Selected News For Week Nov 22 – Nov 28

47 Responses to “Selected News For Week Nov 22 – Nov 28”

1. BillK

   November 22, 2008 at 12:08 am

   Was there ever a doubt?

   The Obama kids will continue to attend a private school.

   From the Los Angeles Times:

   Sidwell Friends School gets new students: Malia and Sasha Obama

   The private Quaker school is the alma mater of Chelsea Clinton, as well as President Nixon’s daughters. President-elect Obama and Michelle Obama also considered public schools, aides say.

   By John McCormick

   Malia and Sasha Obama are headed for the Washington-area private Quaker school that Chelsea Clinton attended, aides to the future first family confirmed Friday.

   The Obamas picked Sidwell Friends School, where Vice President-elect Joe Biden’s granddaughters also attend.

   The school is known for its rigorous standards and for educating children from some of Washington’s most prominent and wealthy families.

   It is also the alma mater of President Nixon’s daughters and Al Gore’s son.

   “A number of great schools were considered,” said Katie McCormick Lelyveld, the incoming first lady’s spokeswoman. “In the end, the Obamas selected the school that was the best fit for what their daughters need right now.”

   Sasha, 7, and Malia, 10, visited classes and met with students earlier this week, while their mother, Michelle Obama, talked to school officials and parents.

   Aides said the Obamas looked at a variety of schools, including public ones. Michelle Obama went to public school in Chicago.

   The girls will go to classes on two campuses in different cities. Sidwell’s lower school, where Sasha will attend second grade, is in Bethesda, Md. The middle school, where Malia will attend fifth grade, is in northwestern Washington.

   The school has an enrollment of about 1,100, with 39% being students of color. Lower school annual tuition is $28,422, and middle school tuition is $29,442, according to the school’s website.

   The girls now attend the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, one of the city’s top private schools.

   http://www.latimes.com/news/na.....6037.story

   Yes, the Obamas will be spending nearly $30,000 per child to send their kids to a private school, just as they did in Chicago. Just as the VP-elect has done.

   (That’s only about $10,000 more per child than they pay now in Chicago.)

   Yet the NEA will continue to fight tooth and nail to prevent other Americans from doing so, and won’t utter a single peep of protest over the Obamas’ decision to send their children to a private school. (Further they never brought up that they already had been sending their kids to a $20,000/year private school in Chicago – thanks for investigating on that one, news media!)

   Where’s the “they’re just like us” crowd now?

   Somehow I think public schools might suddenly get a bit better if the Obama kids were facing the threats to their safety and sub-par education that regular government workers’ kids do.

   But the big news here is I think Michelle’s spokeswoman needs to be fired:

   “A number of great schools were considered,” said Katie McCormick Lelyveld, the incoming first lady’s spokeswoman. “In the end, the Obamas selected the school that was the best fit for what their daughters need right now.“

   In what way is this not a tacit admission that the D.C. Public Schools do not meet their childrens’ needs?

   Bravo to the Obamas for doing what’s right for their own kids, but they’d also fight tooth and nail to deny that choice to others.

   But that’s OK, they’re Democrats, at least they (theoretically) feel bad about it… right?

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2. BillK

   November 22, 2008 at 12:11 am

   Do you think Bill is able to conceal his glee at the fact that his wife will now be out of the country for extended periods of time?

   From the Los Angeles Times:

   It’s decided: Barack Obama picks Hillary Clinton for Secretary of State

   Aides to both of the former rivals confirm that she’s his choice as top diplomat. She has not yet accepted the job, but is reportedly ready to give up her Senate seat.

   By Peter Nicholas and Christi Parsons

   President-elect Barack Obama has settled on former rival Hillary Rodham Clinton to be secretary of State, following a high-stakes courtship that is expected to lead to a formal announcement after the Thanksgiving holiday, aides to both said.

   After an extensive examination of former President Clinton’s complicated financial dealings, the Obama transition team is satisfied that the nomination will not pose any conflicts of interest, an aide to the president-elect said.

   On her end, Sen. Clinton is ready to give up her Senate seat and become the nation’s top diplomat, friends and advisors said Friday. They added that she had not yet accepted the job.

   The developments came amid a blur of leaks Friday that Obama was close to naming other members of his Cabinet. Among them: New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson for Commerce secretary and Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano for Homeland Security.

   As recently as a few days ago, Clinton was prepared to return to her role as the junior senator from New York. Democrats in the Senate considered creating a new leadership position for Clinton in recognition of her stature within the party.

   Obama’s overture surprised her, colleagues said. The two met face to face Nov. 13 in Chicago.

   Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) said she had spoken privately with Clinton about the Cabinet prospect on Tuesday during a Democratic organizational meeting in the old Senate chamber.

   “I kept saying I thought it was such a good fit for her,” Boxer recalled. “And she said: ‘I just wasn’t thinking about this. This wasn’t in my mind.’ She was a bit thrown off by it. My strong impression was she really didn’t expect it. She was planning her role in the Senate. Hillary is a very thoughtful person, and I could see she was really thinking it through.”

   The Obama transition team and Clinton’s Senate office both said the nomination was “on track.”

   Richardson and Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), the Democratic presidential nominee in 2004, have also been mentioned as possible candidates for the job. …

   http://www.latimes.com/news/na.....0338.story

   Do you think the Call Girl agencies that serve the area in which the Clintons live are already staffing up?

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3. BillK

   November 22, 2008 at 2:02 am

   Then it was 120.

   From the Minneapolis Star Tribune:

   Recount, Day 3: Coleman holds lead

   Norm Coleman is hanging on to his whisker-thin lead over Al Franken. With 64 percent of the 2.9 million ballots recounted, Coleman is ahead by 120 votes.

   By Kevin Duchschere

   The wear and tear of the state’s U.S. Senate recount began to show Friday, as some counties reported missing ballots and a rising number of challenged ballots frayed nerves among counters and monitors alike.

   As of Friday night, Republican Sen. Norm Coleman was hanging on to his whisker-thin lead over Democrat Al Franken. With 64 percent of the 2.9 million ballots recounted, Coleman was ahead by 120 votes, down from 136 at the end of Thursday and from the unofficial lead of 215 signed off on Tuesday by the state Canvassing Board.

   The figures represent a compilation of recount data reported to the secretary of state and gathered by the Star Tribune.

   A handful of counties will continue counting today, and perhaps even Sunday, in hopes that their work may be substantially finished by Thanksgiving. Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie said Friday that 75 percent of the recount would be completed by tonight. Ritchie also said the Canvassing Board will meet Wednesday to discuss what to do about the Franken campaign’s request to consider rejected absentee ballots and count them if they were improperly turned aside.

   Earlier Friday, during an energy-related visit to Wright County, Coleman expressed second thoughts about a statement he made the morning after the Nov. 4 election.

   Asked whether he would concede the race if the Canvassing Board certified Franken as the winner — as Coleman had suggested that Franken should do that post-election morning — the senator noted that at the time his 700-plus-vote lead over Franken was more substantial and that he hadn’t slept in 36 hours. Now, he said, “I don’t think I’d have made the same statement.”…

   http://www.startribune.com/pol.....ec8O7EyUsr

   Amazing how apparently not a single vote has been found for Coleman in the recount, isn’t it?

   Franken campaign officials said their internal counting showed they had cut Coleman’s lead to “double digits” as of late Thursday and said that the recount had so far taken place in Republican-leaning parts of the state.

   “The ballots that have been counted are slightly redder than the total pool,” said Marc Elias, the lead Franken recount attorney. “We overall feel very good.

   See – all the votes for Franken so far have come from Republican counties – we haven’t even started the recount of Democrat counties yet.

   I’ll leave how a political candidate can have any internal counting of secret ballots as an exercise for the reader.

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4. BillK

   November 22, 2008 at 2:05 am

   More from the Minneapolis Star Tribune:

   Coleman revisits post-election comments

   By Rochelle A. Olson

   Sen. Norm Coleman was in Wright County on Friday and though his visit to an Xcel facility in Monticello was to discuss energy issues, reporters asked him, of course, about the election recount.

   He said several times that he has confidence in the Canvassing Board. He also said he’s not involved in the day-to-day recount.

   Asked at one point whether he would concede if the board certified Al Franken as the winner, as the senator had suggested Franken do the morning after the election, Coleman didn’t answer directly.

   However, he expressed second thoughts about his comments that morning. He noted that his lead at the time was substantially larger, more than 700 votes, and also that he hadn’t slept in 36 hours. Now, he said, “I don’t think I’d have made the same statement.”

   During a response to a previous question about ballot challenges, Coleman said: “My sense is, there are games being played on both sides and it would be great if they would put the games aside.”

   Of the recount, he said: “I’ve got faith we’ll get it done the Minnesota way.”

   He also said he’s confident he’ll prevail.

   “The vote will be what the vote will be,” he said. “I’m not walking around wringing my hands worried about the recount.” …

   http://www.startribune.com/pol.....aDUiacyKUU

   Let’s face it, Democrats have patented the “recount until we win” strategy and Coleman is toast.

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5. BigOil

   November 22, 2008 at 10:05 am

   From the AP:

   Obama economic plan focuses on job creation, public works projects, alternative energy sources

   By WILL LESTER

   WASHINGTON – President-elect Barack Obama promoted an economic plan Saturday he said would create 2.5 million jobs by rebuilding roads and bridges and modernizing schools while developing alternative energy sources and more efficient cars.

   “These aren’t just steps to pull ourselves out of this immediate crisis. These are the long-term investments in our economic future that have been ignored for far too long,” Obama said in the weekly Democratic radio address.

   The goal is to it quickly through Congress, with help from both parties, after Obama takes office Jan. 20. The plan, which envisions those new jobs by January 2011, is “big enough to meet the challenges we face,” he said.

   Obama noted the growing evidence the country is “facing an economic crisis of historic proportions” and said he was pleased Congress passed an extension of unemployment benefits this past week. But, he added, `We must do more to put people back to work and get our economy moving again.”

   Nonetheless, he said, “There are no quick or easy fixes to this crisis, which has been many years in the making, and it’s likely to get worse before it gets better.”

   http://www.startribune.com/pol.....=1&c=y

   Here comes the New Deal version 2.0. After all, everyone knows the government creates the wealth in America. Our country is crumbling and The One has arrived to rescue us from ruin.

   Democrat ideology is evolving. They’ve gone from tax and spend to spend and tax.

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6. 1sttofight

   November 22, 2008 at 10:32 am

   So those 2.5 million jobs will all be gov jobs in his civilian security farce. That is why he wants them in place by 2011. What else do you expect from a community organizer.

   Nice day outside, little chilly but I think I will go do a little ammo shopping later when it warms up a bit.

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7. GuppyNblue

   November 22, 2008 at 11:08 am

   Re: The Obama kids will continue to attend a private school.

   DC schools are the epitome of inner cities controlled by politicians just like Obama. They’re unsafe and fail miserably in academics but the solution is always the same – more money. Where the money ends up you can guess but the results are certain.

   The Obama’s are typical liberal hypocrites. Michelle’s spokeswoman says, “In the end, the Obamas selected the school that was the best fit for what their daughters need right now.” Thats an answer that tells you nothing. The truth is it would be insane to send their daughters to a DC public school and they know this.

   I’ll testify that northwest Washington (I’m there right now) is fairly safe for the DC area. But it’s surrounded by liberal wastelands and sending your kid to a public school there is like sending them to a Mexican prison. I don’t have much sympathy for the parents that can’t afford otherwise because they show how much they truly care by how they vote.

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8. Diane

   November 22, 2008 at 11:17 am

   Re: Obama’s cabinet picks. Two things occur to me. One article ( http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,455545,00.html )mentioned that, taken in aggregate, Obama’s picks so far have a total of over 60 years of Washington experience, as opposed to 58 for Clinton and 30 for Bush, Jr. Didn’t this guy run on a platform of “change”? If your cabinet picks are so overwhelmingly from Washington, how does that change anything?

   Also, it’s been less than a week since Obama stated that there would be Republicans on his cabinet, although he wouldn’t say how many. Has anyone seen a single Republican as yet?

   I’m sure we can trust him with this, though. I mean, he’s never broken any promises before, right? Right?

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9. proreason

   November 22, 2008 at 11:24 am

   “BigOil …… President-elect Barack Obama promoted an economic plan Saturday he said would create 2.5 million jobs by rebuilding roads and bridges and modernizing schools while developing alternative energy sources and more efficient cars.”

   There ya go, pull a few guys off park benches, pay em $12 an hour, and presto, in a year or two ya got fusion in a test-tube and windmill-powered cars.

   Economics is easy. that’s why most politicians skipped those courses in school

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10. locomotivebreath1901

    November 22, 2008 at 4:01 pm

    Hard Times.

    Brothels see job applications surge amid ailing economy.

    But the would-be hoes & sportin’ house managers understand supply & demand better than nine percent nancy, and her myrmidon congress critters.

    More Women Seek Work Amid Spending Slowdown by Clients.

    “The irony for Austin (who runs Nevada’s Mustang Ranch) is that while the money is drying up, more women are applying for jobs. “And the age group is going older,” she said. “I had a 72-year-old apply for a job.”

    She says the poor economy has forced her to lay off 30 percent of her staff, unheard of in a business generally regarded as a printing press for making money.”

    Yes, there’s video, but you pervs will be disappointed to learn that it is safe for work.

    Hey, it’s a slow news day.

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11. U NO HOO

    November 23, 2008 at 5:32 pm

    The Obama kids wouldn’t need safe schools if their parents were sane.

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12. BillK

    November 24, 2008 at 4:36 am

    The latest iteration of the same article I’ve now seen at least four times in five different newspapers over the past week.

    From the AP and (Madison) Wisconsin State Journal

    Frugality is in – nationwide and in Wisconsin

    Frugality is making a comeback.

    Fearful that economic conditions could get worse and stay that way, Americans are showing an enthusiasm for thriftiness not seen in decades.

    This behavioral shift isn’t simply about spending less. It emphasizes stretching every dollar — spending more at discount chain stores, buying secondhand clothes or trading down to store brands. Consumers are clipping more coupons and swiping their credit cards less.

    Patty Lomasney of Plain, about an hour outside of Madison, said she is cutting back on spending across the board. Her family is entertaining at home, dining in and going to movies less.

    “Christmas is going to be smaller this year. We buy basically what we need now instead of the extras,” she said, adding that they drive less by combining errands. “We want to make our trips count.”

    That kind of scrimping may be good for stressed family budgets, but it’s bad for the nation’s overall economy — and that has the potential to reinforce the miserly mood. Yet with home prices, 401(k)s and job stability suffering, such frugality is likely to be more than a fad.

    “It is a whole reassessment of values,” said Candace Corlett, president of the consulting firm WSL Strategic Retail. “We’ve just been shopping until we drop and consuming and buying it all, and replenishing before things wear out. People are learning again to say ‘No, not today.”‘ …

    http://www.madison.com/wsj/topstories/315477

    Reassessment of values?

    There are those people who have all along not gotten in over their heads and have been if not frugal, not wildly irresponsible.

    You know, the ones the Federal Government, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have been telling to go take a hike while they give the irresponsible cuts in mortgage payments, lowered interest rates and lowered principal balances, while those who have paid on time get nothing.

    But better yet, how many Christmases in a row now have we read the stories about how “people aren’t just buying anything” and how consumers are “looking for bargains” and are “only buying the necessities?”

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13. BillK

    November 24, 2008 at 10:37 am

    Somehow, this is supposed to be bad news.

    From the Denver Post:

    Giving up on the American dream

    With its faltering economy, the U.S. is no longer the land of opportunity it once was for Mexican immigrants.

    By Bruce Finley

    A tightening economy and social hostility are driving once-hopeful Mexican immigrants such as Absalom Lopez out of Colorado.

    Seven years after an illegal crossing that led to abundant work cooking and cleaning, Lopez, his wife and their 6-year-old, Denver-born son plan to chase their dream of opening a tortilla factory in Mexico. They say their $1,000-a- week combined earnings here plummeted in recent months to around $300. They’re moving from a $700-a-month rented house in Wheat Ridge to a less costly two-room apartment until they head home to Veracruz next year, Lopez said.

    Negative remarks and lower wages for Latino workers “hurt you,” he said, citing social climate as a factor in his family’s decision.

    “Mexico’s a better place to raise a child. . . . If we stay longer, we’ll lose money, because there won’t be enough work.”

    They’re among growing numbers of immigrant families uprooted by economic hard times who now are recalculating whether to go or stay. Any exodus would add to what recent surveys in both the U.S. and Mexico show to be sharply reduced migration into the United States.

    “This crisis in the U.S. is affecting many Mexican nationals. They came here seeking better opportunities. Some now are thinking of going back to Mexico. Some are moving to other states,” said Eduardo Arnal, Mexico’s consul general in Denver. “These are people accustomed to dealing with difficulties.”

    Colorado’s population of 5 million includes 243,000 Mexico-born residents — many of them with U.S.-born children — and another 37,000 immigrants from elsewhere in Latin America. Latinos, half of them immigrants, make up a recently estimated 14 percent of the nation’s workforce.

    Signs of the gradual exodus can be found throughout Colorado.

    • Starting in September, Mexican government officials noticed more workers lining up at their consulate for one-time permits that let Mexicans moving home import U.S.-purchased possessions tax-free.

    Up to three a day ask for these permits, along with dozens seeking passports and other documents, officials said, compared with two a week last year.

    • Business is brisk at cash-only car dealerships along Denver’s Federal Boulevard that cater to immigrants. Mexican workers are hunting for affordable pickups, useful for hauling belongings — 1998 or newer to comply with Mexico’s environmental laws, said Maria Casillas on the Sierra Auto Sales lot at South Federal and West Cedar Avenue. She and her husband have sold 21 vehicles in the past three months, triple the number sold during that period in 2007.

    “They say they’re going home because there’s no work and they can’t pay the rent. One family, their kids didn’t want to leave because they don’t know people down there.”

    • Bank data show the amount of money Mexican workers send home is falling for the first time in a decade. Mexico has come to rely on these remittances, which totaled $24 billion last year.

    • Denver bus depot managers say Mexico-bound buses are filling up more swiftly than usual. Since October, four 55-seat buses a day departed from Denver’s Central de Autobuses Americanos — a surge that manager Jose Hernandez said previously happened only for the December holidays.

    “Some are going one-way,” he said. “You figure they aren’t coming back.” …

    http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_11047298

    I am not anti-immigrant or anti-Latino.

    But why is it bad news when immigrants who are here illegally return to their native countries?

    Also, if “Mexico is a better place to raise a child,” don’t let the border gate hit you in the butt on the way out.

    Finally, Mexicans are applying to be able to take their possessions back to Mexico tax-free?

    I thought tax policies had no effect on behavior?

    Meanwhile, we’re supposed to be moved to tears over stories like this:

    Recently, a mother who raised three U.S.-born children huddled tearfully by her husband outside Denver’s Mexican Consulate. For 15 years, his welding, truck driving and work at construction sites earned enough to make $1,200-a-month mortgage payments on a house in Aurora — even though she and her husband were in the country illegally.

    Now after a year without work, they’re facing eviction. They couldn’t even afford the $95 permit Mexican officials offered for hauling possessions to Mexico tax-free. They asked that their names not be printed because of their immigration status, but they were in the process of packing up his Ford truck to head south in search of a more affordable life in Ciudad Juárez.

    Sorry, it’s just not going to happen.

    Of course I’m sure our new masters are working on any number of Government programs to give said illegal immigrants enough free money so that they stay:

    President-elect Barack Obama would have to find a way for qualified Mexicans to work here legally with dignity, he said. Today he’s departing reluctantly from close friends in Colorado Springs, trying to look on the bright side. He and his visiting fiancee, Olga Guzman of Sonora, plan to marry after visiting his parents in Michuacan. For years Manzo sent his family $200 a month — until this year.

    “They understand,” Manzo said. “They say: ‘If there’s not much for you to do now, better to get back home.’ “

    Note – “get back home.”

    Meaning that many such immigrants had no intention of ever assimilating or otherwise making the United States their home, despite what the activists say.

    They think of Mexico as “back home” and always will. Not the “home country,” not the “old country,” but “home.”

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14. nuthingbettertodo

    November 24, 2008 at 10:50 am

    “If an individual voter does not have standing to bring such a suit, who, in fact does?”

    “Who other than an individual voter has standing to bring up potential violations such as this?”

    Alan Keyes does!!!! And about a dozen other people in as many states.

    Leo C. Donofrio also filed. This suit went to SCOTUS and Souter also rejected. It was submitted to Justice Thomas who moved it to a review scheduled for Dec 5th.

    see more here> http://www.americasright.com/2.....-berg.html

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15. BillK

    November 24, 2008 at 10:51 am

    nuthingbettertodo, sorry, that was an older story than I thought, so I pulled it.

    Thanks for the update, though.

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16. BillK

    November 24, 2008 at 10:57 am

    This is hilarious – poor Hillary, having to subject herself to the whims of a man!

    Perhaps it will be fun watching the Dems spin themselves crazy.

    From an obviously depressed feminist at the AP:

    Clinton prepares to relinquish independence

    By Beth Fouhy

    NEW YORK — For years, Hillary Rodham Clinton set aside her own considerable ambition to promote her husband’s political career.

    Now, as President-elect Barack Obama’s choice to be secretary of state, the former first lady faces the prospect of subsuming her political identity yet again — this time on behalf of the man who dashed her hopes of returning to the White House in her own right.

    Friends said the potential loss of her independence, hard won by her election to the Senate from New York in 2000, caused Clinton to waver last week as she considered Obama’s offer. But advisers said the discussions got back on track after he promised she would have considerable input on staffing decisions and plenty of access to him.

    Aides said that while the deal is not yet final, the president-elect is on track to nominate Clinton as the nation’s top diplomat after Thanksgiving.

    Obama’s decision to choose Clinton has stunned many observers riveted by the two Democrats’ epic primary battle, leading some to question how this high-profile partnership might work.

    Among the issues: Why would Obama choose someone he repeatedly criticized for voting for the U.S. invasion of Iraq to be the face of his administration’s foreign policy? Why would he abrogate his famous “no drama” policy and embrace Clintonian theatrics? And why would Clinton subordinate her strong personality and views to be a global ambassador for Obama? Throughout the campaign, she insisted he didn’t have the experience to be president and dismissed his willingness to meet with rogue leaders as “irresponsible and frankly naive.” Obama’s advisers said the matter is simple: The strengths Clinton would bring to the job would outweigh the drawbacks.

    “Hillary Clinton is a demonstrably able, tough, brilliant person who can help … advance the interests of this administration and this country,” Obama strategist David Axelrod said today in an interview on “Fox News Sunday.” He added that Obama, as president, would set U.S. policy no matter how many strong personalities he had in his cabinet and on his staff.

    Indeed, perhaps as a counterweight to the Clinton pick, Obama is likely to name James L. Jones, a widely respected former Marine Corps commandant and NATO commander, to be his national security adviser. Jones would lend a powerful voice on foreign policy matters right in the White House, while Clinton was at the State Department or overseas.

    To be sure, not everyone is happy about the Clinton pick. Many bloggers at the liberal Daily Kos Web site have been venting frustration, decrying her campaign attacks on Obama and her repeated defense of her Iraq war vote.

    While Obama and Clinton’s primary battle was often fierce, friends say it was professional, not personal, and that they enjoy a mutual respect. And while they do not share the close bond President George W. Bush has with the current secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, or that Bush’s father shared with his widely respected secretary of state James Baker, they have a similar world view and know how to make strategic use of their shared celebrity.

    “The tension and rivalry between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama was very intense and very brief. It doesn’t go back 20 years, which is sometimes true in politics,” said Michael Gerson, a former speechwriter for President Bush and a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. “It’s easier for politicians to get along when they’re part of a winning team. There’s an opportunity there for real reconciliation.” Obama has had Clinton in mind for secretary of state for some time, his advisers said, believing that her visibility and the respect she commands from many world leaders would lend immediate heft and credibility to U.S. diplomatic efforts.

    Bill Clinton, whose network of business dealings and global philanthropic efforts might have complicated his wife’s efforts, has also done his part to make the partnership work. He’s agreed to step away from day-to-day operation of his foundation while his wife serves and to submit speeches and business deals for administration vetting. …

    http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_11057962

    It’s fun to watch the Kos-heads wail on Hillary for a while, isn’t it?

    All while the feminists are saddened that there’s a man in charge after all – relinquish her independence?!?!

    Of course they could have had a female VP.

    But that’s right, she wasn’t a “real” woman…

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17. Liberals Demise

    November 24, 2008 at 12:06 pm

    It looks to me that you can add another lie to the already “3 Biggest Lies in the World” list.
    Here is the new add on : “She would have considerable input on staffing decisions and plenty of access to Obama.” I would not be surprised at all if Obama did a last minute switch-a-roo and thought that a real Clinton criminal is too much for an already heavy ex-Clinton Administration on his staff!! She has a mouth that would make a sailor blush……..Frau Hildabeast as SOS? What in the hell is Diplomatic about a potty mouth HAG?

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18. pdsand

    November 24, 2008 at 7:38 pm

    Just a little sidebar. I caught Saturday Night Live sometime in the near past, and on weekend update they glibly reported that since Obama won, it’s official, for the next four years it will be pronounced “nuclear”. I remember thinking, well for the last eight years we’ve had a president who understands that the biggest problem associated with the word “nucular” is a weapon of mass destruction, and not a source of pollution.

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19. pdsand

    November 24, 2008 at 7:42 pm

    Or maybe for the last eight years we’ve had a President who’s more concerned that the terrorists might get a “nucular” weapon, than the fact that we have them.

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20. BillK

    November 25, 2008 at 4:32 am

    The fight just never stops.

    From the Los Angeles Times:

    Seattle’s mayor is up in arms about guns

    Mayor Greg Nickels wants to ban guns from city property. But a Washington state law, and other challenges, may shoot down his proposal.

    By Kim Murphy

    Seattle’s annual Northwest Folklife Festival is a throwback to the hippie days, a laid-back celebration of folk music, grilled salmon and sandals with socks in a city that has always considered laid-back a point of civic pride.

    So when 19-year-old Joshua Penaluna felt a sharp pain in his wrist after two men came bursting toward him through the crowd at last May’s festival, he assumed he had merely broken a bone as he fell.

    “Then I heard someone say, ‘Oh my god, he’s been shot,’ ” Penaluna recalled recently.

    Penaluna’s girlfriend was also hit by the stray bullet and another person was injured. The shootings, in a city where sporadic but horrific incidents of violent street crime rattle its culture of progressive cool, sent Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels on a mission: banning guns on city property, including at parks, sporting events and street fairs. Next month, he will hold a public hearing on his executive order.

    In a state where more than 239,000 residents have permits to carry concealed weapons — and many consider a gun in their pocket a better deterrent to street crime than any law the mayor may think up — the proposal appears almost certain to become a local gun control battle in a year when the courts and possibly the administration of President-elect Barack Obama are set to redefine the national debate.

    After a Supreme Court ruling in June that the 2nd Amendment explicitly protects Americans’ right to own guns for self-defense, gun rights advocates are gearing up for a new round of court cases in California, Chicago and elsewhere. The cases will determine how far the justices’ decision striking down the District of Columbia’s handgun ban can be extended to state and local governments.

    In Seattle, the battle will be over a Washington state law that specifically reserves the “entire field of firearms regulation” to the state. Last month, the state attorney general’s office issued an opinion that Nickels could not legally preempt state law with the handgun ban.

    No matter. The mayor’s staff announced Friday that he was proceeding with a public hearing Dec. 15 to take testimony on the proposed administrative rule that would go into effect next spring, making anyone entering city property with a gun guilty of criminal trespassing.

    “Our parks, our community centers and our public events are safer without guns,” Nickels said at a June news conference when he announced his executive order for the ban. “At many properties, including City Hall, you can bring a gun if you have a concealed-weapons permit. Under this order, people with concealed weapons will be asked to give up their weapon or leave.”

    Nickels was joined at the news conference by Police Chief R. Gil Kerlikowske, who said in an October debate sponsored by the Rosenkranz Foundation in New York that laws like Washington’s, which require the issuance of concealed-weapons permits to anyone who meets the standards, are too lax.

    In the case of the Folklife Festival shooting, he said, the young man whose gun went off during a scuffle had been issued a concealed-weapons permit even though he had been under drug addiction treatment with methadone and had “a number of other problems.”

    “That is a person that should’ve never had a concealed-firearms permit,” Kerlikowske said. “There has to be far more than being mobile and not being blind as a reason to give someone a firearms permit.”

    The backdrop to Seattle’s gun debate is the growing concern about crime, sometimes violent, in downtown Seattle. The downtown core’s edgier neighborhoods have been havens for drugs and prostitution, but lately upscale condos and restaurants are popping up as part of an attempt to fight sprawl and keep the city from rolling up the sidewalks when downtown workers head for the east side at 5 p.m.

    Merchants and residents in neighborhoods like Belltown have been on a harangue against the police, complaining that street bums and their occasionally violent counterparts are making their community’s sidewalks a no-go zone after dark.

    One Belltown woman became an Internet sensation this year by posting home videos shot from her apartment window depicting various scenes of drug-dealing, heroin-shooting and sex — with whimsical titles like “Crackhead makes a pipe out of a can while wearing a sombrero.”

    Nothing was to prepare the city, though, for what happened last month to 53-year-old Edward McMichael — the offbeat merrymaker known as the “Tuba Man” who had long been a fixture outside sporting events across the city, playing his tuba in oversize Dr. Seuss or Uncle Sam hats.

    McMichael was not far from where the Folklife Festival is held when he was set upon by five youths who the same night had been hitting up others for money and cellphones. As he lay on the ground in a fetal position, the youths kicked him and beat him, fatally injuring the Seattle man.

    More than 1,000 people turned out at Qwest Field for a memorial service Nov. 12. …

    http://www.latimes.com/news/na.....3462.story

    The Police chief is correct here.

    But the mayor’s attitude regarding guns is dangerously naïve.

    He believes, as all liberals do, that a “gun free zone” means there will be no guns.

    Instead all it means is that no law-abiding citizens have guns; if a criminal is planning a gun-related crime, I don’t think whether guns are “allowed” will enter into their thinking.

    There is of course little of more use to criminals than a disarmed citizenry.

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21. BillK

    November 25, 2008 at 4:39 am

    God help us.

    From the Los Anglees Times:

    UC Berkeley economist named to Obama team

    Christina Romer is chosen by President-elect Barack Obama to head his Council of Economic Advisors. She is an expert on the Great Depression and monetary policy.

    By Richard C. Paddock

    UC Berkeley economics professor Christina D. Romer, named Monday by President-elect Barack Obama to head his Council of Economic Advisors, is an expert on the Great Depression and monetary policy who is respected for her keen analytical skills, friends and colleagues say.

    Associates praised Romer, 49, as a knowledgeable and tough-minded expert who can be expected to work well with other members of Obama’s team as his administration attempts to overcome the country’s economic crisis.

    “She’s a great choice,” said Harvard University economics professor Gregory Mankiw, who chaired the economic council from 2003 to 2005 and is a longtime friend of Romer’s. “She’s a very good economist, a great public speaker, and . . . brings to the table an understanding of history that most economists don’t have.”

    Nobel Prize-winning UC Berkeley economics professor Daniel McFadden, who taught Romer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the early 1980s, also applauded her selection.

    He said her historical perspective would be of great help as the Obama administration tries to halt the nation’s economic slide.

    “She understands in great detail what went wrong in the 1930s and what government policies were ineffective,” McFadden said.

    “I would describe her as a modern macro-economist who understands the power and the limits of the government to affect the economy,” he said. “She has a sophisticated and nuanced view of what economic policy would do.”

    Romer’s husband, David, also is an economics professor at UC Berkeley, and the two have long worked closely together, often co-authoring research papers. David Romer, like his wife, is a specialist in monetary policy. They have taught at the university for 20 years.

    “They are a very close-knit team and work together on their research,” McFadden said. “President Obama is getting two for the price of one.” …

    http://www.latimes.com/news/na.....8514.story

    A UC Berkeley “expert” on the Great Depression?

    “She understands in great detail what went wrong in the 1930s and what government policies were ineffective”

    I’d be really entertained to know what, other than perhaps “they didn’t do enough,” she believes government did wrong.

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22. JohnMG

    November 25, 2008 at 7:07 am

    BillK; …….”UC Berkeley economist named to Obama team…..”

    Last time I checked, this isn’t the 30’s. With all the layers of government regulation, and government meddling we have now, one could make a plausible arguement that government doesn’t know WTF its doing and should stay out of economics.

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23. BillK

    November 25, 2008 at 10:21 am

    Smackdown at the Clinton News Network!

    From The Hollywood Reporter:

    NLRB to CNN: Rehire workers

    Organization finds the network violated labor laws

    By Leslie Simmons

    The National Labor Relations Board has ordered CNN to reinstate more than 100 workers in New York and Washington after finding that the news network violated labor laws when it ended its subcontract agreement with Team Video for camera, studio and engineering work.

    In December 2003 and January 2004, CNN ended its long-standing relationship with Team Video and directly hired employees to perform the tech work at the two bureaus. According to the 169-page decision, CNN’s goal was to operate the bureaus without a union.

    Administrative law Judge Arthur Amchan, however, found that CNN was a joint employer of Team Video Services and was obligated to recognize and bargain with the National Association of Broadcast Employees & Technicians-Communications Workers of America over the decision to terminate the subcontracting relationship, as well as in the hiring of new employees.

    Amchan found that CNN engaged in “widespread and egregious misconduct demonstrating a flagrant and general disregard for the employees’ fundamental rights.”

    CNN said it will appeal the decision.

    “CNN disagrees with the recommended decision and denies that it violated the National Labor Relations Act,” the network said. “CNN plans to appeal this decision to the full NLRB. Because an appeal will be filed, the judge’s recommended decision is not enforceable and is not binding.”

    Amchan’s decision also orders CNN to recognize the unions in New York and Washington; retrain those reinstated, if needed; and restore any bargaining work that was outsourced after the Team Video contracts ended.

    http://www.hollywoodreporter.c.....7485234d43

    Reap, sow, you know the rest…

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24. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 3:44 am

    See? It’s all because Bush didn’t do more.

    From the AP:

    Climate crisis energizes radical environmentalists

    By Dina Cappiello

    LOUISA, Va.— Under arrest, Paxus Calta raised two fingers from his shackled hand to flash a peace sign. Fellow environmental activists cheered as police escorted him to the van that would take him to jail.

    He had intended to get arrested, as he had before in 12 countries on three continents.

    For two hours, Calta and 19 other protesters associated with the grassroots group Rising Tide North America had occupied the visitor’s center at Dominion’s North Anna Nuclear Power Station.

    While radical groups and their tactics are by no means new, climate change is a new cause for them.

    Rising Tide isn’t protesting the causes of global warming as much as the solutions. It is against clean coal, nuclear power and capping carbon pollution while letting polluters buy and sell rights to pollute under the cap—the very fixes under discussion in Washington. It disdains the compromise and collaboration between the Big 10 environmental groups and elite corporations, as well as the view that technology can save the environment.

    The protest at Dominion—which is seeking to build a new reactor—was the latest stunt organized by Rising Tide.

    “There are lots of different ways that you can approach the problem of climate change. What the direct action movement believes is that the market-based solutions that have been used in the past are inappropriate,” Calta said in an interview after he was charged with trespassing, and released from jail at 2 a.m. on $1,000 bail.

    “The alternative is that we let corporations and governments do what they have always done, and the world is going to die,” he said.

    Rising Tide originated in the Netherlands in 2000. It came to the U.S. in 2006. That’s when a group of activists involved in Earth First!, one of the earliest groups to use in-your-face tactics such as tree sitting and blocking roads with human chains, decided that more attention needed to be paid to global warming.

    “There was a huge need for a climate-focused group that wasn’t going to compromise … not do what is conducive to business, but what we actually need for ecosystems on this planet to survive,” said Abigail Singer, who was in those early discussions and is one of roughly 20 people who lead Rising Tide nationally. Small cells have spread across the country in Asheville, N.C., Boston, Portland, Ore., and more recently Houston and Baltimore.

    The group’s annual climate camps draw hundreds of activists, anarchists and organizers each year. The participants—many in their early 20s—camp out for the week, share group meals and learn skills such as tree climbing that can help during a demonstration.

    Calta is one of the veterans. A tall and lanky figure with stringy shoulder-length hair, he has been protesting nuclear energy for 20 years in the U.S. and abroad. The Dominion plant is likely the closest he has gotten to home—he lives in a nearby commune.

    Rising Tide’s first protest took place in July 2006 at a coal plant in Carbo, Va., where two activists chained themselves to a coal truck and another suspended himself from a bridge. One of their demands: a nationwide movement away from fossil fuels.

    Earlier this year former Vice President Al Gore made the same call: The nation should wean itself off carbon-based fuels in 10 years. Then, in September, he urged young people to protest all new coal plants that don’t have technology to capture greenhouse gases.

    Rising Tide’s targets include other environmentalists.

    The group issued a fake press release and Web site under the name of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership, an association of businesses and large environmental groups that support action on global warming. The phony media blitz claimed the groups’ members, which include Alcoa Inc., BP PLC, Dow Chemical Co. and General Electric Co., had agreed to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases by 90 percent. More than one major news organization bit on the hoax.

    “Radicals don’t think they are going to get solutions from the very social sectors that are driving the problem,” said Bron Taylor, who teaches and writes about environmentalism at the University of Florida. …

    http://www.denverpost.com/nationworld/ci_11078153

    Thus Bush’s policies really are creating new terrorists, don’t you get it?

    Why Gore isn’t sitting it Gitmo I’ll never know; too bad he’ll likely have a cabinet position in the Obama White House instead.

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25. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 3:52 am

    Ski areas, too.

    From the Denver Post:

    Ski areas have wish list for Obama

    High on their desires are stimulating the economy and addressing climate change.

    By Jason Blevins

    Colorado’s ski industry is greeting President-elect Barack Obama and the Democratic sweep of Congress with its trademark optimism.

    And a list.

    Highest on the $4 billion-a-year industry’s wish list from a unified Democratic president and Congress:

    • Stimulate the economy and get people vacationing.

    • Reform immigration and consider upping the number of temporary worker, or H-2B, visas that are the lifeline for resorts seeking seasonal employees.

    • Increase Forest Service funding or at least separate firefighting funds from operation budgets.

    • Address climate change by increasing tax credits for businesses that pursue environmentally friendly programs.

    “Obviously this administration has a lot on its plate,” said Melanie Mills, president of Colorado Ski Country USA, the marketing and policy group responsible for peddling Colorado skiing as a whole. “We don’t want recreation to be left behind.”

    Public-lands policy did not play much of a role in this year’s presidential campaign, as more pressing issues took the spotlight. Obama’s approach to public lands and his plans for the Forest Service are uncertain. The first sign of direction will be his appointment of the undersecretary for natural resources and environment, the position in the U.S. Department of Agriculture responsible for Forest Service policies and operations.

    “We are waiting with bated breath to see who is appointed,” said Geraldine Link, head of public policy for the 134-resort National Ski Areas Association in Lakewood.

    As for the top of the list, the No. 1 priority depends a lot on who’s wishing.

    “I think climate change is much more important than anything right now,” said Chris Diamond, head of the Steamboat resort. “I’m hoping the new president takes the 30,000-foot view. I mean climate change, we have got to fix this or we are all done.”

    In that vein, 70 ski resorts across the nation are lobbying Congress for mandatory caps on carbon-dioxide emissions, hoping to decrease the amount of greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming.

    “A lot of people in the industry are very concerned about climate change and something will actually be done about it in this Congress,” Link said. “That’s the big one.” …

    http://www.denverpost.com/commented/ci_11047116

    Alas, the ski industry is too stupid to realize that action to “mitigate” their “number one concern” – something that isn’t happening – will destroy their business even faster.

    Mandatory caps on carbon dioxide? There goes all the cars, shuttles and buses that take people to their resorts.

    Not to mention the airlines that fly guests in.

    Then there’s the astronomical increases in energy – like the power to run their lifts. To heat the lodges.

    $40 hamburger at the lodge? Getting those beef patties to 10,000 feet won’t be any cheaper.

    They’re so myopic it would almost be funny if it weren’t for the fact that they’re no worse than many other American businesses these days.

    They seem to think mandatory “greenhouse” emission caps come in a vacuum.

    Instead they’ll simply make getting to the wilderness to enjoy a day’s worth of sliding down snow a financial impossibility.

    Not like the environmentalists who agree with them wouldn’t see the death of the entire ski industry as one of their biggest successes.

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26. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 5:29 am

    From Denver’s KCNC Television, news of the “economic downturn”:

    Vail Man Wants $500,000 For His Parking Space

    Money Would Go Towards Helping Daughter’s Skiing Career

    Written by Stan Bush

    VAIL, Colo. (CBS4) ― Real estate prices in the high country are generally high, with the extreme examples being in Vail, Telluride and Aspen.

    However, one parking spot near the Vail Village has a price tag that exceeds the average cost of the American home.

    Buzz Schleper is selling his space for $500,000, which likely makes it the most expensive parking spot in the country.

    Expensive parking spaces in Vail are not rare. Many actually sell for prices upwards of $300,000.

    Schleper says his is so expensive because of its indoor amenities, close proximity to the mountain and his personal need to fund his daughter’s athletic career. That daughter, Sarah, is a former world champion skier and member of the U.S. Ski Team.

    “Parking is a premium in Vail. It is very difficult to find parking a block from a lift,” Schleper told CBS4.

    Schleper says he needs to raise the money because his daughter’s sponsors do not pay enough for her to travel with her young family.

    Sarah Schleper hasn’t skiied competitively since injuring her knee in 2006. She has relied on her dad for support.

    “He’s been the backbone of my career. He has always been very encouraging,” she said.

    Real estate analysts say that while the half million dollar price tag on the parking spot may be well over market value, its likely someone in Vail will still pay for it.

    Schleper said some prospective buyers have already expressed interest. …

    http://cbs4denver.com/local/va.....74217.html

    Won’t it be great when Obama puts a stop to things like this?

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27. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 6:26 am

    Remember – the MSM has said over and over again there is no “War on Christmas.”

    From the AP:

    Florida University Employees Angry About Campus Ban on Christmas Decorations

    FORT MYERS, Fla. — Employees at Florida Gulf Coast University are protesting a campus ban on Christmas decorations in common spaces.

    The Staff Advisory Council voted on Monday to send university leaders a letter explaining employees’ concerns.

    The university administration said employees can decorate their desks but not common areas.

    It also canceled a greeting card design contest and renamed a giving tree for needy preschoolers a “giving garden.”

    In a memo to faculty and staff last week, President Wilson Bradshaw said public institutions “often struggle with how best to observe the season in ways that honor and respect all traditions.”

    http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,457215,00.html

    I wonder what would happen if say, President Bradshaw were to ban the wearing of head coverings in public areas instead?

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28. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 6:32 am

    From Fox News, the ultimate “bad news.”

    Russian Scholar Predicts Economic Crisis Will Rip America Apart

    A Russian scholar is predicting that the United States’ current financial crisis will lead to the breakup of the country.

    Igor Panarin, a professor at the diplomatic academy of Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told the newspaper Izvestia on Monday that America will break apart into six regions following the crisis.

    “Dissatisfaction is growing, and it is only being held back at the moment by the elections, and the hope that [President-elect] Obama can work miracles,” according to a translation by Bloomberg. “But when spring comes, it will be clear that there are no miracles.”

    Panarin predicts the U.S. will split into: the Pacific, the South, Texas, the Atlantic coast, the central states and the northern states, and hinted that Alaska could be Russia’s for the taking.

    http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,457550,00.html

    Of course they’re right as far as no miracles are coming.

    I also pity Russia if they track to take Alaska, as they’ll have to deal with Palin.

    The professor said China and Russia will become the world’s great regulators.

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29. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 6:35 am

    From Fox News:

    NPR Sends Wiccan Priestess to Public Prayer Booth

    A pagan priestess runs into the president of the atheists in a phone booth in New York.

    No, it’s not a joke — it’s the start of a controversial report from National Public Radio — and your tax dollars may have paid for it.

    New York City officials this fall launched an art project called “Public Prayer Booth,” which features a modified phone booth rigged up with a flip-down kneeler. Passers-by, if they’re in the mood, can bend to their (padded) knee and say a prayer — a private moment in a very public atmosphere.

    To cover the story, NPR sent reporter Margot Adler, a Wiccan priestess and author of two books on paganism. Lo and behold, she happened upon the president of the New York City Atheists, Ken Bronstein, an outspoken opponent of public religious displays.

    “I just happened to be walking by at this exact moment,” Bronstein told Adler. Then he denounced the display of what he called a “supernatural situation” on city property. Bronstein said that it was inappropriate for the public sphere and had to go.

    “You know, if they want to put it on private property, that’s where it should go — but not in public space,” said Bronstein.

    Critics are calling the radio report a biased assault on religion — one that’s being supported in part with public funds.

    “There are serious efforts under way right now to erase religious expression from the public square,” said Father Jonathan Morris, a Catholic priest and FOX News contributor. “I don’t understand why these groups would be so fascinated with taking this [religious expression] away.”

    NPR vehemently denied that its coverage was opposed to prayer or organized religion.

    “There’s no bias in this story and to imply that there is because of a reporter’s religious beliefs is absurd,” said Anna Christopher, an NPR spokeswoman. “[Adler] spoke with several different people with several different viewpoints on the booth.”

    Adler said traffic was sparse by the booth and she had trouble finding someone who took it seriously enough to pray there, but she interviewed a woman named Francesca Richardson who lives on disability payments and stopped to say a prayer. Adler compared her to Avery Williams, 7, who said grace for her ailing pets.

    “Well, my gerbil died so we prayed for him, and my dog had a very bad leg so we prayed for that too,” said Williams.

    Asked whether their reporter was taking snipes at the faithful on the government dime, NPR was adamant that she wasn’t and explained that only a minuscule amount of its funding comes from the government.

    “Less than two percent [of NPR's budget] comes from competitive grants from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the National Endowment for the Arts,” Christopher said.

    “There’s no disrespect for religion at all. Our reporters are able to separate their private practices … and their standards as journalists, and in no way does [Adler's] religious affiliation affect that.“…

    http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,457205,00.html

    But Fox News can’t be trusted to hold a Presidential debate.

    Of course not.

    So if so little of NPR’s budget comes from the Federal Government, it’s no big deal if we zero that line item out – right?

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30. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 7:04 am

    From the Los Angeles Times:

    Liberal Hollywood ponders next step in fight for same-sex marriage

    After the passage of Proposition 8, some are calling for boycotts and firings. Others worry about free speech rights being trampled.

    By Rachel Abramowitz and Tina Daunt

    Should there be boycotts, blacklists, firings or de facto shunning of those who supported Proposition 8?

    That’s the issue consuming many in liberal Hollywood who fought to defeat the initiative banning same-sex marriage and are now reeling with recrimination and dismay. Meanwhile, activists continue to comb donor lists and employ the Internet to expose those who donated money to support the ban.

    Already out is Scott Eckern, director of the nonprofit California Musical Theatre in Sacramento, who resigned after a flurry of complaints from prominent theater artists, including “Hairspray” composer Marc Shaiman, when word of his contribution to the Yes on 8 campaign surfaced.

    Other targets include Film Independent, the nonprofit arts organization that puts on both the Los Angeles Film Festival and the Spirit Awards; the Cinemark theater chain; and the Sundance Film Festival.

    In Film Independent’s case, the board has defended the continued employment of Richard Raddon, the Mormon director of the L.A. Film Festival who donated $1,500 to support Proposition 8. Cinemark is under siege because Chief Executive Alan Stock gave $9,999 to support the same-sex marriage ban. And in a sign of a powerful ripple effect, Sundance, perhaps the American institution that has done the most to support gay filmmakers and gay cinema, is being targeted because it screens films in a Cinemark theater.

    For many in Hollywood, the Proposition 8 backlash represents a troubling clash of free speech, religious beliefs and the right to fight intolerance. Many supporters of same-sex marriage view the state constitutional amendment as codified bigotry, a rollback of civil liberties for gays and lesbians.

    Raddon has been a particularly polarizing figure because Film Independent’s board includes many independent film stalwarts, including Don Cheadle, Forest Whitaker, Fox Searchlight President Peter Rice and Oscar-winning writer Bill Condon. One of the group’s explicit missions is to promote diversity.

    Last week, Raddon offered to resign. According to one board member, a conference call was hastily arranged, and after much discussion the board voted unanimously to keep him.

    Yet the anger continues to stew.

    “There is still roiling debate within the organization,” says distributor Howard Cohen, an advisor to the film festival who is gay. “Is it OK to let this go? There are a lot of gay people who work at Film Independent. The issue has not been closed.”

    No one is certain how the current protest will affect Film Independent’s Spirit Awards in the spring, a popular event recognizing work that “challenges the status quo.” And there are already indications the Los Angeles Film Festival could be affected.

    Gregg Araki, director of the critically acclaimed gay cult hit “Mysterious Skin” and an influential figure in “new queer cinema,” has said he won’t allow his films to be shown there, while others, such as “Milk” producers and gay activists Dan Jinks and Bruce Cohen, say they’re going to “study in depth all the facets of our specific situation before making a decision.”

    Araki says Raddon should step down. “I don’t think he should be forcibly removed. The bottom line is if he contributed money to a hateful campaign against black people, or against Jewish people, or any other minority group, there would be much less excusing of him. The terrible irony is that he runs a film festival that is intended to promote tolerance and equality.”

    Others are leery of punishing free speech, even if they consider it hateful. “I can’t quite stomach the notion that you fire somebody because of what they believe. It doesn’t feel right to me,” says Christine Vachon, a pillar of gay cinema who produced such films as “Boys Don’t Cry” and “Far From Heaven.”

    Raddon declined to comment, but Dawn Hudson, executive director of Film Independent, says, “Are we happy with his donation? No. But he has a right to his religious and personal beliefs.

    “The very cornerstone of our organization is diversity, and diversity includes sexual orientation. Rich’s actions have always been in accordance with those principles,” she said. …

    http://www.latimes.com/enterta.....2815.story

    Or, “blacklisting is OK if we do it.”

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31. BannedbytheTaliban

    November 26, 2008 at 8:47 am

    Something many of us have experienced in the last couple days,

    From BBC:

    Obama victory prompts US gun rush

    In a quiet side street not far from where the Texas freeway system knits the sprawling suburbs of Houston into something like a city centre, business is booming at the Top Gun shooting range.

    Recession is not biting here in the oil-rich Energy Capital of the World as it is in the rest of the United States – but that is not the only reason why it is difficult to find a parking space outside Top Gun towards the end of the working day.

    America’s gun owners are worried that the incoming Obama administration, which is coming to power offering hope and change, is going to mean something rather different for them – restriction and regulation.

    So they are rushing to buy certain types of weapons in the dying weeks of the Bush years.

    …It is a reminder that Barack Obama’s win was not just a victory of optimism and energy over age and staleness, it was also a victory across a cultural divide, of one sort of America over another.

    A gun-lovin’, largely rural and conservative vision of the US was clearly defeated by a brand of big city liberalism which fears or despises firearms and wants to do something about America’s love affair with them.

    The American right to bear arms is enshrined in the second amendment of the constitution, so there is a limit to what even a Democratic president supported by majorities in both the House and the Senate could do it about, even if he were minded to.

    Any legislation would really tinker around the edges of the right, restricting the purchase of certain types of assault weapon, and certain sizes of ammunition cartridge.

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7749474.stm

    There it is in a nut shell. The liberal people of america have somehow been given the right to tell the rural conservatives how to live their lives. A mandate if you will, since they are the pillars of clarity and reason. And us few, us lucky few, have only sweetness and light to go on.

    Funny I seem to remember reading something about some short of legistlation in Cal. that got the liberals all up set. Wonder what that could of been about?

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32. Diane

    November 26, 2008 at 1:44 pm

    This was linked to on Ann Coulter’s website, but just in case you didn’t see it:

    http://www.howobamagotelected.com/

    There’s a video there, and I can only think of two words to describe its content: hilarious and scary. Perhaps very scary.

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33. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 4:35 pm

    The very definition of “clueless.”

    From Television Week:

    SAG to Hold Strike Authorization Vote

    By Sergio Ibarra

    Screen Actors Guild President Alan Rosenberg said SAG will conduct a strike authorization vote in December, inching the union closer to the brink of a strike.

    Mr. Rosenberg made the announcement via e-mail and video message Wednesday.

    “Now, per the resolution passed by 97% of our newly constituted national board of directors in October, we are launching a member education campaign and we will send out a strike referendum ballot to SAG members in December,” Mr. Rosenberg said in his announcement. “We ask that you support your board and negotiating committee, and vote ‘yes’ to authorize the board to call a strike only if it becomes absolutely necessary.”

    SAG has already begun its educational campaign via its Web site with topics related to the strike authorization vote.

    The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers responded with a brief statement.

    “SAG’s latest mass e-mail fails on three counts: It fails to explain why SAG deserves more than everyone else in the industry, the AMPTP said in the statement. “It fails to justify why SAG members should bail out a failed negotiating strategy by striking during a time of historic economic crisis. And it fails to explain why it makes sense to strike when SAG members will lose more during the first few days of the strike than they could ever expect to gain.”

    Mr. Rosenberg blasted those citing the ailing economy as a reason not to strike.

    “It’s also curious that these global corporations are preaching to us about the bad economy,” he said. “Like it’s our fault. As middle-income actors we are the victims of corporate greed. We didn’t cause this turmoil.”

    http://www.tvweek.com/news/200.....rizati.php

    I hope they authorize the strike, I really do.

    When the MSM has made the American populace frightened for their jobs and convinced them they will never be able to retire and that the banks in which their savings are held are one withdrawal away from insolvency, they’ll get to see their favorite movie and TV stars walking the picket line, demanding more money.

    Granted, many actors just eke out a living – but the press coverage is going to focus on the very people we see regularly who are all making seven if not eight or nine figures annually.

    The anti-union PR value of said strike will be priceless.

    Doesn’t the attitude of “Yeah, the economy sucks, but that’s not our fault – we want more money” play right into every anti-Union statement ever made, not to mention the prevailing American attitude towards the bailout of the Big Three?

    Do you think even the most pro-Union UAW worker will support their Union brothers and sisters when they see a picture in People of Reese Witherspoon carrying a picket sign stating actors are underpaid? (For better effect they’ll hopefully see said photo not long after blowing $10 per person to sit through the dreadful Four Christmases…)

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34. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 5:04 pm

    Feel guilty at Thanksgiving, damn you.

    From an OpEd piece at the Los Angeles Times:

    Which Thanksgiving?

    By Karl Jacoby

    When Americans sit down to our annual Thanksgiving meal with family and friends, we like to imagine that we are reenacting a scene that first took place in 1621. That year, having made a successful harvest after a brutal winter that killed half their number, the 50 or so surviving Colonists in Plymouth “entertained and feasted,” in the words of one, a visiting delegation of nearby Wampanoag Indians, led by “their greatest king,” Massasoit.

    American holidays, however, sometimes reveal more about what we have forgotten about the past than what we remember. Historical records indicate that the parties dined on venison and corn rather than on the stuffing, cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie Americans have come to associate with Thanksgiving, and that the feast probably took place in the early autumn rather than November. Moreover, it is not even clear that the Pilgrims referred to their 1621 celebration as a thanksgiving. To devout Pilgrims, a day of thanksgiving was usually a solemn religious undertaking, marked by worship and, often, fasting. It was not a day spent gorging on wild deer and engaging in “recreations” with one’s Indian neighbors.

    Although there were sporadic local Thanksgiving days in Colonial and early America, it was not until the middle of the Civil War — 1863 — that President Lincoln issued a proclamation making the last Thursday in November a national holiday of Thanksgiving. Lincoln’s statement suggested that thanks were being given as much for “the advancing armies and navies of the Union” as for a bountiful harvest, and the president urged special prayers for “all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged.”

    Not surprisingly, few at the time viewed Thanksgiving as a private, family occasion. Instead, Northern civilians donated turkey and cranberries to feed Union troops, while Jefferson Davis declared separate Thanksgiving holidays for the Confederacy.

    During Reconstruction, many Southerners initially expressed reluctance at celebrating what they saw to be a Yankee holiday. And yet it was at this moment, as the recently rejoined United States struggled to reconcile its populace after a divisive Civil War, that it became useful to reinvent the history of Thanksgiving. Most Americans found it far more pleasant to imagine this American holiday as originating not during the traumas of the 1860s but rather during the more distant past of the early 1600s. To partisans of the Union and the Confederacy alike, the image of Pilgrims and Indians sitting down together to a shared meal offered a comforting vision of peace between potential rivals.

    Yet this new image of Thanksgiving not only allowed Americans to gloss over the deep divisions that had led to the Civil War, it also overlooked much of the subsequent history of the Pilgrims’ relations with their Indian neighbors. About 50 years after Massasoit and his fellow Wampanoags enjoyed their harvest meal at Plymouth, the Colonists’ seizures of Wampanoag land would precipitate a vicious war between Plymouth Colony and the Wampanoags, now led by Massasoit’s son, Metacom.

    Most of the other peoples in New England at first tried to avoid the conflict between the onetime participants in the “first Thanksgiving.” But the confrontation soon engulfed the entire region, pitting the New England Colonies against a fragile alliance of Wampanoags, Narragansetts, Nipmucs and other Native American groups. Although these allies succeeded in killing hundreds of Colonists and burning British settlements up to the very fringes of Boston itself, the losses suffered by New England’s indigenous peoples were even more devastating. Thousands died over the two years of the war, and many of those captured were sold into slavery in the British West Indies, including Metacom’s wife and 9-year-old son.

    Metacom met his end at the hands of a Colonial scouting party in August of 1676. His killers quartered and decapitated his body and sent Metacom’s head to Plymouth, where for two decades it would be prominently displayed on a pike outside the colony’s entrance. That same year, as the violence drew to a close, the colony of Connecticut declared a “day of Publique Thankesgiving” to celebrate “the subdueing of our enemies.”

    Perhaps it is not surprising that we choose to remember the Thanksgiving of 1621 and to forget the Thanksgiving of 1676. Who, after all, would not prefer to celebrate a moment of peaceful unity rather than one of bloody conflict? But if our public holidays are meant to be moments for self-reflection as well as self-congratulation, we should think of Thanksgiving not as a perpetual reenactment of the “first Thanksgiving” of 1621 but instead as a dynamic event whose meaning has shifted over time. …

    http://www.latimes.com/news/op.....8652.story

    So there.

    We need not forget Massasoit’s pleasant experiences dining with the Pilgrims in order to remember the more troubling fate of his son at the hands of the Pilgrims’ descendants. Indeed, commemorating all the many reasons Americans have expressed thanks over the centuries allows us to come to a more complete and more honest understanding of our history. For while we cannot change events in the past, we do have the power to decide what we wish to be thankful for now and in the future.

    Sigh…

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35. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 5:08 pm

    Rush used to make fun of these stories, but they’ve become the default way of reporting now.

    From the Los Angeles Times:

    SUV hits 2 children, man outside Diamond Bar school

    By Ruben Vives

    Two children and a man were hit by a sport utility vehicle outside an elementary school in Diamond Bar this morning, leaving at least one of the children in critical condition.

    The accident occurred about 7:40 a.m. in front of Maple Hill Elementary School, said Lt. John Saleeby of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s Walnut station. The driver lost control of the vehicle, went over the sidewalk along Maple Hill Road and struck a 2-year-old girl, a 4-year-old girl and a man, said Ron Haralson, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Fire Department.

    About 8:37 a.m. one of the girls and the man were airlifted from the school to a hospital, said L.A. County Fire Department spokesman Sam Padilla. The other child was taken by an ambulance.

    The 2-year-old girl was listed in critical condition, and the 4-year-old and the man received non-life-threatening injuries, authorities said. The driver of the SUV was still being questioned at the scene, Saleeby said. No arrests have been made, and the cause of the accident was under investigation, he said.

    http://www.latimes.com/news/lo.....3952.story

    Were the children hit by a large sedan or perhaps a station wagon, would the article be as specific or just say “Vehicle hits two children” or perhaps “Car hits two children?”

    But no, they were hit by an evil SUV, the scourge of the roads.

    One wonders if the story would even have been reported had the kids been hit by a Prius or (gasp!) an electric car…

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36. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 5:13 pm

    From MSNBC – though he won’t be the first President to do so, Obama’s nomination of Clinton may violate the Constitution:

    HRC, State — and the Constitution

    By Pete Williams

    If President-elect Barack Obama nominates Hillary Clinton to be secretary of state, many legal scholars believe it would be the former law professor’s first violation of the Constitution as president.

    Why? Because the Constitution forbids the appointment of members of Congress to administration jobs if the salary of the job they’d take was raised while they were in Congress. (Article I, Section 6: “No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil office … the Emoluments whereof shall have been encreased during such time.” Emoluments meaning salaries and benefits.)

    Past presidents have confronted this problem repeatedly — Taft in nominating Sen. Philander Knox to be secretary of state, Nixon in nominating Sen. William Saxbe to be attorney general, Carter in nominating Sen. Ed Muskie to be secretary of state, and Clinton in nominating Sen. Lloyd Bentsen to be treasury secretary, to name some notable examples.

    The usual workaround is for Congress to lower the salary of the job back to what it was so that the nominee can take it without receiving the benefit of the pay increase that was approved while the nominee was in Congress. This maneuver, which has come to be known as “the Saxbe fix,” addresses the clear intent of the Constitution, to prevent self-dealing.

    But many legal scholars believe it does not cure the Constitutional problem, because the language of Article I is so clearly an absolute prohibition: No senator or representative, period.

    “The content of the rule here is broader than its purpose,” said Professor Michael Stokes Paulsen, a Constitutional law expert at St. Thomas School of Law in Minneapolis. “And the rule is the rule; the purpose is not the rule.”

    “A ‘fix’ can rescind the salary,” he added, “but it cannot repeal historical events. The emoluments of the office had been increased. The rule specified in the text still controls.”

    Having said all this, so what? If Obama goes ahead and nominates Clinton, it’s doubtful the courts would entertain a lawsuit from an outraged citizen. Such generalized taxpayer lawsuits are disfavored by the federal courts.

    A more difficult case might come if a Secretary of State Clinton issued an order that put a specific citizen at a disadvantage. That might give rise to a lawsuit that could get some traction.

    Even then, though, some legal scholars believe it would be a hard case to make. Former Clinton Justice Department solicitor general Walter Dellinger says there’s reason to think that the official acts of someone in a federal office are valid, even if the person’s qualifications for the office are in doubt.

    http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com.....88640.aspx

    Needless to say, should a lawsuit occur, the courts will dismiss it as quickly as they’ve dismissed the “birthplace” lawsuits.

    Because no citizen has standing to sue over a President’s actions.

    Unless, of course, said President is a Republican.

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37. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 5:26 pm

    In case you haven’t already seen this, from Treason Times columnist Gail Collins:

    Time For Him to Go

    By Gail Collins

    Thanksgiving is next week, and President Bush could make it a really special holiday by resigning.

    Seriously. We have an economy that’s crashing and a vacuum at the top. Bush — who is currently on a trip to Peru to meet with Asian leaders who no longer care what he thinks — hasn’t got the clout, or possibly even the energy, to do anything useful. His most recent contribution to resolving the fiscal crisis was lecturing representatives of the world’s most important economies on the glories of free-market capitalism.

    Putting Barack Obama in charge immediately isn’t impossible. Dick Cheney, obviously, would have to quit as well as Bush. In fact, just to be on the safe side, the vice president ought to turn in his resignation first. (We’re desperate, but not crazy.) Then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would become president until Jan. 20. Obviously, she’d defer to her party’s incoming chief executive, and Barack Obama could begin governing.

    As a bonus, the Pelosi presidency would put a woman in the White House this year after all. On the downside, a few right-wing talk-show hosts might succumb to apoplexy. That would, of course, be terrible, but I’m afraid we might have to take the risk in the name of a greater good.

    Can I see a show of hands? How many people want George W. out and Barack in?

    A great many Americans have been counting the days all year on their 2008 George W. Bush Out of Office Countdown calendars. I know a lot of this has been going on because so many people congratulated me when the Feb. 1 Bush quote turned out to be from one of my old columns. (“I think we need not only to eliminate the tollbooth from the middle class, I think we should knock down the tollbooth.”)

    This was not nearly as good as Feb. 5 (“We ought to make the pie higher”) or Feb. 21 (“I understand small business growth. I was one.”) But we do what we can.

    In the past, presidents have not taken well to suggestions that they hand over the reins before the last possible minute. Senator J. William Fulbright suggested a plan along those lines when Harry Truman was coming to the end of a term in a state of deep unpopularity, and Truman called him “Halfbright” for the rest of his life. Bush might not love the idea of quitting before he has a chance to light the Christmas tree or commute the execution of one last presidential turkey. After all, he still has a couple more trips planned. And last-minute regulations to issue. (So many national parks to despoil, so many endangered species to exterminate … .) And then there’s all the packing.

    On the other hand, he might want to consider his legacy, such as it is.

    In happier days, Bush may have nurtured hopes of making it into the list of America’s mediocre presidents, but somewhere between Iraq and Katrina, that goal became a mountain too high. However, he might still have a chance to avoid the absolute bottom of the barrel, a spot currently occupied by James Buchanan, at least in my opinion. Buchanan nailed down The Worst President title in the days between Abraham Lincoln’s election and inauguration, when the Southern states began seceding and Buchanan, after a little flailing about, did absolutely nothing. “Doing nothing is almost the worst thing a president can do,” said the historian Michael Beschloss.

    If Bush gives up doing nothing by giving up his job, it’s possible that someday history might elevate him to the ranks of the below average. Better than Franklin Pierce! Smarter than Warren Harding! And healthier than William Henry Harrison! …

    http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11......html?_r=1

    You get the idea.

    Also, if you didn’t realize, the Bush quotes she’s ridiculing are him saying the way to help the Middle Class is to grow the economy as a whole – a “funny” idea to redistributionists like Collins, her readers, and Mr. Obama.

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38. BillK

    November 26, 2008 at 5:34 pm

    The ultimate end game for those who are PC, from the Ottawa, Canada National Post:

    Ottawa university boots cystic fibrosis from charity drive

    ‘I think they see this, in their own twisted way, as a win for diversity’

    By Joanne Laucius

    OTTAWA — The Carleton University Students’ Association has voted to drop a cystic fibrosis charity as the beneficiary of its annual Shinearama fundraiser, supporting a motion that argued the disease is not “inclusive” enough.

    Cystic fibrosis “has been recently revealed to only affect white people, and primarily men” said the motion read Monday night to student councillors, who voted almost unanimously in favour of it.

    Every year near the beginning of fall classes, during university orientation for new arrivals, students fan out across the city and seek donations from passersby. According to the motion, “all orientees and volunteers should feel like their fundraising efforts will serve their (sic) diverse communities.”

    Nick Bergamini, a third-year journalism student on the student council, said he was the only elected councillor present to vote against the motion. The decision is an example of campus political correctness gone too far, he said.

    “They’re not doctors. They’re playing politics with this,” said Mr. Bergamini. “I think they see this, in their own twisted way, as a win for diversity. I see it as a loss for people with cystic fibrosis.”

    The Shinearama fundraiser is carried out by students at about 65 colleges and universities across Canada. It has raised money for the Canadian Cystic Fibrosis Foundation for almost 50 years and Carleton has been participating for at least 25.

    During orientation week this year, Carleton students, who have raised about $1-million over the years, raised about $20,000, said foundation chief executive Cathleen Morrison, who was surprised and dismayed by the student association decision.

    The rationale for dropping cystic fibrosis as the beneficiary is not correct, she said. CF is diagnosed just as often among girls as boys, although the health of girls deteriorates more rapidly, she said. It is commonly considered an illness that affects Caucasians, but that includes people from the Middle East, South America, North Africa and the Indian subcontinent.

    ” ‘Caucasian’ as we understand it isn’t just white people,” said Ms. Morrison. “It includes people with a whole rainbow of skins.”

    One of the councillors who voted in favour of switching the charity said Monday night that the information provided to the panel prior to the vote was factually incorrect, and he will be seeking support from other members to hold an emergency meeting to reconsider their decision. “After seeing all the reaction today, I definitely think it should be revisited and reconsidered,” said Michael Monks, who represents Carleton’s business students for the student council.

    Student association president Brittany Smyth said the motion came about because the association has been contemplating rotating the beneficiary of Shinearama to different charities each year instead of giving the money to a single charity.

    “It’s about people wanting to do something different,” she said.

    The motion was forwarded by Donnie Northrup, who represents science students. Mr. Northrup did not respond to a request for an interview.

    The preamble to the motion is Mr. Northrup’s explanation for why he supports the motion, based on what he learned as an orientation-week volunteer, said Ms. Smyth.

    In making a decision, it was not the preamble but the declaration itself that matters, she said.

    “The preliminary is the councillor’s own motivations and ideas,” she said. “Most discussion revolved around rotating the charity.” …

    http://www.nationalpost.com/ne.....?id=992946

    Even if the disease affected mostly white men, that would be a reasonable rationale to not support research into its cure?!?!

    Obligatory revelation: I knew a really sweet girl in college, the sister of a roommate’s girlfriend, who had CF.

    Like most with CF, she didn’t expect to live to see her 30s.

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39. Anonymoose

    November 26, 2008 at 8:28 pm

    Thanksgiving is next week, and President Bush could make it a really special holiday by resigning.

    Boy, you’d think that whole 5% mandate Obami got was more like 90%. They just can’t wait for Obama to start, he’s the guy who should be talking to the financial leaders at the summit, he’s the guy we want up there RIGHT NOW!

    And just what miracle could Obami work in seven weeks? Over his Christmas break?

    The party on January 20th will be horrible to endure, but how long until the halo falls off? The True Believers(tm) will never doubt him; we’ve gone past the mindset that their candidate has to maintain an image, instead the believers maintain the image for him and tell us all to see it.

    But the college kids, the moderates, the “I-vote-based-on-the-news” types, how long until they wake up?

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40. Anonymoose

    November 26, 2008 at 8:31 pm

    Cystic fibrosis “has been recently revealed to only affect white people, and primarily men”

    It’s bad enough that white males like me are told continually we’re the cause of all the world’s problems, now honestly sick people are going to be bereft of charity because they think a disease is too inclusive to us. (?!?) And when they realize their error, I’m sure they’ll still find some way to blame it on us.

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41. sheehanjihad

    November 26, 2008 at 8:55 pm

    Apparently stupidity doesnt infect just white males….

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42. BillK

    November 27, 2008 at 1:09 am

    President Bush hasn’t resigned yet, right?

    From the AP:

    Obama reassures nervous nation on ailing economy

    By Sara Kugler and Stephen Ohlemacher

    CHICAGO (AP) – President-elect Barack Obama sought to reassure the nation and nervous holiday shoppers about the ailing economy Wednesday as beleaguered stores braced for their most important month of the year.

    “Help is on the way,” he proclaimed at his third news briefing on the economy this week. Fifty-five days away from taking office, he declared he would have an economic plan ready for action “starting day one.”

    Investors’ improved spirits kept pace. The Dow Jones industrials climbed 247 points, marking the first time since last spring that the average had risen for four straight sessions.

    To help with ideas from outside the White House, Obama announced he was forming a new team of advisers with former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker as the head.

    “There is no doubt that during tough economic times family budgets are going to be pinched,” Obama said. “I think it is important for the American people, though, to have confidence that we’ve gone through recessions before, we’ve gone through difficult times before, that my administration intends to get this economy back on track.”

    The crucial holiday shopping season gets under way in earnest on Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, with deep discounts already in place as stores try to lure buyers who are worried about their jobs and homes.

    Volcker, 81, will head the President’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board. The board’s top staff official will be Austan Goolsbee, a University of Chicago economist, Obama said.

    Volcker is no stranger to economic crises, having led the Fed under two presidents from 1979 to 1987. Volcker is a legendary central banker who raised interest rates and restricted the money supply to tame raging inflation in the 1980s. It was a painful prescription that helped send the economy into one of the nation’s worst recessions.

    However, he is largely credited with ushering in nearly three decades of relatively low inflation — an unthinkable feat in the 1970s, when the country was grappling with high unemployment, high interest rates and ever-rising prices.

    “He pulls no punches,” Obama said of Volcker. “He seems to be fairly opinionated.” …

    http://www.ktla.com/landing_bu.....p;feedID=6

    Not even a single mention of the current occupant; Obama has rushed in to reassure us.

    Meanwhile, of course it was Volcker that brought us the prosperity of the 1980s; Reagan had nothing to do with it, it was all Fed policy that “ushered in nearly three decades of relatively low inflation.”

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43. U NO HOO

    November 27, 2008 at 10:37 pm

    Just a quick note about what I saw yesterday, an Obama ‘08 bumper sticker on a HUMMER.

    Ariana Huffington, are you out there reading this?

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44. JohnMG

    November 27, 2008 at 11:02 pm

    …..”Obama announced he was forming a new team of advisers with former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker as the head…..”

    Let’s see now. McCain was too old to be president, but Volcker’s brain cells, at age eighty-one, are still firing on all eight cylinders.

    Well, if Obama is going to “get this economy back on track” beginning on ‘day one’, I will expect dramatic results beginning on ‘day two’. And if I don’t get what I’m promised, I intend to start ragging on that egotistical bastard beginning on ‘day three’ and I won’t let up for the next 1458 days!

    What a yutz! He even believes his own press releases and expects us to do likewise. Maybe he really is a fairy, but he’s missing his magic wand.

    Anybody want to bet that none of his failures will be his fault? Didn’t think so.

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45. Diane

    November 28, 2008 at 12:24 am

    Hmm. As far as I know, breast cancer victims are overwhelmingly women. I suppose we should stop supporting the search for a cure for that as well. I wonder how that would play?

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46. imnewatthis

    November 28, 2008 at 5:25 am

    Decades ago, my cousin’s cousin died of CF. I don’t remember exactly how old he was, but I think he was only around eleven. But we shouldn’t feel too sorry for him-he was a fortunate one- a white male.

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47. BillK

    November 28, 2008 at 6:48 am

    The MSM is using the tag line “Democrats to play Hardball” to describe this.

    From the Los Angeles Times:

    Democrats may play hardball in Pennsylvania

    MSNBC’s Chris Matthews could be in the mix of candidates hoping to win Republican Sen. Arlen Specter’s seat in 2010.

    By Josh Drobnyk

    The Northeast’s dwindling cast of Senate Republicans has Democrats circling Arlen Specter’s seat in Pennsylvania, convinced the party is well-positioned to make a competitive race out of the 2010 election.

    Leading the pack of prospects — at least in celebrity — is Chris Matthews, the MSNBC “Hardball” host and a former Capitol Hill Democratic staffer. The Philadelphia native has been toying with a run for months, and this week he sat down with state Democrats to discuss the prospect of taking on the five-term GOP senator.

    Others considered in the mix include Rep. Joe Sestak, who is sitting on $3 million in campaign funds; state Rep. Josh Shapiro; and U.S. Rep. Allyson Y. Schwartz, a two-term Philadelphia area lawmaker who has moved up quickly on the Hill and has a Rolodex full of prospective donors from her unsuccessful 2000 Senate run. “We’ll see,” she said about a repeat bid.

    “There are a lot of compelling reasons why serious Democrats would aspire to run in 2010,” said Pennsylvania Democratic Party Chairman T.J. Rooney, who said Matthews had been in Pennsylvania Monday meeting with other Democratic leaders.

    “You look at what has gone on in this state in the past six or seven years, and you think nothing is out of reach,” Rooney said. Since 2002, Pennsylvania Democrats have grabbed the governor’s mansion; unseated the Senate’s No. 3 Republican, Rick Santorum; and picked up five U.S. House seats. But just as relevant to the party’s optimism is what has happened outside the state. The Northeast lost nearly half its slate of Senate Republicans in the previous two elections, leaving Specter with just three GOP colleagues from the eight Northeastern states: Susan Collins and Olympia J. Snowe of Maine and Judd Gregg of New Hampshire.

    This month’s Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan political newsletter that handicaps races, cast Specter as among the four most vulnerable senators of the 35 up for reelection in two years. “He is increasingly isolated from his party as a Republican in a Northeastern sea of blue,” said Hershey, Pa.-based pollster Michael Young.

    Matthews, 62, who didn’t respond to a request for comment, has dismissed questions about a run in recent months as he lays the groundwork behind the scenes. His contract with MSNBC expires in June. …

    http://www.latimes.com/news/na.....9657.story

    But it’s Fox News that can’t be trusted due to bias.

    Uh huh.

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