WASH POST: DIEBOLD TOUCHSCREEN SOURCE CODE DISCOVERED STOLEN IN MARYLAND!
ALSO: State Report Finds Sensitive Voter Registration Database Vulnerable to 'Across-the-Board Access'
Diebold, State Election Director Lamone Continue State of Denial…
The Washington Post is reporting in Friday editions that the FBI is investigating the "possible theft" of Diebold electronic touch-screen voting system source code in Maryland.
While the Maryland State Board of Elections admits that the disks contained "the software…used in Maryland in the 2004 elections," Diebold denies everything. Of course. They gave their catch-all apologia — the software is for "versions…that are no longer in use in Maryland" — although they were forced to acknowledge "the version of one program apparently stored on the disks is still in use in 'a limited number of jurisdictions.'"...
COMPLETE DETAILS
This from Marcus, our soldier in Iraq:
Whoever that guy was that said we dealt with Iraq in "stupidity" and "ignorance" finally got it right. I thought we were about to come into some real honesty in this debate. But...he retracted his statements. Doesnt matter though they have already been broadcast on Al Jazeera.
I felt better if only for a minute. It scares me that they are just going to deny reality all the way unitl the end. Just keep denying. It doesnt matter what everyone else says I guess they have made no mistakes. The end of what...I dont know. The Iraq Debacle, the elections, the world perhaps.
Kokomo...big UAW town. The factories span US 31 from the north side to the center of the city. My dads in the UAW. You dont know how much our quality of life improved once my Dad got the union gig at Rolls Royce Engines.
LYDIA CORNELL: AFI Best Actress Nominee, People's Choice Award winner; Actor, Writer, Director, Producer; woman and children advocate; teen mentor, comedienne, talk show host, inspirational pubic speaker best known for her starring role on ABC's "Too Close for Comfort" as TV legend Ted Knight's daughter 'Sara'; HBO's Curb Your Enthusiasm, and over 250 shows, episodes and movies worldwide. Turns tragedy into comedy, life-saving issues for women and equal pay for equal work...
Is this America or Uruguay?
ReplyDeleteDiplomat Cites U.S. 'Stupidity' in Iraq
ReplyDeleteASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: October 22, 2006
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP)
A senior U.S. diplomat said the United States had shown ''arrogance'' and ''stupidity'' in Iraq but was now ready to talk with any group except Al-Qaida in Iraq to facilitate national reconciliation.
Worfeus we have not learned the NEW Diebold math yet.
ReplyDeleteIt actually is really simple to learn all democratic votes are less than all republican votes -1, no matter what the variables on either side of the equation.
algebracically it looks like this;
R-1>D
Test Two weeks from now, study hard.
Just got back from Kokomo Indiana, where I got to be a guest on Larry's radio show, as well as Allan James morning drive show, plus several other interviews. Robert Dreyfuss from Rolling Stone joined me. Larry is a great human being and does a lot of mission work for the homeless.
ReplyDeleteAlso did interviews for the newspapers there, and will be writing a regular column for the main newspaper. Great town and great people, especially the labor unions. Met the wonderful Sona head of the UAW!
yeah Doltron, kinda like Bush saying he is not spying on all Americans, or he doesnt believe in torture, or there are no secret prisons.....................oh and lets not forget Mark Foley saying he wants to protect kids from sexual predators.......you big brave repuggies keep talking out of the side of your mouth saying you are our only hope to protect us from evil............whose gonna protect us from you fools?
ReplyDeleteNo really, we should listen to the republicans.
ReplyDeleteLets all just go to the polls next month and vote for our congress on computers that have been repeatedly demonstrated to be subject to all sorts of tampering.
And while we're at it, lets just make sure there is no paper trail.
That makes sense.
Who needs democracy?
ReplyDeleteAfter all, looks like the Iraqi's aren't getting any, so why should we?
ReplyDeleteI know. Lets just all vote over the Intenet.
ReplyDeleteAfter all thats how they chose who wins American Idol.
Lets just do a TV show, where the candidates are voted off by the viewers. The home viewers can use the Internet and we can give gamepads to the studio audience.
We can call it, "Who wants to be Commander in Cheif".
ReplyDeleteRegis Philbin could be the debate moderator. Yea, and besides debates, we could like, ask them questions and stuff. You know, see if they're really smart.
ReplyDeleteWe could have like a "presidential Jeopardy round" where they have to answer questions on a broad range of topics.
"uhhh....I'll take international ballistic missile treatys for a 1000 Alex"
Alex: "The catagory is MidTerms
ReplyDeleteWhat single magor strategy is the RNC counting on to help win the fall elections?
"uh...what is Gerrymandering Alex?"
Buzzer sounds:
ReplyDeleteAlex:"sorry that is incorrect. Candidate number 2?"
Candidate #2:"uhhh, what is computerized voting Alex?".
Alex:"Correct.
And I'm being told we would have also accepted 'Diebold Machines'.".
"Voltron" and "Worftron"???
ReplyDeleteYou guys sniffin model glue or something......lol?
My masterpiece(latest video) is close to completion..... please, no applause!
Hmmmmmmm.......wonder if the very vivacious Ms.Cornell mentioned the mighty Moo on one of those radio shows?
Certainly, Im worthy......at least thats what my Psychiatrist told me?
Alex: "The catagory is 'Rubbernecking' for $500"
ReplyDelete"What is the republican congress's official policy on dealing with child molestion in its ranks?".
Candidate #1:"What is 'appoint them to a governing body in charge of child molesters"?
Alex: "Sorry that is incorrect."
ReplyDeleteCandidate #2:"What is 'Don't ask, Don't tell', Alex?"
Alex:"correct"
ReplyDeleteI thought all the good dictatorships of modern times always had elections that were tampered with? You know, The Party (refer to George Orwell's books 1984) wants to remain in control and loves being the dictators who can torture and do whatever they want, so making sure the electronic voting machines flip the vote internally on the harddrive at the precise time is essential for The Party to remain in power!
ReplyDeleteAll dictatorships are like that...welcome to the United Fascist States.
Those who are squealing with delight that our system of democracy (voting) has been rigged and hacked are the TRUE TRAITORS OF AMERICA.
ReplyDeleteThe End.
How do you KNOW Bush is LYING, his lips are moving;
ReplyDeleteBush: ‘We’ve Never Been Stay The Course’
During an interview today on ABC’s This Week, President Bush tried to distance himself from what has been his core strategy in Iraq for the last three years. George Stephanopoulos asked about James Baker’s plan to develop a strategy for Iraq that is “between ’stay the course’ and ‘cut and run.’”
Bush responded, ‘We’ve never been stay the course, George!’
Bush is wrong:
BUSH: We will stay the course. [8/30/06]
BUSH: We will stay the course, we will complete the job in Iraq. [8/4/05]
BUSH: We will stay the course until the job is done, Steve. And the temptation is to try to get the President or somebody to put a timetable on the definition of getting the job done. We’re just going to stay the course. [12/15/03]
BUSH: And my message today to those in Iraq is: We’ll stay the course. [4/13/04]
BUSH: And that’s why we’re going to stay the course in Iraq. And that’s why when we say something in Iraq, we’re going to do it. [4/16/04]
BUSH: And so we’ve got tough action in Iraq. But we will stay the course. [4/5/04]
Does he NOT KNOW they video tape him and KEEP the Tapes....for a LONG time?
Why LIE like he does?
Doesn't he KNOW LYING is a SIN?
It's on that list of ten things we are NOT supposed to do............
Don't know what to tell you Volt.
ReplyDeleteQuit spamming.
Go ahead though and post the entire text.
ReplyDeleteIt might help.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteSorry about that, I just searched the street address. Post deleted
You mean you didn't know VenusFlix is Lydia's company? Its plastered all over the website. And her movie she made was the Venus Conspiracy.
I will tell you this though.
ReplyDeleteIf your PC got infected with a virus, and pushed it up to your mailbox on your ISP's mail server, (and if your ISP sucks), then a worm or virus could be sending emails to everyone in your address book, and everyone you ever sent a message to or received a message from. These emails could be for many reasons, the most likely, to propagate the worm.
Chances are you accidently clicked on a mailto link on her website, and accedentally hit "send" or "enter" when you were trying to close Outlook or Outlook express.
ReplyDeleteI could see that happening.
Yes Voltron.
ReplyDeleteMaybe the FBI is using Carnivore on your email, and spying on you.
Patriot act gave them that right you know.
But I'm sure you're down with that, so don't worry. Its your buddies.
ReplyDeleteThey could be transferring your files up via SMTP transfer, and reviewing what you've been up to.
ReplyDeleteYou know Lydia's been investigating hacking, so that makes sense, no?
Please excuse Voltron Ladies and Gentlemen.
ReplyDeleteHe's busy mircowaving his harddrive.
LoL.
ReplyDeleteDon't do anything drastic buddy, I'm just funnin ya.
That was just a load of malarky, they don't operate that way.
Chances are, you, or someone submitted a comment from the email option on the main blog page and it looks like her mailbox there is full, so it bounced back.
Someone could be impersonating you, in blogger, and the return to address will still be yours, so you'll see the non delivery report.
No, I see you xx'd your email address out, lol.
ReplyDeleteVoltron said...
ReplyDeleteAnd like I said before, my security is pretty good. They might be able to read my email over the net, but if anyone were in my computer I would know.
Not neccesarily.
You strike me as someone playing dumb but likely know just a 'wee bit' more than you're letting on.
But either way I could care less. I'm tired of the skullduggery bs.
I'll take you at your face value and if you're being dishonest then shame on you, not me. Anyway unless you're running TripWire or COPS or something along those lines then your computer can be hacked without you ever knowing.
Everytime you connect to a website, you are opening whats known as a 'socket connection' with a website. A socket is just a technical term for an network addresss bound to a layer 4 port and some upper layer protocols.
What that means is its like inviting someone into your home. Socket connections are "2 way", and theres all kinds of ways people can push malicious code to you if you connect to their site.
The fact that you run spyware and such is fine, but that stuff is only as good as its latest definitions. Something breaks in the wild, and your spyware programs may not even see it. And as for the government, well, investigate "magic lantern" (at your own peril) and you'll see where that lies.
Anyway I'm sure your fine, its probably someone messing with you.
Maybe.
ReplyDeleteIt might be Lydia's having all of the comments in her forwarded to that mailbox and it just got full.
Thats a good bet.
Of course, then everybody would be getting them.
ReplyDeleteSo rule that out.
Unless it was a fluke.
ReplyDeleteLOL thats priceless DOLT......maybe the DOD is hacking you DOLTY HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
ReplyDeleteYou know maybe your RNC buddies or the DOD figure you been hanging out here so long your one of us.........................but like Worf said you guys are cool with the "DECIDER" being able to spy on people to catch bad guys, what did you bastions of Freedom say, if you have nothing to hide whats the big deal right.......what o you guys call it again? oh yeah neccessary tools to catch bad guys.
\
I have to say Dolt you sure sound like a conspiracy kook claiming that your computer is being hacked LOL. ARE YOU WEARING A TINFOIL HAT DOLTY???
The Carnivore project came out of the Clinton administration, FYI. Just Google "clinton carnivore."
ReplyDeleteVoltron said;
ReplyDeleteSo...??
So nothing.
Basic. Fortran? Tandy TRS 80?
Not exactly a 'novice', thats for sure.
Now go echo off
ReplyDeleteTalllTexan said...
ReplyDeleteThe Carnivore project came out of the Clinton administration, FYI. Just Google "clinton carnivore."
TT, on my worst day I know more about carny than you on your best. Unless of course you're a fed, or something.
And we weren't talking Clinton\Bush.
ReplyDeleteVoltron asked for help, and I was being neighborly.
so you can GOTO you know where.
Sure Volt. I've followed Gibsons work for years.
ReplyDeleteHe was even on Leo Laporte's show a few times, but I've been using SPINRITE since it first came out.
LOL TT and the other repugs are so incompetent they are hacking and pushing malware on the wrong peoples computers, what do they say about evil always turning on itself.
ReplyDeleteBut Dolty you sound kinda paranoid buddy take off the tin foil hat, take a deep breath, crack a beer and relax, the jack booted thugs arent coming to get you at 3AM.
Just remember Dolt, if you are having your privacy invaded and being hacked just remember that these are neccessary tools to protect us from evil doers and no true patriot would question that LOL...............................even i'm choking on this BS.
maybe TT or Johnny is trying to spoof your e-mail to make you the fall guy Dolt.
He's a smart guy, although shields up is little more than a port scanner.
ReplyDeleteYou can do that yourself and much more if you know how.
And something tells me you do.
why is it all you brave reich wing patriots are computer programmers, did Colter recruit you to go to liberal blogs and play games?
ReplyDeleteOh Look the prince of darkness TT just showed up when we are talking about a hacking......................Do you think it was the DOD TT. common tell dolt to take of the Tin Foil Hat HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
ReplyDeleteI'm enjoying the WAY TOO MUCH!!!!!!!!!
DO you even know what Carnivore is Volt?
ReplyDeleteOr should I say, was.
ReplyDeleteVoltron said...
ReplyDeleteBut if I wanted to, I could probably find out.
Yea. I bet it helps to have connections at the NSA.
They've got some of the best in the world over there.
Thats right. It was a sniffer or protocol analyzer which is the actual name. A sniffer with a script, that pulls SMTP messages off into a buffer for later viewing.
ReplyDeleteNothing fancy.
It worked great, till encryption became popular.
Protocol Analyzers can't decode encryption.
Hey TT did you get hacked also.............man the DOD and NSA are running amuck, you brave patriots must feel safer knowing that they are turning over every rock to catch evil doers................you clowns dont believe in warrants, or evidence what we need is a witch hunt full steam a head, I say we bring back the dunking chairs to test if someone the "DECIDER" or his cronnies label a terrorist, really is, if the person drowns, then "mission accomplished" you killed a terrorist and if the person doesnt drown..........whats that ypou say, they always drown, wow thats impressive then you have a 100% record of catching, convicting and executing terrorists, what brave patriots.
ReplyDeleteCharlie Cook is saying he starts with the democrats winning 20 seats in the House, and it could get even worse for the repugs from there......losing the House,
ReplyDeletehello Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
and Barney Frank, chairman of the Financial Services Committee
and Charlie Rangel chairman of the Ways and Means committee
and John Conyers chairman of the Judicary committee
and Henry Waxman chairman of the Government Reform committee
and David Obey chairman of the Appropriations committee.
Holy crap. Wiki's got a page on magic lantern?
ReplyDeleteWhats this world coming to, lol.
Go check out a movie called The Recruit, with Al Pacino.
ReplyDeleteIn it, they talk about something called "ICE".
The concept was real, and there was a company in Northern VA that claimed they could do it, but then we never heard anything more about it, meaning it was probably purchased by the government.
Basically, if its real, all they need to do is dump a cookie on your system and your data is transmitted in the electomagnetic fields generated around any and all power lines.
Its an amazing concept, and I believe it could work, and possibly does exist.
What it means is anyone connected to the national power grid, whether they're connected to the Internet or not, could be easily comprimised.
No firewall in the world would be able to block it.
I haven't said anything more than the movie said, so I'll leave it there, but the theory is sound.
ReplyDeleteBasically, regardless of whether its real or not, when it comes to your PC, the only way to keep the government out is to not connect it to the internet (or a wall outlet if ML is real) or make laws to keep them from doing it.
Because Microsoft, all the Virus Vendors, the Telcos, the ISP's etc, all have departments dedicated to classified federal government projects, and that means they can put stuff into the OS's, like back doors, or into the applications like Virus Programs, that can comprise your system only for them.
Also they can filter at the ISP level, and pull everything sent unencrypted off and just see it all.
Encryption is your best friend.
And even thats not foolproof.
ReplyDelete"WORFTRON said...
ReplyDeleteAnd even thats not foolproof.
8:44 PM"
You beat me to the punch there. All encryption does is slow things down, from what I hear.
"WORFTRON said...
ReplyDeleteAnd even thats not foolproof.
8:44 PM"
You beat me to the punch there. All encryption does is slow things down, from what I hear.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteVolt, the thought actually occurred to me! You may be starting a trend.
ReplyDeleteVoltron said...
ReplyDeleteI gotta question that one
On the surface it sounds plausible, but if they were going to listen in on everyone...
Hell "multiplexing" doesn't even begin to cover it. That many signals at once would look randomized.
Well, they say intuitive physics is almost always wrong...LOL
Well I'm not sure which one your question there, because you're talking about multiple things.
I am referring to targeted monitoring on systems infected with a worm or trojan of some sort that uses probably some proprietary protocol and rides across the power cable into the wall, and out the national power grid. It would require equipment at the local power substations to make it work, and other stuff, and I'm not even saying its real. I'm just saying the concepts plausible, and there was some evidence it has already been done.
As for monitoring everyone, they're likely already doing that.
That would not be hard, it would just take a lot of SANS sites to make it fly. Data passing through digital switches can be "SPAN"d off to a buffer and warehoused for later data mining efforts.
TT, while I said it is not foolproof, that doesn't mean it just "slows it down" some.
ReplyDeleteIt slows it down MUCHO.
Just look at this FBI case with the laptop that they can't get the files because they were encrypted using PGP.
It is not easy to do, and can take years.
By the way I wrote Lydia and asked her about the account and she said yes, that posts are forwarded to that account, and it just filled up.
ReplyDeleteSo you didn't send anything, it was just some posts you had made earlier that were bouncing back.
BTW, for all TT's complaining about me posting on porn sites (which I don't), I can't help but notice he overlooked a guy who's email is "poonzilla".
ReplyDeleteSo much for the moral majority, ay?
Nite poonmonster.
ReplyDelete"WORFTRON said...
ReplyDeleteBy the way I wrote Lydia and asked her about the account and she said yes, that posts are forwarded to that account, and it just filled up.
So you didn't send anything, it was just some posts you had made earlier that were bouncing back.
9:02 PM"
Worf, that sounds plausible except for one thing. Why would the posts bounce back to Volt's email address. I would think that they would bounce back to eBlogger.
I've had some things bounce from e-blogger before also, those useless fools never respond when i contact them about it either.
ReplyDeleteTT Said;
ReplyDeleteWorf, that sounds plausible except for one thing. Why would the posts bounce back to Volt's email address. I would think that they would bounce back to eBlogger
Because when you post you are technically posting from your email address. The email address you enter into blogger is where you post is sent from. That is how blogger does it if you have all posts forwarded offline to an email account.
Some blog owners only read their blog in email, and never actually enter the blog.
Anyway Lydia said she just checked and its full, and since the SMTP failed delivery receipt says the same thing, then I think thats the most "plausible" conclusion to arise at.
Unless you have another theory you'd like to share with us.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteSorry, I always hang out for a little bit just to see what you say about me when I'm gone...
Thats why we always wait an extra hour before we rail on you.
:P
Whoever that guy was that said we dealt with Iraq in "stupidity" and "ignorance" finally got it right. I thought we were about to come into some real honesty in this debate. But...he retracted his statements. Doesnt matter though they have already been broadcast on Al Jazeera.
ReplyDeleteI felt better if only for a minute. It scares me that they are just going to deny reality all the way unitl the end. Just keep denying. It doesnt matter what everyone else says I guess they have made no mistakes. The end of what...I dont know. The Iraq Debacle, the elections, the world perhaps.
Kokomo...big UAW town. The factories span US 31 from the north side to the center of the city. My dads in the UAW. You dont know how much our quality of life improved once my Dad got the union gig at Rolls Royce Engines.
Lets hope the end of the world thing is a little ways off.
ReplyDeleteBTW dusty is THIS bet still open?
ReplyDeleteI dont want you to have to go on ebay and sell any of your Star Wars
memorabilia,I do realize how near and dear those Yoda dolls are to you guys.But,lets say we bet $5,000 that the Dems do not win control of either the house or senate or I'd give you 2-1 odds that they dont win both.We could put the money in an escrow account here in Las Vegas and have a lawyer write up the actual bet.What do you say?
By Anonymous, at 12:46 PM
Worfeus I wonder if the BIG mouth still stands behind the bet he wanted to make back in February?
ReplyDeleteWell he modified it, because he knew he lost one house.
ReplyDeleteAnd right now the Senate is too close to call according to everyone, which is a bad sign for the republicans.
We'll know in less than 3 weeks.
If the republicans don't win this one, its going to be an interesting next 2 years.
Mike said
ReplyDelete"maybe TT or Johnny is trying to spoof your e-mail to make you the fall guy Dolt."
A comical, yet calculated effort by Mike to drive a wedge between Voltron and myself.
I suggest Mikes the hacker........he desperately wants all those sexy pics of Lydia for free.
Talltexitron.....I like it!
ReplyDeleteCorny, yet effective.
Worf said, "Anyway Lydia said she just checked and its full, and since the SMTP failed delivery receipt says the same thing, then I think thats the most "plausible" conclusion to arise at.
ReplyDeleteUnless you have another theory you'd like to share with us."
Worf, I'm not trying to pick any kind of fight here, but I would only buy that theory if other people had their posts bounce back to them from Lydia's email address. If Volt is the only one this has happened to, I would say the explanation must lie elsewhere.
Okay, here's the deal. This happened before with Venusflix: some mail bounced back and said "Delivery failed"
ReplyDeleteI switched email accounts so the comments would go to the one Volt mentioned. I guess when the mailbox is too overloaded some mail bounces back, but I've noticed it bounced back to the people who registered an actual email address, not a "noreply"
Don't know how that works, but maybe it's because Volt used an actual email address or account, which I just saw.
Tiny Intellect said;
ReplyDeleteWorf, I'm not trying to pick any kind of fight here, but I would only buy that theory if other people had their posts bounce back to them from Lydia's email address. If Volt is the only one this has happened to, I would say the explanation must lie elsewhere.
Lydia Cornell said...
Okay, here's the deal. This happened before with Venusflix: some mail bounced back and said "Delivery failed"
I switched email accounts so the comments would go to the one Volt mentioned. I guess when the mailbox is too overloaded some mail bounces back, but I've noticed it bounced back to the people who registered an actual email address, not a "noreply"
Don't know how that works, but maybe it's because Volt used an actual email address or account, which I just saw.
*****************************************
Well Tiny Intellect, Lydia just made you out to be a FOOLE once again, because you opened you big mouth about another thing you actually knew NOTHING about, but were quick to impune a sinister action.
I'd say you LOOK stupid now, but we already KNEW that didn't we TINY?
Clif, what I wrote was a perfectly reasonable scenario, and I posted it BEFORE Lydia's explanation. What's your theory, Einstein? (Cutting and pasting won't help you here.)
ReplyDeleteGeeze. A guy posts an innocuous theory and Clif turns it into a personal attack.
Sorry Tiny but I call them as I see they, and you look quite DUMB about now.
ReplyDeleteRush Limbaugh online at 12 ET/ 9 PT
ReplyDeleteOh look Troll tex is posting his stupid links that no one cares about again...........................................you really must have NOTHING WORTHWHILE TO SAY even more than usual.
ReplyDeleteBTW Troll Tex, take off that tinfoil hat son, you sound kinda paranoid.
Mike said, "Oh look Troll tex is posting his stupid links that no one cares about again"
ReplyDeleteWould you prefer a full transcript?
I would prefer you crawl back under your rock or bridge or whatever..............but I dont have much to complain about regarding your posts latelt TT, because you dont have much to say anymore...............................cat got your tongue or is it too many lies to keep track of.
ReplyDeletelike Clif said a repug is lying when his lips are moving and you've become a lot more honest lately troll tex.
Actually Mike the tiny conscience inTexan has just become MORE Irrevelant lately, and come November 7th he will be even MORE irrevelant.
ReplyDeleteHis tired and discredited political propaganda is LOSING. And NO amount of bloviating by the drug addicted lying limpman will help it at all.
Saturday, October 21, 2006
ReplyDeleteSpitting on vets
Today's peace movement is being held back by distorted memories of yesterday's peace movement. The documentary Sir, No Sir! reminds us that many, many vets supported Jane Fonda and the anti-war protests. The protestors cared a lot more about the V.A.'s treatment of wounded vets than did the hawks.
The most pernicious myth, still believed by many, holds that anti-war protestors spat on returning soldiers. If you know of anyone who still believes this nonsense, show 'em this interview with Jerry Lembcke, who teaches Sociology at Holy Cross College. Lembcke examines the origins of this legend in a book called The Spitting Image
http://cannonfire.blogspot.com/
How the Myth of Spat on Vets Holds Back the Anti-War Movement
ReplyDeleteInterview with Jerry Lembcke
Conducted and transcribed by Stephen Philion
by Stephen Philion
DIGG THIS
Q: In the recent days the British general responsible for British troops in Iraq has make remarkably strong calls for British troops to be removed from Iraq. So it’s pretty timely to have a discussion like this, since I’m finding that there are quite a few students who are opposed to the US occupation of Iraq, but are afraid to "go against" the soldiers, many of whom are friends or relatives. First thing, though, is, for the sake of those who haven’t read your book The Spitting Image, maybe you could give a quick intro to the key arguments of the book.
Lembcke: I got interested in this topic in the runup to the Persian Gulf War in 90–91. There were students who were opposed to the war, but afraid to speak out because of what they had heard about the antiwar movement and veterans during the Vietnam War era. These stories of "spat upon" vets were beginning to circulate in the news and students on campuses were picking up on these stories. I had never heard these stories before. So I got interested in where they were coming from, how long they had been told, who was telling them and so forth.
One thing led to another and I kept looking back in the historical records, when people were actually coming home from Vietnam and I found out that no, there was no record. Not only was there no record of people spat on, but none of anyone claiming that they were spat on. So then I got interested in the stories as a form of myth and found out that in other times and other places, especially Germany after WWI, soldiers came home and told stories of feeling rejected by people and particularly stories of being spat on.
Like with the case of the Vietnam stories many of the "spitters" were young girls and knowing that these things happened at another time and place supposedly, I found out about a Freudian psychologist who wrote about male fantasies and treated these stories as fantasies, expressions of the subconscious, men who felt they’d lost manhood in the war. When I told a psychologist friend of mine in women's studies, she asked me who the spitters were…she too thought it was likely a myth since the spitters were women, an expression of loss of manhood.
Looking a little further, I found that French soldiers returning from Indochina after defeat at Dien Bien Phu also told stories of being treated badly, rejected by women, attacked by women on the streets, having to take their uniforms off before going in public, being ashamed of their military service. These were very similar to stories circulating in the 1980’s in the US. The time gap between the end of the Vietnam War and when the stories began to be told is also a sign that there is something of an element of myth or legend. That’s the key part of the book, not whether or not such things, since it’s hard to refute what isn’t documented, ever happened, as much as the mythical element.
And of course we see how the rise of the myth had an effect on support for the war in Iraq.
Q: And what is the link that you see?
Lembcke: In a nutshell, most people remember there was pretty widespread opposition to the US going into Iraq with huge demos in February and March of 2003. And then there were a good number of "support the troops" rallies that tapped into the popular sentiment that something bad happened to the troops when they returned from Vietnam. The very slogan "support the troops" with the yellow ribbons and all that sort of presumes that someone doesn’t support the troops and that presumption is based on that sentiment, belief that when people came home from Vietnam they were treated badly and we don’t want to do that again this time.
By having these rallies in 2003, the people who supported the war use support the troops as a way to support the war. A lot of these rallies told stories of Vietnam vets who had been spat on. I got calls from people in Florida, North Carolina, Vermont,…news reporters who had been at these rallies and asking me, "What about these stories?" Sometimes they would even have men who said they were vets or family members who claimed they remembered someone being spat on. The myth was used to drum up emotional support for the troops, or better said, to dampen down opposition to the war. Again, the same way it worked during the Persian Gulf War, some were afraid of being outspoken against the war lest they be accused of being "against the troops."
I teach at Holy Cross College and just the other day in one of my classes, in the context of talking about the context of the Bush administration’s strategy of being very accusatory toward critics of the war policy as being "cut and run" Democrats, "soft on terrorism..." With no more context than that, one of my students said she was "undecided about the war, but as long as the troops were fighting it was really important to "support the troops and we have to support the mission…" Now is not the time to be critical of the war, it was, in her mind…all mixed together.
That’s the way it works on people’s emotions. It throws them off-target. The target is the war itself and what we need to be doing is opposing the war itself. Often emotions get kind of confused with this stuff about "supporting the troops." It creates just enough space for the administration to push on ahead.
Q: Yes, it seems to be a good strategy to distract from the main issue, namely the policy of making war itself. I never quite understand why it’s so important to focus on the supporting the troops as so central an issue. It doesn’t really matter, since the troops in fact have little, in fact no say, in war policies to begin with.
Lembcke: Yes, it confuses the means and ends of war, it becomes a form of demagoguery. It makes a non-issue an issue, "support or not supporting the troops." At a humanitarian level, none of us wants to put people in harm’s way. The people who oppose the wars are most strident in that objective of keeping people out of the war. That’s not an issue, but it keeps us from focusing on the war itself and talking about it. And one of the things I’m concerned about now is a certain strain of the anti-war movement has gotten caught up in this itself. There’s a certain group of antiwar types who focus on what happens to the soldiers, how they’re damaged psychologically, physically,…I’ve been to a number of anti-war rallies now where all they talk about is PTSD and what happens to "our boys" when we send them off to war. It’s sort of a mirroring of the political right’s approach. They make the "support the troops" ideology the basis for supporting the war, and some strands in the anti-war movement now mimic that we need to oppose the war by "supporting the troops" and, I’ve been to some antiwar protests where very very little is said about the war itself!
We hear instead about getting the troops the help they need and heart rendering stories of parents of sons who have committed suicide after they come home, etc. That stuff from the anti-war left is as beclouding as similar rhetoric from the right, in that it takes us away from a political discourse, which we need in order to focus our energies around stopping the war and its causes.
Q: What’s your sense in terms of how this myth is replayed now with vets coming home from Iraq and claims of their being "abused" by the antiwar movement or sentiment?
Lembcke: I’ve heard a few of these stories. Again, in the spring of ’03, stories circulated about soldiers being spat on. In Vermont a story went around that a woman in the National Guard had been pelted with a box of stones by antiwar teenagers. None of these stories have turned out to be supportable by any sort of evidence. And then, periodically, other stories like one in Seattle of a guy who was back from Iraq marching in a parade, "spat on," "booed," "called baby killer," etc. The same, no serious evidence.
Occasionally then I get reports of these, but I’ve always suspected if the war goes down as a "lost war," we’ll hear more such stories, but the more important point, I think, is that the image of spat on Vietnam Vets is so engrained and part of the American memory and cultural sub-text, it almost doesn’t have to be reaffirmed through stories of Iraq Vets being "spat on" or "mistreated." It’s almost as though the Vietnam Spitting myth is a background that everyone "knows" about and when the President talks of Democrats not supportive of the war or otherwise baits antiwar people, the background that makes that resonant is the belief that something untoward happened to Vietnam Vets.
So it’s not necessarily good news for the anti-war movement if we don’t hear stories of Iraq Vets being "spat on." My fear is the mythical spat on Vietnam Vet is now so internalized as something that "happened," it doesn’t have to be spoken anymore as a contemporary phenomenon.
Q: What’s the significance of the documentary Sir! No Sir, which tells the story of the GI antiwar movement during Vietnam, in terms of what that film can tell students trying to organize antiwar movements on campuses across America today?
Lembcke: Oh, I think it’s terribly powerful. Even thought there’s no mention of Iraq, Afghanistan, or the War on Terror in the film, it seems that everyone that sees the film can extrapolate from it to the ways it applies to the wars that we’re currently involved in. Probably the greatest impact it has is on young people in the military today. I’ve done quite a bit of public speaking at showings of the film.
First of all, it reminds even those of us involved in the antiwar movement as vets of stuff that they had forgotten about or informed us about things that were going on at that time that we didn’t know about. They’re kind of surprised to find out quite a few things about the GI antiwar movement that they didn’t know.
Q: One of the things I was surprised to learn of was the extent of support shown to Jane Fonda by American soldiers stationed in Asia during the war at the "Free The Army" tour that she, other famous actors such as Donald Southerland, and soldiers/vets organized at US bases. Considering all the media discourse about vets’ anger at Fonda, I had no idea that some 60,000 soldiers had attended and enthusiastically received her at those shows, which served as an alternative to Bob Hope’s pro-war tours at the time. Also the extent of African American soldiers in the antiwar movement was something I never fully heard about in histories of the antiwar movement, which the movie makes clear was very deep and militant.
Lembcke: I was in Vietnam in 1969 and got involved in Vietnam Veterans Against the War once I returned and yet there were things in that film that I had not known about at the time. On the one hand there was a lot in the news in the papers about the vets antiwar movement at the time, which I know now just from researching it. I don’t think there was a blackout at all, often it was front-page news and people knew about it.
One of the things I found interesting was looking at Stars and Stripes, the civilian-published but military-supported publication that soldiers got in Vietnam and a lot of anti-war news was reported there. It reported the story of Billy Dean Smith, the GI accused of fragging an officer, which is featured in Sir! No Sir!. It had stories about soldiers in Vietnam wearing black armbands in support of the 1969 anti-war Moratorium back home. It turns out Stars and Stripes is a pretty good source for information on the vets’ and soldiers antiwar sentiment and movement back then!
So people knew of these things then. The more important story is what’s happened to that in people’s consciousness and memory. It certainly is gone now, even from people who were active in the vets' antiwar movement then. Sir! No Sir! has helped to bring it back into the public memory and showing that a vets antiwar movement can happen now is very helpful for people teaching in college and high school. They can take this knowledge into the classroom and that part of the history can get back into the curriculum. Younger people will now get a different view of what happened then.
I’ve talked to a few soldiers back from Iraq, one a Holy Cross College student who graduated in Spring 2002 who was an ROTC cadet who is back from Iraq and has spoken after showings of Sir No Sir!, and likewise didn’t know about the GI antiwar movement during Vietnam. She reports that there is a lot of opposition to the US occupation of Iraq among US soldiers in Iraq but it doesn’t express itself because there’s no organization, no organized communication between people. Maybe the film will play a catalyst role, if people see this film about organized GI opposition to the Vietnam War, it might inspire and even spark their imagination about the kinds of thing that can be done to oppose the war from within the military.
Q: And the significance of that for today?
Well, the GI antiwar movement became a vitally important part of the antiwar movement during Vietnam. And that is likely to be the case today also. Lots of people are asking what’s the difference between today and Vietnam? Why isn’t there a movement today? One possible answer is that the movement within the military is not quite congealed yet, but that the potential is there. Hopefully Sir! No Sir! can have an effect on accelerating that development a bit.
Q: One of the things that struck me about the film is that you saw that soldiers were not just protesting the war because of their equipment issues or technical matters about how the war was being conducted, but actually because they were against what was happening to the people of Vietnam because of the war and they were learning, while deployed there, about the actual history of the Vietnamese people’s struggles against foreign occupation as opposed to what they were brainwashed to believe in boot camp or high school teachers.
Lembcke: Here’s a big difference, namely the nature of the "enemy" and how it’s perceived. In the later years of Vietnam we came back rather sympathetic to the cause of the other side. One of the vets interviewed in the film, David Cline, talks of how he was shot and how he had shot a Viet Cong soldier. He then recalls how he looked at the fellow he had shot dead and realizes that this man was fighting for his country too, for freedom. That was a real consciousness raising moment for him and he dedicated moments like that to doing something to honor the loss of that man’s life, namely to end the war and contributing to the other side’s fight for freedom. I certainly came back in February 1970 with such sentiments, though I’m not sure exactly how it happened. Surely conversations with other GIs and my own reading at the time helped with that.
But today it is harder to portray the "enemy" in Iraq or Afghanistan in that kind of sympathetic way, there’s a political challenge there for the American antiwar movement to understand what the other side represents.
It needs to get some grasp on what is supportable in what the other side is doing in Iraq and Afghanistan, like we did in the Vietnam War. Recall in the early phases of the Vietnam war, Ho Chi Minh and the Viet Cong were called terrorists and their tactics were called tactics of terror. Today we talk about the roadside bomb in Iraq, but during Vietnam there was the satchel charges were one of the main weapons of the Vietnamese War.
Q: For those of us who haven’t fought in a war, what is a Satchel Charge?
Lembcke: A briefcase that would be loaded with explosives, dropped off some place and would explode. The point I’m making is that early in the war in Vietnam the Vietnamese and the Vietcong weren’t as viewed sympathetically as they were by the early 1970’s. What changed was how they were represented in terms of what they were all about. I think we need to go through that rethinking process on Iraq now, though I’m not sure where that goes.
We don’t right now have an embraceable "other" as we did in Vietnam and what the complexity of the other side means, how it’s to be sorted out, what’s supportable…but we need to find if there is something there to be supportable and that can have a big impact on the military elements against the war, namely that there is an honorableness to the "enemy" on the other side as was the case for GIs against the war in Vietnam.
Q: I always find it interesting to focus on what happens with US when it does negotiate with the armed opposition in Iraq, what the US’s key demands are during such negotiations and how the US can’t meet the oppositions’ demands because of that oppositions’ demands, no matter how low the bar is set, because those demands go against the interests of the US, given its actual goals in Iraq.
Lembcke: Most of us understand the war ended when the Vietnamese people won. And when we recognized that the sooner the other side wins, the war is over. The US is not gonna stop fighting until it stops, when the US is unable or unwilling to win the war. That conclusion is very sobering if it’s applied to the war in Iraq. That’s a pretty sobering thought, is this war going to go on until the US can’t do so anymore and at what point is the US antiwar movement going to see that the war won’t end until the other side wins and who is the other side? It’s very complex, the other side is very divided, not a monolith. So I don’t know how that lesson from Vietnam translates into something we can act on to inform our political work today.
Q: There’s plenty of writing out there on the liberal left that we can’t leave now because of the nature of the opposition.
Lembcke: Yes, there is that, but you know the pro-war elements during Vietnam used that logic too. They often said we can’t leave now, we’ll have so many losses or the "bloodbath" that would happen if we left too soon…
Q: I find that when I deal with people on the liberal-left who will argue that calling for leaving Iraq immediately is "isolationism." But if you argue back that this is not isolationism we are arguing, but that the US should pay massive reparations to the people of Iraq for the damage the US invasion and occupation has caused the Iraqi people – no reply forthcoming. They have no answer as to why we know that that is not going to happen if the US stays there or if it leaves!
But it opens up the question that people on the liberal-left who support staying there that the pro-war or lukewarm "anti-war" liberal left have no answer for, namely what is the purpose of what the US is doing in Iraq? It’s just set in stone for them that if we leave things will be worse, even though the evidence now is so overwhelmingly that the US occupation is the key source of the violence we see in Iraq today. So much so that the argument that once was so common among the liberal left, "well the Iraqis want us to stay" has really collapsed under the weight of Iraqi realities. Now even the Iraqis polled are saying in big majorities in US State Dept. commissioned polls that they want us to leave now and it’s okay to shoot US soldiers.
Lembcke: The NYT kind of buried that story on the inside, but the antiwar movement can use that information. We shouldn’t have to make that argument, it should be apparent we’re not welcome, but sometimes data helps to persuade.
Q: It also throws the light back on Iraqis, which the "supports the troops" antiwar movement focus doesn’t do. The focus is so often only on Americans as though the only impact is on Americans or it’s the only one that matters, except for small periods like Abu Ghraib or Haditha…
Lembcke: Yes, the war becomes all about us and erases Iraqis, much like we did during Vietnam erasing the agency of Vietnamese people.
Q: Yes, it’s interesting that in the process, ironically, it ignores the agency of the soldiers and their potential role in stopping the war and recognizing the actual roots of war itself.
Lembcke: Yes, you know one of the best new sources of information for the antiwar movement is another film called "Why We Fight." I saw it with two classes and they haven’t stopped talking about it. If they had heard before about the term "military industrial complex," now it makes it more real. Now they think about the war beyond the slogans of "the war is for freedom, democracy"…which is all most Americans know. The oil thing too has also become a kind of cliché they don’t think about much. For my students those bumper-stickered explanations are erased and the film puts the war in a much more material and realistic framing. It’s a film that might have as important an impact as Sir! No Sir!
October 16, 2006
Jerry Lembcke [send him mail] teaches
Sunday, October 22, 2006
ReplyDeleteA BIG Flip-Flop By Another Name
The facts are that the Bush administration has decided the Iraq war will kill them at the polls and therefore immediate changes are necessary.
But a Republican regime that is never wrong and is as immutable as the Pope cannot change.
So the Prez says he isn’t changing strategies in Iraq, he’s changing tactics.
And the difference is? The Encarta World English Dictionary says: “A tactic is the science of organizing and maneuvering forces in battle to achieve a limited or immediate aim; also called a strategy. A strategy is the science or art of planning and conducting a war or a military campaign; also called a tactic.”
Nevermind, the psychopath in the White House says, "Our goal is clear and unchanging: Our goal is victory…what is changing are the tactics we use to achieve that goal. Our commanders on the ground are constantly adjusting their approach to stay ahead of the enemy, particularly in Baghdad."
PARTICULARLY IN BAGHDAD? RIGHT! Baghdad, where the war has totally gone to hell and where the US has been ineffective and useless and where death and destruction is unremitting day and night, and where the enemy has constantly stayed ahead of US forces from Day One up to and including today.
When the New York Times ran a story yesterday explaining that the Bush administration had drafted a timetable (Yikes! That forbidden word!), White House spokesperson Nicole Guillemard issued a statement that the Times’s account wasn’t accurate, but she didn’t say what was inaccurate.
On Saturday, the Prez said in his radio address, “We will continue to be flexible, and make every necessary change to prevail in this struggle. Our goal in Iraq is clear and unchanging.”
That’s about the size of it. The Bush administration is going to change (or seem to change) whatever it needs to change in Iraq so that voters will more wholeheartedly embrace the killing of American soldiers, the devastation, the failure of the Bush administration and the plan for the US to occupy Iraq until the year 3000. But the Bush administration has no intention of changing anything.
posted by Joy Tomme at 10:08 AM 1 comments links to this post
http://ratbangdiary.blogspot.com/
Which argument is about as cogent and intelligent as President George W. Bush himself was during George Steph’s interview with our National Embarrassment yesterday.
ReplyDeleteIf Bush weren’t president of the United States, weren’t such a grandiose narcissistic sociopath idiot and asshole, one could almost feel sorry for him. He hasn’t read any of Bob Woodward’s books about him, he said. He wouldn’t feel right reading books about himself, he said. “You don't think there's anything to be learned from these books in real time?” George Steph asked. No! The president answered quickly and succinctly.
George W. Bush says the Economy is on an upswing, “I've always found the economy to be an issue. And if it's good, you do OK, and if it's not good, you don't do OK in American politics.”
George W. Bush hasn’t thought about what life will be like if the Dems win. “If I have to, I'll think about it later on. But I'm a person that believes we'll continue to control the House and the Senate.”
George Steph said that James Baker is looking for a policy between cut-and-run and stay-the-course. George W. Bush said, “We've never been stay the course, George. We have been -- we will complete the mission, we will do our job and help achieve the goal, but we're constantly adjusting the tactics, constantly.”
And George W. Bush says there is no civil war in Iraq, but the situation in Iraq is “dangerous”.
With regard to North Korea, George W. Bush said the decision to have nuclear devices is Kim Jong-Il's decision to make. “We've made our decision,” Bush said.
“Tell us how you made the decision,” George Steph asked the President of the United States. “I don't know,” the President said. “And I — you know, I just don't know. “
Two more years of that.
If the Dems don’t prevail on November 7th, then the entire United States truly deserves the consequences.
posted by Joy Tomme at 10:47
An interesting Associated Press story yesterday said, “North Korean leader Kim Jong Il expressed regret about his country's nuclear test to a Chinese delegation and said Pyongyang would return to international nuclear talks if Washington backs off a campaign to financially isolate the country, a South Korean newspaper reported Friday.”
ReplyDeleteBefore anyone jumps to the conclusion that the empty threats of George W. Bush were effective, it should be pointed out that China is planning to place an embargo on oil exported to North Korea. Close to 90% of North Korea’s oil comes from China. An oil embargo is far more terrifying to the North Koreans than vague threats from the Bush administration about “grave consequences”. This morning, the New York Times reported that, “China is prepared to step up pressure on North Korea in coming weeks by reducing oil shipments, among other measures, if the country refuses to return to negotiations or conducts more nuclear tests, Chinese government advisers and scholars who have discussed the matter with the leadership say.
As the NYT says, “experts argue that as long as the Bush administration kept its focus on a diplomatic solution (re North Korea), China would work to maintain solidarity with the United States.”
But now that the moment has come to step back and let negotiation and diplomacy solve the North Korea problem, what will the belligerent, swaggering, limp-dick, overcompensating Bush administration do?
Hey TT how many times did Bush say "we need to stay the course in iraq" more times than you have fingers and toes i'll guess, even if an inbred like you has 6 fingers and 6 toes. bush also lied about the secret prisons, his claiming he doesnt support torture and spying on all Americans without warrants.............................now we could impeach him for lying OVER and OVER AGAIN, but I say we impeach the chimp for being STUPID and incompetent!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeletehttp://ratbangdiary.blogspot.com/
ReplyDeleteIdle Threats
At least Senator John McCain (R-AZ) was laughing yesterday when he said in Iowa that he’d commit suicide if the Dems gain control of Congress in the November 7th elections.
But President Bush was absolutely serious when he said the United States would stop North Korea from transferring nuclear weapons to Iran or al-Qaida and that North Korea would then face "a grave consequence."
The delusional and grandiose Prez would not say exactly how the United States would retaliate. But in an ABC News interview he said, "You know, I'd just say it's a grave consequence. They’d be held to account.” The last time he used the phrase “grave threat”, was with regard to Saddam Hussein.
"If we get intelligence that they're (North Korea) about to transfer a nuclear weapon, we would stop the transfer, and we would deal with the ships that were taking the - or the airplane that was dealing with taking the material to somebody," the president said.
"The leader of North Korea has to understand that he'll be held to account. Just like he's being held to account now for having run a test," Bush said.
So, which is it? Is the Bush administration going to “stop North Korea” and “deal with” ships or planes transferring nuclear materials? Or will Kim Jong-il be held to account “just like he’s being held to account now”?
Because the way North Korea is being held to account now is by not holding North Korea to account.
Bush probably believes his vow to ABC News that he would use whatever means necessary to keep North Korea from selling its nuclear arms to other countries, because George W. Bush is crazy as a loon. But even Dick Cheney, who has never served in a war, knows that the US would have to be able to back up an act of war with an army and we barely have enough men in Iraq. Bush just said that “it broke his heart” for American men to die in Iraq but to pull them out would mean defeat.
A wiser, or at least a sane president, would not make rash claims about staying the course in Iraq plus plans for a new war in North Korea when he can’t get his approval rating above 38%.
George W. Bush using “whatever means necessary” against North Korea is as unlikely as John McCain committing suicide when the Dems prevail in elections.
posted by Joy Tomme at 9:59 AM
In that great pie-in-the-sky deluded world where George W. Bush lives and dreams, at some time in the mysterious and incomprehensible future the US will win in Iraq. And then we all can go to the seashore.
ReplyDeleteAnother reporter engaged Snow in a back and forth about whether in fact the White House still believes in the principle that when the Iraqis stand up, the US will stand down. After much sophistry and skirting of the issue from Snow, the reporter said, “So they are standing up, but we're not standing down. So is that principle no longer operable?”
And Snow said, “It seems to me that we're playing -- this is kind of a fun verbal game.”
That’s the way it seems to me too. The Bush administration is playing verbal games, which it thinks is a lot of fun. And George W. Bush is living in never-never-land, which he thinks is a lot of fun.
And the real fun for the rest of us is only three weeks away.
posted by Joy Tomme at 10:21
Middle class living on the edge?
ReplyDeleteCould your family absorb the financial strain of a job loss or medical emergency? A Democrat-funded think tank says most families' economic risks are growing.
By Debora Vrana
The middle class today is less prepared for an economic emergency, such as losing a job or visiting an emergency room, than at any time since the late 1970s, concludes a new study from a political think tank in Washington, D.C., that's funded by Democrats.
"Middle Class in Turmoil," produced by the Center for American Progress and the Service Employees International Union, mines data from the Federal Reserve, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, census records and other sources to paint a picture of increasing peril for those in the middle 60% of income distribution, about $18,000 to $88,000.
Despite a growing economy, a rising stock market and stronger corporate earnings that are helping the rich get richer, the middle class in America is caught in an unprecedented squeeze that makes it increasingly unstable, the study's authors say. The financial declines each year since 2001 have been dramatic, they report:
Income for middle-class families has remained stagnant or flat since 2001.
Prices for big-ticket items -- housing, health care, college education and transportation -- have skyrocketed, leaving families unable to save.
Middle-class families are borrowing record amounts of money to pay their monthly bills.
"Families are being forced to live beyond their means, just to pay for the basics, such as housing and health care," said Christian Weller, a senior economist for the Center for American Progress, which is headed by John Podesta, a former Clinton-administration chief of staff. "They are not only spending their current income but all their future income."
Economic risks up sharply
Researchers frame their conclusions in terms of risk:
Would you be able to keep your home for even three months if the family breadwinner became unemployed? Just 28.8% of middle-class families could sustain themselves through a spell of joblessness in 2004, the most recent year for data, compared with 39.2% in 2001, the study says.
Do you have the cash reserves to pay for a medical emergency? With double-digit increases in health-insurance costs for most of this decade, it's no surprise that the number of Americans without insurance rose by 1.3 million last year, up to 46.6 million people, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The cost of family health insurance is up nearly 90% since 2000, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit organization. The study says only 22.3% of middle-class families could cope with the $3,013 average cost of a small medical emergency, such as treatment for a broken ankle. That's down from the nearly 35% that could handle such an expense in 2001.
Do you have three months of income put away for a rainy day? Just 18.3% of middle-class families -- those with dual incomes earning from $18,500 to $88,030 -- in 2004 had accumulated wealth equal to three months' worth of income, a drop from the nearly 29% who had such savings in 2001. The number is expected to be even lower now.
"People are incredibly anxious, and families are stressed out. We're seeing too many families passing like ships in the nights in the driveway," said Andy Stern, the head of the Service Employees International Union, the largest and fastest-growing union in the United States. "The rising tide is not raising all boats -- only luxury liners. It's not building the kind of America that any of us want."
To maintain day-to-day consumption, Americans are taking on record amounts of consumer debt, researchers say -- $5.2 trillion since 2001. In June 2006, families took on debt equivalent to 129% of their disposable incomes, a big increase from the 96% in March 2001. Many homeowners are tapping into the equity in their homes, assuming more debt to pay for escalating energy and health-care costs. Falling home prices could force many of these middle-class families into foreclosure or back into apartments.
Middle-class families are also struggling with the ballooning costs of higher education. The total cost of tuition, fees, and room and board at four-year public colleges has increased 44% in the past four years.
A political football
Expect the financial condition of the middle class to become a critical issue in the November elections, say Democrats, even though Republicans have assailed the new study, arguing the concern is overblown.
"Let's not kid ourselves. The data say we're wealthy. And we're one of the wealthiest nations on Earth," said Tim Kane, a director at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank in Washington, D.C. "You can make a case that there is increased inequality, with the rich getting richer, but I don't think there is increased poverty."
But some economists and others, such as Lou Dobbs, a CNN commentator, are increasingly calling for public-policy action to alleviate financial stresses on the middle class. Dobbs has made the subject a key focus of his on-air commentary, calling the slipping condition of this group nothing less than "class warfare."
One family feeling the pinch is the Andrew Miller family in Charleston, S.C. With a combined income of just less than $100,000 a year, Miller and his wife say they work harder than ever but are no better off than five years ago. They keep a tight rein on spending, but tiny raises that don't match inflation and escalating health costs are leaving them feeling like they are treading water.
"The (medical) co-pays have jumped to $25 for each visit," said Miller, who has two daughters, ages 10 and 8. "Luckily, we have pretty healthy kids. But our premiums are also going up. We're just getting squeezed here."
Middle-class security indicators Year Have 3 months' income set aside Can cover jobless spell Can cover medical emergency
1989
21.2%
35.0%
Not available
1992
16.7%
25.3%
Not available
1995
24.5%
36.0%
32.4%
1998
22.6%
33.1%
29.2%
2001
28.8%
39.2%
34.8%
2004
18.3%
28.8%
22.3%
Sources: Center for American Progress and Service Employees International Union
is that so called female with a big adams apple with you again fool?
ReplyDeleteTalllTexan said...
ReplyDeleteMike said, "Oh look Troll tex is posting his stupid links that no one cares about again"
Would you prefer a full transcript?
No. We thank you for you brevity.
No you repug pedohiles are into hanging out with the 'guys' provided the guys are 16 and under.
ReplyDeleteHey TT, what are you going to do when you find out your Idol, Rash Limpballs, is a kiddie perv?
ReplyDeleteWhat are you going to do when it comes out that the only thing he was "visiting" in the DR was the local teenpoon bar?
What are you going to do when you find out he likes to play a game of "Speak into the radio dj's microphone" with 14 year olds?
ReplyDeletethe repugs seem to have a problem hooking up with women so they turn to underage boys, I mean look at Rove, and Cheney and limpballs and Rusty, they couldnt get any in a whorehouse with a $500 taped to their forehead. the repugs are a far cry from ladies men or toughguys they must be looking in those funhouse mirrors, where what they see is all distorted.
ReplyDeleteI honestly don't know why he ever let go of that hot Darin Kagin from CNN Mike.
ReplyDeleteShe could've read my weather report anyday.
Course, she probably was just using his big fat bloated self as a stepping stone to advance her career.
ReplyDeleteBut she probably got tired of playing "Find the shrimp" so she moved on.
http://www.powers-point.com/
ReplyDeleteMonday, October 23, 2006
THIS IS WHAT WATERBOARDING LOOKS LIKE
Here is what waterboarding looks like. (Via The Buck Stops Here)
This is the interrogation technique that has been at the root of the claims that the United States is torturing people at Gitmo. I oppose torture, but I don't consider waterboarding torture (though it is considered such by plenty of smart people...we just disagree). To me torture is amputating limbs or digits, ripping out fingernails, drilling holes in feet, starving people...you know, the things Iraqi insurgents and the Hussein clan do/did to people). That said, I'd be happy to agree that we would never waterboard a soldier who is fighting for a country that has signed on to the Geneva Conventions, since it would be a reciprocal agreement. We have no such agreement with terrorists and the worst of what we do to them -- in an attempt to protect ourselves, not for revenge -- is a walk in the park compared to what they do to Americans they capture or attack.
We would be unbelievably lucky if they treated us the way we have treated them in Gitmo.
I don't think the waterboard should be rolled out routinely for any person in our custody. But it should be allowed in extreme cases -- as part of an interrogation, not for fun -- which is exactly how it's been used. Like for people like Khaled Sheikh Mohammed, who admitted to murdering Danny Pearl after about two minutes of waterboarding.
Allah points out that they probably didn't give KSM breaks, as the person in this video is receiving.
posted by Kirsten Powers @ 2:11 PM
check out this video on waterboarding and torture.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.current.tv/video/?id=13462474
NRCC RUNS SLEAZY AD
ReplyDeleteWhen people speak of dirty campaigning, this is what they mean.
The national GOP campaign office started airing an ad Friday that showed [Democrat Michael] Arcuri leering at the silhouette of a dancing woman who says, ''Hi, sexy. You've reached the live, one-on-one fantasy line.'' He supposedly dialed the service two years ago from a New York City hotel room and billed taxpayers – for all of $1.25 for a one-minute call. He is the district attorney in Oneida County. Now the Utica Observer-Dispatch today notes that Arcuri's campaign has released records to the paper showing the call to the 800 sex line was followed the very next minute by a call to the state Department of Criminal Justice Services – and the last seven digits of the two numbers are the same.
posted by Kirsten Powers @ 9:07 PM
Those are good articles Mike, but I disagree with the guy on waterboarding.
ReplyDeleteI offer to him the same offer I make to anyone else who thinks waterboarding isn't torture.
Let me waterboard them, and THEN they can tell us wether its torture or not.
Then they'll be an expert on the subject.
I agree, but the video was interesting.
ReplyDeleteI think waterboarding is torture and I think thise engaging in torture should be held accountable and all authorizing it does is legitimize it and remove accountability.
ReplyDeleteI just came across this old post of mine from the beginning of February, we really used to have some good discussions back then.
ReplyDelete"I think we’re back to the Hornet’s nest analogy, I promise I will be relatively brief Kirk, I just
want to make a point and tie it in with the last few posts. I think NECESSARY is a more
appropriate choice of words than essential. Essential implies we cant do without it and I think that
while conflict is at times unavoidable and necessary, it is definately something we can live without
and thus not essential. Now bear with me here, my point isnt just semantic, while I agree that
conflict is at times necessary, I think that is only a small portion of the time, much less than people
actually think. The only times I think conflict is truly unavoidable is when you are in a real “life or
death” or “us or them” type situation or when greater evil will come from doing nothing. The vast
majority of the time being open minded and trying to see things from the other sides perspective
or point of view or showing kindness or compassion can allow things to be resolved without
conflict or deadly force.
Now while I think dealing with the REAL terrorists is definately an “us or them” type situation, I
don’t think the war in Iraq is, we are occupying these people’s homeland against their will, many
of these people have had friends and family killed and houses destroyed by our bombings, many
have been accidently shot or blown up by both our troops and by insurgents. I think that the
majority of Iraqi’s are just poor simple people whose main focus is to survive and get enough to
eat, not to attack and destroy a group of people they don’t even know on the other side of the
world, however if we keep giving them reasons to hate us and adding fuel to the fire that could
change.
One more distinction, to these people we are invaders and bullies and they are freedom fighters,
and although there may be some REAL terrorists attempting to enter the country due to the chaos
we created, the vast majority are not, even though they may use terrorist type tactics much like
our forefathers did against the British during the Revolutionary War, in their eyes they are
defending their homeland. I have several friends in the military and have a huge amount of respect
for our soldiers, however from the Iraqi’s perspective our soldiers are legitimate military targets.
All this “might makes right” philosophy does is stir up hate and create more enemies, till
eventually the bully messes with the wrong person, or all of the little people band together to deal
with the bully. I have to say that I agree with Lydia and Worfeus in that I think the world would
be a safer place if we didnt invade Iraq, much of the world views us as a bully, mainstream
moderate muslims are being converted to the terrorist cause, I think if we tried to see things from
their perspective and put the wheels in motion for a pullout we could turn things around, if not,
where does it end, its like the Hatfields and the McCoys if one side doesnt blink or attempt to take
the high road the killing will never stop and both sides will lose, theres no winning a quagmire like
this, This administration is still caught up in the past fighting the last War, they think its the Cold
War part 2 ."
BTW dusty the active duty personnel are STARTING to speak out, which means the active duty soldiers have
ReplyDeleteLOST faith in the commander in chief and pentagon leadership.
65 Active Duty Military to Ask Congress to End Iraq War
This is most unexpected. According to CNN, sixty-five (65) active duty members of the US military (that's right, active duty, not retired) will hold a press conference on Wednesday petitioning Congress to end the Iraq War:
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sixty five active duty service members are officially asking Congress to end the war in Iraq -- the first time active troops have done so since U.S. invasion began in 2003.
Three of the service members will hold a press conference Wednesday explaining their decision to send "Appeals for Redress" under the Military Whistleblower Protection Act to their members of Congress. Under the act, National Guard and Reservists can send communications about any subject to their member of Congress without punishment.
These individuals, if they go through with this step, will be acting in the highest interest of their country, because they are risking their careers and possible court martials for taking a public stand in opposition to the Bush adminsitration's policies on Iraq. I know that they assert the right to do so pursuant to the Whistleblower Act, but I doubt that will stop a vengeful administration from exerting every effort to make these soldiers pay for their effrontery. There are no truer patriots, and no braver men and women in the United States today. God bless them all.
The link to their press release is HERE.
Looks like the MORON in the WHite Housw and the Dunce in the Pentagon have not only lost the faith of a majority of the American people, BUT also those they sent to fight the war. And troops that do NOT believe in their leadership, do not make good photo ops.
What heroes. They risk their necks fighting in an illegal war, because they honor their commitment to their country, and they risk everything else speaking out.
ReplyDeleteIt takes a lot to speak up, but it takes even more to speak up if you are a soldier. There's hope for mankind yet.
Now lets get em home.
ReplyDeleteAs they SAY, you can not make these quotes up;
ReplyDeleteBush says he uses “the Google.”
Transcript:
HOST: I’m curious, have you ever googled anybody? Do you use Google?
BUSH: Occasionally. One of the things I’ve used on the Google is to pull up maps. It’s very interesting to see — I’ve forgot the name of the program — but you get the satellite, and you can — like, I kinda like to look at the ranch. It remind me of where I wanna be sometimes.
AAaaawwwwwww georgie's HOMESICK.
Hell the IDIOT should google the word failure...and see what he really is.
ReplyDeleteBush is a failure just ask google......LOL
ReplyDeleteKeith Olbermann, Mr Bush you need to pull over and ask directions.....
ReplyDeleteOr he could Google FAILURE, #1 response;
ReplyDeletePresident of the United States - George W. Bush
Google, "worst president ever";
ReplyDeleteresponse;
President of the United States - George W. Bush
Obviously google does "know" something, if ti see's bush as both a FAILURE and the worst president ever.
Pat Lang on the fiasco in Iraq;
ReplyDeleteIraq is Partitioning Itself
"President Bush expressed unwavering confidence in Nouri al-Maliki's ability to clamp down on the sectarian violence. Yet continued instability and rising casualties have led to calls, growing louder as the Nov. 7 elections near, for Bush to overhaul his war plan." Boston Globe
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nuri al-Maliki is merely one of the actors in the political drama now being played out in Iraq. The "constitution" of Iraq, the election, the purple thumbs, al-Maliki... All of that is just baloney. The real political process lies in the struggle for power and resources that is being waged more or less in the open now among and between the many different and differing insurgent groups (Sunni Arabs) and the Shia factions who are fighting the Sunnis and each other to see which will be the biggest "players" in whatever part of the former Iraqi state the Shia Arabs manage to retain some control in. Ah, which will be the recipients of Iranian favor and largesse and protection? Surely, the Iraqi Shia Arabs have noticed that Iran has opened its purse to the Lebanese "brothers" for re-construction and political purposes.
I have always (since Desert Storm) been against the partition of Iraq. I remain opposed to that future for the region. 1- Partition inevitably will create havens for anti-American activity in some parts of the country, 2- Partition may lead to a general war in the region among contestants for dominance over resulting parts of what had been a country. 3- The Shia Arab state of "Iraq" will be an ally of Iran.
Nevertheless, one must face the fact that Iraq is falling to bits, and we have very little power to stop that or affect the division of the "spoils" that is coming.
President Bush can sit in his "bunker" in the basement of the West Wing and lecture his generals and functionaries until the end of days and that represents NOTHING in the real world of armed political struggle in Mesopotamia. He can lecture Al-Maliki every day and it will affect nothing. Why? It is because al-Maliki is just another Shia contender for power. He is head of the Iraqi government in name only.
Historians eventually will work this out. By then it will all be long over.
Pat Lang
clif said...
ReplyDeleteGoogle, "worst president ever";
Does he get a medal for that or something?
ReplyDeleteMaybe he could be in Ripleys.
ReplyDeleteNext to the guy with the 4 foot earlobes.
My take on Pat Lang;
ReplyDeleteThe Idiot and Dumsfeld produced ineffectual plays, and are doing a kabuki dance for the press while the players on the field have to deal with an offense from the enemy which does not accept our rules, and is playing to WIN, and not just an election.
And they will do what ever it takes to win, in manpower, not setting some arbitrary level of troops and setting ridiculous goals like purple fingers, which in the game of control mean NOTHIUNG if the purple fingers lead to ineffectual leadership which HIDE inside the green zone.
And no amount of presidential spokesman disinformation or angry press conferences of the president will change that ONE bit. Sound bites might win elections, they never win wars. So the repugs use sound bites and the enemy uses the tactics which worked against the Soviet Army in Afghanistan.
Not only has the Idiot and Dumsfeld failed to heed the lessons of Vietnam we were supposed to have learned, they have ignored the lessons the military took away from the soviets defeat in Afghanistan.
As the repugs thrash and rail against the looming election losses, they have a much bigger problem looming on their horizons. They have failed MUCH worse in their war on terra, in both Iraq and Afghanistan. And that failure and loss will not just cost them an election, but ALL OF US.
The limits of liberty: We're all suspects now
ReplyDeleteOn new year's day 1990, three days after becoming president of Czechoslovakia, Vaclav Havel looked his people in the eye and spoke to them as no one had done before. It is difficult to read his words without feeling the vibration of history of both the liberation and the horrors of the regime that had just expired, leaving the Czech people blinking in the cold sunlight of that extraordinary winter.
This is what he said. "The previous regime, armed with its arrogance and intolerant ideology, reduced man to a force of production. It reduced gifted and autonomous people to nuts and bolts of some monstrously huge, noisy, stinking machine whose real meaning was not clear to anyone. It could do no more but slowly and inexorably wear itself out, and all the nuts and bolts too."
That perfectly defines the true tyranny, where the state takes all liberty and bends each individual will to its own purpose. And here is the interesting thing that Havel put his finger on: no matter how brutal or ruthless the regime, the act of depriving people of their freedom starts the stopwatch on that regime's inevitable demise. What he was saying was that in modern times a state can only thrive in the fullest sense when individuals are accorded maximum freedom.
I agree. Individual liberty is not just the precondition for civilisation, not just morally right, not just the only way people can reach their full potential, live responsibly and have fun; it is also a necessity for the health of government.
(snip)
You might think this story is about the United States, but it is not, the British citizens are being forced to give up their liberty just as the citizens of the USA are.
And it is frightening what Blair and HIS neo-con group is doing over there MIRROR what Bush and the repug neo-cons are doing here. It's almost like they were playing off the same page in the playbook. To achieve the same goals.
But that would require some sort of cooperation between the two governments of the British and American peoples to deny them rights which took centuries to build up, and even WW1 and WW2 did not dissolve. And survived the cold war against the thtreat of communist domination by the Soviets.
Suddenly the term "New World Order" has an onimous meaning.
anyone watching John Stewart tonight, its a good one.
ReplyDeleteIts a rerun.
ReplyDeleteIt was on last Monday.
ReplyDeleteI missed Studio 60 so I'm watching it via NBC webcast.
ReplyDeleteIts great. You get to watch the whole show, and only see one commerical per segement.
The drawback is its the same commercial each time.
ReplyDeleteThis next story is a very good indicator of what is happening and HOW bad Iraq has become.
ReplyDeleteSunni captive spared execution by man he saved in battle
Hala Jaber
IT was a warm Wednesday morning when Abdul Rahman Ahmad, a Sunni, last risked his life by driving into the Shi’ite Baghdad suburb of Sadr City to stock up on supplies for his thriving supermarket.
In tranquil, pre-war times, Ahmad, 52, would make the journey to Sadr City’s Jamila wholesalers’ market every week, lingering to savour its spicy fragrance and its cacophony of banter and barter. But since the militias on either side of Baghdad’s post-war sectarian divide had started picking out victims at random, he paid no more than one peremptory visit a month.
Ahmad always sought safety in numbers. On this particular morning, he arrived with 28 fellow traders in a convoy of 11 vehicles.
The grim fate of frightened groups of men going about their business in Baghdad has become a routine story in the Iraqi media but Ahmad’s account of the horrors that befell his friends is remarkable, not least because he alone lived to tell the tale.
They had been in the market for only half an hour when it suddenly started to empty. Shutters were rolled down and doors locked. By the time Ahmad’s group tried to leave, all the exits were blocked by white four-wheel-drive vehicles surrounded by men in black from the Mahdi Army of Moqtadr al-Sadr, the radical Shi’ite cleric. The men checked identity cards, sending away three traders with Shi’ite names but marching the 26 Sunnis towards their vehicles. They ignored the pleas of their captives who were blindfolded with hands tied behind their backs.
“They drove us off in broad daylight and in front of everyone and nobody could help us,” Ahmad said.
After half an hour, the vehicles stopped in the playground of what appeared to be a school where the blindfolds and bonds were removed.
“We were hit on the head and our families and religion were cursed as they lined us up,” Ahmad recalled. “We were surrounded by 30 armed men all dressed in black.”
It was at this point that a sheikh arrived to declare: “A death sentence has been issued against you.” His announcement created panic.
“We were all begging and screaming and shouting,” Ahmad said. “We were so terrified that the mood was totally hysterical. Some men beat their chests and hit their faces and their bodies as they pleaded. We screamed to be spared. We even knelt on the ground and begged them not to kill us. But I saw death in their eyes.”
During these excruciating minutes, Ahmad felt the gaze of one of the militiamen upon him. The man approached and spoke softly to him amid the pandemonium. “You are Abdul Rahman?” he asked. “I am Karim. Does my name mean anything to you?” Ahmad realised instantly that the two men had been in another desperate situation 15 years earlier when they were soldiers retreating on foot from Kuwait beneath a ferocious American bombardment at the end of the first Gulf war.
“You were injured in the leg and I carried you on my shoulders,” Ahmad said. And he began to cry.
Karim glanced at the other traders, who included Rahman’s 21-year-old nephew. “I can’t do anything for them but I will try to save you,” he said. “I will be your executioner but I won’t shoot you. As we open fire you must immediately drop to the ground and play dead.”
They were made to march for about five minutes and then to stand in a line. “I thought to myself, ‘this is it’,” Ahmad said.
At the sound of the first shot he hit the ground as he had been told to do and two men fell on top of him. The firing continued for perhaps two minutes. He was picked up and dumped in the back of a truck and eventually thrown on a piece of waste ground with the others.
As soon as he reached home after the massacre on August 16, Ahmad and his wife began preparing to flee with their four children to Amman, the Jordanian capital, where he recounted his ordeal last week.
Ahmad’s friends were among 2,200 people who died violently in Baghdad in August. The figure for September rose to nearly 2,600 and October’s figure is expected to top 3,000. It is little wonder, then, that 1.6m refugees are estimated to have left Iraq, 500,000 of them for Jordan. “What is important is that I am alive and with my family,” Ahmad said. “I never ever want to go back to Iraq.”
******************************************
We have NO real clue what they go through every day.
But Bush would like to "stay the course" , I wonder if the Iraq's agree with him?
I just picked up the book "HUBRIS" by Michael Isikof and am skimming through it, listen to this exchange betweem Helen Thomas, Ari Fleischer and GWB. at the beginning on page 2.
ReplyDeleteBush casually asked Fleisher how his day had ben going and what the talk in the pressroom was. fleisher mentioned Helen Thomas and that she was a Gadfly constantly giving him a tough time on Iraq.
Bush and other Administration officials had been decrying saddam as a threat to the USA and the world. To many it sounded like war talk. the media were filled with speculation that the White House was preparing for invasion, But Bush refused to state his intentions.
At the days press briefing Thomas had peppered Fleisher with questions about Iraq, refering to stories in the media about secret plans for military action, what was the presidents rationale for invading Iraq, what made saddam differnt from other dictators and worth an invasion.
Fleisher said "Bush believes the people of iraq as well as the region will be MORE PEACEFUL and better off without Saddam, Helen Thomas retorted " thats not a reason to go to war" Fleisher responded "Well Helen, if you were president you could have vetoed the law"
As Fleisher recounted the exchance for Bush, bush's mood chasnged and out of nowhere, he unleashed a string of expletives.
Bush said ""did you tell her I dont like motherfu#$%s who gas their own people"
"did you tell her I dont like assho$%s who lie to the world"
"did you tell her i'm going to kick his sorry motherfu$%ing a$$ all over the middle east"
I love these quotes in particular:
ReplyDeleteFleisher said "Bush believes the people of iraq as well as the region will be MORE PEACEFUL and better off without Saddam"
here's another gem by GWB "did you tell her I dont like assho$%s who lie to the world"
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, Bush must have alot of self hatred and loathing with all the times he has lied to the world and the American public.
Aww. Bushy doesn't like himself.
ReplyDeleteIndependent Voters Favor Democrats by 2 to 1 in Poll
ReplyDeleteIraq War Cited Most Often As Top Issue for Elections
By Dan Balz and Jon Cohen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, October 24, 2006; Page A01
Two weeks before the midterm elections, Republicans are losing the battle for independent voters, who now strongly favor Democrats on Iraq and other major issues facing the country and overwhelmingly prefer to see them take over the House in November, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.
speaking of voting, I called the state elections board or whatever its called because I didnt receive my voting card and I mailed it in 2 months ago, their reply was that it was mailed to me over a month ago, could be simple incompetence, but it looks a little odd to me that people registering 2-3 months prior to an election would not get a voter registration card, almost like they know people who are not registered yet would vote against the incumbants.
ReplyDeleteWorfeus the repugs are the party of FEAR,
ReplyDeleteThey ran campaigns based on it,
the forsed silence from the opposition with it,
and NOW they shake with it, because they see reality is coming back, and reality is like FDR,
"We only have to fear is fear itself"
and the Americans seem to be deciding the FDR approach to war works better then the GWB approach,
NO FEAR
The only thing we have to fear is their fear.
ReplyDeleteWhen republicans are afeared the rest of us suffer.
Some of them are starting to realize that fear of getting killed by a terrorist is pretty silly, considering you have a better chance of being killed in a subway mugging than you do from a terrorist.
ReplyDeleteAnd thats if you live in Arizona.
ReplyDeleteor a long time I've had a post rattling around in my head about fear. I've had no luck writing the thing. But this great post by Alex, about a Cato Institute paper called "A False Sense of Insecurity" (PDF), finally spurred me to make the attempt. Bear with me.
ReplyDeleteWhat harms people in the U.S.?
Mainly heart disease and cancer, along with several other health ailments, accidents (mostly automobile), and suicide.
Homicide used to be among the top 15 killers, but it dropped off that list in 2003. Military attack on home soil hasn't happened since WWII. And terrorism? From the Cato paper:
Until 2001, far fewer Americans were killed in any grouping of years by all forms of international terrorism than were killed by lightning, and almost none of those terrorist deaths occurred within the United States itself. Even with the September 11 attacks included in the count, the number of Americans killed by international terrorism since the late 1960s (which is when the State Department began counting) is about the same as the number of Americans killed over the same period by lightning, accident-causing deer, or severe allergic reaction to peanuts.
There's more to threat assessment than body count, but ... peanuts?
It seems the main threat to the Americans comes not from other people but from ourselves: smoking, eating poorly, getting no exercise, polluting our air and water, and driving around in 2-ton personal vehicles.
And yet. What do we spend money on? Defending ourselves against other people. Almost half the U.S. federal budget is devoted to military expenditures. (Of course, the lion's share of DoD money is not "defending" us from anything. But put that aside.) Bush's military budget request for 2007 is over $460 billion. That's about 46 times the total U.N. budget, seven times larger than the military spending of China (the next biggest spender), and bigger than the military spending of the next 14 nations combined.
The Iraq war may yet run us over $1 trillion.
We Americans spend a grossly disproportionate amount on threats from other people rather than the things that, objectively speaking, most endanger our health and well-being. But harm is harm; death is death. I don't see why those who suffer and die from diseases of civilization are any less to be lamented than those killed by terrorists.
Americans also spend a grossly disproportionate amount of time thinking about threats from other people. Parents live in terror of "stranger danger" and child abduction, while stuffing their children with fatty, salty food, allowing them to sit in front of video games for eight hours a day, exposing them to environmental toxins, and driving them around in cars that mangle and kill thousands of them every year.
Fear of crime has risen in tandem with punitive criminal sentences for years, even though violent crime has declined for over a decade.
It sometimes seems that the healthier, wealthier, and safer we get, the more we fear other people. Why?
The biochemical system homo sapiens uses for threat assessment evolved over many thousands of years of brutal animal life on the savanna, at a time when living to 30 qualified you as a senior citizen. Immediate danger to person or tribe elicits a torrent of hormones from our adrenal glands; we are gripped by a fight-or-flight response.
As a way of avoiding danger on the savanna, it's handy. As a way of assessing the dangers of 21st century human society -- the worst of which are slow, imperceptible, and accumulative -- it sucks. Really sucks.
The toxic American political milieu thrives on this maladaptation. That as much as anything explains why contemporary environmentalism is difficult (dead, whatever). More on that next post.
so over the last 40 years about the same number of Americans have died from eating peanuts or getting hit by lighntning as have died from terrorism........but the Neo Cons expect us to sacrifice our freedoms and dismantle the constitution for a threat that over a 40 year span is about as dire as eating peanuts.
ReplyDeleteGeorge W. Bush was in the Air Force?
ReplyDeleteWe saw the importance of air power six days ago -- six decades ago, after our nation was attacked at Pearl Harbor. Soon after the attack, General Hap Arnold called Lieutenant Colonel Jimmy Doolittle into his office and gave him an unprecedented mission -- retaliate against Tokyo. Just over four months later, Doolittle's raiders had shocked the world by striking the enemy capital some 4,000 miles away from Pearl Harbor. To do it, they had to load B-52 bombers on the deck of an aircraft carrier, sail within a few hundred miles of enemy territory, take off and drop their payloads, knowing they had little chance to make it safely to China.
I'll bet any Navy vets can see that Georgie had to be really coked up.......really to think what he said could ever happen.
Even the White House website has a FOOTNOTE for those who do not know what the problem is.
Thats some good writing Mike. I am having a hard time seperating your writing from the article.
ReplyDeleteThats why I use italics when I'm quoting.
oops I forgot quotes and a link, I have to figure out how to do the italics and links.
ReplyDeleteItalics is easy. Just put an i inside of two angled brackets.
ReplyDeleteI can't type it here because the blog will interpret the characters and not display them, but just put in a < and I and an >.
Then close the tag when you want the italics to stop with an < and an / and an i and an >.
Thats it.
A link is not much more completected.
testing testing
ReplyDeletehttp://gristmill.grist.org/story/2006/8/15/0351/50738
ReplyDeleteBy Dave Roberts
"or a long time I've had a post rattling around in my head about fear. I've had no luck writing the thing. But this great post by Alex, about a Cato Institute paper called "A False Sense of Insecurity" (PDF), finally spurred me to make the attempt. Bear with me.
What harms people in the U.S.?
Mainly heart disease and cancer, along with several other health ailments, accidents (mostly automobile), and suicide.
Homicide used to be among the top 15 killers, but it dropped off that list in 2003. Military attack on home soil hasn't happened since WWII. And terrorism? From the Cato paper:
Until 2001, far fewer Americans were killed in any grouping of years by all forms of international terrorism than were killed by lightning, and almost none of those terrorist deaths occurred within the United States itself. Even with the September 11 attacks included in the count, the number of Americans killed by international terrorism since the late 1960s (which is when the State Department began counting) is about the same as the number of Americans killed over the same period by lightning, accident-causing deer, or severe allergic reaction to peanuts.
There's more to threat assessment than body count, but ... peanuts?
It seems the main threat to the Americans comes not from other people but from ourselves: smoking, eating poorly, getting no exercise, polluting our air and water, and driving around in 2-ton personal vehicles.
And yet. What do we spend money on? Defending ourselves against other people. Almost half the U.S. federal budget is devoted to military expenditures. (Of course, the lion's share of DoD money is not "defending" us from anything. But put that aside.) Bush's military budget request for 2007 is over $460 billion. That's about 46 times the total U.N. budget, seven times larger than the military spending of China (the next biggest spender), and bigger than the military spending of the next 14 nations combined.
The Iraq war may yet run us over $1 trillion.
We Americans spend a grossly disproportionate amount on threats from other people rather than the things that, objectively speaking, most endanger our health and well-being. But harm is harm; death is death. I don't see why those who suffer and die from diseases of civilization are any less to be lamented than those killed by terrorists.
Americans also spend a grossly disproportionate amount of time thinking about threats from other people. Parents live in terror of "stranger danger" and child abduction, while stuffing their children with fatty, salty food, allowing them to sit in front of video games for eight hours a day, exposing them to environmental toxins, and driving them around in cars that mangle and kill thousands of them every year.
Fear of crime has risen in tandem with punitive criminal sentences for years, even though violent crime has declined for over a decade.
It sometimes seems that the healthier, wealthier, and safer we get, the more we fear other people. Why?
The biochemical system homo sapiens uses for threat assessment evolved over many thousands of years of brutal animal life on the savanna, at a time when living to 30 qualified you as a senior citizen. Immediate danger to person or tribe elicits a torrent of hormones from our adrenal glands; we are gripped by a fight-or-flight response.
As a way of avoiding danger on the savanna, it's handy. As a way of assessing the dangers of 21st century human society -- the worst of which are slow, imperceptible, and accumulative -- it sucks. Really sucks.
The toxic American political milieu thrives on this maladaptation. That as much as anything explains why contemporary environmentalism is difficult (dead, whatever). More on that next post."
so over the last 40 years about the same number of Americans have died from eating peanuts or getting hit by lighntning as have died from terrorism........but the Neo Cons expect us to sacrifice our freedoms and dismantle the constitution for a threat that over a 40 year span is about as dire as eating peanuts.
cool, now I gotta figure out the bold like Dolt does and remember how to do links.
ReplyDeleteThe problems with Georgie's speech to dedicate the, United States Air Force Memorial Dedication in Arlington, Virginia.
ReplyDelete1. The Raid that Bush referenced too place on, April 18, 1942.
2. The B-52's first flight took place on, April 15, 1952.
3.a. The aircraft carrier the raid took off from is the USS Hornet.
b. Lenght, 824 feet 9 inches
c. Width, 114 feet
4.a. The B-52 has a wingspan of, 185 ft 0 in
b. and a lenght of, 159 ft 4 in
c. and take off requirement of 8200 ft.
Seems the air craft carrier that doolottle used was a bit short for a plane that was not even built when the raid occured.
But Bush being WRONG about the facts is NOYTHING new is it.
it is just disrespectful to the memories of those who fought the WW2 raid NOT to check the facts, and disrespectful to the Air Foprce that Bush knows so little and his handlers allow him to LOOK SO STUPID
Only some Coked up foole would think a B-52 could ever take off the USS Hornet.
ReplyDeleteMike Bold just requires a ..b.., in place of the I for italic letter, B is Bold letter
ReplyDeleteThis is a great peice Mike, and is a point I have been a strong advocate of in here and in TP (before they banned me permanently).
ReplyDeleteI really want to meet the American who is scared of terrorist attacks, because I want to ask them a question.
I want to ask them how they deal with the volumes of other ways the are about a million times more likely to die from.
If they're so afraid of something thats about as likely to happen as monkeys flying out of their butts, how do they deal with the real likelihood of automobile accidents? Do they just not drive?
How do they deal with heart disease? Are they all vegitarians?
How do they deal with crime? Do they just not leave their homes? Or for that matter, are their homes steel fortresses?
I'm serious, I'd really like to talk to the American who is so afraid of the terrorists they'd hand over our constitutional freedoms to the President hoping it will keep them safe.
testing testing
ReplyDeleteCLIF!
ReplyDeleteThats HILARIOUS!
When did Bush give this speech?
I wonder if the press will pick up on it? How could they put him up their with all thost false facts?
Are they just so used to lying that they don't even think about it anymore?
If you want to do links you need to do whats called an anchor tag.
ReplyDeleteJust like the italics or bold tags you use the brackets.
You need to do a bracket < followed by an A followed by a space followed by the word HREF followed by an immediate = sign followed by a single " followed by the URL followed by another " and a closing bracket>. Then your text goes here. Then just close it with a bracket followed by a slash / followed by an A followed by a closing bracket >.
Thats it.
Well worfeus, actually it is NOT a LIE because the Idiot proly does NOT know.
ReplyDeleteThe speech took place on Oct 14 2006, and the White House web site has a footnote to correct the "error"
I guess we all know why the Iraqi Intel was so screwed up, they can't even get facts straight if it on;y requires google and the internet to check them out.
Thats really amazing Clif.
ReplyDeleteWhen they make mistakes like that with our OWN HISTORY, how the hell does anyone believe them when they PREDICT the FUTURE???
LOL.
It is very telling the white House has to footnote Presidential speeches to correct them.
ReplyDeleteBush is the biggest embarrassment that ever resided in the white house.
No wonder 65 active duty soldiers in Iraqhave sent notice to congress to get them out of Iraq,
ReplyDeleteThey are proly fed up with his ignorance and Hubris also
I just read that link to that blog Clif. Thats an amazing story and its going to be big on the news.
ReplyDeleteI pulled this quote off the blog.
Lydia will like this one.
When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace.
Jimi Hendrix
Worfeus, the cracks in the repug machine are breaking out everywhere.
ReplyDeleteIt is not, to put it in the terms of the trolls here,just the "barking moon bats" anymore, but regular citizens and soldiers are seing through them NOW.
I guess they are gonna need a lot more people to listen to the Americans now.
If the soldiers are quietly revolting, that does not bode well for the clowns at the top.
The actions of the 65 soldiers is one legal way to express their opinion.
Moonbats.
ReplyDeleteYou don't even hear that expression anymore.
They don't want to offend 2 thirds of Americans.
The funny part, congress HAS to respond. The response can be exhibited, and Wednesday's press conference is going to be INTERESTING.
ReplyDeleteWill the MSM cover it?
What does the GOP say to spin this?
How do you swiftboat a soldier in a combat zone?
The US Military is now the enemy?
This Wednesday is going to be quite interesting.
Oh yea I think the MSM will DEFINATELY cover it.
ReplyDeleteIt's becoming cool to question authority again.
The Jesus Juice is slowly wearing off.
But when these assclowns do realise the end of the game they have played for the last decade is coming, they will proly get quite dangerous and nasty.
ReplyDeleteThey still have two aircraft carriers the Enterprise and Eisenhower, and their complete battle groups, combined with the Iwo Jima Expeditionary Strike Group steamed into the Persian Gulf to join the US naval, air and marine concentration piling up opposite Iran's shores. It consists of the amphibious transport dock USS Nashville, the guided-missile destroyers USS Cole and USS Bulkeley, the guided-missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea, the attack submarine USS Albuquerque, and the dock landing ship USS Whidbey Island.
The Iwo Jima group is now cruising 60 km from Kuwait off Iran's coast. As DEBKAfile and DEBKA-Net-Weekly reported exclusively two weeks ago, three US naval task forces will be in place opposite Iran in the Persian Gulf and Arabian Sea by October 21. The other two are the USS Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group and the USS Enterprise Strike Group..
They still can strike Iran after the election irregardles of how it turns out. By striking between the election and Janurary they can get the lame duck repugs to give them the money to fund this after the initial attack.
I'm NOT saying they will, but they have that option, and we are powerles to stop it.
One of the servicemen appealing to congress to stop the war will be on Countdown with keith olbermann Tuesday..........and their press conference is Wednesday.
ReplyDeleteThis WILL become the story for a few days at least.
Clif. If you haven't seen it yet you should get the second season of TCFC. The last episode theres an option to listen to it with Lydia and Deb talking about it, and its kind of cool. They remenise about making the show and they talk about some cool things like John Ritter working next door, and Mclean Stevenson coming by and eating lunch with Hal Lindon.
ReplyDeleteAll those stars we knew back in the good ole days. (My mom loved Barney Miller)
Theres also in the special features and interview with Lydia, Jim Bullock and Deb Van Valkenburg at a TCFC reunion. Lydia says something thats really profound, she says the 80's had an innocence to them, and thats exactly true. There was something special about the 80's, and something decent, and people were nicer to each other then. Kids were nicer, and didn't shoot people, republicans were movie stars and good guys and it was cool to be happy.
ReplyDeleteMan I miss the 80's.
I watched every episode of those DVD's. It really took me back.
ReplyDeleteAnd hey British Gary, if you're lurking out there old boy, if I had to liken TCFC (since you asked me earlier and I never answered) to a British comedy I'd say it was a lot like the BBC sitcom, "As Time Goes By". The delivery is similar albeit more Americanized and it wacky friends theme is there as well.
ReplyDeleteIf you're looking to go back to a better time, a happier and simpler time, then you're going to like watching the episodes, especially the last 8 on the second season. Theres a lot more of the girls on those.
Ronald McDumsfeld said; "lets be realistic"
ReplyDeleteRight this coming from a clown who planned to invade a country with the expectations that the invading Army would be greated with hugs and Flowers.
I think McDumsfeld's "realism" to me is as Bad as Bush's "democracy" in Iraq was to Putin.
My latest creation.
ReplyDeleteOh, btw, Mike/Worf, the creature under Neo........thats a girl....the female counterpart of our species. Dont be scared and close your eyes, they are simply bonding....LOL!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lUXn8NaUCk
Bible Boy said
ReplyDelete"Man I miss the 80's."
Agreed!
George W. Bush and Presidential Greatness
ReplyDeleteOctober 24th, 2006
It’s very unfashionable these days to say nice things about George W. Bush. After six years of being screamed at by the press, even W’s friends are getting worn down. But that’s no different from Lincoln and Truman. Being screamed at long and hard is practically an entrance test for presidential stature in America.
I’ll bet right now that Bush 43 will come to be seen as one of the most important presidents, not because he has solved the challenges of the war we now face, but because he is the first president to try to do so with all his heart and soul. In the Long War on Islamofascism, future administrations will learn from George W. Bush, just as Cold War presidents learned from Harry S Truman. Truman didn’t win the Cold War, but he defined it for the next forty years. Like Truman’s, this is a watershed administration, gifted with the intelligence and courage to recognize the times we live in.
Sad to say, our Democrat Party isn’t ready to govern. The only thing more terrifying than nuked-up mullahs is the Democrats’ eagerness to give them whatever their tiny hearts desire. It was Bill Clinton who gave two nuclear reactors to Kim Jong Il in exchange for a promise to be good— but with no actual inspections for five years. It was Jimmah Carter who allowed Ayatollah Khomeini to seize power in Tehran, because a religious person like Khomeini just had to be a lot sweeter than the Shah. The sadomasochistic nature of the Khomeini regime is incomprehensible to ole Jimmah, who naturally still thinks he was right all along. The dictionary doesn’t have a word for that kind of folly. It is beyond words.
Clinton and Carter are unable to learn. The press constantly tells them how wonderful they are, and invents new delusions to set the stage for more Democrat fiascos to come. So Clinton and Carter keep the Democrats stuck in a mythic past. Jimmy Carter really believes he had Kim Jong Il changing course toward peace and love in 1994. Clinton presumably believes Yasser Arafat really was going to stick with his solemn agreements with Israel. For the Democrats it’s “shoulda-woulda-coulda” forever and ever.
But great PR does not make for great presidencies. Passing the buck doesn’t do it. Had Lincoln chosen to ignore those shots fired at Fort Sumter in April, 1861 he would have enabled the end of the United States. Had Harry Truman failed to drop the Bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the US would have lost hundreds of thousands more lives—or settled with an Imperial Japan that was only a decade away from nuclear weapons. Such decisions are inhumanly difficult, but they must be made with clarity and courage. That is why Carter and Clinton will forever be third-raters, and why Truman and Bush 43 may be among our best. For our greatest presidents it’s not “book learning” but character that matters.
Moral intuition is the key. Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. once said that FDR had a third-rate mind but first-rate political instincts. What Lippmann didn’t say was that most of our lives are governed by finely honed instincts: only intellectuals try to define every word they say, and it constantly gets them snarled up when they try to act: It’s the Hamlet syndrome. In contrast, moral intuition is cherished in Anglo-American conservatism because our intuitions capture truths that cannot be fully articulated. Karl Marx was a creature of German and French philosophy, which is precisely why his ideas have been so immensely destructive of human lives and happiness. Marx represents the triumph of ungrounded intellect over reality-based intuition.
Our chattering classes think that ordinary Americans are stupid, because they don’t know the difference between Slovakia and Slovenia. But they know the difference between right and wrong: which is a lot more important, and an insight in painfully short supply among those who fashion themselves of superior mental capacity.
By the measure of moral clarity and courage, George W. Bush is right up there with the best in American history.
James Lewis is a frequent contributor to American Thinker.
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles.php?article_id=5973
TT only a moron would mention GWB and presidential greatness in the same sentence.
ReplyDeleteWorf,I agree with you those episodes take me back to a happy care free time.
ReplyDeleteBTW,werent those commentaries cool, I never saw anything like that but I thought it was really cool to have Lyd and Deb remenise and give their perspective about the show.
I liked the reunion also, it was such a happy reunion, I watched the Happy Days reunion the year before and it was great, but it just had a different tone to it and made you feel all sad and sappy.
I always take a long weekend on Halloween weekend to watch all the scarry movie marathons and go to a party i'll try to find the time to watch Season 2 this weekend in its entirety.
06 ELEX: BACK TO TOSS-UP
ReplyDeleteBy DICK MORRIS & EILEEN Mc GANN
October 24, 2006 -- THE latest polls show something very strange and quite encouraging is happening: The Republican base seems to be coming back home. This trend, only vaguely and dimly emerging from a variety of polls, suggests that a trend may be afoot that would deny the Democrats control of the House and the Senate.
With two weeks to go, anything can happen, but it is beginning to look poss- ible that the Democratic surge in the midterm elections may fall short of control in either House.
Here's the evidence:
* Pollsters Scott Rasmussen and John Zogby both show Republican Bob Corker gaining on Democratic Rep. Harold Ford Jr. in Tennessee, a must-win Senate seat for the Democrats. Zogby has Corker ahead by seven, while Rasmussen still shows a Ford edge of two points.
* Zogby reports a "turnaround" in New Jersey's Senate race with the GOP candidate Tom Kean taking the lead, a conclusion shared by some other public polls.
* Even though Sen. Jim Talent in Missouri is still under the magic 50 percent threshold for an incumbent, Rasmussen has him one point ahead and Zogby puts him three up. But unless he crests 50 percent, he'll probably still lose.
* Even though he is a lost cause, both Rasmussen and Zogby show Montana's Republican Sen. Conrad Burns cutting the gap and moving up.
* In Virginia, Republican embattled incumbent Sen. George Allen has now moved over the 50 percent threshold in his internal polls. (He'd been at 48 percent.)
Nationally, Zogby reports that the generic Democratic edge is down to four points, having been as high as nine two weeks ago.
None of these data indicates that the Republicans are out of trouble yet, but Democrats must win one of these three races: Ford in Tennessee, Menendez in New Jersey or Webb in Virginia. If not, they'll fall at least one seat short of controlling the Senate even if they succeed in knocking off all five vulnerable GOP incumbents in Montana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Missouri.
Why are Republican fortunes brightening?
The GOP base, alienated by the Foley scandal and the generally dismal record of this Congress, may have fast forwarded to the prospect of a Democratic victory and recoiled. They may have pondered the impact of a repeal of the Patriot Act, a ban on NSA wiretapping and a requirement of having an attorney present in terrorist questioning - and decided not to punish the country for the sins of the Republican leaders.
Bush's success in dealing with North Korea and his willingness to reassess tactics in Iraq could also play a part in the slight shift now underway.
Then, too, some in the Democratic Party must be finally realizing what a disastrous decision it was to put Howard Dean in as party chairman. The Democratic National Committee is broke and borrowing, while the GOP can afford to fund fully its key races.
Right now, we would have to say that control of Congress has gone from "lean Democrat" to a "toss-up." And that's progress for the Republicans.
Dream on Troll Tex, the repugs reign of evil is coming to an end, and your halfwit dictator's wings are about to be clipped.
ReplyDeleteTalllTexan said...
ReplyDeleteGeorge W. Bush and Presidential Greatness
BAWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAAHHAHHAHHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAHHAHAHA
He's great alright.
ReplyDeleteGreat at making a mess.
Mr.Excitement Al Gore was in Berkeley yesterday to lend support to an initiative that earmarks monies for "green projects," although Tipper's better half arrived in a Prius (yes,his fat ass fit in one)his motorcade consisted of 2 motorcycles,2 limousines and a Dodge Ram 1500 truck....can you say global warming? Hypocritcal?You make the call.
ReplyDeleteFor those of you with functioning brains, global warming will not be impacted one iota based on what Al Gores support group drives.
ReplyDeleteGlobal warming will only be impacted by changing minds, and laws, and turning us away from the combustion engine and moving us ahead to new techology which is everywhere, and fully capable of meeting our transportation needs.
Ignorant people always naysay whenever there is change on the horizon, but fortunately history usually records them as such and society moves slowly forward.
your absolutely right Worf the first leg of the push into Alternate energy to make us more independent will most likely come from vehicles and transportation away from gas to electric hybrids and fuels based on cleaner burning natural gas and synthetic fuels made from clean coal technology.
ReplyDeleteRight now they can build a car that runs on water Mike. They've done it in fact.
ReplyDeleteProblem is, their are people like Rusty in the world.
People who worship power, wealth and greed above all else. These people have been fighting the development of new technology since we realized fossil fuels were a problem, and help the big oil companies bury these new techologies.
California made a law that required fuel emissions improvements in automobiles, and General Motors made a fleet of 1000 electric cars that were super fast, plugged in anywhere, and were not hybrids, in other words the burned no gasoline.
The big oil companies pulled their strings, and GM recalled all the cars, then DESTROYED THEM!!!!!
Think about the level of EVIL it takes to do something like that.
Hastert goes before congressional panel
ReplyDeleteBy LARRY MARGASAK,
Associated Press Writer
17 minutes ago
WASHINGTON
House Speaker Dennis Hastert on Tuesday sat down with ethics investigators trying to pin down when he and his staff learned about ex-Rep. Mark Foley (news, bio, voting record)'s come-ons to former male pages and what they did to stop it.
The timeline that Hastert and his staff have given conflicts with the accounts of others. Hastert, R-Ill., has said that he didn't find out about Foley until late September, when Foley's approaches to the former pages became public.
Hastert's appearance followed that of Rep. Tom Reynolds of New York, the House GOP campaign chairman, who said he warned the speaker about Foley last spring.
Hastert, expected to testify this week, has said he doesn't recall the conversation.
Well Worf once the Bush Administration who is in bed with and beholden to big oil is out of office I think we will see a push for more fuel efficient cars that run on alternate fuels, but that push needs to come from government or it will never happen.
ReplyDeleteFools like Rusty rail on Jimmy Carter, but it was Carter whose push for increased fuel economy for cars as well as Solar, Nuclear and wind power as well as him having the guts andlongterm thinking to appoint Volker to the fed and allow him to break the back of inflation that set up the boom and almost 20 year Bull Market that Reagan got credit for.
Carter installed solar panels on the White House and Reagan immediately ripped them out. but your right, Reagan wasnt a bad president or an evil man like GWB. I remember Reagans son talking about his fathers presidency, he said he didnt agree with many of Reagan;s decisions, but he said his father was a good decent man and GWB isnt fit to shine his shoes, and I agreed with him completely.
Carters push into alternate energy and more fuel efficient cars waswhat brought down the price of oil and along with lower interest rates sparked the almost 20 year bullmarket.
ReplyDeletewhat I find amazing is hippocritical fools like Rusty say the recession that happened at the beginning of GWB's first term was Bill Clintons fault but yet they blame Carter for recession, high oilprices and inflation that happened on his watch also but were directly caused by the vietnam war and inflatiuonary policies and money supply growth that occured under Nixon, ford and Johnson.
Pay not attention to that man behind the curtain folks.
ReplyDeleteHe's merely pulling levers and pushing buttons and has no brainpower of his own.
Hydrogen powered vehicles have been around for a while, and the Musashi series literally ran on just a few gallons of water.
They are clean, efficient and as safe as petroleum powered vehicles.
Forgive rusty. He can't help it if the home schooling thing didn't pay off.
Poor pathetic rube.
ReplyDeleteTry not to speak....
ReplyDeleteYou need to preserve those precious remaining brain cells.
Another Jem from TPM
ReplyDelete"Simply staying the course in Iraq is not working. We need to take a new direction. We believe these recommendations comprise an effective alternative to the current open-ended commitment which is not producing the progress in Iraq we would all like to see. Thank you for your careful consideration of these suggestions."
That's Nancy Pelosi and the House Democratic leadership laying out in July what appears to be the Bush Republican position in October.
(ed.note: Special note of thanks to TPM Reader PH.)
-- Josh Marshal
So the repugs are reduced to using Osama and al Zawahri as spokesmen, and stealing ideas from Nancy Pelosi, and Tiny thinks they have a chance?
Hell the had to run;
OPERATION DESPERATE RADIO CALL
on the white house lawn today.
It should be known as;
Operation Spread the Bullsh*t Around
And considering two weeks from a mid term election the fact they have to get the most brainless reichwingnut talking heads to sit in a tent on the white house lawn and spew propaganda points for the Idiot and KKKarl, it is very telling Tiny, it tells me that they want these dishonest hate mongers for the reichwingnuts to just shrill their LIES with NO editorials about how bad everything really is.
You assclowns have about run your pathetic illegal and immoral course.
Come November the beginning of a return to SANITY is gonna happen.
And you clowns FEAR it.
We who live in the reality based world do NOT, just the kool aid swirling reichwingnut neo-con minions who have LIED along with their masters hoping to get a spot at the GOP pig trough.
Well son, that is a commin' to an end..and soon the separation the crooks from the idiots will begin.
Which are you a crook who knew and decided to aid in the illegal and immoral actions or an Idiot whop really didn't know but are so stupidly indoctrinated you never accepted all the clues from reality.
Wow. The senate is really down to the wire. A raft of new Mason-Dixon polls just came out. Corker (R) over Ford (D) by two, Tester (D) over Burns (R) by 3, McCaskill (D) over Talent (R) by three. See them all here.
ReplyDelete-- Josh Marshall
Loud and blustery Tiny?
The polls say something different?
It's that "reality thingy" again ain't it boy?
Don't worry, you can claim STUPIDITY, and ask for clues to reality after November 7th.
Clif, start dusting off your conspiracy theories because you'll need them.
ReplyDeleteNo son I onbly need the Democrats to take the HOUSE, and the reality based cleaning of the nations capital can begin.
ReplyDeleteJust the HOUSE and the repug machine is gonna get a truth-o-cution, even better than it got in the summer of 1974.
Remember the senate is just extra, we are really only counting on capturing the House, it is the MSM who wants to push the senate so they can say that the democrats did not win that much, BUT control of just one half of the legislativce branch will bring Bush to the table with democrats or get squat.
Bush does not know how to work with those he disagrees with.
So he will proly just play nintendo fron janurary 2007 until Janurary 2009. And dead eye will be neutered.
Get ready to be TRUTH-O-CUTED.
ReplyDeleteClif said: "Bush does not know how to work with those he disagrees with."
ReplyDeleteHe worked with a Democratic statehouse here when he was governor.
Anyway, the only way to save face is to call it a conspiracy. And, bottom line: GOP retains both houses, so the point is moot.
Start buying Reynolds Wrap so you can fashion a hat out of it, and rap it around your head.
BTW tiny the abramoff investigation is FAR from cleaning out corrupt repugs, like Doolittle, Lewis, Palumbo, who all have lawyered up....with tens of thousands of dollars spent on their lawyers.
ReplyDeleteAnd the Duke Cunningham investigation is not done eother.
I'd mention Curt Weldon here but with the Ongoibg FBI raids and investigation, I do not think he will be a memeber of congress come Jan.
It was always about the HOUSE son, the senaye is just what happened along the way.
And if the IDIOT has to deal with Speajker nancy Pelosi, he has little to threaten her with, and KKKarl will just have to try the NSA tattletale routine hoping to get something to blackmail her like he did Denny and Mark Foley
But continue to HOPE diebold and the voter supression can pull it out just one more time.
ReplyDeleteAfter all you assclowns HAVE not run on your pathetic record or the failures of the Idiot have you.
It's very simple. We win both houses.
ReplyDeleteAny questions?