expected this time.

    But Mr. Carter said new revelations in August that Mr. Rangel had not disclosed an additional $500,000 or more in assets required some action on the part of the House, particularly after multiple tax and financial lapses were uncovered in 2008.

    “It all boils down to this, the public perceives — and rightfully so — that Mr. Rangel’s indiscretions are being overlooked, and they know that theirs would not have been,” said Mr. Carter, who said he hoped the resolution would prompt the ethics committee to finish an investigation that many think was taking too long.

    Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, the Republican leader, also urged action if Mr. Rangel refused to step aside voluntarily. “It’s improper for Chairman Rangel to remain in his position with all of the influence that he has while the serious allegations remain hanging,” Mr. Boehner said.

    Democrats accuse Republicans of trying to score political points. “This is nothing more than a partisan stunt to distract from the G.O.P.’s lack of ideas to improve America’s health care system and help our economy recover,” Elbert Garcia, a spokesman for Mr. Rangel, said in a statement.

    Republicans do see political opportunity with the ethics troubles of Mr. Rangel, as well as investigations into whether senior Democratic members of the Appropriations Committee improperly steered projects to allies and campaign contributors.

    They would love to serenade Democrats with the “culture of corruption” refrain that Democrats so successfully employed against Republicans in gaining control of the House in 2006. But Republican efforts are being diluted by misconduct in their own ranks, including the case of Senator John Ensign of Nevada, who is drawing renewed scrutiny for his efforts to cover up an affair with the wife of one of his former top aides.

    At this point, Democrats say they are not overly concerned. They believe the fact that an ethics review is under way insulates them from suggestions that they are protecting Mr. Rangel. The hard decision for Democrats might come after the ethics findings. The panel could recommend that Mr. Rangel be ousted from his chairmanship. If a censure were recommended and approved by the House, he would automatically lose his chairmanship under Democratic rules.

    But if the ethics committee delivers a mild or moderate rebuke, Democrats might have to assess, with an eye to difficult midterm elections, whether they can take the heat of having the tax panel headed by a lawmaker who erred on his own finances and taxes.

    http://tinyurl.com/y8n2qpr

    You see, it’s all those evil Republicans fault.
    And oh, by the way, Senator Ensign (Republican) is having or had an extra-marital affair so that excuses Rangel’s criminal behavior.
    Can we call that tortured logic?

  5. Rusty Shackleford
    October 3, 2009 at 12:34 pm

    From the UK:

    Elderly won’t have to sell their homes to fund care… if they make one-off payment of £8,000, say Tories

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new.....ories.html

    By Tim Shipman and James Chapman
    Last updated at 1:15 PM on 03rd October 2009

    The Tories say they will prevent the elderly ever having to sell their homes to pay for long-term residential care.

    Shadow Chancellor George Osborne revealed that pensioners will be invited to pay an £8,000 lump sum when they reach 65.

    In return, the state will pick up all their care-home costs for life and guarantee they can pass on their homes to their children.

    The Home Protection Scheme, to be set up next year if the Tories win the general election, is designed to eliminate the misery of the 45,000 middle-class people who have to sell their homes every year to pay for residential care – a scandal exposed by the Daily Mail’s Dignity for the Elderly campaign.

    It will strike a major blow for families, who find worry over how to pay expensive care home bills for frail relatives worsens an already fraught time.

    The voluntary scheme, which will be at the heart of the Tory election manifesto, is far simpler and cheaper than the plan outlined recently by Labour under which a £20,000 lump sum is taken either on retirement or from the estate on death.

    It is one of a raft of proposals which the Conservatives will roll out at their party conference in Manchester next week in the hope of convincing voters that they are a credible government in waiting.

    In an exclusive interview with the Daily Mail, Mr Osborne revealed that he is preparing to detail deep spending cuts to tackle the spiralling national debt while avoiding tax hikes.

    The Shadow Chancellor made clear that he aims to reverse Labour’s half a penny rise in National Insurance, due to come into effect in 2011, attacking it as a ‘tax on jobs’.

    But he warned that no one will be spared the pain as a Tory government seeks to restore stability to the public finances, saying: ‘We are all in this together.’

    That will be seen as a sign that the Conservatives – who have already indicated they will cut tax credits for middle-income families – will take the axe to other benefits for the better-off.

    But the Home Protection Scheme is designed to woo middle-class supporters, who have lost out under Labour, without costing taxpayers a penny.

    ——-Wait a minute! As a US citizen totally in love with Obama’s utopian plan for the future and wanting to be more like those sophisticated Europeans, you mean to tell me that they AREN’T taken care of cradle to grave and that in their senior years have to sell off their very HOME in order to have senior care?

    ——-What’s all this then? Is this what they want the US to end up doing….so that at the end of life the house ends up being the property of the government? Say it isn’t so.

    ——-Truly, I love it when the papers from foreign lands give these details of how socialized government works….yet, when I put this in front of a liberal, they invariably say, “Oh that won’t happen here…..they have a better plan”.

    ——-To what end? How better, exactly? They can’t predict three-thirty at three o’clock let alone come up with a better plan than the private sector can. Socialized government is all about taking everyone’s money and doling it out in a committee-based fashion. How can that be “better”? Seeing a senior citizen faced with selling their very HOME in order to have senior care is one thing…but to have to sell it to the government at the end of life?

    ——–On a side note, the house can be sold…but the land on which is sits belongs to the crown. You cannot own land in the UK.

    • proreason
      October 3, 2009 at 1:29 pm

      Looks like the criminal politicians in the UK figured out how to extend their ponzi scheme for another couple of years.

  6. canary
    October 3, 2009 at 4:02 pm

    The Washington Post: White House may narrow Afghanistan war effort
    October 03, 2009 By Scott Wilson and Anne E. Kornblut

    WASHINGTON — Senior White House officials have begun to make the case for a policy shift in Afghanistan that would send few, if any, new combat troops to the country,…

    In a three-hour meeting Wednesday at the White House, senior advisers challenged some of the key assumptions in Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s blunt assessment…

    Gen. McChrystal, commander of the 100,000 NATO and U.S. forces in Afghanistan, has asked Mr. Obama to quickly endorse his call for a change in military strategy and approve the additional resources he needs to retake the initiative from the resurgent Taliban.

    Mr. Obama summoned Gen. McChrystal early yesterday to a meeting in Copenhagen aboard Air Force One

    before Mr. Obama left the Danish capital, where he addressed the International Olympic Committee in an unsuccessful bid to promote Chicago’s bid for the 2016 Summer Games.

    Gen. McChrystal had been in London and flew to Copenhagen specifically to meet face-to-face with the president.

    The White House said the meeting in Mr. Obama’s forward cabin on Air Force One lasted 25 minutes, after which the general left the plane.

    “The president wanted to take the opportunity to get together with Gen. McChrystal,” White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters. ..

    White House officials are resisting Gen. McChrystal’s call for urgency, which he underscored Thursday in a speech in London, and questioning important elements of his assessment,….

    One senior administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the meeting, said, “A lot of assumptions — and I don’t want to

    say myths, but a lot of assumptions — were exposed to the light of day.”

    Among them, according to three senior administration officials who attended the meeting, is Gen. McChrystal’s contention that the Taliban and al-Qaida share the same strategic interests,

    and that the return to power of the Taliban would automatically mean a new sanctuary for al-Qaida.

    … some White House officials say, al-Qaida has not regained its foothold, even as the Taliban insurgency has strengthened.

    …Senior White House officials asked some of the sharpest questions, …., while the military, including Gen. David Petraeus, head of U.S. Central Command, did not take issue with Gen. McChrystal’s assessment.

    According to White House officials involved in the meeting, Vice President Joseph R. Biden offered some of the more pointed challenges to Gen. McChrystal.

    Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg.....z0Su6xNAGr

    So, Obama finally takes 25 minutes from celebritie gatherings and meets with General McChrystal. And then unidentified WH officals and Biden say that the General’s report is based on myths and assumptions?
    These idiots spending billions, pushing health care, partying and traveling,
    already had their minds made up. The war belongs to Obama, the self-made reality star, with a poor sporadic drug enduced education.

    http://www.post-gazette.com/pg.....nworld.xml

    • canary
      October 3, 2009 at 4:09 pm

      The denial of more troops implys a phasing out of troops by genocide. Soon the 5 that die each day will grow in number, as they live side by side with the most dangerous terrorists in the world, building water pumps and handing out schools supplies to children with grenades.

    • caligirl9
      October 3, 2009 at 4:40 pm

      This is very simple: Either fight this whatever war to win (more troops and the best support possible) or put every last one of them on a plane RIGHT NOW and bring ‘em home. Every one of ‘em. No “phasing out.” Just bring them home. No reason to risk any more American lives for the president’s stupidity.

      Bless our troops!!

    • canary
      October 4, 2009 at 4:01 am

      All Obama’s talk of going after Afganistan, and now the chain of command has been climbed, and commander in chief (and the rest of his leaders) have now deserted their troops. Court-Marshall them all.

  7. Rusty Shackleford
    October 3, 2009 at 10:57 pm

    From the AP:

    Jackson, Farrakhan at beaten Ill. teen’s funeral.

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_.....DMQ–

    —-Now, let’s compare for a moment.

    —–Things they said about teen violence with regard to this death:

    Farrakhan said he came to the funeral because he was “deeply pained” by the death of 16-year-old honor roll student Derrion Albert.

    “The eyes of the world are watching,” Pastor E.F. Ledbetter Jr. told mourners…”This has affected people all over the globe.”

    “The code of silence is unacceptable in this day and age where we have young children being killed,” Daley said.

    “Derrion didn’t have to die,” Jackson said. “He was murdered. His pain, his suffering, his death have shook the world.”

    “Let’s go get our young people,” Farrakhan said. “His righteousness was to serve as a redemptive force to command us to get up and get busy and save our children.”

    ——OK, you get all that? “deeply pained”, “eyes of the world are watching”, “get busy and save our children”

    ——Now, let’s move back to September. To a tussle in a school bus in St Louis where a bunch of angry black teens beat the crap out of a white student.

    http://www.stltoday.com/stltod.....enDocument

    ——In reference to this incident, Farrakhan said:

    ——Jackson said:

    ——It is good that our community watchdogs, Jackson and Farrakhan are so diligent in these matters. Otherwise I’d think they were looking at the world though agenda-colored glasses.

    • Liberals Demise
      October 4, 2009 at 9:35 am

      Just think if there was one honky as a stander by ……… would there be condemnation for this person and a APB put out for the individual to be brought forth before the law?

      Jesse and Louie would be sharing a pulpit this a.m. demanding ………….

    • neocon mom
      October 9, 2009 at 6:30 pm

      You can be sure they wouldn’t have been there to congratulate this fallen young man had he lived to graduate at the top of his class.
      These guys scatter like roaches from black achievement but show up with bells on when some high profile tragedy like this happens.

  8. Rusty Shackleford
    October 3, 2009 at 11:18 pm

    From the AP:

    Health insurance bills could be hardship for many

    Now, the original headline read: Health reform might not mean affordability for all middle class

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_.....DMQ–

    by RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR, Associated Press Writer Ricardo Alonso-zaldivar, Associated Press Writer – 2 hrs 1 min ago

    WASHINGTON – Many middle-class Americans would still struggle to pay for health insurance despite efforts by President Barack Obama and Democrats to make coverage more affordable.

    The legislation advancing in Congress would require all Americans to get insurance — through an employer, a government program or by buying it themselves. But new tax credits to help with premiums won’t go far enough for everyone. Some middle-class families purchasing their own coverage through new insurance exchanges could find it out of reach.

    Lawmakers recognize the problem.

    “For some people it’s going to be a heavy lift,” said Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del. “We’re doing our best to make sure it’s not an impossible lift.”

    Added Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine: “We have no certainty as to whether or not these plans are going to be affordable.” Both are on the Senate Finance Committee, which finished writing a health care bill on Friday.

    A new online tool from the Kaiser Family Foundation illustrates the predicament.

    ——–Now get this:

    The Health Reform Subsidy Calculator provides ballpark estimates of what households of varying incomes and ages would pay under the different Democratic health care bills. The legislation is still a work in progress and the calculator only a rough guide. Nonetheless, the results are revealing.

    A family of four headed by a 45-year-old making $63,000 a year is in the middle of the middle class. But that family would pay $7,110 to buy its own health insurance under the plan from the committee chairman, Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont.

    The family would get a tax credit of $3,970 to help pay for a policy worth $11,080. But the balance due — $7,110 — is real money. Maybe it’s less than the rent, but it’s probably more than a car loan payment.

    Kaiser’s calculator doesn’t take into account co-payments and deductibles that could add hundreds of dollars, even several thousand, to a family’s total medical expenses. A Congressional Budget Office analysis estimates total expenses could average 20 percent of income for some families by 2016.

    The issue of affordability “has been lurking in the background and is nowhere near resolved yet,” said Kaiser’s president, Drew Altman. “It’s tricky because it doesn’t take a lot of people to make affordability a political problem. It just takes some very visible and understandable cases.”

    At the root of the concerns is the push to cut the overall cost of health care overhaul legislation. Congress is trimming the budget for subsidies to meet Obama’s target of $900 billion over 10 years — as the Baucus plan does. It means premiums will be higher than under earlier Democratic proposals.

    The trade-off directly affects people who buy their own coverage. For those with job-based insurance, employers would continue to cover most of the costs.

    Most of the uninsured are in households headed by someone who’s self-employed or works at a business that doesn’t provide coverage. It’s this group that Democrats are trying to help.

    ——So, why not let the private market handle it? If you go squeezing on one end of the balloon, guess what happens? You see it bulge on the other end of that same balloon.

    ——-This article alone indicates quite clearly that they put all their eggs in the public option basket and never considered any other ideas. Not that I’m surprised; I’m just sayin’

    ——-And, as I’ve been reading, any and all GOP suggestions are shot down the minute they see light of day. So I say fine, make it all a democrat-run gig. Let them have it. It’ll be their fault and they will have no BS “bipartisan” garbage to lay the blame when it all goes “kablooie”.

    —–Additionally, why the sudden swerve that they are “trying to help middle America”? That’s not what we’ve been hearing for the past year and half…and beyond all the way to Hillarycare. I’m smack-dab in the middle of middle class and I’m quite satisfied with my medical plan, thankyouverymuch.

    ——I still submit for the record that I prefer that the government, in its present iteration, leave it ALONE.

    • proreason
      October 4, 2009 at 1:01 pm

      “Kaiser’s calculator doesn’t take into account co-payments and deductibles that could add hundreds of dollars, even several thousand, to a family’s total medical expenses”

      After being forced to 11% of their pre-tax income to buy the health INSURANCE, they will have to forego actually getting any health CARE. They simply won’t be able to afford it.

      But they will be able to feel good about the health care their tax dollars will buy for deadbeats, illegal aliens, and othe Obamy voters.

  9. canary
    October 4, 2009 at 2:46 am

    AP: Attack on remote Afghan outposts kills 8 US troops
    By Associated Press Writer Lori Hinnant, Oct 4 2009

    KABUL – Militant fighters streaming from a village and a mosque attacked a pair of remote outposts near the Pakistan border, killing eight American soldiers and as many as seven Afghan forces in one of the fiercest attacks of the troubled eight-year war.

    The Taliban claimed responsibility.

    The raid began around dawn Saturday morning and lasted several hours, said Jamaludin Badar, governor of Nuristan province. ..

    The U.S. military statement said the Americans and Afghans repelled the attack by tribal fighters and “inflicted heavy enemy casualties.”

    “This was a complex attack in a difficult area,” Col. Randy George, the area commander, said in the U.S. statement. “Both the U.S. and Afghan soldiers fought bravely together.”

    Nuristan, bordering Pakistan, was where a militant raid on an outpost in July 2008 claimed the lives of nine American soldiers and led to allegations of negligence by their senior commanders. Army Gen. David Petraeus last week ordered a new investigation into that firefight, in which some 200 militants armed with machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars pushed their way into the base.

    Badar said he had sought more security forces for Kamdesh, the district where Saturday’s attack took place, and said Taliban fighters had fled to Nuristan and neighboring Kunar after Pakistani forces drove many extremists from the the Swat Valley earlier this year.

    “When there are few security forces, this is what happens,” he said.

    He also complained about a lack of coordination between international forces and Afghans.

    A Taliban spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, claimed responsibility and said 35 Afghan police are in Taliban custody, including the district chief, and that a council would decide their fates. Badar said no Afghan police were missing.

    ~~The U.S. statement said the attack would not change previously announced plans to leave the area.~~~

    Associated Press writers Noor Khan and Rahim Faiez contributed
    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....tbw–

    No inspite of even more new evidence to support the General, proving to the Obama’s the growth of Taliban is worse everyday, it makes no difference. One thing is for the Obomies to be honest and say we don’t care, but instead they have defamed and implied the General is ignorant and incompetent. This is Obama’s war, and the innocent blood of our soldiers are on his hands. Obama knows this area is not rehabilatable, and his new be nice is not working.

  10. canary
    October 4, 2009 at 3:00 am

    And 2 troops killed, 2 troops wounded in sleep by fellow Afghan soldier they trained.
    Afghan soldier shoots dead two American troops Oct 3 2009
    Sat Oct 3, 10:34 am ET

    KABUL (Reuters) – An Afghan soldier on guard at a joint base with U.S. troops shot dead two American servicemen and wounded two others as they slept, a provincial official said on Saturday.

    Shahedullah Shahed, spokesman for the governor of Wardak province west of Kabul, said the shooting took place after a combined team of Afghan and U.S. forces had returned from a joint operation late on Friday.

    “The Americans were in the middle of sleep when an Afghan soldier on duty opened fire on them,” Shahed said.

    “We have no clue as to why he shot them.”

    (Reporting by Hamid Shalizi; Editing by Andrew Dobbie)
    http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/200.....pZQ–

    “We have no clue as to why he shot them.” Because it’s a holy world

  11. canary
    October 4, 2009 at 3:14 am

    AP: Olympics loss forces Chicago to rethink city plans
    By Associated Press Writer Deanna Bellandi Oct 3 2009
    Sat Oct 3, 7:27 pm ET

    CHICAGO – Chicago’s dream of an Olympics-sized stimulus was dashed when the 2016 Summer Games were awarded to Rio de Janeiro, and the loss amounts to more than a bruised ego for the nation’s third-largest city.

    Officials can no longer trumpet the $13.7 billion citywide economic impact local Olympics organizers estimated would come of games-related jobs, construction, tourism and transportation. They’ll also have no excuse for distraction in a city grappling with a mounting deficit and violence that has led to dozens of deaths of city teens each year.

    The loss marked a stunning defeat for Mayor Richard M. Daley, who spent three years working to sell Chicago residents on the games, …

    Still, a recent Chicago Tribune/WGN poll showed Daley’s approval rating had sunk to 35 percent in part because of skepticism over the Olympics and an unpopular deal to lease city parking meters to a private contractor.

    And the mayor was in Copenhagen as an unwelcome spotlight again shone on his city after a 16-year-old honors student was beaten to death while walking to a bus stop after school.

    Back at home, one of the first big issues the mayor will have to deal with comes Wednesday, when U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Education Secretary Arne Duncan meet with school officials, students and residents to talk about chronic school violence.

    Daley is likely to be asked yet again what can be done to address the issue.

    ~~As for jobs, at least some of the anticipated construction still should materialize because the city has pledged to move forward with redeveloping the site that would have been the Olympic Village.~~

    The plan calls for transforming the site of a shuttered South Side hospital complex into a mixed-use, mixed-income neighborhood. City contracts already are out for some demolition work and the city plans to sell the land to private developers.

    “Unfortunately, not having the bid means that many of those projects will take much longer to complete, but they are still on the table and we will move forward,” said Chicago Alderman Brendan Reilly.

    Advocates hoped the Olympics would provide the leverage needed in lobbying for funds to overhaul aging transportation systems that support trains on old tracks and crowded roads that need work.

    “It doesn’t diminish the need to figure out how to fund this stuff, but it is disappointing,” said Barry Matchett of the Chicago-based advocacy group Environmental Law & Policy Center.

    The Chicago Transit Authority’s elevated subway system is perhaps the most troubled. Some of the worst track has been recently fixed, partly drawing on federal stimulus funds. …

    Chicago’s Metra commuter trains are better off, but hardly trouble free. The International Olympic Committee’s evaluation report had singled out Metra, saying it would be hard-pressed to handle what would be more than double the peak commuter traffic during the games.

    Alderman Tom Tunney said the city must move on quickly and refocus efforts on other growth areas like green technology, manufacturing and its reputation as the country’s freight rail hub.

    Associated Press Writer Michael Tarm contributed to this story.
    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....BpY3Nsb3Nz

  12. canary
    October 4, 2009 at 3:28 am

    Muslim women boxers to wear hijab at 2012 Olympics
    TimesOnLine Marie Woolf, Whitehall Editor Oct 4 2009

    THE burqa boxers are coming. Young women are training in Afghanistan to fight in Islamic dress at the 2012 London Olympics.

    Wearing hijabs beneath their headguards and clothes that cover their bodies, 25 female pugilists are preparing for their bouts in gruelling training sessions at Kabul’s Olympic stadium,

    once the scene of public executions by the Taliban.

    The team, whose ages range from 14-25, were recruited by their coach, Fadir Sharify,..

    The International Boxing Association (IBA), which regulates the sport, said the women could observe religious dress requirements providing their faces were uncovered so the judges could record the number of punches they received.

    “At the moment there is nothing preventing women boxers from wearing full Islamic dress….said an IBA spokesman.

    The Afghan team is being sponsored by Oxfam as part of a project designed to promote peace and women’s rights. “In a country ravaged by 30 years of war and run by a conservative male-dominated society, these female boxers are Afghanistan’s most improbable ambassadors for peace,” Oxfam said.

    Mirwais Wardak, who runs Fighting for Peace, the Kabul boxing programme, said the team were challenging stereotypes in Afghanistan about how women should behave.

    “The fact that these women have formed a boxing team in a country where women are routinely harassed for taking part in sport should be applauded,” said Jowell. “Their courage deserves to succeed.”

    Ahmad Nategh-Nouri, an Iranian MP and head of the Iranian Boxing Federation, said the country would begin training a women’s team as soon as suitable clothing could be found.

    “So far we have not attempted to establish women’s boxing because of difficulties with their outfits,” he said.

    http://www.timesonline.co.uk/t.....860256.ece

    Hopefully, the women will be searched with metal detectors on a frequent basis.

  13. canary
    October 4, 2009 at 3:33 am

    AP: Tenn. soldier killed in Afghanistan Oct 3 2009

    - The Defense Department says a Tennessee soldier has been killed in Afghanistan.

    Officials say 22-year-old Spc. Russell S. Hercules Jr. of Murfreesboro died Oct. 1 in Wardak province. He was killed when insurgents attacked his unit using small arms fire.

    He was assigned to the 4th Battalion, 101st Aviation Regiment, 159th Combat Aviation Brigade, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault), Fort Campbell, Ky.

    http://www.wmctv.com/global/story.asp?s=11252154

  14. canary
    October 4, 2009 at 4:38 am

    It just occured to me that Obama is in control of 90% of heroin in the world
    Check out where Obama got his reasoning on stopping the erradication
    that Bush has done since 2001. Hmmmm?

    WorldFocus: West should buy, not eradicate, Afghanistan’s poppy crops
    May 22 2009

    More than 90 percent of the world’s opium comes out of Afghanistan, where poppy crops blanket the provinces of Helmand, Kandahar and Zabul.

    Jonathan Power of the World Policy Blog argues that rather than eradicating poppy crops, which runs the risk of driving desperate farmers into the willing arms of the Taliban, the West should buy crops.

    Legalizing Poppy Growing in Afghanistan

    If only our governments today could take such a sanguine and informed view of the use of opiates in medicine today.

    Both the former president of Pakistan, Pervez Musharraf and the wise senior statesman and former finance minister Sartaj Aziz,… have told me that it would be more sensible for Western governments to help buy the poppy crop.

    This would solve two problems in one blow. First, it would help deal with the world-wide shortage of medical opiates which, according to the

    World Health Organization, are causing a “global pain crisis.”

    In Africa hundreds of thousands of people are dying in agony for lack of pain relief.

    There are many practical problems with the idea of buying up the crop. If the price were set too high, it might encourage even more farmers to grow opium poppies. If it were not high enough, they would go on selling at least some on the black market. Nevertheless, they would probably rather sell their crop legally than to the mafia.

    http://worldfocus.org/blog/200.....rops/5500/

  15. canary
    October 4, 2009 at 2:39 pm

    AP: Obama to take on military gay ban at `right time’ Oct 4 2009

    WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama will focus “at the right time” on how to overturn the “don’t ask, don’t tell” ban on gays serving openly in the military, his national security adviser said Sunday.

    Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., recently wrote Obama and Defense Secretary Robert Gates asked to share their views… In Sept. 24 letters, Reid also asked for a review of the cases of two U.S. officers who were discharged from the military because of their sexuality.

    Jones said Obama “has an awful lot on his desk… but at the right time, I’m sure the president will take it on.”

    The largest number of gays who were ousted under the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy came in 2001, when 1,227 were discharged, or .089 of the force.

    The House is considering legislation to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell” and allow people who have been discharged under the policy to rejoin the military.

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....s_military

    What an outrage Reid doesn’t have more important worries about the troop. I’ll bet the highest 2001 rate of gays and all those that followed “told” because they wanted out. When I served there were gay men trying to get out under medical discharges, coming in with photo’s of themselves performing gay acts. And guess what, they didn’t get their wish to get out.

    • canary
      October 4, 2009 at 2:48 pm

      “.. and allow people who have been discharged under the policy to rejoin the military.” How about force them to rejoin and fulfill their duty and they can openly tell the Afganistans they’ll live side by side with.

  16. Rusty Shackleford
    October 4, 2009 at 7:56 pm

    “.. and allow people who have been discharged under the policy to rejoin the military.”

    Yes, that will work out well.

  17. Rusty Shackleford
    October 4, 2009 at 8:11 pm

    The AP reports:

    Waves of new fund cuts imperil US nursing homes

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....DMQ–

    By DAVE COLLINS, Associated Press Writer Dave Collins, Associated Press Writer – Sun Oct 4, 3:14 pm ET

    HARTFORD, Conn. – The nation’s nursing homes are perilously close to laying off workers, cutting services — possibly even closing — because of a perfect storm wallop from the recession and deep federal and state government spending cuts, industry experts say.

    A Medicare rate adjustment that cuts an estimated $16 billion in nursing home funding over the next 10 years was enacted at week’s end by the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services — on top of state-level cuts or flat-funding that already had the industry reeling.

    And Congress is debating slashing billions more in Medicare funding as part of health care reform.

    Add it all up, and the nursing home industry is headed for a crisis, industry officials say.

    “We can foresee the possibility of nursing homes having to close their doors,” said David Hebert, a senior vice president at the American Health Care Association. “I certainly foresee that we’ll have to let staff go.”

    The funding crisis comes as the nation’s baby boomers age ever closer toward needing nursing home care. The nation’s 16,000 nursing homes housed 1.85 million people last year, up from 1.79 million in 2007, U.S. Census Bureau figures show.

    Already this year, 24 states have cut funding for nursing home care and other health services needed by low-income people who are elderly or disabled, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonprofit research firm based in Washington, D.C.

    Some facilities are now closed because of money problems — including four in Connecticut — and others have laid off workers because of what industry officials say are inadequate Medicaid reimbursement rates. Medicare cuts are troubling, they say, because the higher Medicare reimbursements have been used to compensate for the lower Medicaid rates.

    In Griswold, Conn., the community’s only nursing home shut down earlier this year because of rising costs and an inability to pay for $4.9 million in needed renovations for the 90-bed facility.

    “A 92-year-old woman was screaming and crying as she was loaded into the ambulance, saying ‘This is my home,’” Griswold First Selectman Philip Anthony said. His 88-year-old mother was a resident of the same home at the time.

    Anthony sought and found a new facility for his mother, but she died of pneumonia before the Griswold Health and Rehabilitation Center closed in the spring.

    “To be hit with a sudden and deliberate closure like this, it just drained the heart right out of you,” Anthony said.

    Connecticut Gov. M. Jodi Rell and state lawmakers gave no Medicaid rate increases to nursing homes in the state last fiscal year and kept the funding flat for the next two years.

    The Griswold home was one of four nursing homes in the state that have closed since December because of financial problems, a higher rate than usual, said Deborah Chernoff, a spokeswoman for District 1199 of the New England Health Care Employees Union in Connecticut, which represents more than 20,000 health care workers in the state.

    “We’re really teetering on the edge of what we see as the collapse of the long-term care system,” she said.

    Chernoff said many of Connecticut’s 240 or so nursing homes have been reducing workers’ hours to deal with money problems, while two are in bankruptcy now.

    Remember, the Obama administration said this wouldn’t happen.

    http://www.startribune.com/politics/60379102.html

    “Obama has pushed the cuts to providers even while repeatedly insisting they won’t reduce seniors’ benefits. “Nobody is talking about cutting Medicare benefits,” Obama said during an online AARP forum in July.”

    And: http://seattletimes.nwsource.c.....ors10.html

    “Administration officials said Saturday that they are considering several options for reaching out to skeptical seniors, including a “myth-busting” Web site and public appearances by the president.”

    However, the same seattletimes article later says:

    “From the raw numbers, seniors appear to be the net losers under a bill approved by three House committees. The legislation trims $563 billion out of Medicare’s growth rate over 10 years while pumping in about $320 billion. Without changes, the government-run program is expected to cost about $6.4 trillion over the same period.”

    And mind you, the healthcare bill has yet to be voted upon…this is merely the result of Obama’s economy-handling that has worked out so well.

    Imagine what will happen to grandmas with Obama-care in place.

    • proreason
      October 4, 2009 at 10:24 pm

      Oh now I get it.

      No Death Panels.

      Obamy is handling it personally.

    • canary
      October 5, 2009 at 2:23 am

      Obama’s will order the hospice 3 day death panel to get rid of the elderly.
      only they’ll do it in hospitals unlike Obama letting his grandmother do it at home, so no would might hear something grandma might say.

  18. Rusty Shackleford
    October 5, 2009 at 11:56 am

    From the completely clueless at Politico:

    Dems: GOP rooting against America

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/politi.....DMQ–

    Glenn Thrush Glenn Thrush – Mon Oct 5, 5:48 am ET

    During the Bush era, Republicans from Karl Rove to Joe Wilson questioned — in ways both veiled and overt — the patriotism of Democrats who challenged the administration’s Iraq policy, pre-war intelligence and surveillance programs.

    But the joyous reaction in some GOP quarters to the International Olympics Committee’s snub of Chicago — coupled with the party’s rapid-fire reaction to bad economic data – has some Democrats turning the tables and asking if Republicans are the ones cheering against America now.

    Many Democrats saw the outbursts following the IOC decision – the merry Tweets, videos of cheering conservatives and chest-thumping by party leaders like Newt Gingrich — as part of larger pattern that includes the flirtation of right-wing Texans like Gov. Rick Perry with secession and the caustic tone of right-wing talk radio, embodied by Rush Limbaugh’s “I want him to fail” comment about Obama in January.

    “Some of these people are starting to put politics first and country second,” said Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), the head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, taking particular issue with Limbaugh and Glenn Beck.

    Boy, Chris, you REALLY don’t get it. It’s my nation first and always…but the politics of your party is wrecking it.

    “The American people are starting to wonder if they are rooting against America,” he added.

    Now wait a minute. First we were the “right-wing nutjobs” who had US Flags and were gun carrying lobbyists and “perverted souls” who oddly put nationalism out in front…and suddenly….SUDDENLY…we’re against America? How, exactly do you do that? By what odd psychological mechanism does that occur, doctor Thrush?

    Two influential progressive spokesmen, Talking Points Memo founder Josh Marshall and Markos Moulitsas of Daily Kos, hit that theme hard last week, with Marshall musing, “I wonder if right-wingers would be less stoked if Chicago were part of America.”

    Moulitsas was more blunt. “So when did wingnuts start cheering against America? Their unbridled joy at losing out to Brazil is a bit unseemly, isn’t it?” he asked, adding: “America, f—- yeah!” has become “F—- America, Yeah!”

    Again, missing the point. The joy we felt about Chicago not getting the Olympics is in direct proportion to our severe dislike for the individual(s) who went there to sell it.

    Both democrats and republicans tend to have a deep-rooted love for this nation…and yet, as Hitlery pointed out, it’s ok for the dems to have open dissent, as that’s patriotic. But to be openly pleased at a president’s failure, based on principles, is somehow otherwise.

    It’s always going to be the conversation between the emotional teenagers and the parents, I guess. But you still shouldn’t let the democrats have the keys to the car.

  19. Rusty Shackleford
    October 5, 2009 at 12:23 pm

    From the dope-smokers at the AP:

    Now, before you get your knickers in a knot…I have to say that my reason for posting this has nothing to do with the content of the article…or, rather it does. But not for the reasons in the headline. No. Although the article starts by adhering to the main subject, it somehow morphs into a piece about AIDS and condoms.

    Top Africa cardinal: next pope could well be black

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....black_pope

    VATICAN CITY – A prominent African cardinal said Monday there was no reason why the next pope couldn’t be black, particularly following the election of President Barack Obama.

    Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson of Ghana is playing an important role in guiding a three-week meeting at the Vatican on the challenges of the Catholic Church in Africa.

    At a news conference Monday, Turkson was asked whether he thought the time was right for a black pope, especially in light of Obama’s election.

    “Why not?” Turkson replied. He argued that every man who agrees to be ordained a priest has to be willing to be a pope, and is given training along the way as bishop and cardinal. “All of that is part of the package.”

    He also noted that former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan was from Ghana.

    “He had problems, but he still did it,” Turkson said. “And now it is Obama of the United States. And if by divine providence — because the church belongs to God — if God would wish to see a black man also as pope, thanks be to God!”

    ————-then later————

    Turkson also was asked about the Catholic Church’s position on the use of condoms as a way to fight HIV, which has ravaged the continent. The Vatican opposes condoms, as well as any form of artificial birth control. Critics say the church’s position has only worsened the HIV problem.

    Turkson didn’t rule out condoms outright, suggesting they could be useful in a situation of a married, faithful couple where one partner is infected.

    But he said the quality of condoms in Africa is poor, and can engender false confidence. He said abstinence and fidelity were the key to fighting the epidemic, along with refraining from sex if infected.

    He also said the money being spent on condoms would be better spent providing anti-retroviral drugs to those already infected.

    “Let’s talk clearly,” he said. “We’re talking about a product of a factory, and there are different qualities. There are condoms that arrive in Ghana which in the heat will burst during sex. And when that is the case, then it gives a false sense of security which rather facilitates the spread of HIV/AIDs. And when that is the case, we are reluctant — even in the case of conjugal relations of people who are faithful,” to suggest condom use as a way of preventing AIDS.

    This has got to be one of the most clever pieces ever written to forward the gay agenda.

    • Steve
      October 5, 2009 at 12:28 pm

      Thanks for posting this, Rusty. But please try to use the format linked at the top of the thread (and observed by BillK, for instance).

      It just makes reading the articles much less confusing.

    • Rusty Shackleford
      October 5, 2009 at 12:33 pm

      OK, sorry. Now that I looked for and found the commands, I can do that, no sweat.

      I feexed it.

  20. canary
    October 5, 2009 at 2:48 pm

    5+1 group didn’t ask Iran to suspend enrichment: Jalili
    Tehran Times Political Desk Oct 4 2009

    TEHRAN – Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator, Saeed Jalili, has said that in the Geneva talks on Thursday, the 5+1 group did not raise the issue of uranium enrichment suspension, as has been demanded by the recent United Nations Security Council resolutions.

    http://www.tehrantimes.com/Ind.....ode=204548

    Khaleej Times Online Oct 5 2009

    (DPA)No change in stance after Geneva talks: Iran
    Khaleej Times Online Oct 5 2009

    TEHRAN – There has been no change in the Iranian nuclear stance and the issue was not raised in the Geneva talks with the world powers, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hassan Ghashghavi said on Monday.

    Tehran has signalled that would consider implementing the protocol if the Iranian dossier was returned to the IAEA and sanctions lifted.

    http://www.khaleejtimes.com/Di.....middleeast

    NewYorkTimes: Report Says Iran Has Data to Make a Nuclear Bomb
    Oct 4, 2009 By William J. Broad and David E. Sanger

    …has acquired “sufficient information to be able to design and produce a workable” atom bomb.

    But the report’s conclusions, described by senior European officials, go well beyond the public positions taken by several governments, including the United States.

    Great Britian has joined France, Germany and Israel in disputing that conclusion, saying the work has been resumed.

    The atomic agency’s report also presents evidence that beyond improving upon bomb-making information gathered from rogue nuclear experts around the world, Iran has done extensive research and testing on how to fashion the components of a weapon. It does not say how far that work has progressed.

    The dispute pits the agency’s departing director, Mohamed ElBaradei, against his own staff and against foreign governments eager to intensify pressure on Iran.
    Dr. ElBaradei has long been reluctant to adopt a confrontational strategy with Iran…. issued an unusual statement cautioning it “has no concrete proof”…

    Most dramatically, the report says the agency “assesses that Iran has sufficient information to be able to design and produce a workable implosion nuclear device” based on highly enriched uranium.

    ~~~~Weapons based on the principle of implosion are considered advanced models compared with the simple gun-type bomb that the United States dropped on Hiroshima.~~~~

    They use a blast wave from a sphere of conventional explosives to compress a ball of bomb fuel into a supercritical mass…

    The excerpts of the analysis also suggest the Iranians have done a wide array of research and testing to perfect nuclear arms, like making high-voltage detonators, firing test explosives and designing warheads.

    The evidence underlying these conclusions is not new: Some of it was reported in a confidential presentation to many nations in early 2008 by the agency’s chief inspector, Ollie Heinonen.

    …. but many intelligence agencies assume that Iran obtained a bomb design from A. Q. Khan, the rogue Pakistani black marketer who sold it machines to enrich uranium. That information may have been supplemented by a Russian nuclear weapons scientist who visited Iran often, investigators say.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10.....4nuke.html

  21. pdsand
    October 5, 2009 at 4:21 pm

    I guess the headline says it all, from the AP:

    “NAACP spearheads prison vote drive in Maine
    Oct 5, 2009 (12:33p CDT)
    By CLARKE CANFIELD (Associated Press Writer)

    PORTLAND, Maine – The NAACP is registering voters at prisons in Maine, one of just two states that allow all inmates to vote while behind bars, in what is apparently the nation’s first such statewide drive…

    “Having that access to the vote makes a difference. It makes me feel I’m continuing in the loop of the community and society. You feel like you count,” said Horr, who has served nearly nine years of an 11 1/2-year sentence for habitual drunken driving.

    State laws giving convicted felons the right to vote vary. About 5.3 million people nationwide are barred from voting because of criminal convictions, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.

    Only in Maine and Vermont are felons in state prisons allowed to cast ballots while serving their sentences. Those prisoners, however, still have to register to vote, something easier done on the outside.

    To help those inmates, the NAACP last year held a drive at the Maine State Prison, the Maine Correctional Center in Windham and the Cumberland County jail in Portland.”

    http://kai03.qwest.com/Windows.....&qid=0

    That’s just too hilarious. I had to quote the guy saying what it means to him to be a part of the society while he’s in prison.

    • proreason
      October 5, 2009 at 4:30 pm

      Is “Criminals for Obama” redundant?

    • Liberals Demise
      October 5, 2009 at 4:48 pm

      Incredible ………….. simply incredible!!

      Now the left is going after the “Criminal” vote.
      A lesson learned from their ‘Oak Seed’ cabal; no doubt!

  22. BillK
    October 6, 2009 at 5:42 am

    Shoot the messenger.

    From the UK Telegraph:

    White House angry at General Stanley McChrystal speech on Afghanistan

    By Alex Spillius

    According to sources close to the administration, Gen McChrystal shocked and angered presidential advisers with the bluntness of a speech given in London last week.

    The next day he was summoned to an awkward 25-minute face-to-face meeting on board Air Force One on the tarmac in Copenhagen, where the president had arrived to tout Chicago’s unsuccessful Olympic bid.

    In an apparent rebuke to the commander, Robert Gates, the Defence Secretary, said: “It is imperative that all of us taking part in these deliberations, civilians and military alike, provide our best advice to the president, candidly but privately.”

    When asked on CNN about the commander’s public lobbying for more troops, Gen Jim Jones, national security adviser, said:

    “Ideally, it’s better for military advice to come up through the chain of command.”

    Asked if the president had told the general to tone down his remarks, he told CBS: “I wasn’t there so I can’t answer that question. But it was an opportunity for them to get to know each other a little bit better. I am sure they exchanged direct views.”

    An adviser to the administration said: “People aren’t sure whether McChrystal is being naïve or an upstart. To my mind he doesn’t seem ready for this Washington hard-ball and is just speaking his mind too plainly.”

    In London, Gen McChrystal, who heads the 68,000 US troops in Afghanistan as well as the 100,000 Nato forces, flatly rejected proposals to switch to a strategy more reliant on drone missile strikes and special forces operations against al-Qaeda.

    He told the Institute of International and Strategic Studies that the formula, which is favoured by Vice-President Joe Biden, would lead to “Chaos-istan”.

    When asked whether he would support it, he said: “The short answer is: No.”

    He went on to say: “Waiting does not prolong a favorable outcome. This effort will not remain winnable indefinitely, and nor will public support.”

    The remarks have been seen by some in the Obama administration as a barbed reference to the slow pace of debate within the White House. …

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new.....istan.html

    While it is true that these types of remarks absolutely have to go through ranks in the military to avoid complete chaos, it’s interesting the White House is more peeved at the content than the route the comments took.

    • Rusty Shackleford
      October 6, 2009 at 8:25 pm

      Well, upset or not, “Da Houss” needs to realize that a general owes it to his troops to be forthright and honest. Without that, they will follow his orders but only so far. If they trust and respect him, they will always go the extra mile for him.

      However, Barry and his thugs understand nothing of real, true loyalty and character….they are simply operatives from a world of corruption. They don’t know any better. Some excuse, huh?

  23. BillK
    October 6, 2009 at 5:47 am

    Of course, a few days earlier, the Brits effectively said the same thing.

    Also from the UK Telegraph:

    Army chief warns of ‘terrifying prospect’ of failure in Afghanistan

    By Sean Rayment

    In an unprecedented intervention, the chief of the general staff described the conflict as “this generation’s war” and added that failure by Nato would have an “intoxicating effect” on militant Islam.

    In his first interview as the head of the Army, Sir David told The Sunday Telegraph that if Britain and Nato failed in Afghanistan the risks to the western world would be “enormous” and “unimaginable”.

    He said: “If al-Qaeda and the Taliban believe they have defeated us – what next? Would they stop at Afghanistan? Pakistan is clearly a tempting target not least because of the fact that it is a nuclear-weaponed state and that is a terrifying prospect. Even if only a few of those (nuclear) weapons fell into their hands, believe me they would use them. The recent airlines plot has reminded us that there are people out there who would happily blow all of us up.”

    The general’s intervention comes at a crucial time, with the US General in charge of operations in Afghanistan calling for more troops to be sent to the country to fight the Taliban.

    At home, the Government has come under increasing pressure for the way it has handled the war, with critics saying the armed forces have been under-resourced.

    Yesterday The Daily Telegraph reported that the Prime Minister believes that he has been “let down” over the running of the Afghan War by Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, the chief of the defence staff. Suggestions that Sir Jock may be forced to step down, however, have been denied by senior defence sources.

    The increasing tensions come against a background of rising British casualties.

    Yesterday the Ministry of Defence named a 24-year-old member of the Royal Air Force Regiment who died in a blast near Camp Bastion in Helmand on Thursday. Aircraftman Marcin Wojtak is the 219th member of the armed forces to have died in Afghanistan since the conflict began in 2001.

    Sir David has issued his unprecedented warning because he believed the public and even members of the government had not “woken up” to the “enormous risks” which would result if the war was lost.

    He said: “Failure would have a catalytic effect on militant Islam around the world and in the region because the message would be that al-Qaeda and the Taliban have defeated the US and the British and Nato, the most powerful alliance in the world. So why wouldn’t that have an intoxicating effect on militants everywhere? The geo-strategic implications would be immense.”

    Sir David, who succeeded Gen Sir Richard Dannatt as head of the Army, said that a failure by the public to back the war would ultimately “delete” troop morale – an effect which, he said, would be far more damaging than a lack of resources.

    The Army chief declared that Britain was ready to send more troops to Afghanistan if called on to do so in the wake of the revised strategy which has been drawn up by Gen Stanley McChrystal, the US commander of Nato troops in southern Afghanistan.

    He said that more troops would result in fewer casualties and would allow British and Nato troops to deliver greater security more quickly. …

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new.....istan.html

    Of course the US media ignored this story completely and instead focused on Obama’s Olympics bid and the David Letterman “scandal.”

  24. BillK
    October 6, 2009 at 5:53 am

    Scary news amazingly reported by the treasonous New York Times:

    Report Says Iran Has Data to Make a Nuclear Bomb

    By William J Broad and David E. Sanger

    Senior staff members of the United Nations nuclear agency have concluded in a confidential analysis that Iran has acquired “sufficient information to be able to design and produce a workable” atom bomb.

    The report by experts in the International Atomic Energy Agency stresses in its introduction that its conclusions are tentative and subject to further confirmation of the evidence, which it says came from intelligence agencies and its own investigations.

    But the report’s conclusions, described by senior European officials, go well beyond the public positions taken by several governments, including the United States.

    Two years ago, American intelligence agencies published a detailed report concluding that Tehran halted its efforts to design a nuclear weapon in 2003. But in recent months, Britain has joined France, Germany and Israel in disputing that conclusion, saying the work has been resumed.

    A senior American official said last week that the United States was now re-evaluating its 2007 conclusions.

    The atomic agency’s report also presents evidence that beyond improving upon bomb-making information gathered from rogue nuclear experts around the world, Iran has done extensive research and testing on how to fashion the components of a weapon. It does not say how far that work has progressed.

    The report, titled “Possible Military Dimensions of Iran’s Nuclear Program,” was produced in consultation with a range of nuclear weapons experts inside and outside the agency. It draws a picture of a complex program, run by Iran’s Ministry of Defense, “aimed at the development of a nuclear payload to be delivered using the Shahab 3 missile system,” Iran’s medium-range missile, which can strike the Middle East and parts of Europe. The program, according to the report, apparently began in early 2002. …

    http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10.....4nuke.html

    Remember folks, nothing to see here. Our intelligence agencies said Iran gave up this effort back in 2007.

    The same ones the left said failed to predict 9/11 due to a “failure of imagination.”

    Perhaps even the New York Times realizes that were a rogue country or terrorist to gain a nuclear weapon, their fair city would more thank likely be Ground Zero in all definitions of the term.

  25. proreason
    October 6, 2009 at 4:32 pm

    Just in case you don’t know that you are being lied to all the time about Global Warming, check this out from the American Thinker:

    UN Quietly Scrubs Embattled Graph from Climate Report

    In yesterday’s article, UN Climate Reports: They Lie, we discussed the problems associated with a chart that appeared in the UN’s most recent climate report. One such issue was that the graphic, which claimed to establish a “correlation between temperature and CO2,” used a temperature plot immediately recognizable as the infamously debunked “Hockey Stick Graph.” …

    But as now reported by Anthony Watts at Watt’s Up With That, UNEP has replaced the embattled graphic,…

    http://www.americanthinker.com.....ed_gr.html

    But it’s even worse. The graphic they tried to sneak in was the famous Hockey Graph that everybody with a brain now knows was a fantasy. But get this, the one they replaced it with is a distortion as well in two ways. They start the graph at a point in time that hides the ups and downs before 1880, and worst of all, they stop the graph before the cooling since 2002.

    These people need to be guillotined. Nothing less.

  26. Rusty Shackleford
    October 6, 2009 at 8:15 pm

    Norway is best place to live, China moves up: UN

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20.....entpoverty

    PARIS (AFP) – Norway takes the number one spot in the annual United Nations human development index released Monday but China has made the biggest strides in improving the well-being of its citizens.

    The index compiled by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) ranks 182 countries based on such criteria as life expectancy, literacy, school enrolment and gross domestic product (GDP) per capita.

    Norway, Australia and Iceland took the first three spots while Niger ranks at the very bottom, just below Afghanistan.

    China moved up seven places on the list to rank as the 92nd most developed country due to improvements in education as well as income levels and life expectancy.

    Colombia and Peru rose five spaces to rank 77th and 78th while France — which was not part of the top 10 last year — returns to the upper echelons by moving up three places to number 8.

    The UNDP said the index highlights the grave disparities between rich and poor countries.

    A child born in Niger can expect to live to just over 50, which is 30 years less than a child born in Norway. For every dollar a person earns in Niger, 85 dollars are earned in Norway.

    This year’s index was based on data from 2007 and does not take into account the impact of the global economic crisis.

    “Many countries have experienced setbacks over recent decades, in the face of economic downturns, conflict-related crises and the HIV and AIDS epidemic,” said the UN development report’s author Jeni Klugman.

    “And this was even before the impact of the current global financial crisis was felt.”

    Afghanistan, which returns to the list for the first time since 1996, is the only Asian country among the bottom ten which also include Sierra Leone in the 180th spot, just below the Central African Republic.

    The top ten countries listed on the index are: Norway, Australia, Iceland, Canada, Ireland, the Netherlands, Sweden, France, Switzerland and Japan.

    The United States ranks 13th, down one spot from last year.

    Barry to Michelle, “Look, I do believe it’s working. Who should we tell that ‘we suck’ next?”

    And, if it so sucks to live here, why are our immigration numbers, both legal and otherwise so staggering?

  27. Rusty Shackleford
    October 6, 2009 at 11:01 pm

    From the AP Obama slaveys/damage-control-czar:

    AP Poll: Obama’s job approval rises amid concerns

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....ma_ap_poll

    By BETH FOUHY, Associated Press Writer Beth Fouhy, Associated Press Writer – Tue Oct 6, 7:39 pm ET

    NEW YORK – President Barack Obama’s approval ratings are starting to rise after declining ever since his inauguration, new poll figures show as the country’s mood begins to brighten. But concerns about the economy, health care and war persist, and support for the war in Afghanistan is falling.

    An Associated Press-GfK poll says 56 percent of those surveyed in the past week approve of Obama’s job performance up from 50 percent in September. It’s the first time since he took office in January that his rating has gone up.

    People also feel better about his handling of the economy and his proposed health care overhaul.

    But not about the war.

    Support for the war in Afghanistan has declined, the poll said Tuesday. And approval of Obama’s handling of it is holding steady — in contrast to his gains in other areas — as he considers a big troop increase there. Poll respondents narrowly oppose the increase.

    Overall, 39 percent said they disapprovedof Obama’s performance in office, down from 49 percent last month.

    While a majority of those surveyed remain pessimistic about the direction of the country, that number has begun to improve, too. The poll found 41 percent now believe the U.S. is headed in the right direction, compared with 37 percent in September.

    But a large majority of respondents said they remain very concerned about most of the major issues facing the country. The economy was the biggest concern, with 88 percent saying they consider it extremely or very important, followed by unemployment, health care, terrorism, the budget deficit, taxes and the war in Afghanistan.

    The increase in Obama’s job approval rating was driven by a more positive view of his handling of nearly all of those issues.

    OK….but compare the Rasmussen numbers which still show him today at a -7 overall. Additionally, his approval rating was never anywhere near 50% in September and continued to stay somewhere in a 32% average range. The AP must be using the super-special-adjusted-for-black-presidents polling system. Actually they appear to be using the “total approve” and “total disapprove” numbers to tell their slanted story. The real information is in the weighted value..the -7 and the “strongly approve/disapprove” numbers.
    http://www.rasmussenreports.co.....ex_history

    I’m not sure where they get the basis-in-fact as to how he’s “handled” anything. Everything except the Olympic bid is still up in the air and far from any kind of “done deal” or resolution. He’s NOT handling the war in Afghanistan, the economy by AP’s own admission continues to tank and unemployment is on it’s way to double digits.

  28. Rusty Shackleford
    October 6, 2009 at 11:28 pm

    AskMen’s 49 Most Influential Men of 2009

    http://omg.yahoo.com/blogs/a-l.....009/281?nc

    The man topping AskMen’s list of the 49 Most Influential Men of 2009 has all the qualities an iconic male personality should possess: He’s compelling, distinctive, a commanding persona, and a manipulator of larger trends. So does it matter at all whether or not he actually exists?

    As it turns out, no.

    After over 500,000 votes were cast by AskMen.com readers, “Mad Men’s” Don Draper landed the No. 1 spot on the websites list of the 49 Most Influential Men of 2009, beating out Usain Bolt and Barack Obama, who came in second and third, respectively.

    It may seem strange, at first, to accept the idea that a fictional character trumped an athlete who embodies our ideals of a timeless Olympian (Bolt) and a politician who personifies mankind’s ongoing fight for equality (Obama), but Don Draper did just that. It’s not that Don Draper, the character, is ultimately more important to the history of the 21st century than Bolt and Obama; it’s that he embodies the character traits that the 21st century man wants to have and, at the same time, he is not without his flaws. He is the Everyman without being an actual man at all.

    So, even a fictional character outweighs the “articulate and clean” president we have.

    So what, if anything, does this tell us? Or were all 500,000 voters just racists?

    Who’s Don Draper? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Draper

  29. BigOil
    October 6, 2009 at 11:31 pm

    Hope and Change in Detroit from Clickondetroit.com:

    Thousands Line Up For Stimulus Money

    DETROIT — Thousands of people have lined up Tuesday for a chance at millions of stimulus dollars set aside to help Detroit’s homeless and low-income residents.

    The money is available to help low-income residents from becoming homeless and homeless residents to find housing.

    Some people in line falsely believed they were registering for $3,000 stimulus checks from the Obama Administration.

    http://www.clickondetroit.com/.....etail.html

    Take a look at the video in the article. Obama is not replicating soup line America – he is creating cash line America.

    Note how inconvenienced some are in the line having to wait a couple hours to receive a form for their injection of stimulus.

  30. canary
    October 7, 2009 at 1:54 am

    SunStarNetwork:Militants kill Marine in fresh fighting Oct 6 2009

    ZAMBOANGA — Al-Qaida-linked militants killed a Marine soldier in a fresh attack on a southern island where two US troops died in a land mine blast last week, officials said Tuesday.

    Philippine Marines came under attack Monday while attempting to repair a bridge that Abu Sayyaf militants damaged in an explosion last week on Jolo Island, said military spokesman Maj. Ramon David Hontiveros.

    One Philippine Marine was killed and another was wounded, he said. The military halted the operation to repair the bridge, which was used by Philippine army tanks to transport troops and equipment.

    Both attacks were in Jolo’s Indanan township, where the Abu Sayyaf has jungle strongholds and has evaded joint Philippine and US military operations for years. The militants, suspected of receiving funds from al-Qaida, … terror group Jemaah Islamiyah.

    ~~~An estimated 600 US troops~~~
    are currently stationed in the southern Philippines to train and assist Filipino soldiers fighting the militants.
    ~~~They are barred by Philippine law from engaging in direct combat~~~, and their prolonged deployment has been repeatedly questioned by lawmakers in Manila.(AP)

    http://www.sunstar.com.ph/netw.....ing-128-pm

    So, why the BLEEP don’t the Philippines help us in Afganistan. Why they can hand out school supplies to children with grenades, build water wells, bridges, and grow crops in freezing cold land to replace the poppy. Our U.S. Marines can do combat, as long as an innocent goat won’t get killed.

  31. canary
    October 7, 2009 at 2:03 am

    NewsOK: FBI warns of three new e-mail fraud schemes October 6, 2009

    The FBI sent out a warning Monday about three new e-mail hoaxes claiming to be from government agencies.

    Two of the e-mails claim to be from the FBI. The first has the subject line “Intelligence Bulletin No. 267” and purports to be a confidential report on new patterns in Al-Qaida financing. The e-mail contains an attachment “bulletin.exe.”

    Another e-mail contains the subject line “RE: Weapons of Mass Destruction Directorate” and contains an attachment “reports.exe.”

    The final e-mail claims to be from the Department of Homeland Security or the FBI Counterterrorism Division and contains the subject line “New DHS Report.” The text contains information about a “New Usama Bin Ladin Speech Directed to the People or Europe” and contains an attachment “audio.exe.”

    The e-mails are fraudulent and links and attachments may contain viruses, the agency warns. The FBI does not send unsolicited e-mails, it said. File complaints at IC3.gov.

    Read more: http://newsok.com/fbi-warns-of.....z0TE8tjq9t

    http://newsok.com/fbi-warns-of.....le/3406575

  32. canary
    October 7, 2009 at 2:25 am

    The Haaretz: Who is really to blame for the tensions on the Temple Mount?
    By Avi Isaacharoff Oct 6, 2009

    Yet, reality, as always, is a bit more complicated. The status quo in the plaza surrounding the Al-Aqsa Mosque has in fact not changed since 2003. The entry of Jews and tourists is permitted on the Temple Mount from 7:30 to 10 A.M., and from 12:30 to 1:30 P.M. These visits do not have to be coordinated with officials of the Waqf (Muslim trust) and take place without any interference. Indeed, last Thursday, for example, the area was totally calm. At 1 P.M., dozens of tourists could be seen wandering around the plaza.

    The advent of the holiday season in Israel, combined with the desire of Palestinian politicians to win a few minutes of fame, has recently led, however, to various violent incidents.

    At present, the PA is not doing enough to ease tensions, ….working in concert with a number of Palestinian figures in an effort to spark an escalation of hostilities on the mount.

    …in 2003, Israel unilaterally opened the Temple Mount to tourists.

    …a number of Jewish groups distributed notices announcing that they planned to visit the Temple Mount on the eve of the holiday.

    In response, the former mufti of Jerusalem, Sheikh Ikrima Sabri, called on Muslim worshipers to gather at Al-Aqsa Mosque last Sunday, to defend it against the Jews… His call was also taken up by Hatem Abdel Khader, the Fatah official… and other factions belonging to the Islamic Movement.

    After morning prayers that day, some 200 people gathered at the square waiting for the Jews to enter.

    At 7:30 A.M., the Mughrabim Gate was opened and a group of tourists entered the compound. Muslims began hurling stones at them and at the police officers who tried to hurry the tourists away from the scene.

    …. the police decided that the entire area would remain closed to non-Muslim visitors.

    http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1118873.html

  33. canary
    October 7, 2009 at 2:41 am

    ForeignAffairs: The Other Ticking Clock in Iran
    BY CHRISTIAN CARYL | OCTOBER 2, 2009

    …, you can bet that Israeli military planning for an attack on the Islamic Republic’s nuclear facilities has moved into overdrive. Yet there’s another ticking clock the Israelis are worried about that hasn’t been in the headlines quite so much.

    For years now, Tehran has been working hard to acquire sophisticated Russian antiaircraft missiles that would make it far tougher for Israeli planes to stage a successful attack on Iranian nuclear facilities.

    One Israeli lawmaker, Zeev Elkin, even warned last week that delivering the missiles could even speed up the timing of an Israeli air raid. “I hope Moscow understands that the deliveries will at least speed up such events, if not trigger them,” Elkin told the Russian daily Kommersant.

    The system in question is the S-300 — … is essentially the Russian equivalent of the American Patriot: quick-reaction missiles designed to defend large areas of airspace against incoming airplanes and ballistic missiles.

    full article
    http://www.foreignpolicy.com/a.....ck_in_iran

  34. canary
    October 7, 2009 at 2:58 am

    AP: La. prosecutor probes ACORN after embezzlement
    Associated Press Writer Michael Kunzelman Oct 6, 2009

    NEW ORLEANS – Louisiana’s attorney general said Tuesday he has stepped up an investigation into embezzlement at ACORN nearly a decade ago, but the prosecutor and community activist group clashed over how much money was taken.

    Louisiana Attorney General Buddy Caldwell claimed the figure was $5 million, but ACORN said the sum hadn’t changed from slightly less than $1 million.

    ACORN said its chief executive officer estimated it could cost up to $5 million to “get everything together” in the aftermath of the embezzlement, but the group’s leaders claim only $948,607 was stolen.

    The prosecutor’s new figure was reported in a subpoena filed last week. He was seeking information from a company that provided bookkeeping, accounting and other financial management services to ACORN.

    ACORN said Caldwell was basing the $5 million figure on remarks Chief Executive Officer Bertha Lewis made during an October 2008 board meeting.

    “The $5 million figure was an off-handed remark by Bertha as a worst-case scenario for what it could potentially cost to get everything together,” ACORN President Maude Hurd said in a statement. “Lawyers, accountants and consultants were quite expensive, and the board needed to know that. Bertha’s remarks have since been taken out of context.”

    Caldwell’s subpoena said the exact amount was unknown until the 2008 board meeting. Caldwell said he wanted ACORN’s financial records to determine if the money was public or private.

    “The only question is whether some of that money was classified as expenses, or trips, or this, that and the other, and wasn’t actually stolen. There may be some question as to whether it was $3.5 (million), $2.8 (million), it’s more than a million,” Caldwell said.

    Once he sees the records, Caldwell said he would then determine if anyone can be charged.

    “We’re not going to take their word for anything,” he said. “We’re going to take their records and let the records speak for themselves.”

    The subpoena requested documents from Citizens Consulting Inc., which assisted ACORN, and from various accounting and legal consultants in New Orleans.

    Dale Rathke’s brother Wade, who founded ACORN, could not be reached immediately for comment. His wife, Beth Butler, said he was in Thailand on Tuesday for work.

    Butler claimed the $5 million figure was made up “out of thin air.” ACORN’s critics, she added, are “operating without evidence or facts here, and when that happens it’s called a smear.”

    Karen Inman, one of two former ACORN board members removed last year after filing a lawsuit over the embezzlement, echoed ACORN’s account of the 2008 meeting. She recalled that Lewis said the embezzlement “generated more than $5 million worth of problems,” including the need to hire an auditor.

    Associated Press Writer Cain Burdeau contributed to this report.
    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....NlY3V0b3I-

  35. BillK
    October 7, 2009 at 3:16 am

    From an unashamed Associated Press:

    President Obama’s poll numbers up

    By Beth Fouhy

    NEW YORK — President Barack Obama’s approval ratings are starting to rise after declining ever since his inauguration, new poll figures show as the country’s mood begins to brighten. But concerns about the economy, health care and war persist, and support for the war in Afghanistan is falling.

    An Associated Press-GfK poll says 56 percent of those surveyed in the past week approve of Obama’s job performance, up from 50 percent in September. It’s the first time since he took office in January that his rating has gone up.

    People also feel better about his handling of the economy and his proposed health care overhaul.

    But not about the war.

    Support for the war in Afghanistan has declined, the poll said Tuesday. And approval of Obama’s handling of it is holding steady — in contrast to his gains in other areas — as he considers a big troop increase there. Poll respondents narrowly oppose the increase.

    Overall, 39 percent said they disapproved of Obama’s performance in office, down from 49 percent last month.

    While a majority remain pessimistic about the direction of the country, that number has begun to improve, too.

    The poll found 41 percent now believe the U.S. is headed in the right direction, compared with 37 percent in September. …

    http://www.denverpost.com/ci_13501328

    See, everything’s OK now. Once Health Care passes we’ll all hold hands, pay the VAT and sing “Kumbaya.”

    • Rusty Shackleford
      October 7, 2009 at 9:54 am

      Yes, this is ridiculous. AP is as always, clueless. Bill K, I posted this last night, same article. (scroll up), though highlighted differently.

      Also referenced the Rasmussen data to compare.

  36. BillK
    October 7, 2009 at 3:21 am

    Spin, defined, from the Denver Post:

    Obama, reform get doctors’ support

    By Michael Riley

    WASHINGTON — Seeking to build on what appears to be growing momentum for a health care overhaul, the White House on Monday switched the clamor of politicians to a set of spokespeople in whom Americans put more faith: doctors.

    Dozens from across the country gathered with President Barack Obama in the White House Rose Garden, many offering examining-room stories that illustrate the need for reform.

    It was meant to show that the reform effort had what Bill Clinton’s version did not — the wide backing of the medical establishment.

    But it also sought to leverage the fact that polls show Americans put more trust in the opinions of physicians on health care reform than the declamation of their lawmakers in Washington.

    “I think people need to hear from us. They need to know that their doctors care enough to try to make a difference,” said Dr. Lila Rosenthal, a general practitioner from Boulder who appeared with Obama.

    Rosenthal said she’s seen the impact that a lack of health insurance can have, not just on patients but on the entire system.

    One recent patient without insurance came into her office only when the tumor on her ovary had grown to the size of a watermelon.

    “This is the state of the American health care system. If people don’t agree that it’s a moral issue, then we should care about it from an economic point of view,” she said. …

    http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_13494412

    See, people want this. They want it! We say so and so do the handful of doctors we’ve found that support it!!!

    Note per usual no attempt is made to ascertain whether the woman with the tumor would have sought medical attention earlier had she had insurance, nor whether it would have made any difference.

    Of course stories like this rule the day here, but stories of Canadian health care problems? Why those are isolated, possibly apocryphal tales.

    • wardmama4
      October 7, 2009 at 4:14 pm

      One recent patient without insurance came into her office only when the tumor on her ovary had grown to the size of a watermelon

      This woman’s (the patient) problem was not having no health insurance, it is that she is stupid and even government health care won’t fix that.

      And once again, leave it to liberals (even doctors) to put forth the most stupid ‘health insurance horror story’ going – probably will turn out to be a lie or distortion anyway. They always do (she probably chose to have her boobs done rather than spend the $ on health insurance). So I’m suppose to vote for government run health insurance based on Illegals, Idiots and those who can afford to buy a hospital (if they need to)? What a bunch of idiots who really truly believe that We The People are even dumber than them.

  37. BillK
    October 7, 2009 at 3:24 am

    From Fox News:

    N.Y. School District Agrees to Pay Student $1 for Refusing to Allow Bible Club

    A New York school district will pay a student a paltry $1 in damages after he accused officials of prohibiting him from forming a Bible club.

    The Lindenhurst School District on Long Island denies it violated the unidentified student’s civil rights, but agreed to settle the lawsuit. It also paid his $2,500 legal expenses.

    The Central Islip, N.Y., district says that in March — a month after the suit was filed — Lindenhurst High School recognized the Bible club.

    The district already shelled out $2,500 to the Arizona-based Alliance Defense Fund, which represented the student. …

    http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,561024,00.html

    No big surprise here.

  38. BillK
    October 7, 2009 at 3:29 am

    A strange admission from the Associated Press:

    Senate Health Bill Imposes $29B More in Taxes

    WASHINGTON — California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger praised President Barack Obama’s drive to overhaul the nation’s health care system on Tuesday and urged fellow Republicans to join in efforts to finish the job this year.

    The new Republican support for Obama’s top domestic priority came as a potential setback emerged for Senate health legislation: Congressional tax experts reported that the bill would impose $29 billion more in taxes on health care industries than originally thought — levies that could be passed on to consumers in the form of higher premiums.

    That could be troublesome news for an overhaul bill facing a crucial vote in the Senate Finance Committee this week, and with Republican senators already complaining that the legislation contains too many taxes. …

    http://www.foxnews.com/politic.....te-health/

    But the AP loves this story as they can point to all the RINOs tripping over themselves to support it:

    Although Schwarzenegger stopped short of embracing a Democratic bill, his words of encouragement came on the heels of similar statements from other Republicans outside Congress, including former Senate Republican leader Bill Frist. The White House and Democrats highlighted them as evidence of momentum and division within GOP ranks.

    Schwarzenegger, who two years ago tried but failed to pass a universal health care plan in California, said in a statement that he appreciated Obama’s partnership with the states and his effort to hold down costs and improve quality. He urged lawmakers from both parties to “move forward and accomplish these vital goals for the American people.”

    Congressional Republicans responded that they have been calling for health care improvements for months — just not the kind that Democrats are offering.

    “Americans want commonsense reform,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in a speech on the Senate floor, arguing that Democratic plans would expand government control, raise taxes on the middle class and cut Medicare benefits.

    Tommy Thompson, who headed the Health and Human Services Department under President George W. Bush, said Monday the Senate Finance Committee bill “is another important step toward achieving the goal of health care reform.” Frist, a heart surgeon, told Time magazine he would vote for the committee bill if he were still in Congress. However, both Frist and Thompson said they thought the bill could be improved.

    New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a political independent first elected as a Republican, said Monday that health care legislation deserves support across the political spectrum. …

    http://www.foxnews.com/politic.....te-health/

    Make no mistake; these comments from prominent “Republicans” will not only assure the Democrats’ plan passes, it will also destroy any hopes for GOP gains in 2010 as American voters see there really is no difference between parties anyway.

  39. BillK
    October 7, 2009 at 3:45 am

    From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the EPA (surprise) recommends more Government regulation!

    EPA director backs tougher regulation of chemicals

    By Meg Kissinger

    Washington — Lisa Jackson, director of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, said Tuesday that massive reform is needed if America’s children are to be protected from toxins, such as bisphenol A, found in household products.

    “We are not getting the job done,” Jackson said at a summit of government scientists, chemical industry executives and environmental advocates.

    She called for better labeling of chemicals in products and more rigorous testing.

    “We know far too little about chemicals coming into the market,” she said. “Manufacturers have far too little certainty about how chemicals they make are regulated. The EPA needs the tools to do the job that the public expects.”

    Jackson cited programs highlighted in the Journal Sentinel ongoing series “Chemical Fallout” as examples of how the government has failed to give consumers the information that they need. The programs include the EPA’s High Production Volume Challenge program, the Voluntary Children’s Chemical Evaluation Program and the Toxic Substance Control Act.

    She urged the estimated 200 members in the audience to make chemical reform a top priority alongside health care reform and global warming.

    Chemicals discussed at the meeting included bisphenol A – used to make hard, clear plastic – that has been found to cause harm in laboratory animals. The chemical has been linked to disorders in humans, too, including cell changes that lead to breast and prostate cancers, asthma, diabetes and heart disease.

    A study released Tuesday found that BPA exposure in early pregnancy was associated with behavior problems in girls.

    The study, published in Environmental Health Perspectives, is the first human study examining the association of BPA with behavioral problems. The authors found that 2-year-old girls who were exposed to BPA early in their fetal development showed behaviors more typical of boys, including hyperactivity and aggression.

    The American Chemistry Council criticized the study as limited.

    “Inherent in the design of this small-scale study is the inability to establish cause-effect relationships,” said Steven Hentges, a director at the council. “The study can only evaluate parameters measured in the study for statistical associations, which may be neither real nor meaningful.” …

    http://www.jsonline.com/watchd.....48292.html

    Why would the EPA ever recommend otherwise?

    The great thing about being a government agency is you just recommend that your department grow and voila! it happens!

    Normal checks and balances? Nah, that’s for the private sector – and who needs them?

    But of course the biggest point in all this is what passes for “science” these days – where casual associations are interpreted as causal.

    “Why, some girls had behavior problems, and they were exposed to a chemical that’s in most all plastics – it must be because of the chemical!”

    See Global Warming.

  40. Rusty Shackleford
    October 7, 2009 at 10:12 am

    From a very defensive Yahoo news:

    Separating fact from fiction regarding the size of Michelle Obama’s staff

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/ynews_pl944

    ue Oct 6, 11:42 pm ET

    In the past it’s been almost a tradition for America’s first ladies to catch flack from their husbands’ political opponents over the size of their staffs, and Michelle Obama certainly hasn’t been exempt from that. Criticism of her “massive” staff has popped up on email chains, blogs, and chat rooms. But what are the facts regarding how many people are under her employ, and how does the size of her staff compare to that of past first ladies?

    On July 1st of this year, the Obama White House posted the Annual Report to Congress on White House Staff on its official blog. A minor uproar over the first lady’s staff size ensued. One critic at CanadianFreePress.com accused the president’s wife of employing an “unprecedented number of staffers” for someone who “doesn’t perform any official duties,” while a widely circulated chain email reported that “there has never been anyone in the White House at any time that has created such an army of staffers whose sole duties are the facilitation of the First Lady’s social life.” Many other critics of the Obama administration expressed similar sentiments.

    Soon after the minor brouhaha erupted, Factcheck.org looked into the matter and discovered that there are 16 White House staffers with the term “first lady” in their job title, along with eight additional staffers who also provide support to Michelle Obama, bringing the total number of paid first lady aides to 24, two more staffers than the number noted in the aforementioned chain email circulated by Obama critics. Michelle Obama’s press secretary, Katie McCormick Lelyveld, confirmed that 24 was an accurate count of staffers working for the current first lady.

    So just what does a staff of 24 do for Michelle Obama? Well, for starters there are the 32,000 pieces of mail that have flooded the East Wing since Michelle Obama took occupancy in January,

    Well then, that settles it.

    but the main official duty of the first lady is to tend to the care and maintenance of the White House and its seemingly endless social functions.

    Which, of course she does very well, what with those fancy sneakers and all.

    Of course some first ladies, like Michelle Obama, maintain a higher profile than others, and with that comes the need for people to help write speeches, arrange travel and security details, handle media inquiries, etc. About the myriad tasks and responsibilities handled by White House staffers, Anita McBride, Laura Bush’s former chief of staff, recently said, “There’s never enough people to do the amount of work that has to get done.”

    So if there are never enough people Ms McBride, nothing got done to any degree of satisfaction? I’m sorry, but that’s just an exasperating statement.

    As far as Michelle Obama’s staff size being “unprecedented” in modern times, this appears to be factually inaccurate.

    Of course it is, and probably not a little bit “racist”.

    According to the Washington Post, the Bush White House also had 16 people on staff whose official titles included the term “first lady” working for Laura Bush

    (So, 24-16=8 less staffers.)

    and a recent AP story placed her total number of staffers at between 24 and 26. The same AP report also noted that Hillary Clinton had up to 19 staffers,

    (So, according to the AP, 24-16=0)

    while Lady Bird Johnson and Jacqueline Kennedy had 30 and 40, respectively.

    Well, they probably started with just 24….and went up from there.

    To that end, Snopes.com, another Web site dedicated to checking the facts on issues prominent in the public discourse, described the claims of Michelle Obama’s “unprecedented” staff as “grossly inaccurate” and “on par with her predecessor’s.”

    And please note that Snopes.com is notorious for defending the liberal point of view.

    – Brett Michael Dykes is a contributor to the Yahoo! News Blog.

    And a flaming idiot.

    • proreason
      October 7, 2009 at 3:46 pm

      24 people!! which is no doubt vastly understated.

      let’s see.

      1 to spin toilet paper roll.
      1 to remove toilet paper.
      1 to (—deleted—)
      1 to flush toilet.

      Yes, I see where she could perhaps use more than 24.

  41. Rusty Shackleford
    October 7, 2009 at 10:21 am

    From the creators of wonderful news at the AP:

    AP Poll: Health care overhaul has a pulse

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....DMQ–

    By RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR and TREVOR TOMPSON, Associated Press Writers Ricardo Alonso-zaldivar And Trevor Tompson, Associated Press Writers – Wed Oct 7, 6:22 am ET

    WASHINGTON – The fever has broken. The patient is out of intensive care. But if you’re President Barack Obama, you can’t stop pacing the waiting room. Health care overhaul is still in guarded condition.

    The latest Associated Press-GfK poll has found that opposition to Obama’s health care remake dropped dramatically in just a matter of weeks. Still, Americans remain divided over complex legislation that Democrats are advancing in Congress.

    The public is split 40-40 on supporting or opposing the health care legislation, the poll found. An even split is welcome news for Democrats, a sharp improvement from September, when 49 percent of Americans said they opposed the congressional proposals and just 34 percent supported them.

    Anger about health care boiled over during August. Lawmakers returning home for town hall meetings faced outcries that the government was trying to take over the system, ushering in higher costs, lower quality — even rationing and euthanasia.

    “It’s very significant that there’s an upturn in support for the plans because after August there was a sense that the whole effort was beginning to decline and would not come back in terms of public support,” said Robert Blendon, a Harvard professor who tracks public opinion on health care.

    “Even with this,” added Blendon, “the country is still divided over whether or not moving ahead is the right thing to do.”

    Reading this simply tells me that the Obama distractions worked and the healthcare legislation, largely being done behind closed doors with the public not being allowed to see any of it has basically taken it off the public’s radar. Not that there are any differences in the bill now than there were two months ago.

  42. Rusty Shackleford
    October 7, 2009 at 3:30 pm

    From a doubtful AP:

    Can Obama, McChrystal Agree New Afghan War Strategy?

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/0.....DMQ–

    By MARK THOMPSON / WASHINGTON Mark Thompson / Washington – Wed Oct 7, 12:05 pm ET

    President George W. Bush, eight years ago today, in his first press conference after launching the Afghan war, conceded he didn’t know when the conflict would end. “People often ask me, ‘How long will this last?’ ” he said 96 hours after the invasion began. “It may happen tomorrow, it may happen a month from now, it may take a year or two, but we will prevail.” Three weeks into the war, New York Times reporter R.W. Apple wrote that “the ominous word quagmire has begun to haunt conversations” in Washington about the conflict. Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld had little time for such grousing. “I must say that I hear some impatience from the people who have to produce news every 15 minutes,” he said as the first month’s fighting neared its end, “but not from the American people.”

    Bush is no longer President, Rumsfeld no longer Defense Secretary; R.W. “Johnny” Apple is dead, and so are nearly 900 U.S. troops killed in Afghanistan – 239 of them this year alone.

    Note, that during Obama’s presidency, 26.5% of the total casualties have occurred. That’s over a quarter of the total US soldier deaths in less than one year compared to the 3/4 of them over seven years.

    And most Americans have run out of patience with the war, modestly begun eight years ago to overthrow the Taliban regime that had harbored Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda before 9/11. That goal seemed to have been achieved seven years and 11 months ago, when the Taliban were driven from Kabul. But the U.S. and its allies have waged an inconclusive war against the Taliban and their al-Qaeda allies ever since. President Barack Obama is being asked by his generals to commit more troops to Afghanistan at a moment when fewer than 1 in 3 Americans supports that option.

    Afghanistan is Obama’s war now, so branded after he approved dispatching 21,000 more U.S. troops into battle earlier this year, a move that will raise the U.S. troop level there to 68,000 next month. He also tapped Army general Stan McChrystal as his new Afghan commander to develop a new strategy to win the war. But McChrystal found the security situation there in a dangerous decline, and says he needs 40,000 additional U.S. troops to have the best chance of turning things around. Obama’s inner circle is having doubts over whether the President should approve that request.

    Bear in mind that this is the war that Obama railed against Bush about for “going about it all wrong”. Yet the troops are still in Iraq, and the Taliban (which no longer exists, according to the MSM) is saying how they are ready for a “very long war”.

    Ah, I’m sure he has some masterful plan that he will spring at the last second and all will be well.

  43. Rusty Shackleford
    October 7, 2009 at 3:39 pm

    From the shape-shifters at AP:

    Fired up? The grass-roots health care battle

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_.....DMQ–

    By BETH FOUHY, Associated Press Writer Beth Fouhy, Associated Press Writer – 1 hr 36 mins ago

    NEW YORK – Fired up? Ready to go? You might not know it from the way President Barack Obama’s grass-roots supporters have been largely drowned out in the raucous debate over his health care plan.

    Yes, they’re behind him, officials say — volunteering in their communities and contacting lawmakers in Congress. But some Obama organizers are calling their forces a “silent majority,” embracing Republican terminology of long ago. And if the final legislation doesn’t include a government run plan to compete with private insurers, they may be invisible, too.

    Silent majority? Wait, the “silent majority” just marched on the mall at Washington DC and the MSM ignored them. That was the real silent majority.

    While opponents of the health care revamp have largely controlled the image war with rowdy town halls and a huge march on Washington last month, Obama supporters have been mobilizing across the country as well, tapping into the unprecedented network his presidential campaign built last year.

    Oh, so now you notice? Note “Huge” march. Seems to me the AP downplayed it pretty well when it was actually going on.

    We’re building a long-term organization with leaders in the community who are trained. It was successful in the election and it will be successful again,” says Jeremy Bird, deputy director of Organizing for America.

    Can anyone say “ACORN”?

  44. canary
    October 7, 2009 at 5:17 pm

    Ahwazi Organization: Iran is Planning to Attack the Gulf Countries; Iran is Producing Chemical Weapons and Burying the Waste in Ahwaz
    MEMRI Oct 6 2009 No. 2579

    On October 5, 2009, Alarabiya.net posted an interview with an Arab Ahwazi man who was presented as a former undercover agent for the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). The man claimed that 40,000 well-trained operatives, mostly Shi’ites, are in the service of Iran in the ArabGulf states – 3,000 of them in Kuwait alone. He stated that the cells formed by these operatives were trained to collect intelligence, sabotage installations in the Gulf region, and assassinate senior officials. He added that Iranian Al-Qods forces commander Qassem Suleimani had prepared a plan to take over 22 embassies, both in Iran and outside it, if Iran were to be attacked.

    This interview is in line with a July 14, 2009 intelligence report posted by the Ahwazi Islamic Sunni Organization on its website (www.sonnaalahwaz.org ). The organization claimed that the report was based on classified Iranian Air Force information, according to which Iran has a comprehensive military plan to attack the Gulf countries using the MiG-31 aircraft that it had purchased from Syria. Thus, it said, Iran is preparing secret airports and camps in Ahwaz province, as well as forces in the northwest of the province, in order to attack Iraq, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia.

    The report also revealed a purported IRGC plan to carry out terrorist operations in the Gulf countries, and alleged that Iran was developing chemical weapons in two top-secret plants in Ahwaz province, and was burying the chemical waste products in the province. Also according to the report, Iranian special forces belonging to the IRGC and acting outside Iran have the capability and the access to carry out biological and chemical weapons attacks, and had conducted joint maneuvers with Hamas and Hizbullah as well as with Yemeni Houthi forces, and also with Iranian sleeper cells in Iraq and in the Gulf countries.

    It should be noted that this organization claims to be operating with Saudi backup and support.

    Following are the main points of the report: [1]

    “In direct cooperation with the National Research Center in Ahwaz, and with direct support of the Saudi National Association [sic], we have succeeded in obtaining an important classified document issued by Iranian air force headquarters, signed by the commander [Gen. Hassan Shah Safi] and sent to the commander of the airbase in the city of Al-’Amidiyya, known as ‘Airbase No. 5.’ In addition, we disclosed a plan by IRGC [to attack the Gulf countries from its military bases located] near the city of Al-Hamidiyya [in western Ahwaz], which is detailed below…”

    MiG-31 Warplanes Expected to Arrive at Al-’Amidiyya Airbase

    According to the report of the Ahwazi Islamic Sunni Organization, on November 2, 2008, Iranian Army Air Force commander Gen. Hassan Shah Safi sent Al-’Amidiyya airbase commander Shahryar Hosseini Nejad a classified military document with instructions to prepare for the arrival of three MiG-31 warplanes. The instructions stated that all the pilots on base must prepare for special military maneuvers, and that all the information – “photos, films, and geometrical maps indicating the storage and deployment of missiles with chemical warheads – [must be forwarded to] Ali Qaramlaki, chief expert on weapon manufacture.”

    The document sent by Iranian Army Air Force commander Gen. Hassan Shah Safi to Al-’Amidiyya airbase commander Shahryar Hosseini Nejad, as posted at http://www.sonnaalahwaz.org:

    http://www.memri.org/bin/lates.....D=SD257909

  45. canary
    October 7, 2009 at 5:21 pm

    ABC News: Is the U.S. Preparing to Bomb Iran?
    By JONATHAN KARL Oct. 6, 2009—

    First, some background: Back in October 2007, ABC News reported that the Pentagon had asked Congress for $88 million in the emergency Iraq/Afghanistan war funding request to develop a gargantuan bunker-busting bomb called the Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP). It’s a 30,000-pound bomb designed to hit targets buried 200 feet below ground. Back then, the Pentagon cited an “urgent operational need” for the new weapon.
    Click here to see a copy of the Pentagon’s request, provided to ABC News.

    The comptroller said the Pentagon planned to spend $19.1 million to procure four of the bombs, $28.3 million to accelerate the bomb’s “development and testing”, and $21 million to accelerate the integration of the bomb onto B-2 stealth bombers.

    ‘Urgent Operational Need’

    The notification was tucked inside a 93-page “reprogramming” request that included a couple hundred other more mundane items.

    Why now? The notification says simply, “The Department has an Urgent Operational Need (UON) for the capability to strike hard and deeply buried targets in high threat environments. The MOP is the weapon of choice to meet the requirements of the UON.” It further states that the request is endorsed by Pacific Command (which has responsibility over North Korea) and Central Command (which has responsibility over Iran).

    The request was quietly approved. On Friday, McDonnell Douglas was awarded a $51.9 million contract to provide “Massive Penetrator Ordnance Integration” on B-2 aircraft.

    http://abcnews.go.com/Politics.....id=8765343

  46. canary
    October 7, 2009 at 5:33 pm

    Thousands of Christians march for Israel
    by Patrick Moser Patrick Moser Oct 6 2009

    JERUSALEM (AFP) – Thousands of Christian pilgrims from around the world marched through the streets of Jerusalem on Tuesday, chanting their support for Israel and praying for peace in the Holy Land.
    “People must understand the Holy Land was given by God to the Jews,” she meant not just what is now Israel but also Jordan and the occupied West Bank.

    Angolan delegation… Singapore delegation swirled colourful banners… chanting the Hebrew song Shalom Aleichem (peace be upon you).

    “Virtuous Women Community” wrapped around a Zimbabwean

    The Korean delegation sported T-shirts proclaiming: “Prepare the way for the King of Glory.”

    …from the Philippines proudly held up a flag of Jerusalem.

    Many said the annual pilgrimage, organised by the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem (ICEJ,) represented a fulfilment of a Biblical prophesy
    that all nations would gather in Jerusalem for Sukkot — the Feast of Tabernacles — which the Jewish faithful celebrate this week.

    … who travelled from Turangi, New Zealand to attend

    The ministry estimated at 8,000 the number of Christians who travelled to Israel for the Sukkot week, saying this amounted to 56,000 hotel nights and income of between 16 million and 18 million dollars (11 million-12 million euros).

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20.....1006165009

  47. canary
    October 7, 2009 at 5:52 pm

    `Lieberman wants ‘new Israeli foreign policy’

    Haviv Rettig Gur , THE JERUSALEM POST Oct. 7 2009
    The policy staff in Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman’s office has drawn up a secret memo calling for a radical refocus of Israeli foreign policy…

    “There is no replacement for Israel’s special relations with the United States,” the memo continues, calling America “without a doubt Israel’s best friend in the world.

    In an apparent critique of US President Barack Obama’s efforts for an immediate jump-start of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, the memo says that attempts “to impose an immediate, total and comprehensive solution between Israel and the Palestinian Authority are preordained to fail.”

    Citing “attacks on Jewish communities around the world and the undermining of Israel’s legitimate right to defend itself,” the document says the Foreign Ministry “must not take such expressions lightly.”

    Specific examples of behavior Israel must condemn in the future included the presence of the Swedish ambassador to Iran as the only European representative at the swearing-in “of the Holocaust-denier Mahmoud Ahmadinejad” in August.

    for long indepth version
    http://www.jpost.com/servlet/S.....e/ShowFull

  48. proreason
    October 7, 2009 at 6:35 pm

    A couple of Jonah Goldberg comments on the Ayers “confession” to an obscure conservative blogger who ran into him in a coffeeshop.

    http://corner.nationalreview.c.....VlNzAyOWQ=

    http://corner.nationalreview.c.....c2OGJiNTM=

    This is the blogger who originally heard Ayers say he wrote it.
    http://backyardconservative.bl.....dream.html

    Of course, whatever Ayers says about it can’t be believed. He’s a professional liar, just like the Moron.

    But the liberals blogs are all agog about it with the spin that lovable, crafty Bill Ayers is making fools of the bumpkins. Now why would those enlightened creatures pay any attention to a story that has no credence whatsoever.

    Andy McCarthy has also commented about it.
    http://corner.nationalreview.c.....E4YzRjMjg=

    Somehow, I don’t see Andy McCarthy as a bumpkin.

    • pdsand
      October 7, 2009 at 6:57 pm

      New theory, maybe Obama wrote his own autobiography, and Bill Ayers’s. That’s why they’re so similar.

    • Rusty Shackleford
      October 7, 2009 at 7:02 pm

      Well, after following this for awhile, it really becomes clear, even to the most casual observer, except flaming liberal retards, that if the boy was able to string more than two words together to form a coherent thought, I might give him some credit on it. But if I were a 5th grade English teacher, I could tell pretty quickly he did not do his own work; Indeed, it appears that his life and Ayers are darn near identical. How could such a thing happen?

  49. canary
    October 7, 2009 at 7:10 pm

    Van Jones is on the board of the Free Press
    Glenn Beck: Another day, another Marxist Oct. 7 2009

    GLENN:… Robert McChesney..from the University of Illinois. And also John Bellamy Foster. They are two of the three co founders of Free Press. The guy who has been looking into this is Seton Motley of the Media Research Center..

    MOTLEY: Well, Robert McChesney is an avowed Marxist….remember how Lloyd used Democratic to describe Chavez’s revolution interpretation of the First Amendment and do direct battle with the Orwellian implications of the ACLU’s commercialized First Amendment.

    ~~~GLENN: Well, but you also have on your own board at the Free Press you have oh, that’s weird. Van Jones.

    MOTLEY: Van Jones is on the board of the Free Press.~~~~

    GLENN: Okay… He is at the University of Illinois.

    GLENN: Okay. Here’s, in December 2008 in an op ed he said on the U.S. economic crisis, he was quoted as saying, quote: “There is no real answer but to remove brick by brick the capitalist system itself, rebuilding the entire society on socialist principles.”

    GLENN: He is having meetings at the FCC or where is he having meetings?

    MOTLEY: Well, Vince Scott is his policy director, and he had three disclosed meetings developing Internet policy with the FCC.

    MOTLEY: But it goes beyond just that because FCC chairman Julius Genachowski named former Free Press spokeswoman Jen Howard as his press secretary…. For Julius Genachowski, the chairman of the FCC. The Free Press spokeswoman was Jen Howard and she is now Genachowski’s press secretary.

    GLENN: He is also a strong defender of Venezuelan, Hugo Chavez?
    MOTLEY: Right. And he, too, like Mark Lloyd admires the way Chavez

    GLENN: …This new study done by the FTC where they’re talking about maybe the government should have, you know, special tax breaks for certain kinds of news organizations…

    This guy also wrote something here on the substantial intervention by the government in journalism. He wrote, quote: Only government can implement policies and subsidies to provide an institutional framework for quality journalism…”

    MOTLEY: Every time they say Democratic, think Marxist because that’s what they mean. But yes, no, this is what the FTC’s talking about. And don’t forget, at the FCC when Commissioner Michael Copps was acting chairman awaiting the confirmation of Genachowski, he started a notice of inquiry which is the first step in a notice of rule making at the FCC

    http://www.glennbeck.com/conte.....198/31640/

    Van Jones new job was starting the regulation of advertisers on bloggers.

    These and Top Democrats are the ‘MANY” that Obama wrote he agrees with that Hugo Chavez type government is the role model for the U.S.A.

  50. Rusty Shackleford
    October 7, 2009 at 9:37 pm

    The commie-loving AP reports:

    Diplomats urge return of ousted Honduran president

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....duras_coup

    By BEN FOX, Associated Press Writer Ben Fox, Associated Press Writer – 43 mins ago

    TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras – Diplomats from across the hemisphere on Wednesday told Honduras’ interim government to restore democracy to the impoverished nation and reinstate President Manuel Zelaya, calling his ouster in a coup a mistake that must be fixed.

    Delegations from about a dozen countries held talks with representatives of Zelaya and the coup-installed government behind closed doors in Honduras’ capital, then later met with interim President Roberto Micheletti in an at-times angry confrontation broadcast on local television.

    Micheletti, his voice bristling with rage, scolded the diplomats for refusing to recognize what he insisted was the lawful removal of Zelaya under the Honduran Constitution and urged them to recognize elections scheduled for Nov. 29.

    “We have been fighting for many years for our Constitution,” Micheletti said during the meeting in the presidential palace. “And we will keep fighting no matter what happens.”

    So, how does it feel to be the only sane man in the asylum?

    I considered making a list of those US government officials who thought Zelaya’s ouster was a “coup” and not a lawful removal based on established protocol and law…but I’d be here all night.

  51. Rusty Shackleford
    October 8, 2009 at 12:13 am

    Another piece by the over-excitable AP:

    NYC undercover stings expose ‘gun show loophole’

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....DMQ–

    By SARA KUGLER, Associated Press Writer Sara Kugler, Associated Press Writer – Wed Oct 7, 4:28 pm ET

    NEW YORK – Private unlicensed gun dealers were captured on video selling weapons to undercover investigators who admitted they couldn’t pass background checks in a sting operation by Mayor Michael Bloomberg to highlight the “gun show loophole.”

    The stings, described in a city report and documented on video released at City Hall on Wednesday, were conducted at seven gun shows in Tennessee, Ohio and Nevada. Those states are among the many that permit private unlicensed dealers, known as “occasional sellers,” to sell weapons at gun shows without conducting background checks.

    Gun-control advocates say the loophole makes it easier for criminals to acquire guns and prevents law enforcement from being able to trace those weapons if they are used in crimes.

    OK, so there’s a law that permits occasional sellers to do just that. Sell occasionally. At gun shows. And not have to have customers submit to a background check. And here we have undercover agents, posing as gun purchasers and all seems well within the law. I do not see any laws being broken here.

    At least, not like those who purchase them illegally, or who shouldn’t own guns because they are known felons, or who illegally transport them to Mexico for drug wars. No, it’s the “occasional seller” who is bad. This is a warped version of the “drug pusher/drug user” argument.

    Nine states, including New York, have passed laws to close the loophole, requiring background checks on at least all handgun purchases at gun shows. Bloomberg has long campaigned for Congress to close it, and for states to do it on their own if the federal government does not.

    Even in states that haven’t closed the loophole, federal law bars “occasional sellers” from selling guns to people they have reason to believe would fail background checks.

    This is where the Bloomberg operation says 19 out of 30 sellers broke the law during the investigation, in which undercover investigators posing as buyers wore tiny cameras concealed in baseball hats and purses and audio recorders hidden in wristwatches.

    A tactic, you may recall, that was flamed by ACORN advocates as “unfair” and “predatory”.

    In each purchase, the investigator showed interest in buying a gun, agreed on a price and then indicated that he probably could not pass a background check. Most sellers allowed the purchases anyway, responding in some cases by saying, “I couldn’t pass one either,” or “I don’t care,” according to the videos.

    So, you’re saying they should be highly adept at profiling, or at least passive psychoanalysis? Heck, the buyers could’ve been joking for all you know. Or not…makes no difference. You didn’t define (in the law) what constitutes “reason to believe they would fail background checks”.

    Later, the article says:

    The city has no legal authority over the dealers and is using its findings to make a point about the unregulated sales of so-called “occasional dealers.” A copy of the report is being sent to every member of Congress and the findings will be shared the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

    So—-the purpose of this exercise is……what…..again? Money well spent? Time well-invested? Being nosy? What?

    If you have no legal authority, then why did the author call it a “sting”. Also, why did the author, Sara Kugler, make such a huge fuss about the sale of “assault rifles” and semi-automatic handguns. And it’s not like a revolver is inherently more safe than a semi-auto. But I could go on til the sun burns out…it matters not to Sara. To her, “guns are ikky”

    The people involved in the sting might do better to sell a few guns with GPS tracking devices and see where they end up rather than try to crucify people who operate within the letter of the law, even if Sara feels the intent wasn’t upheld.

  52. canary
    October 8, 2009 at 2:15 am

    AP: Father of Palin’s grandson to pose for Playgirl
    Wed Oct 7, 2009

    ANCHORAGE, Alaska – Levi Johnston is going for the ultimate exposure — the 19-year-old father of Sarah Palin’s grandchild will pose nude for Playgirl, his attorney said Wednesday.

    Publication of the photographs could be a source of embarrassment for Palin, often mentioned as a possible 2012 presidential candidate. Her memoir, “Going Rogue,” will be published next month and pre-sales already have made it a national best seller.

    Johnston also has been marketing himself for a possible modeling or acting career, spending time in New York and Los Angeles. His first TV commercial, hawking Wonderful brand pistachios, debuted this week.

    Playgirl approached Johnston about posing in the buff, Butler said.
    We told him he would have to do what actors and actresses do,” Butler said. “They get in the gym.”

    Johnston has been working out with Marvin Jones, a former Mr. Alaska competitor who has put the teenager on a low-carb, high-protein diet.

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....Vyb2ZwYWxp

    So, Levi Johnston is indecently exposing himself in front of his young son and their friends, for fame and money. I knew Palin shouldn’t have taken him along. He always had this smirk on his face.

  53. BillK
    October 8, 2009 at 7:25 am

    I don’t normally post OpEds, but just as a sanity check on how the left “thinks.”

    From the ultra-left wing Madison, WI Capital Times:

    Yes, let’s end America’s health care holocaust

    Washington Republicans claim that their delicate sensibilities have been offended by the bluntness of Florida Democratic Congressman Alan Grayson.

    The tough kid from the Bronx (and Harvard Law School), who represents an Orlando-area district that was Republican until recently, pulled no punches last week, when he declared on the House floor:

    “The Republican health care plan is this: Don’t get sick, and if you do get sick, die quickly.”

    After his GOP colleagues recovered from the shock of a Democrat actually calling them out, they demanded an apology.

    Grayson returned to the House floor to announce:

    “I would like to apologize – I apologize to the dead and their families that we haven’t voted sooner to end this holocaust in America.”

    So unfamiliar with the notion that a Democrat might actually take the health care debate seriously enough to try to win it, the Republicans presumed that Grayson had gone off the deep end. The National Republican Congressional Committee screeched.

    NRCC spokesman Ken Spain claimed: “This is an individual who has established a pathological pattern of unstable behavior.”

    Grayson hasn’t cracked.

    The former aide to U.S. Supreme Court Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Antonin Scalia is dealing in facts.
    Indeed, Grayson has seized on a study produced by Harvard researchers that details how 44,000 Americans die annually because they lack health insurance. And he is laughing off a Republican attempt to formally condemn his choice of words.

    Georgia GOP Congressman Tom Price does not think it is fair for a Democrat to counter months of Republican hyperbole with actual statistics. So the Georgian has drafted a resolution that accuses Grayson of committing “a breach of decorum and (degrading) the integrity and proceedings of the House.”

    Grayson’s response: “A resolution like that doesn’t save one human being’s life.” …

    http://host.madison.com/ct/new.....03286.html

    But mentioning the trivially easy to prove contention that Obama is a liar?

    Of course that’s ridiculous.

  54. BillK
    October 8, 2009 at 9:19 am

    Why do the police even bother anymore?

    From a thrilled Associated Press:

    Church Thief Shot by Calif. Cop Awarded $1.2M

    OAKLAND, Calif. — A San Francisco Bay Area city will pay $1.2 million to settle a lawsuit filed by a burglary suspect who was left a paraplegic after being shot by a police officer.

    The Oakland City Council approved the payment to Charles Davis Jr. during a closed session Tuesday night.

    Davis was suspected of burglarizing a church in 2007 when he was shot by the Oakland officer. Though Davis was unarmed, the officer said he mistook items that Davis was stealing from the church for a gun.

    Rick Simons, Davis’ attorney, says the money will be used the help the 49-year-old Davis with the “basic needs” of living as a paraplegic.

    The settlement comes after the council voted on Sept. 22 to approve a $1.5 settlement payment to the family of a 20-year-old man shot and killed by an Oakland police officer in 2007. …

    http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,562103,00.html

    Yes, the poor thief won’t be able to return to his previous vocation – of stealing things.

    • Rusty Shackleford
      October 8, 2009 at 10:02 am

      Hey, Bill, it’s tough out there, man. You surely don’t expect him to try to find a job in this current employment market, let alone a job for someone with a disability now, do you? You insensitive, draconian-minded fool!

      Clearly the police are at fault here and we must provide for those who cannot provide for themselves.

      (ok, sarcasm off…sorry Bill)

      What a world….

  55. Rusty Shackleford
    October 8, 2009 at 10:20 am

    Perhaps one of the more ridiculous headlines ever from Bloomberg:

    Voters Back Obama Over Republicans on Health Care, Poll Finds

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/bloomb.....DMQ–

    Jonathan D. Salant Jonathan D. Salant – Thu Oct 8, 6:30 am ET

    Oct. 8 (Bloomberg) — Months of Republican attacks on President Barack Obama’s health-care proposals appear to have hurt the party, according to a Quinnipiac University poll.

    Quinnipiac is a flaming liberal private school with very little ability to grasp reality, let alone “working class America”

    The survey found 64 percent of voters disapproving of the way Republicans in Congress are doing their jobs, with 25 percent approving. Also, 53 percent had an unfavorable opinion of the party in general, while 25 percent rated it favorably.

    The performance of Democratic lawmakers was disapproved of by 56 percent, with 33 expressing approval. For the party in general, 46 percent expressed disapproval, 38 percent approval.

    Asked who they trusted to do a better job on the health- care issue, 47 percent said Obama, 31 percent said the Republicans. The president’s overall approval rating was 50 percent, unchanged from a similar survey in late July and early August.

    OK, and 27 percent of all third-graders preferred ice cream to a snickers bar when on recess, compared to just 12 percent when on the bus.

    In other words, the numbers are not weighted or carefully evaluated. They are just loosely grappled assemblages of crap, skewed by preppies to give a desired result.

    “President Barack Obama’s approval rating has held at 50 percent over the past two months of high-intensity debate on health care and other issues,” said Peter Brown, assistant director of the Hamden, Connecticut-based university’s polling institute. “And while the spotlight is on the president, Republicans are taking a public-opinion pounding.”

    I submit—Depends on who you ask, doesn’t it?

  56. Rusty Shackleford
    October 8, 2009 at 11:10 am

    From a very sympathetic AP:

    Analysis: Obama’s woes keep piling up around globe

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....DMQ–

    By BARRY SCHWEID, AP Diplomatic Writer Barry Schweid, Ap Diplomatic Writer – 1 hr 56 mins ago

    WASHINGTON – The woes keep piling up for President Barack Obama.

    While it is unfair to blame him for all the world’s problems (although some folks try)

    Oh boo-freakin’-hoo

    there is no question he is having trouble finding the right answers.

    Is there one for pacifying Afghanistan, even assuming he makes the hard judgment that more American troops must be lost to reach that end?

    Nearly 800 have lost their lives since the 2001 invasion began.

    (900 according to TIME, but who’s counting?)

    Pulling out is not an option, a White House spokesman said this week.

    But remember what that means in the “Baracktionary”. So, yes, pulling out is not just an “option”, it is the only clear choice to Barry.

    So more Americans are at risk, whether Obama decides on another buildup or stays at about 68,000 troops in Afghanistan.

    Next door, in Pakistan, Obama is looking for a way to motivate the government to try harder to neutralize the militant fighters in border sanctuaries. One familiar approach is to contribute U.S. money to aid the government.

    Motivate the Pakistani government? Well, thanks to Steve, we have that info posted here at S&L too, as Barry sent Biden and Kerry (AKA “Larry and Curly”) to PAK to “motivate” them.

    But Pakistan’s military leaders are questioning the proposed aid package of $1.5 billion a year for five years as potentially meddlesome.

    Meddlesome? Why—-whatever do you mean…meddlesome? Could it be that foreigners can easily identify it yet our own citizens can’t recognize meddling when it’s in their very faces?

    How to ensure the nuclear-armed country is a safe and reliable ally against terrorism is a tough one for the president.

    So is finding a way to deter Iran from taking the final steps to production of nuclear weapons — a goal Iran denies but most of the world does not doubt it is pursuing.

    If Iran does not negotiate a settlement, and the prospects appear dim right now, its power to intimidate would be expanded, and might even be used.

    Lurking in the background, meanwhile, is the unresolved Middle East conflict.

    You asked for it, you got it. (But it’s all Bush’s fault)

    I’m afraid that el presidente’ gets no sympathy from me. While world troubles mount and mulitply, he was busy diddling in the banks, carmakers, etc. Not to mention his self-created distractions and “domestic policy” to destroy the nation. Too bad if you have to deal with those pesky things that keep you from enjoying your white house vacation

  57. nuthingbettertodo
    October 8, 2009 at 11:57 am

    Another fight at Fenger High

    Oct 7, 2009 6:09 pm US/Central

    Fight At Fenger While Officials Discuss Violence
    Activists Say Violence Against Students Spiked After School Plan Started

    President Barack Obama was so shocked by the deadly beating of a Fenger High School student that he dispatched two members of his cabinet to address the problem.

    But on the day Attorney General Eric Holder and Education Secretary Arne Duncan met with local officials to discuss youth violence, there was another fight at Fenger.

    As CBS 2’s Mike Puccinelli reports, students said what happened Wednesday is typical of what happens every day. Students from Altgeld Gardens got into a fight with students who live in the area surrounding the high school, an area known as “The Ville.”

    Students and other Far South Side residents were protesting Wednesday outside the mayor’s office on the fifth floor of City Hall and at Altgeld gardens.

    They were trying to add their voices to what Holder and Duncan called a national conversation on student violence.

    Altgeld Gardens resident Tommie McCoy said Holder and Duncan should have visited Fenger and Altgeld Gardens, not just met with Mayor Richard M. Daley and other local officials in downtown Chicago.

    “I think they should have come out this way instead of downtown because this is where it’s happening at out here,” McCoy said.

    If Holder, Duncan and Daley had been outside Fenger on Wednesday when school let out, students said they would have gotten an eyeful.

    “They was fighting,” one girl said.

    Another student said, “Some boys they got off the bus fighting and that. Then the police came over there breaking up the fight.”

    As soon as the punching stopped at Fenger, the students and the simmering tension moved south to Altgeld Gardens a few miles south.

    Protesters shouted “We want Carver back. We want Carver back.”

    During the protest in Altgeld Gardens, police called in reinforcements because one officer claimed the crowd was becoming hostile and unruly.

    The students and adults said they have a single mission: to get Carver High School turned back into the community high school for Altgeld Gardens.

    Although Carver is located in the Altgeld Gardens area, three years ago it was changed into a military school with selective enrollment. That forced many students who live in Altgeld Gardens to travel five miles north to Fenger. Many students said that decision made their lives hell.

    Luevinne Leggett, a senior at Fenger, said she doesn’t feel welcome there.

    “I don’t feel welcome because I get chased home from school every day,” Leggett said. “I try and avoid the problem by walking and they chase me. The police not doing nothing. They sit out there and they watch people get chased.”

    Vashion Bullock said he feels similarly. He was involved in the fight that claimed the life of 16-year-old Derrion Albert last month. Bullock’s brother is one of four teens charged with murder.

    Bullock said Duncan is wrong if he believes that the problems don’t stem from making Carver a selective enrollment school. He said he gets attacked by students who live close to Fenger because he is from Altgeld Gardens.

    “Before I went to this community school (Fenger), I didn’t have no fights, no nothing; until I went outside the (Altgeld Gardens) community,” Bullock said.

    Altgeld Gardens residents said the violence would subside if Carver once again becomes a community school. They blamed Duncan for turning the school into a military academy as part of his Renaissance 2010 program.

    But Duncan said it is ridiculous to suggest that Renaissance 2010 contributed to a surge in violence among students.

    “Chicago won’t be defined by this incident but rather our response to it,” Duncan said. “I am committed to this fight, I am committed to this cause.”

    Duncan, who as the former head of Chicago Public Schools helped implemented the district’s improvement plan, told reporters that is easy to point fingers, but the country needs to focus it’s attention instead on the root of the problem.

    Since 2005, dozens of Chicago’s public schools have been closed and thousands of students reassigned to campuses outside their neighborhoods — and often across gang lines — as part of Renaissance 2010. While the plan has resulted in replacing failing and low-enrollment schools with charter schools and smaller campuses, it has also led to a spike in violence that has increasingly turned deadly, many activists, parents and students say.

    Before the 2006 school year, an average of 10-15 public school students were fatally shot each year. That soared to 24 deadly shootings in the 2006-07 school year, 23 deaths and 211 shootings in the 2007-08 school year and 34 deaths and 290 shootings last school year.

    Few deaths have occurred on school grounds, but activists say it’s no coincidence that violence spiked after the school closures.

    Albert, an honor roll student at Fenger, was attacked when he got caught up in a mob of teens about six blocks from school on the city’s South Side. Video shows him curled up on the sidewalk, as fellow teens kick him and hit him with splintered railroad ties. So far, four teens have been charged in his death.

    Duncan says Fenger would receive $500,000 in federal money to help it stabilize after the violence. The school can use the money for counselors and other programs.

    Daley also said Wednesday that the high-profile involvement of President Barack Obama’s administration isn’t “show and tell” but a genuine commitment to address youth violence.

    http://cbs2chicago.com/local/f.....34130.html

    • proreason
      October 8, 2009 at 12:06 pm

      “but the country needs to focus it’s attention instead on the root of the problem.”

      Gee, what could that be?

      No doubt the “solution” will be to give the students more of our money. Then they won’t have to kill people to get what they want.

      And even though it won’t stop the violence, we will all be able to feel good about doing the right thing.

  58. Rusty Shackleford
    October 8, 2009 at 4:07 pm

    Politico once again, caught with its pants down:

    Whodunit? Sneak attack on U.S. dollar

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/politi.....DMQ–

    Eamon Javers Eamon Javers – 2 hrs 19 mins ago

    It’s the biggest mystery in global finance right now: Who conducted a sneak attack on the U.S. dollar this week?

    It began with a thinly sourced but highly explosive report Monday in a British newspaper: Arab oil sheiks are conspiring with the Russians and Chinese to quit using the dollar to set the value of oil trades — a direct threat to the global supremacy of the greenback.

    Is it true? Everyone from the head of the Saudi central bank to U.S. officials scrambled to undercut the story, but no matter.

    With the U.S. economy on the ropes and America by far the world’s biggest debtor, investors aren’t feeling as secure about the dollar as they used to. And the notion of second-tier economies ganging up on Uncle Sam didn’t sound so far-fetched.

    For American officials, the possibility of the dollar losing its long-term dominance in global commerce is a nightmare scenario because it would likely mean sharply higher interest rates at home and a declining ability to finance the U.S. debt. No one believes it could really happen right now, but stories like the British report this week make it seem incrementally more likely.

    So the piece by Robert Fisk of the Independent shocked currency traders around the world and almost instantly sent the value of the U.S. dollar spiraling downward and the price of gold skyrocketing to an all-time high, as a hedge against a weakened dollar.

    The website drudgereport.com quickly amplified the impact of the story with a headline atop the site: ARAB STATES LAUNCH SECRET MOVES WITH CHINA, RUSSIA, FRANCE TO STOP USING DOLLAR FOR OIL TRADING …

    Quick answer?

    Barack Hussein Obama mmm mmm mmm

  59. BillK
    October 8, 2009 at 8:14 pm

    Even the US Chamber of Commerce has drunk the Global Warming Kool-Aid. :(

    From the Wall Street Journal:

    Chamber CEO Takes Another Dig at Apple

    By Stephen Power

    The head of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce isn’t letting the group’s feud with Apple rest.

    After blasting Apple earlier this week for quitting the Chamber, Thomas Donohue took aim at the company again today at an hourlong news conference at the Chamber’s headquarters. Apple, he said, has been “misstating” the chamber’s position on U.S. climate policy, and suggested some companies are quitting his group as part of an orchestrated campaign.

    But Donohue also expressed regret that one of his aides called for a “Scopes monkey trial” on the evidence that human activity is raising surface temperatures, saying he was “madder than hell” when that was reported over the summer. Donohue called global warming “an issue the world has to deal with,” and said his group doesn’t oppose the principle of requiring companies to pay for the right to emit carbon dioxide, though he attached numerous qualifiers.

    An aide said any proposal to curb emissions would have to avoid causing “undue” harm to the U.S. economy. Donohue added that such a stance doesn’t reflect a change of heart, and that the Chamber is “standing firm” in opposing congressional proposals to cap U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.

    “If people want to attack us, bring ‘em on,” Donohue said. …

    http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/20.....-at-apple/

    Or, he admits Global Warming is occurring, so the balance of it is just a matter of policy.

    Once you accept the big lie, the rest is so much easier…

  60. Rusty Shackleford
    October 8, 2009 at 11:03 pm

    Proof that Obama is panicking

    From TIME:

    Calling ‘Em Out: The White House Takes on the Press

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/2.....9192905800

    By MICHAEL SCHERER Michael Scherer – Thu Oct 8, 4:25 pm ET

    There was never a single moment when White House staff decided the major media outlets were falling down on the job. There were instead several such moments.

    For press secretary Robert Gibbs, the realization came in early September, when the New York Times ran a front-page story about the bubbling parental outrage over President Obama’s plan to address schoolchildren – even though the benign contents of the speech were not yet public. “You had to be like, ‘Wait a minute,’” says Gibbs. “This thing has become a three-ring circus.” (See who’s who in Barack Obama’s White House.)

    For deputy communications director Dan Pfeiffer, the more hyperbolic attacks on health-care reform this summer, which were often covered as a “controversy,” flipped an internal switch. “When you are having a debate about whether or not you want to kill people’s grandmother,” he explains, “the normal rules of engagement don’t apply.”

    And for his boss, Anita Dunn, the aha moment came when the Washington Post ran a second op-ed from a Republican politician decrying the “32″ alleged czars appointed by the Obama Administration.

    They’re not “alleged”.

    Nine of those so-called czars, it turned out, were subject to Senate confirmation, making them decidedly unlike the Russian monarchs.

    And yet of the ones who fell by the wayside, (tax evaders) none were prosecuted and the ones he kept, all but six have not been confirmed by any hearings at all.

    http://www.politico.com/news/s.....26779.html

    “The idea – that the Washington Post didn’t even question it,” Dunn says, still marveling at the decision. (Read Mark Halperin’s grades for the Obama Administration.)

    All the criticism, both fair and misleading, took a toll, regularly knocking the White House off message. So a new White House strategy has emerged: rather than just giving reporters ammunition to “fact-check” Obama’s many critics, the White House decided it would become a player…,

    Which, as we all know is far better than actually having to use real facts to back up his claims and assertions.

    …issuing biting attacks on those pundits, politicians and outlets that make what the White House believes to be misleading or simply false claims, like the assertion that health-care reform would establish new “sex clinics” in schools. Obama, fresh from his vacation on Martha’s Vineyard, cheered on the effort, telling his aides he wanted to “call ‘em out.”

    And he even tried to resurrect George Goebbels for the job.

    The take-no-prisoners turn has come as a surprise to some in the press, considering the largely favorable coverage that candidate Obama received last fall and given the President’s vows to lower the rhetorical temperature in Washington and not pay attention to cable hyperbole. Instead, the White House blog now issues regular denunciations of the Administration’s critics, including a recent post that announced “Fox lies” and suggested that the cable network was unpatriotic for criticizing Obama’s 2016 Olympics effort. (See pictures of Barack Obama’s nation of hope.)

    White House officials offer no apologies. “The best analogy is probably baseball,” says Gibbs. “The only way to get somebody to stop crowding the plate is to throw a fastball at them. They move.”

    You have got to be kidding me. Baseball? Really? Do you really want to go there?

    (remember how Barry throws)

    I would, instead, use the analogy of that wooshing sound you hear when you flush a toilet…and that’s Blammo’s career.

    Yeah…I’m running scared now. Ever since your “vacation” on Matha’s VinYaad, my contempt for you has quadrupled. And I’m an even more voracious devourer of all things Beck, Hannity, Rush, Coulter, etc.

    You know, there is often nothing so pathetic as a twig-boy who talks tough, thinking people will fear him. Gibbs is another twig-boy among many on the whole twig-people team. Show me what you got, twig-boy.

  61. canary
    October 9, 2009 at 12:49 am

    AP: McCain says Al-Qaida, Taliban work together

    Republican Sen. John McCain says Obama administration policy decisions in Afghanistan shouldn’t be based on viewing the insurgent Taliban and the al-Qaida terrorist network as separate and distinct issues.

    Interviewed Tuesday morning on NBC television, McCain said: “You can’t separate the two. … If the Taliban returns, they will work with al-Qaida. It’s just a historical fact.”

    McCain, who was President Barack Obama’s opponent in last year’s presidential election, is among a host of key congressional leaders slated to meet later Tuesday at the White House with the president. The administration is debating what changes may be necessary in Afghan war-fighting policy amid increasing violence and a call by the US commanding general for thousands of additional fighting forces.

    http://www.hindustantimes.com/.....61873.aspx

    Finally, maybe someone will get this through Obama’s ignorance over the war.

  62. canary
    October 9, 2009 at 7:32 am

    AP: US forces leave isolated Afghan base after attack
    By Accociated Press Writer Todd Pitman, Oct 9 2009

    KABUL – U.S. forces have withdrawn from an isolated base in eastern Afghanistan that insurgents attacked last week in one of the deadliest battles of the war for U.S. troops, the NATO-led coalition said Friday.

    The pullout from the Kamdesh outpost near the Pakistani border is likely to embolden insurgent fighters in the region.

    The Taliban swiftly claimed “victory” for forcing the coalition to leave and said they had raised their flag above the town.

    Insurgents fought their way into the base during the battle, a rare breach of security that underscored how thinly manned the post was. It was the largest loss of U.S. life in a single skirmish in more than a year.
    said coalition forces destroyed what was left of the outpost. The action was likely taken to prevent insurgents from using the base.

    “This means they are not coming back,” Mujahid said. “This is another victory for Taliban. We have control of another district in eastern Afghanistan.”

    “Right now Kamdesh is under our control, and the white flag of the Taliban is raised above Kamdesh,” Mujahid said.

    In the latest reported coalition death, the NATO-led force said one of its soldiers died in a bomb strike Thursday in southern Afghanistan. It gave no other details.

    On Thursday, a suicide car bomber detonated his vehicle outside the Indian Embassy in Kabul, killing 17 people….hinted at Pakistani involvement —

    Over the last decade, India has poured nearly $1.2 billion into Afghanistan, …

    In Kunar, another eastern province bordering Pakistan, around 100 insurgents attacked a series of checkpoints and the police headquarters

    Associated Press Writer Rahim Faiez contributed to this report.
    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....fghanistan

    We need to go over and finish the brazen flag-wavers. bombs away

  63. canary
    October 9, 2009 at 7:44 am

    AP: Entrenched Chicago mayor gives no sign of leaving
    By Associated Press Writer Deanna Bellandi Oct 9, 4:15 am ET

    CHICAGO – “I don’t know why you already put me in the grave,” the 67-year-old Daley joked recently when asked whether he’d seek a seventh term in 2011.

    the mayor, who isn’t constrained by term limit laws like those in place in many other major U.S. cities.

    The fatal beating last month of a 16-year-old honors student that was caught on video brought unwanted attention to the city and led to a visit by U.S. Attorney General Erick Holder and Education Secretary Arne Duncan. Four teens have been charged in that beating, but it was not an isolated incident. According to the Chicago Public School District, there were 34 student deaths and 290 shootings last school year.

    Daley will be forced to contend with a projected budget gap next year of more than $500 million, which could mean higher taxes and cuts in services for city residents.

    Daley has not been accused of any wrongdoing, but his legacy has been tainted by corruption allegations against members of his administration that have landed some people in prison. And continued youth violence could inflame the public against Daley, Simpson said.

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....y_s_future

    It’s not entirely his fault that Obama and Ayers lessoned punishment by juveniles which earned Obama the Nobel Peace prize.

  64. BillK
    October 9, 2009 at 11:47 am

    How many more facts will be revealed before feminists like Maureen Dowd finally have to admit the guy’s an a**? Will America at large react other than by driving his ratings even higher?

    From the New York Post:

    Dave pulls stupid trick on wife in Caribbean

    By Larry Celona and Dan Mangan

    And the No. 1 reason David Letterman is a cad: The “Late Show” host brought the assistant he was sleeping with on Caribbean vacations with his wife and their young son, sources told The Post.

    Letterman’s wife, Regina Lasko, had no clue the comic was having an affair with his pretty, much younger assistant Stephanie Birkitt — a $200,000-a-year employee — when she was tagging along on the cozy, romantic trips, sources said.

    Lasko, 48, “has to be really, really pissed” to learn recently that Letterman was so brazen as to have invited his paramour on vacations with their 6-year-old son, Harry, a source said.

    At least one jaunt was to the Caribbean island of St. Barts.

    Lasko — a former show staffer herself who married Letterman in March after 23 years as his girlfriend — believed that Birkitt was only an innocent “friend” and “co-worker” at the time. Letterman also brought other friends and co-workers along for the ride.

    The Post previously revealed that Birkitt, 34, and Letterman, 62, took hikes together last fall at his eastern Montana ranch.

    Birkitt, a longtime “Late Show” staffer, was identified as Letterman’s lover last week when her ex-boyfriend, CBS News journalist Robert “Joe” Halderman, was arrested for allegedly blackmailing the comic with threats to reveal his dalliance with Birkitt.

    Halderman, 51, had first learned of the on-again affair in December, when he read Birkitt’s diaries. They decided to stay together after Birkitt vowed to stop having sex with the multimillionaire TV funnyman.

    But Halderman, a hot-shot “48 Hours” producer, went ballistic and dumped Birkitt after spotting her and Letterman making out in a parked car in the driveway of Halderman’s Norwalk, Conn., home, where she, too, lived.

    “He sees the two of them . . . in a very passionate embrace,” said Halderman’s buddy, Dr. Bob Arnot, on ABC’s “Good Morning America” yesterday.

    “He is beside himself. He really believed that he was being played; that Joe is the ‘backup guy,’ ” said Arnot, citing Halderman’s own claims to him. “At this point, he’s just enraged.”

    Sources earlier told The Post that a jealousy-driven Halderman allegedly cooked up the extortion scheme to get “revenge” on his rival for Birkitt’s affections.

    “This wasn’t about money,” said a source. “It was about making Letterman miserable . . . He wants to hurt Letterman as much as he can — and he wanted to hurt the girl, too.” …

    http://www.nypost.com/p/news/l.....i1×7L

    The networks talk about being in trouble but pay “assistants” $200K/year?

    Where is the public outrage about her salary, let alone Letterman’s?

    I guess as long as they’re not bankers…

  65. nuthingbettertodo
    October 9, 2009 at 12:52 pm

    Chicago smoked out of cigarette-tax revenue
    Some stores sell packs without city, county stamp
    By Dan Simmons

    Tribune reporter

    October 9, 2009

    We walk up to the bulletproof glass at the counter.

    “Newports, short,” we tell the clerk, sliding payment to him through the slot below. He slides back our cigarettes and a receipt.

    The damage: $7.50. Smokers looking for economic relief must love this store. It’s a dollar cheaper a pack than most stores in Chicago.

    But if you’re the deficit-ridden city or Cook County, this store is not your friend. Not when the pack bears no evidence that the 68-cent Chicago tax and the $2 Cook County tax have been paid.

    As cigarette taxes have gone up, smokers have been finding ways to avoid them, from driving out of state to buying online.

    A Tribune spot-check found that in some cases, local retailers are helping out, selling untaxed cigarettes right off their shelves.

    In 2006, city revenues from cigarette taxes came in at a little less than $32 million. By 2008, they had declined to about $25 million. This year, they’re projected to drop again.

    “In most places, tax increases lead to increased revenues,” said David Merriman, a University of Illinois at Chicago economist who has studied cigarette-tax avoidance worldwide for 15 years. “Chicago would be the only place I know of where it’s gone the other way.”

    Ed Walsh, spokesman for the city’s Revenue Department, said cigarette sales in the city have plummeted 68 percent since 2001, partly because of fewer people smoking and partly because of more smokers buying elsewhere.

    “Consumers buying cigarettes outside Chicago or even outside the state also has an impact,” he wrote in an e-mail.

    To that end, Merriman will soon publish a study with a staggering finding: 75 percent of cigarettes smoked in Chicago come from packs that don’t bear city tax stamps. The rate of tax avoidance here dwarfs the national average of about 20 percent, he said. In New York City — the only place in the country where cigarette taxes are higher — the avoidance rate is about 50 percent, he said, still sharply lower than Chicago’s.

    Add it up and about $10 million a month in possible cigarette-tax revenue doesn’t reach city coffers, according to Merriman’s projections.

    So where are the illicit smokes coming from?

    Certainly, scores of smokers parade to Indiana and surrounding counties in Illinois, where the taxes are lower. And some buy illegally online.

    At six stores, Tribune reporters bought packs of Newport that cost $5.20 to $8.20 — and none had city or county tax stamps. Five were on the city’s South Side, with one in nearby Hometown. Compare their prices with dozens of other stores throughout Chicago, where the prices were in the high $8 to low $9 range. The pricier packs bore city and county stamps.

    Four of the stores where the Tribune bought the untaxed packs are owned by Oak Lawn businesswoman Dana Alsoudi, according to state and city records. She denied authorizing or buying cigarettes without the stamps.

    “You just opened my eyes to something I don’t like,” said Alsoudi, 38.

    Alsoudi said her managers buy in bulk, pay in cash and work special discounts from distributors, all of which allow her stores to price cigarettes more cheaply.

    “Of course we’d buy stamped packs,” she said. “I don’t want to pay the penalties.”

    According to city and state records, one of the other stores where the Tribune bought untaxed cigarettes is owned by Manal Zahdan, whom Alsoudi identified as her sister. Another is owned by Samson Kadamandla. Neither could be reached for comment.

    Illinois cigarette wholesalers must register with the state Department of Revenue and buy tax stamps that are affixed to the bottom of each pack. Wholesalers in Chicago or Cook County are required to buy and attach additional city and county stamps.

    Every city business with a tobacco license undergoes at least one unannounced inspection every year to check for compliance with the city’s minimum-age buying requirement and tax stamps, said Efrat Stein, spokeswoman for the Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection.

    The city is catching more violators. In 2008, 473 businesses were cited for violating cigarette-tax laws, up from 265 in 2007 and 289 in 2006, Stein said. In the last two years, they have confiscated 58,000 packs of unstamped cigarettes and levied $638,000 in fines.

    But Stein acknowledged that the department’s 26 investigators have a mammoth task keeping tabs on the city’s 70,000 licensed businesses.

    “One thing to keep in mind is that a business may be in compliance today and out of compliance tomorrow,” Stein said. “Investigators cannot be at all places at all times.”

    To that point, the Tribune bought a stamped pack during the day and an unstamped pack at night at one of Alsoudi’s stores.

    Violators are fined $15 for each unstamped pack, with a maximum fine of $1,000 for the first offense. The second time in a year, the fine stays the same, but the cap is lifted. If a business fails compliance three times in a year, their license to sell tobacco products can be revoked, Stein said.

    Of the five city stores the Tribune found selling without stamps, only one has ever been cited for it, and that was in 2006, according to city records. Some of the stores have been found in violation of other city codes but largely passed the stamp inspection.

    A competitor in the area called the inspections lacking.

    “The cheating’s so blatant and obvious,” said Jim Kean, co-owner with his brother Raleigh of a Southwest Side gas station at 111th Street and Talman Avenue. “How can you miss people like that?”

    The Keans said sales of cigarettes at their store declined sharply after the 2006 tax increase and have gone steadily down since — from about 10,000 packs a month in 2005, just before the tax increase, to about 3,000 packs a month today.

    At first they thought they were losing all their cigarette business to nearby Indiana. But then they noticed stores around them, in the city and surrounding suburbs, advertising packs at lower prices.

    So they started buying smokes from their competitors and discovered that the same stores with cheaper prices were selling unstamped packs, over and over, in broad daylight.

    They sent a letter to one of the competitors’ alderman, George Cardenas, 12th, in 2006, complete with envelopes containing the illicit cigarettes, but got no response, Jim Kean said.

    Cardenas told the Tribune that he had his staff direct the complaint to the city’s Department of Business Affairs to investigate further.

    “I think people should play by the same rules, and if they’re breaking the rules, they should be held accountable,” he said.

    But the Keans expressed frustration, noting that sales of unstamped smokes have continued for at least the last three years.

    “Why the city or county can’t discover the same thing is beyond me,” Raleigh Kean said.

    The brothers said that even if stores are caught, the fines provide little incentive not to keep selling cigarettes without the tax stamp.

    “One gas station can cheat the city and county out of $26,000 a month,” Jim Kean said. “Of what impact is the maximum fine of $1,000 for a violation?”

    Merriman, the economist, said he hadn’t previously considered the impact of retailers selling unstamped cigarettes, but it fits with a key finding in his study.

    In summer 2007, he commissioned a group of college students to walk the city streets in 100 areas, blanketing the city, collecting more than 1,000 discarded packs of smokes and cataloging which tax stamps each bore.

    He found that packs were much more likely to have an Indiana stamp the closer they were to the state border.

    But he didn’t find a similarly strong correlation at the city and county level: Packs with Illinois state stamps weren’t dramatically less likely to bear Chicago or Cook County stamps the closer they were to the city’s borders, suggesting that some packs bought in the city don’t have city stamps.

    “Maybe the (untaxed) cigarettes are coming to them instead of them going to the (untaxed) cigarettes,” he said.

    Tribune reporter William Lee contributed to this report. dtsimmons@tribune.com

    http://www.chicagotribune.com/.....9836.story

  66. neocon mom
    October 9, 2009 at 6:39 pm

    Another outrage from an Obama “advisor” that’s been completely ignored by the American media:

    From the UK Telegraph:

    Obama Advisor says Sharia Law Misunderstood

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new.....stood.html

    By Andrew Gilligan and Alex Spillius in Washington
    Published: 8:00PM BST 08 Oct 2009

    President Barack Obama’s adviser on Muslim affairs, Dalia Mogahed, has provoked controversy by appearing on a British television show hosted by a member of an extremist group to talk about Sharia Law.

    Mogahed, appointed to the President’s Council on Faith-Based and Neighbourhood Partnerships, said the Western view of Sharia was “oversimplified” and the majority of women around the world associate it with “gender justice”.

    The White House adviser made the remarks on a London-based TV discussion programme hosted by Ibtihal Bsis, a member of the extremist Hizb ut Tahrir party.

    The group believes in the non-violent destruction of Western democracy and the creation of an Islamic state under Sharia Law across the world.

    Miss Mogahed appeared alongside Hizb ut Tahrir’s national women’s officer, Nazreen Nawaz.

    During the 45-minute discussion, on the Islam Channel programme Muslimah Dilemma earlier this week, the two members of the group made repeated attacks on secular “man-made law” and the West’s “lethal cocktail of liberty and capitalism”.

    They called for Sharia Law to be “the source of legislation” and said that women should not be “permitted to hold a position of leadership in government”.

    Miss Mogahed made no challenge to these demands and said that “promiscuity” and the “breakdown of traditional values” were what Muslims admired least about the West.

    She said: “I think the reason so many women support Sharia is because they have a very different understanding of sharia than the common perception in Western media.

    “The majority of women around the world associate gender justice, or justice for women, with sharia compliance.

    “The portrayal of Sharia has been oversimplified in many cases.”

    Sharia in its broadest sense is a religious code for living, which decrees such matters as fasting and dressing modestly. However, it has also been interpreted as requiring the separation of men and women.

    It also includes the controversial “Hadd offences”, crimes with specific penalties set by the Koran and the sayings of the prophet Mohammed. These include death by stoning for adultery and homosexuality and the removal of a hand for theft.

    Miss Mogahed admitted that even many Muslims associated Sharia with “maximum criminal punishments” and “laws that… to many people seem unequal to women,” but added: “Part of the reason that there is this perception of Sharia is because Sharia is not well understood and Islam as a faith is not well understood.”

    The video of the broadcast has now been prominently posted on the front page of Hizb ut Tahrir’s website.

    Miss Mogahed, who was born in Egypt and moved to America at the age of five, is the first veiled Muslim woman to serve in the White House. Her appointment was seen as a sign of the Obama administration’s determination to reach out to the Muslim world.

    She is also the executive director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies, a project which aims to scientifically sample public opinion in the Muslim world.

    During this week’s broadcast, she described her White House role as “to convey… to the President and other public officials what it is Muslims want.”

    Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America, said Miss Mogahed was “downplaying” Sharia Law.

    “There is a reason sharia has got a bad name and it is how it has been exercised. Regrettably in the US there have been acts of injustice perpetrated against women that are driven by the Sharia-type mindset that women are objects not human beings,” she said.

    She cited the example of Muzzammil Hassan, a Buffalo man who ran a cable channel aimed at countering Muslim stereotypes and was charged earlier this year with beheading his wife after she filed for divorce.

    “Americans understand by example, it’s not as if we are an ignorant mass of people. Just as we don’t broad brush all Muslims, so should Dalia not downplay the serious nature of sharia law.”

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