THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE: Bush's approval rating is at 23%, the lowest of any president in history. And 80% of all Americans, want low-income children to have health coverage. But only one president and 14 Republicans with 14 votes stand in the way of the will of the people. What kind of man is President Bush?
Rep. Pete Stark (D-CA) was more than a little upset after the SCHIP veto override failed. The 18-term lawmaker, stirred the pot Thursday when he attacked President Bush and congressional Republicans for backing hundreds of billions of dollars for the Iraq war, but blocking a $35 billion expansion of a children's health insurance program.
"You're going to spend it to blow up innocent people if we can get enough kids to grow old enough for you to send to Iraq to get their heads blown off for the president's amusement," Stark told Republicans on the floor of the House.
The remarks during the debate over Bush's veto of the children's health bill drew howls of outrage from House Republicans and conservative commentators. His words were replayed endlessly on cable news and talk radio. By Friday, even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi - who praised Stark for his leadership on the children's health bill a day earlier - was distancing herself from his comments.
What Pelosi also meant: Stark had handed Republicans an easy way to distract the public from what Democrats view as a winning stance on the popular children's health bill. Stark, 75, declined a request Friday for an interview.
He began: "First of all, I'm just amazed that the Republicans are worried that we can't pay for insuring an additional 10 million children. They sure don't care about finding $200 billion to fight the illegal war in Iraq. Where are you going to get that money? You are going to tell us lies like you're telling us today? Is that how you're going to fund the war?
"You don't have money to fund the war or children, but you're going to spend it to blow up innocent people if we can get enough kids to grow old enough for you to send to Iraq to get their heads blown off for the president's amusement."
He went back to the same point moments later: "But President Bush's statements about children's health shouldn't be taken any more seriously than his lies about the war in Iraq. The truth is that Bush just likes to blow things up in Iraq, in the United States, and in Congress."
On the left, Stark's comments drew rave reviews. They were posted on the blog, DailyKos, stirring applause from the site's anti-war, anti-Bush readers: "Wow, this guy kicks ass" wrote one blogger.
But Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas, who followed Stark on the floor, said: "It is despicable to have a member of this Congress accuse this president, any president, of willfully blowing the heads, quote, blowing the heads off our young men and women over in Iraq and Afghanistan."
The GOP spin machine went into hyperdrive. House Republican Leader John Boehner's press aides alerted reporters to Stark's comments. The National Republican Campaign Committee issued a press release, titled: "Democrat Disgrace: Pete Stark Drags SCHIP Political Circus to All-Time Low."
But Stark continued: "What are you going to do for that 200 or 300 billion bucks, folks, that you're spending to kill these kids when they grow up? You can't answer that, can you? You look at your shoes, look up here, you don't know," he said.
"So you don't even want to talk about 200 or 300 billion bucks to kill innocent Iraqis and young men and women. There is no member of this House that has an enlisted child over there. There is no risk for you guys."
Republican tried unsuccessfully to have his words stricken from the official record.
***
From Arianna Huffington: At Wednesday's press conference, President Bush insisted that he is still "relevant." Normally, it's an immutable law of politics that if you have to say you're relevant, you're not. But in Bush's case, his role as the primary Decider on the war in Iraq is keeping him tragically relevant -- in the same way that the driver of a bus careening toward the edge of cliff is extremely relevant to his passengers. Okay, so Bush is relevant. And deeply deluded if he truly believes, as he also claimed, that he and Congressional Democrats are "finding common ground on Iraq." Beating your opponent into the ground with vetoes and filibuster threats is not the same as finding common ground.
* No Child Left Alone: 2-year-old S-CHIP recipient Bethany Wilkerson is new target of right-wingers.
* Mitch McConnell’s staff DID write emails interested in smearing the Frosts, and then lied about doing so.
My Letter to Congressman Pete Stark:
Thank you for standing up to Bush on his atrocious, un-Christian, warmongering behavior. Over 80% of the country agrees with you and believes Bush does not have his priorities straight. He cares about frozen fetal cells and the unborn, but cares nothing about real, live BREATHING CHILDREN! He cares nothing about the poor or "the least among us." Bush flies across the country in the middle of the night to intervene in the Terry Schiavo case, a private family matter, but sees no reason to help the low-income families and children of America — or the Katrina victims for that matter.
Many Americans believe George Bush is not only un-American, but is a war criminal. We also believe Bush, Cheney, Haliburton and Blackwater among others, are all guilty of war profiteering — a treasonous crime. They are guilty of dividing our country through politicizing this war, of breaking the Geneva Convention, of illegally wiretapping U.S. citizens and of violating our 2nd and 4th Amendment rights, and of myriad of other crimes including breaking the right to writ of Habeas Corpus.
You are right Congressman Stark — Bush should should apologize for lying in a rush to war, for violating our Constitution, and for never being honest about his reasons for this war.
Bush has also chipped away at our freedoms and the morale of our troops by hiring private mercenary armies like Blackwater — at taxpayer expense — whose only loyalty is to cash.
WE THE PEOPLE are horrified at what has become of our beautiful democracy.
Congressman Stark, though we may not have chosen the provocative words you chose, we applaud you for your strength in STANDING UP TO the CORRUPT, FRAUDULENT, UNCHRISTIAN BUSH ADMINISTRATION. Our war planes bombed small children in Iraq. Countless children are dead because of this "war on an abstract noun" the so-called 'war on terror.' Why are Iraqi children less valuable than American children? Why doesn't Bush care about human life?
ON WIRETAPPING:
A caller on Randi Rhodes show called in to say "if you're innocent, what does it matter if they wiretap you?" Randi let him have it. She said, "My father would roll over in his grave to hear you say he fought in vain. He fought in WWII, marching over Normandy to fight for our freedoms — for our Constitutional rights of privacy, freedom of speech, freedom to assemble, freedom to protest." My theory is this: who is to say they won't accuse you or take you away for "perceived liberal bias or treason in speaking out against our Fuhrer (Bush) one day, or misinterpret one of your phone calls? But all of our freedoms are being stripped away right now. We are no longer allowed to assemble except in organized "pens" far away from the object of our protest. We are afraid to speak out loud on the phone or in our homes for fear we will be misunderstood or taken as an enemy of the STate for disagreeing with this absurdly unAmerican president.
If Bush, Cheney and the NSA went to Qwest, Verizon and AT&T to put wiretapping in place seven months before 9/11 doesn't this mean they ied when they said they were wiretapping Americans to catch terrorists as a result of 9/11? Isn't this treason?
Thank you,
Lydia Cornell
www.LydiaCornell.com
www.Basham and Cornell Progressive Talk
www.BashamandCornell.com
The ONLY Progressive Talk show in Las Vegas, broadcasting live daily at 8 AM on KLAV 1230 AM.
***
As you know, media consolidation poses a tremendous threat to authentic journalism and diversity of opinion.
And it may soon be worse. At this very moment, the FCC is trying to pass new media ownership rules that will hand Big Media a Big Win. If the changes are approved, one company could own the major daily newspaper, eight radio stations and three television stations in the same market. Worse yet, once the digital television transition is completed in 2009 -- allowing stations to broadcast multiple signals - a single company could control up to 18 television channels in one market.
As it stands now, six huge conglomerates - whose combined 2006 revenues reached more than $293 billion - dominate media ownership.
You can bet those six companies are more interested in turning a profit than in publishing or broadcasting a diverse range of news and opinions. And the progressive viewpoint? Forget it!
That's why it's more important than ever for progressives to unite online. By harnessing the power of the Internet, we can share information and inspire each other to take action.
Unlike the General Electrics, the Viacoms, and the Walt Disneys of the world, CommonDreams.org isn't interested in making a profit.
God Bless you!
Rep. Pete Stark (D-CA) was more than a little upset after the SCHIP veto override failed. The 18-term lawmaker, stirred the pot Thursday when he attacked President Bush and congressional Republicans for backing hundreds of billions of dollars for the Iraq war, but blocking a $35 billion expansion of a children's health insurance program.
"You're going to spend it to blow up innocent people if we can get enough kids to grow old enough for you to send to Iraq to get their heads blown off for the president's amusement," Stark told Republicans on the floor of the House.
The remarks during the debate over Bush's veto of the children's health bill drew howls of outrage from House Republicans and conservative commentators. His words were replayed endlessly on cable news and talk radio. By Friday, even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi - who praised Stark for his leadership on the children's health bill a day earlier - was distancing herself from his comments.
What Pelosi also meant: Stark had handed Republicans an easy way to distract the public from what Democrats view as a winning stance on the popular children's health bill. Stark, 75, declined a request Friday for an interview.
He began: "First of all, I'm just amazed that the Republicans are worried that we can't pay for insuring an additional 10 million children. They sure don't care about finding $200 billion to fight the illegal war in Iraq. Where are you going to get that money? You are going to tell us lies like you're telling us today? Is that how you're going to fund the war?
"You don't have money to fund the war or children, but you're going to spend it to blow up innocent people if we can get enough kids to grow old enough for you to send to Iraq to get their heads blown off for the president's amusement."
He went back to the same point moments later: "But President Bush's statements about children's health shouldn't be taken any more seriously than his lies about the war in Iraq. The truth is that Bush just likes to blow things up in Iraq, in the United States, and in Congress."
On the left, Stark's comments drew rave reviews. They were posted on the blog, DailyKos, stirring applause from the site's anti-war, anti-Bush readers: "Wow, this guy kicks ass" wrote one blogger.
But Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas, who followed Stark on the floor, said: "It is despicable to have a member of this Congress accuse this president, any president, of willfully blowing the heads, quote, blowing the heads off our young men and women over in Iraq and Afghanistan."
The GOP spin machine went into hyperdrive. House Republican Leader John Boehner's press aides alerted reporters to Stark's comments. The National Republican Campaign Committee issued a press release, titled: "Democrat Disgrace: Pete Stark Drags SCHIP Political Circus to All-Time Low."
But Stark continued: "What are you going to do for that 200 or 300 billion bucks, folks, that you're spending to kill these kids when they grow up? You can't answer that, can you? You look at your shoes, look up here, you don't know," he said.
"So you don't even want to talk about 200 or 300 billion bucks to kill innocent Iraqis and young men and women. There is no member of this House that has an enlisted child over there. There is no risk for you guys."
Republican tried unsuccessfully to have his words stricken from the official record.
***
From Arianna Huffington: At Wednesday's press conference, President Bush insisted that he is still "relevant." Normally, it's an immutable law of politics that if you have to say you're relevant, you're not. But in Bush's case, his role as the primary Decider on the war in Iraq is keeping him tragically relevant -- in the same way that the driver of a bus careening toward the edge of cliff is extremely relevant to his passengers. Okay, so Bush is relevant. And deeply deluded if he truly believes, as he also claimed, that he and Congressional Democrats are "finding common ground on Iraq." Beating your opponent into the ground with vetoes and filibuster threats is not the same as finding common ground.
* No Child Left Alone: 2-year-old S-CHIP recipient Bethany Wilkerson is new target of right-wingers.
* Mitch McConnell’s staff DID write emails interested in smearing the Frosts, and then lied about doing so.
My Letter to Congressman Pete Stark:
Thank you for standing up to Bush on his atrocious, un-Christian, warmongering behavior. Over 80% of the country agrees with you and believes Bush does not have his priorities straight. He cares about frozen fetal cells and the unborn, but cares nothing about real, live BREATHING CHILDREN! He cares nothing about the poor or "the least among us." Bush flies across the country in the middle of the night to intervene in the Terry Schiavo case, a private family matter, but sees no reason to help the low-income families and children of America — or the Katrina victims for that matter.
Many Americans believe George Bush is not only un-American, but is a war criminal. We also believe Bush, Cheney, Haliburton and Blackwater among others, are all guilty of war profiteering — a treasonous crime. They are guilty of dividing our country through politicizing this war, of breaking the Geneva Convention, of illegally wiretapping U.S. citizens and of violating our 2nd and 4th Amendment rights, and of myriad of other crimes including breaking the right to writ of Habeas Corpus.
You are right Congressman Stark — Bush should should apologize for lying in a rush to war, for violating our Constitution, and for never being honest about his reasons for this war.
Bush has also chipped away at our freedoms and the morale of our troops by hiring private mercenary armies like Blackwater — at taxpayer expense — whose only loyalty is to cash.
WE THE PEOPLE are horrified at what has become of our beautiful democracy.
Congressman Stark, though we may not have chosen the provocative words you chose, we applaud you for your strength in STANDING UP TO the CORRUPT, FRAUDULENT, UNCHRISTIAN BUSH ADMINISTRATION. Our war planes bombed small children in Iraq. Countless children are dead because of this "war on an abstract noun" the so-called 'war on terror.' Why are Iraqi children less valuable than American children? Why doesn't Bush care about human life?
ON WIRETAPPING:
A caller on Randi Rhodes show called in to say "if you're innocent, what does it matter if they wiretap you?" Randi let him have it. She said, "My father would roll over in his grave to hear you say he fought in vain. He fought in WWII, marching over Normandy to fight for our freedoms — for our Constitutional rights of privacy, freedom of speech, freedom to assemble, freedom to protest." My theory is this: who is to say they won't accuse you or take you away for "perceived liberal bias or treason in speaking out against our Fuhrer (Bush) one day, or misinterpret one of your phone calls? But all of our freedoms are being stripped away right now. We are no longer allowed to assemble except in organized "pens" far away from the object of our protest. We are afraid to speak out loud on the phone or in our homes for fear we will be misunderstood or taken as an enemy of the STate for disagreeing with this absurdly unAmerican president.
If Bush, Cheney and the NSA went to Qwest, Verizon and AT&T to put wiretapping in place seven months before 9/11 doesn't this mean they ied when they said they were wiretapping Americans to catch terrorists as a result of 9/11? Isn't this treason?
Thank you,
Lydia Cornell
www.LydiaCornell.com
www.Basham and Cornell Progressive Talk
www.BashamandCornell.com
The ONLY Progressive Talk show in Las Vegas, broadcasting live daily at 8 AM on KLAV 1230 AM.
***
As you know, media consolidation poses a tremendous threat to authentic journalism and diversity of opinion.
And it may soon be worse. At this very moment, the FCC is trying to pass new media ownership rules that will hand Big Media a Big Win. If the changes are approved, one company could own the major daily newspaper, eight radio stations and three television stations in the same market. Worse yet, once the digital television transition is completed in 2009 -- allowing stations to broadcast multiple signals - a single company could control up to 18 television channels in one market.
As it stands now, six huge conglomerates - whose combined 2006 revenues reached more than $293 billion - dominate media ownership.
You can bet those six companies are more interested in turning a profit than in publishing or broadcasting a diverse range of news and opinions. And the progressive viewpoint? Forget it!
That's why it's more important than ever for progressives to unite online. By harnessing the power of the Internet, we can share information and inspire each other to take action.
Unlike the General Electrics, the Viacoms, and the Walt Disneys of the world, CommonDreams.org isn't interested in making a profit.
God Bless you!
Really Lydia?
ReplyDeleteDo you really think "most Americans" think Republicans send our troops to Iraq to "get their heads blown off for the president's amusement."???
Is this what political discourse in our country has come to?
I believe that some may think invading Iraq was wrong, some may think the president was misguided or improperly managed the war there. Some may even think he manipulated evidence to invade.
I seriously doubt that "MOST" Americans think he giggles with glee at every report including deaths of our troops.
From what I can see, only you and Larry and a few others think he's having a great time through all of this.
So much for your "prayers" for him eh Lyd?
I also note that Bela Pelosi has rebuked Stark for his comments.
ReplyDeleteVoltron - Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter and Newt Gingrich and Tom Delay and the Swift Boat Veterans and myriad other right-wing Congressmen have launched slanderous, scathing attacks against Clinton and Democrats for simply being too empathetic, too diplomatic, or for being too Christian if you really want to know -- for being soft on the poor, or, HEAVEN FORBID, for having consensual heterosexual sex.
ReplyDeleteYou have no idea how angry we are and we have a right to be angry for th deaths caused by this "president."
How dare you tell us we can't have our Freedom of speech in calling a spade a spade.
I never see Bush have any human emotion about the deaths he has cauused by his illegal, UNCHRISTIAN war.
And even Jesus called the Pharisees a "brood of vipers.
ReplyDeleteEven Jesus got angry at corruption.
I pray for Bush to stop pounding the drum for war in Iran, which he is doing now.
Bush should just get some Viagra.
Excellent post Lydia and no matter how dismayed the media and Nancy Pelosi claims to be over Stark's remarks, the wide majority of Americans believe every word that Pete Stark said.
ReplyDeleteJesus didn't have much tolerance for the conservative leaders of the day, not to mention the warmongering Romans.
ReplyDeleteAnd he sure as hell wouldn't have any tolerance for Bush and the current right wing.
Voltrons declaration, "some may thing invading Iraq was wrong" is the evil ones way of belittling the bloody horrbile deaths of so many hundreds of thousands of Gods children in Iraq.
To Voltron, its a "policy" decision.
But to the 5 year old girl, who's flesh is being burnt off her body by one of our bombs, its not.
And to God its not.
I promise you, that God is looking down from heaven with the rage of 10,000 years at the apathetic self righteous bastards like Voltron, who sell their bloody murder with a wink and a smile.
And I promise you, that sooner or later, he's going to wipe that smirk off his stupid face for time and all eternity.
A murderer is a murderer is a murderer.
And Bush, and all who support this war in Iraq, are murderers of so many thousands of innocent children in Iraq. And God, and fate, will not forget.
I promise you.
Excellent comment Bartlebee in that George W Bush and his many enablers, trolls included will reap what they have sown.
ReplyDeleteBut whoso shall offend one of these little ones it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.
ReplyDeleteAnd Lydia is right.
ReplyDeleteJesus had no problem calling a spade a spade.
And he had some pretty foul words for Herod, the man who killed so many infants trying to get to Jesus.
There's nothing wrong with condemning the murderers. And Bush, and his followers, are the murderers.
They murder in a suit and tie, and think themselves the better for it.
I’m just amazed that the Republicans are worried that we can’t pay for insuring an additional 10 million children. They sure don’t care about finding $200 billion to fight the illegal War in Iraq.
ReplyDelete“”President Bush’s statements about children’s health shouldn’t be taken any more seriously than his lies about the War in Iraq. The truth is that that Bush just likes to blow things up – in Iraq, in the United States, and in Congress.
After Rep. Pete Stark made his harsh statements against the Republicans and Bush over the SCHIP veto, the right wingers are trying to change the subject again by feigning outrage against him. Stark also didn’t fall for the MoveOn ad outrage also. Good for him. CNN ran a small clip of him all morning. Here’s CNN’s poll. 88% say he shouldn’t apologize. What say you?
CNN poll finds 88% agree with Stark and say he should not apologize.
In other words 88% of the public despise Bush and his ENABLERS.
I honestly can't imagine the amount of self deception and lack of respect for human life required at this point to be one of his "enablers".
ReplyDeleteI never claimed you couldn't exercise your "Freedom of Speech" Lydia.
ReplyDeleteYou obviously do exercise it, and I wouldn't try to stop it even if that were in my power.
But do you think outrageous statements and hyperbole is how we should be discussing the political future of this country?
It's painfully obvious to anyone who actually listens to Rush that those who are the most critical of him don't. He deals with subjects mostly through parody and humor, not 'slanderous attacks'. Newt and Tom DeLay while they have been critical usually have much evidence to back up their statements. Ann is, well...Ann. She mainly deals in hyperbole and shock and satire, that's her schtick.
Regardless, there's enough of this kind of scorched earth policy on both sides, Although from my personal experience the most vitriolic and hateful attacks have come from the left.
You once had an opportunity to be a leader in thoughtful, true political discussion from a actual Christian perspective. I'm sad to see you're fast losing that opportunity.
Discourse and decisions in the heat of emotion are usually made hastily and wrongly. And dehumanizing your opponents is the first step to oppression.
Can't you see that "Eye for an Eye" makes everyone blind?
On Thursday's "Countdown," MSNBC host Keith Olbermann suggested that President Bush "hates" kids because of the President's veto of the SCHIP funding bill, as the "Countdown" host teased the show: "Why does President Bush hate American kids?" Olbermann also suggested that it was "refreshing" to see Democratic Congressman Pete Stark refuse to apologize for accusing President Bush of gaining "amusement" at U.S. troops having "their heads blown off"
ReplyDeleteKeith Olbermann agrees with Stark and 88% of America.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteCan't you see that "Eye for an Eye" makes everyone blind?
Yea we see it.
The question is, when are you clowns going to figure it out?
Here folks, a little hopeful news.
ReplyDeleteWhite House may be told to save e-mails
PETE YOST, Associated Press Writer
Fri Oct 19, 5:43 PM ET
WASHINGTON
A U.S. magistrate on Friday rejected arguments by the Bush administration and urged a federal judge to order the White House to preserve copies of all its e-mails.
U.S. Magistrate Judge John M. Facciola said it is necessary to hold out the threat of a contempt-of-court citation to ensure that White House personnel safeguard backup tapes of electronic messages that may have been deleted.
Whether to issue the order is up to U.S. District Judge Henry Kennedy. The Bush administration has 10 days to say why Kennedy should not order preservation of electronic communications by White House officials and aides. Kennedy had referred the issue to the magistrate for a recommendation.
Don't tell us Martial Law isn't on it's way:
ReplyDeleteHeavily armed paramilitary mercenaries from the Blackwater private security firm, infamous for their work in Iraq, are openly patrolling the streets of New Orleans. Some of the mercenaries say they have been "deputized" by the Louisiana governor; indeed some are wearing gold Louisiana state law enforcement badges on their chests and Blackwater photo identification cards on their arms. They say they are on contract with the Department of Homeland Security and have been given the authority to use lethal force. Several mercenaries we spoke with said they had served in Iraq on the personal security details of the former head of the US occupation, L. Paul Bremer and the former US ambassador to Iraq, John Negroponte.
"This is a totally new thing to have guys like us working CONUS (Continental United States)," a heavily armed Blackwater mercenary told us as we stood on Bourbon Street in the French Quarter. "We're much better equipped to deal with the situation in Iraq."
Blackwater mercenaries are some of the most feared professional killers in the world and they are accustomed to operating without worry of legal consequences. Their presence on the streets of New Orleans should be a cause for serious concern for the remaining residents of the city and raises alarming questions about why the government would allow men trained to kill with impunity in places like Iraq and Afghanistan to operate here. Some of the men now patrolling the streets of New Orleans returned from Iraq as recently as 2 weeks ago.
What is most disturbing is the claim of several Blackwater mercenaries we spoke with that they are here under contract from the federal and Louisiana state governments.
Blackwater is one of the leading private "security" firms servicing the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. It has several US government contracts and has provided security for many senior US diplomats, foreign dignitaries and corporations. The company rose to international prominence after 4 of its men were killed in Fallujah and two of their charred bodies were hung from a bridge in March 2004. Those killings sparked the massive US retaliation against the civilian population of Fallujah that resulted in scores of deaths and tens of thousands of refugees.
As the threat of forced evictions now looms in New Orleans and the city confiscates even legally registered weapons from civilians, the private mercenaries of Blackwater patrol the streets openly wielding M-16s and other assault weapons. This despite Police Commissioner Eddie Compass' claim that "Only law enforcement are allowed to have weapons."
Whats funny is to listen to clowns like Voltron, crying about "an eye for an eye" when that is the absolute summary of the Neocon doctrine.
ReplyDeleteHe worry's about words and hurt feelings, while his words cause the death and destruction of hundreds of thousands of innocent people.
It boggles the mind.
Does the troll really worry about hurt feelings, or just how much he can hurt the feelings of those he hates.
ReplyDeleteIts the new tactics of the right wing. They are on the ropes, so they're playing the empathy and sympathy cards, and trying to show themselves as more moderate than before.
ReplyDeleteTheir mission of course is to back people off the left wing, and bring them closer to the center, which considering how far right we’ve turned in the last 7 years, is not really center, but just a little in from far right.
Think Progress:
ReplyDeleteHastert To Announce Retirement As Evidence Mounts Of His Involvement In Cunningham Scandal
For months, Rep. Dennis Hastert (R-IL) has insisted that he will not run for re-election in 2008. In August, The New York Times reported that Hastert “intended to serve through next year because he believed he had an obligation to complete his term.”
Yet now “Republican sources” are revealing that Hastert may announce that he plans to leave the House later this year” and retire early, triggering a special election to replace him.
No specific reason has yet been given for Hastert’s early retirement. DownWithTyranny points out that CNN quoted a GOP aide as stating, “I think he is just done with being a member of Congress.” The former Speaker’s announcement, however, comes as mounting evidence proves Hastert’s involvement in the Duke Cunningham corruption scandal.
In yesterday’s hearings, Joel Combs, the nephew of contractor Brent Wilkes, implicated Hastert in the scandal by pointing to an expensive trip the lawmaker received from Wilkes:
A defense contractor paid thousands of dollars for golf trips, private jet flights, Super Bowl box seats and boat navigation systems for former Congressman Randy “Duke” Cunningham, the contractor’s nephew testified Wednesday.
In return, Brent Wilkes had virtually unlimited access to the lawmaker, said Joel Combs, who worked for Wilkes and frequently joined him on trips and at meals with the congressman. […]
Wilkes also paid to fly Cunningham and former House Speaker Dennis Hastert from a golf outing in Palm Springs to San Diego for a reception and then back to Washington on private jets, Combs testified.
In September, Wilkes’s lawyer, Mark Geragos, attempted to subpoena dozens of federal lawmakers, including Hastert, to testify. House lawyers, however, “objected, saying members of Congress are covered under a constitutional provision that shields them from testifying about the legislative process.” Earlier this month, Geragos said he may attempt to issue new subpoenas for these members.
Hastert was also wrapped up in the ethics scandal of fallen lobbyist Jack Abramoff, ultimately collecting “more than $100,000 in donations from Abramoff’s firm and tribal clients between 2001 and 2004.” While receiving these contributions, Hastert wrote to federal officials on behalf of Abramoff’s clients.
More Republican corruption!
Bill Moyers Journal had a 45 minute segment on Blackwater tonight. Very scary to think that the Army of God whose leaders believe in the very thoughts and actions of the Crusaders are now being paid for with American Citizens Taxpayer Dollars.
ReplyDeleteI also hear that they will be providing security at the RFN's convention next year.
Martial Law isn't to far down the road now.
Also there was a news release by the Military on the flying of Nuclear Armed missiles over the United States.
They said it was only a lot of errors and 17 had been disciplined.
Are we really suppose to believe that lie also? And don't forget that there is now a Martial Law exercise being carried out in several states through the 20th of the month.
And yes we are very pissed off and angry. Not just at the RFN's, but also the Democrats for betraying our Constitution and our country.
Gotta run, catch you later and ...
God Bless.
Anon-Paranoid:
ReplyDeleteIf Blackwater does guard the RFN next year, and they are already walking the streets of New Orleans with more weapons than the police, Martial Law is quickly coming upon us.
Try as he might, Baghdad businessman Ibrahim Georges can't persuade his 11-year-old daughter Sandy to lay down her arms in favour of something less hostile, such as a doll.
ReplyDelete"She loves her gun," Georges said as Sandy, short-haired and dressed in long trousers and T-shirt, proudly displayed a menacing GC toy automatic rifle that, according to a bold stamp on the side, was made in China.
"She never plays with dolls," added Georges ruefully, outside their home in a quiet residential street in the relatively calm western Karrada suburb.
"It has laser and can fire on regular or on automatic," said Sandy, brandishing the gun that can spit out 6mm BB pellets hard enough to take out an eye and is sold in a box carrying a warning, "The best for 18 and up."
"All the children in the streets have toy guns," said Georges with a shrug, pointing to a gang of boys with whom he said his daughter plays "cops and robbers."
"They see adults carrying guns all the time. Who can blame them?"
Children's make-believe war games, which often reflect the sectarian conflict raging across Iraq, have alarmed some parents and educators, and the government has expressed concern at the flood of toy weapons on the streets.
Earlier this year, Trade Minister Abed Falah al-Sudani considered banning the toys because they look so realistic. However, given the seeming impossibility of the task, he appears to have shelved the idea.
Whether invented by parents to scare their children or whether it really happened, children all know the reason it would, perhaps, not be a good idea to point a plastic weapon anywhere near a US soldier.
"One boy was killed by an American soldier who mistook his toy for a real gun," said one of Sandy's friends, who gave his name as Zain and his age as 12, parroting the correct answer.
According to shopkeeper Uday Mohammed, the incident really did happen "about a year ago in Diyala province," which is why he warns children buying guns from his store to be ultra careful about displaying them in public.
Bush is breeding an entire generation of U.S haters.
Quick question Lydia.
ReplyDeleteDoes anyone know if Bush ate that kid in the photo?
Voltron - coming from you, these words sound strangely hollow. Have you crashed any more computers lately with your malicious code?
ReplyDeleteHere is my Christian letter to George Bush in an article I wrote. And yes Volt, I continue to pray for others, to follow Christ and to write about God on a daily basis -- praying for His will and the power to carry that out. Yes, my writings are all about God, as you will soon see. Thank you for bringing it up. I have not been blogging lately because I've been underground writing these books and raising children.
I will post my "Christian article to Bush in the next comment. That's the kind of strong stance we all need to take.
We applaud Stark because he told the truth.
If you can't see sarcasm or exaggeration for effect in light of Bush's crimes and lies -- and the cavalier way Bush responded to the Katrina victims, then you are blind
No human being could be more unconscious or unloving than Bush. In fact, I wonder if he is a sociopath. And I do not say that lightly. Vetoing health care for children while using Blackwater to fight his ugly "war" is evil.
Mr. Bush:
ReplyDeleteMr. Bush, why haven’t you told anyone the truth about how you appeased your biggest enemy, Osama bin Laden, by quietly withdrawing our troops from Saudi Arabia and closing our billion dollar Prince Sultan Air Base? This is exactly what Bin Laden wanted and asked for. Republican Congressman Christopher Shays, Chairman of the House National Security Committee, let slip the real reason you closed the Saudi base on the Larry King show in February, 2004: “We knew we needed to get out of Saudi Arabia, that was one of the contentions of Osama bin Laden.” That is called giving in to the terrorists, or appeasement. When you don't care about the capture or killing of the nation's enemy, you are being an appeaser. When you allow the nation's enemy to slip away because you don't send in enough troops to do the job, you are being an appeaser.
Mr. Bush, my children have lost their innocence because of you. They have watched me cry every night during impassioned prayers for our dying troops and for the countless children lost in this war. I have to explain to my children what good morals are: the opposite of yours. I would rather my sons have an appetite for love, not war. You have destroyed the very definition of moral values. And for the record, your party's irresponsible Ann Coulter/Ken Starr-led witch-hunt exposing the consensual affair of Clinton and Lewinsky, two adults, was in itself immoral and damaging to kids. In painstaking detail they paraded these blow-by-blowjob horrors for the press, not caring what affect it had on childhood innocence. And yes, we were all rightly appalled by President Clinton’s behavior. But where was the right-wing morality brigade in keeping this porn out of the mainstream for our children's sake? I still hear Republicans talk about how shameful Clinton was, yet they never see how the media salivated and profited at the sex appeal of it all. These same Republicans never castigate you, Mr. Bush, for moral corruption on a life-threatening scale with this war in Iraq.
You, Mr. Bush, appear to be against everything pure and beautiful about America: peace, goodwill, harmony, tolerance, trust, truth, forgiveness, life diplomacy, caring for the poor, caring for your own Katrina victims. Aren't these good values? Oops, I shouldn't have said “life” — I know how much you care about frozen fetal cells. While you and your Christian Coalition scour the cartoon channel for sexual immorality, seeing gays in square pants, how do I explain to my kids this pervasive news coverage of children being blown to bits because we played the bully; we invaded a country that was pretty much under the world's watchful control? How do I explain your “Christian” morality of killing, invading and turning a blind eye to torture and corruption? Yesterday a three-year-old Iraqi girl died after the third bomb in four weeks hit her family’s small apartment. As her brothers searched through the rubble, the only piece they found was her hand clutching a teddy bear.
Mr. Bush, why did you have to invade and attack a foreign land? Was there really imminent danger to America from Saddam Hussein, even though the whole world was hovering over him and watching his every move? Weren't there more brainy, imaginative ways of gaining allies in the underground — by attracting people to our light — who would have gladly usurped Saddam from within? Even if it had taken a few more years of clever spy-work — wouldn't it have been a creative challenge to work out diplomatic solutions to grotesque problems? Christ waited over two thousand years for someone to finally put his teachings to use. And when the biggest challenge comes along, our “Christian” leader completely disses Christ! You didn’t even give his method a half-hearted try. Wouldn't it have been worth saving lives and winning hearts to the cause of true Democracy and true Christianity? “It is not that Christianity has been tried and failed. It is that it has never been tried,” as British author G. K. Chesterton said.
I mean after all the Mission Impossible movies you've seen, couldn't you figure out a more clever way than carpet-bombing? Did you do it just to show off our heavy metal machinery, our ‘shock and awe’ capabilities, so the enemy (or anybody who doesn't agree with you) would know who’s the boss? Superpowers don’t need to show off like this.
Mr. Bush, you have robbed the world of its hope and innocence, to say nothing of the mockery you have made of Christianity, the most peaceful force that ever came to man. You have rearranged the fragile building blocks of this planet with your Neanderthal eye-for-an-eye fraudulent, militant Christianity and your total disdain for life. Maybe you don't realize the word Christ is in the word Christianity because the vowel sounds are different. Eye-for-an-eye retaliation is the Old Testament. Christ came with the new law in the New Testament: Resist not evil.” This means, “Do not fight or resist evil; do not fight anyone or anything.” It doesn’t work.
Beyond morality, there’s a practical reason for this. We make our enemies stronger by fighting them. Schools teach kids to disarm bullies on the playground by not reacting, not engaging them in battle — by walking away instead of hitting them back. It’s not easy to turn the other cheek. That’s why Christ said, “the way is narrow.” It’s hard to love your enemies — and I'm not just talking about terrorists; it's hard to love those people you can't stand to be in the same room with! With my relatives at a summer family reunion, I kept asking myself: “How can I be of love and service to people who are incredibly annoying?” Not many people will fit through the gate of returning love for hate — of loving ‘the other’ no matter what religion, color or tribe; of not fighting, and of embracing those morally bankrupt people who offend them. It’s a revolutionary teaching. It would turn the world upside down if anyone ever bothered to apply it, but no one ever has had the courage yet. People always bring up Hitler. I address the Hitler question in a separate chapter. Hitler was able to mesmerize people into believing Jews were not human. The people of Germany were complicit in this brainwashing. They could have stopped the entire Nazi machine a lot sooner, from within.
Mr. Bush - You broke the law by not going to the FISA court to “legally” wiretap us. Our Vice President broke the law by shooting a human in the face while drunk, and waiting until the liquor wore off before filing a police report. Our enemies hate us for our freedoms. Our troops are fighting for our freedoms. Is this so we can be wiretapped so we can have no freedoms? Or are they fighting for you to be able to commit treason and sell our ports to a nation that funds terrorists? Does the UAE get to be wiretapped too — or just American moms and dads who might be wearing 'Peace' signs on their t-shirts? And by the way, does Fox News fall under Freedom of the Press?
Volt, PLEASE READ THIS and the prior two posts. Thank you, I appreciate it. If you are willing, I'd love to have a civilized discussion about this. This article describes why we are so sad, helpless, powerless, angry and dismayed at the war in Iraq.
ReplyDeleteThis was published right when Elizabeth Smart was found in Utah in 2003, titled, "We Care About Elizabeth Smart, Why Not Iraqi Children?"
In the days before Utah police found Elizabeth Smart, Anglo-American aircraft bombed Basra, Iraq, a not uncommon occurrence. Six children in Al Jumohria, a poor section of town, were killed while they slept.
"I walked down the street where the missile had struck in the early hours," writes John Pilger, "it had followed the line of houses, destroying one after the other. I met the father of two sisters, aged eight and 10, who were photographed by a local weddings photographer, Nabil al-Jerani, shortly after the attack. Their bodies were unlike the other four children, who were blown to bits, their limbs and flesh in the overhead wires... These two little girls were left intact. In Nabil's photographs, they are in their nightdresses, one with a bow in her hair, their bodies perfectly engraved in the rubble of their homes, where they had been bombed to death, murdered, in their beds."
These horrid photographs were published in the UK Mirror, not the New York Times. In Britain, where the press enjoys more freedom than it does in America, the people are overwhelmingly against Bush's Iraq attack.
In general, America is unaware of the dead children of Iraq -- children killed in our name by Bush and Blair and other war criminals. "Look closely at their images on these pages," Pilger advises, "they are the faces of a stricken nation of whom 42 per cent are children. When Blair speaks about the 'moral case' for sending hundreds of missiles against this nation of so many children, as well as new types of cluster bombs and bunker bombs and microwave bombs, and shells tipped with pure uranium, a form of nuclear weapon, the images of the two sisters provide an eloquent commentary on the Prime Minister's Christian 'morality'."
It would seem, as well, there is scant Christian "morality" in America, even as our unelected president claims to be a servant of Jesus, the King of Peace.
Why do so few of us care about the children of Iraq? Are they any less precious than Elizabeth Smart? Why do polls (CBS News/New York Times) indicate an unbelievable 55% of Americans have reached the conclusion that the US must invade Iraq? Are the people who participate in such polls cold and calculating monsters -- like their president, whom so many seem to admire, if we are to believe other polls that bother to track such things -- or are they brainwashed, do they simply tune out the reality of what Bush's invasion will ultimately mean: tens, if not hundreds of thousands of people, nearly half of them children, killed or seriously injured, maimed for life, traumatized? We don't read about such stark possibilities in the New York Times, nor does Sean Hannity discuss them on Fox News.
Many of us, if we even bother to glint to truth, are too busy "making a living" or watching sit-coms. Life's complicated enough without taking the weight of the world upon our shoulders. Besides, Saddam is an evil man. He has bio and chem weapons, never mind that Reagan and Dubya's daddy sold them to him.
Lydia said...
ReplyDeleteIf you can't see sarcasm or exaggeration for effect in light of Bush's crimes and lies -- and the cavalier way Bush responded to the Katrina victims, then you are blind
Well said.
Of course I think he does see, but because he's a neocon blog troll, he pretends not to.
Lydia, you're "Mr Bush" comments outstanding.
ReplyDeleteIt clearly is from the heart.
T'hanks Bartlebee.
ReplyDeleteAnd thanks Larry for your earlier comment.
ReplyDeleteThanks for a really good Post Lydia....and I will be sure to also encourage people to write to MrStark this week, I was amazed at his bravery and accuracy- sadly everything he said is true....we should be screaming it out the windows at this point...
ReplyDeleteThank you for remembering the Children, Our Greatest Resource....maybe if they had Oil in their little veins Bush would be interested....
Larry: about Blackwater, they have had contracts, even before Katrina, the joke is and was they had people there before ANY other Govt agency- and they also were the ones that blocked alot of aid and contributed to confusion-...they arrived heavily armed...scared people....they have an ongoing set of contracts, 73-96 million, you can look them up-they have been renewing every year- and here is what bothers me ( well, one of the things that bothers me- there is a list), but WHAT besides NOLA and Katrina have they done for the Many Millions per year, the contracts are for HERE, and they are with HLS and FEMA...( last renewed March 2006)
Also today in the Seattle Times there was an article about how they had acquired a Iraqi Air Force Jet (plane) and are now refusing to give back....WHY would they need that ? and WHAT are they doing with it???? please someone tell me- there are no good answers....
( if you look at my post on China& the Olympics my son asked a really good question- are they going to provide security for the Olympics next year- WHAT else are they hired to do ? are they the WH hired Military ?)
Thanks again for keeping on top of things..and remembering the CHildren....
Blackwater USA tried to take at least two Iraqi military aircraft out of Iraq two years ago and refused to give the planes back when Iraqi officials sought to reclaim them, according to a congressional committee investigating the private security contractor.
ReplyDeleteBush's Gestapho does anything they want.
The Democratic chairman of the powerful House Appropriations Committee is prepared to play hardball with President Bush over funding the war in Iraq.
ReplyDeleteRep. David Obey (D-WI), who has pledged to sideline the latest Pentagon funding request until next year in addition to proposing a tax hike to finance the war, says he's not letting anything -- even Democratic leaders like Speaker Nancy Pelosi -- get in his way.
Obey, who told the Washington Post that he hates the "misbegotten, stupid, ill-advised" war, pushed past Speaker Pelosi's objections to his plan to levy a tax to pay for the war, the paper reports.
"I went to Nancy a week before we did it, and I told her: 'Nancy, I'm gonna do two things,'"said Obey, according to in the Post. "One of them you're gonna like, and one of them you're not."
Pelosi, who favored Obey's idea of not addressing war funding this year, took issue with his war tax plan.
"Just as I have opposed the war from the outset ... I am opposed to a war surtax," she said of the plan at the beginning of the month, and more recently stated that she didn't think that "an across-the-board tax was a fair one...we don't go forward lightly when we're talking about a tax on all the American people."
Undaunted, Obey will introduce the bill next week with Reps. John Murtha (D-PA) and Jim McGovern (D-MA). The measure proposes adding two percent to the taxes of most Americans, and up to a 15 percent increase for wealthier tax payers, according to AP.
The chairman is also using the war to put in perspective what he views as comparatively inexpensive appropriations bills that are working their way through Congress.
"Obey views the $22 billion in extra domestic spending Democrats want as a drop in the bucket compared with the cost of the war," the paper reports. "He calls Bush's philosophy 'an obscenity.'"
The Congressman is taking a hard line against a president he says is a non-negotiator himself.
Citing an experience he had discussing homeland security spending with President Bush following the Sept. 11 attacks, Rep. Obey told the Post that the president said at the time that "if you appropriate a dollar more than I've asked for homeland security, I'll veto the bill...I've got time for four or five comments, and I'm out of here."
"I cannot tell you what a profound effect that meeting had on me," Obey said. "I was absolutely thunderstruck at the arrogance."
Finally someone willing to take Bush and his sweetheart Pelosi on about the war!
Administration said to leak stories to press
ReplyDeleteOne US intelligence source familiar with the events expressed concern about recent news reports describing Syria as having a functioning nuclear weapons program and cautioned against attributing those reports to the US intelligence community.
“The allegations that North Korea was helping to build a nuclear reactor have not been substantiated by US intelligence,” said this intelligence official, adding, “ but that hasn't stopped Dick Cheney and his minions at the NSC, Elliot Abrams and Steve Hadley, from leaking the information [to the press], which appears to be misleading in the extreme.”
Elliot Abrams, who currently serves as the Deputy National Security Adviser for Global Democracy Strategy, was convicted during the Iran-Contra scandal for withholding information from Congress. He was pardoned by President George H. W. Bush along with other Iran-Contra players, some of whom have reappeared in the current Bush administration.
Iran Contra was a criminal scandal in which the Reagan-Bush White House sold weapons to Iran – an avowed enemy of the United States – then funneled the money to extremist anti-Communist group of guerrilla fighters called the Contras, who were fighting the democratically elected government of Nicaragua.
A failed coup in 2002 against Venezuelan President, Hugo Chavez, is also attributed to the approval of Abrams, according to an investigation by the UK Guardian.
Prior to the Iraq war, now-National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley was an integral part of misleading intelligence dissemination and approved clandestine meetings between Iranian arms dealer Manucher Ghorbanifar and members of a secretive cabal inside the Department of Defense’s controversial Office of Special Plans.
During a 2006 interview with neoconservative scholar Michael Ledeen, Raw Story was able to obtain the first on the record confirmation of the trips having been approved by the National Security Council, including the then National Security Advisor, Condoleezza Rice:
“Obviously Hadley did not unilaterally do anything. The Pentagon paid for the expenses of the two DOD officials, and the American ambassador in Rome was fully briefed both before and after the meetings,” Ledeen said.
What concerns intelligence officials is what appears to be manipulation of the press and strategic leaks to the public of false information, undercutting professional intelligence analysis, similar to what occurred before the Iraq war in an apparent effort to bolster support for engaging Iran.
Cheney the ultimate leaker.
The ailing US dollar hit another record low versus the euro as the market fretted over gloomy US economic prospects ahead of a G7 finance meeting in Washington, dealers said Friday.
ReplyDeleteIn early European trade, the euro jumped to a record 1.4319 dollars, the highest level since the single currency's creation in 1999. It later stood at 1.4281 dollars.
The dollar's dwindling value has been thrown into the limelight ahead of the imminent gathering of Group of Seven (G7) finance ministers and central bank chiefs in Washington on Friday.
It's the faltering Bush economy!
Republican National Committee general chairman Mel Martinez, whose party hoped he would reach out to US Hispanics, stepped down Friday citing the need to focus on his job as Florida Senator.
ReplyDelete"It was my goal as general chairman to lead the party as it established the structure and raised the resources necessary to support our presidential candidate and ensure Republican victories next November," Martinez said in statement.
A pathetic loser failing to manage a pathetic losing political party.
(Reuters) - The top executive of U.S. motorcycle maker Harley-Davidson Inc (HOG.N: Quote, Profile, Research) raised the prospect on Friday that the U.S. economy is sliding into recession as he talked about his company's disappointing third-quarter results.
ReplyDeleteJim Ziemer, chief executive of the Milwaukee-based company, in an interview with Reuters following the release of Harley's latest earnings called the current business climate "tough" as falling house prices have soured consumer sentiment and cut into sales of pricey toys like motorcycles and motorhomes.
It's the Bush recession causing all this!
dropped more than 360 points Friday — the anniversary of the Black Monday crash 20 years ago — as lackluster corporate earnings, renewed credit concerns and rising oil prices spooked investors.
ReplyDeleteThe major stock market indexes turned in their worst week since July after Caterpillar Inc., one of the world's largest construction equipment makers, soured investors mood Friday with a discouraging assessment of the U.S. economy. In a week dominated by mostly negative results from banks facing difficult credit markets and rising mortgage delinquencies, investors appeared surprised that an industrial name was feeling an economic pinch, too.
It's the failing Bush economy!
The calculus of living paycheck to paycheck in America is getting harder.
ReplyDeleteWhat used to last four days might last half that long now. Pay the gas bill, but skip breakfast. Eat less for lunch so the kids can have a healthy dinner.
Across the nation, Americans are increasingly unable to stretch their dollars to the next payday as they juggle higher rent, food and energy bills. It’s starting to affect middle-income working families as well as the poor, and has reached the point of affecting day-to-day calculations of merchants like Wal-Mart Stores Inc., 7-Eleven Inc. and Family Dollar Stores Inc.
Food pantries, which distribute foodstuffs to the needy, are reporting severe shortages and reduced government funding at the very time that they are seeing a surge of new people seeking their help.
While economists debate whether the country is headed for a recession, some say the financial stress is already the worst since the last downturn at the start of this decade.
From Family Dollar to Wal-Mart, merchants have adjusted their product mix and pricing accordingly. Sales data show a marked and more prolonged drop in spending in the days before shoppers get their paychecks, when they buy only the barest essentials before splurging around payday.
“It’s pretty pronounced,” said Kiley Rawlins, a spokeswoman at Family Dollar. “It seems like to us customers are running out of food products, paper towels sooner in the month.
Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer, said the imbalance in spending before and after payday in July was the biggest it has ever seen, though the drop-off wasn’t as steep in August.
And 7-Eleven says its grocery sales have jumped 12-13 percent over the past year, compared with only slight increases for non-necessities like gloves and toys. Shoppers can’t afford to load up at the supermarket and are going to the most convenient places to buy emergency food items like milk and eggs.
“It even costs more to get the basics like soap and laundry detergent,” said Michelle Grassia, who lives with her husband and three teenage children in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, N.Y.
Her husband’s check from his job at a grocery store used to last four days. “Now, it lasts only two,” she said.
To make up the difference, Grassia buys one gallon of milk a week instead of three. She
sometimes skips breakfast and lunch to make sure there’s enough food for her children. She cooks with a hot plate because gas is too expensive. And she depends more than ever on the bags of free vegetables and powdered milk from a local food pantry.
Grassia’s story is neither new nor unique. With the fastest-rising food and energy prices since the 1980s, low-income consumers are stretching their budgets by eating cheap foods like peanut butter and pasta.
Industry analysts and some economists fear the strain will get worse as people are hit with higher home heating bills this winter and mortgage rates go up.
It’s bad enough already for 85-year-old Dominica Hoffman.
She gets $1,400 a month in pension and Social Security from her days in the garment industry. After paying $500 in rent on an apartment in Pennsauken, N.J., and shelling out money for food, gas and other expenses, she’s broke by the end of the month. She’s had to cut fruits and vegetables from her grocery order — and that’s even with financial help from her children.
“Everything is up,” she said.
Many consumers, particularly those making less than $30,000 a year, are cutting spending on nutritious food like milk and vegetables, and analysts fear they’re further skimping on basic medical care and other critical services.
Coupon-clipping just isn’t enough.
“The reality of hunger is right here,” said the Rev. Melony Samuels, director of The BedStuy Campaign against Hunger, a church-affiliated food pantry in Brooklyn.
The pantry scrambled to feed 5,000 new families over the past 12 months, up almost 70 percent from 3,000 the year before.
“I am shocked to see such numbers,” Samuels said, “and I am really concerned that this is just the beginning of what we are going to see.”
In the past three months, Samuels has seen more clients in higher-paying jobs — the $35,000 range — line up for food.
In the past three months, Samuels has seen more clients in higher-paying jobs — the $35,000 range — line up for food as the fallout of the subprime mortgage woes takes hold.
The Regional Food Bank of Northeastern New York, which covers 23 counties in New York State, cited a 30 percent rise in visitors in the first nine months of this year, compared with 2006.
Maureen Schnellmann, senior director of food and nutrition programs at the American Red Cross Food Pantry in Boston, reported a 30 percent increase from January through August over last year.
Until a few months ago, Dellria Seales, a home care assistant, was just getting by living with her daughter, a hairdresser, and two grandchildren in a one-bedroom apartment for $750 a month. But a knee injury in January forced her to quit her job, leaving her at the mercy of Samuels’ pantry because most of her daughter’s $1,200 a month income goes to rent, energy and food costs.
“I need it. Without it, we wouldn’t survive,” Seales said as she picked up carrots and bananas.
John Vogel, a professor at Dartmouth College’s Tuck School of Business, worries that the squeeze will lead to a less nutritious diet and inadequate medical or child care.
In the meantime, rising costs show no signs of abating.
Gas prices hit a record nationwide average of $3.23 per gallon in late May before receding a little, though prices are expected to soar again later this year. Food costs have increased 4.5 percent over the past 12 months, partly because of higher fuel costs. Egg prices were 44 percent higher, while milk was up 21.3 percent over the past 12 months to nearly $4 a gallon, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The average family of four is spending anywhere from $7 to $10 extra a week — $40 more a month — on groceries alone, compared to a year ago, according to retail consultant Burt Flickinger III.
And while overall wage growth is a solid 4.1 percent over the past 12 months, economists say the increases are mostly for the top earners.
Retailers started noticing the strain in late spring and early summer as they were monitoring the spending around the paycheck cycle.
Wal-Mart and Family Dollar key on the first week of the month, when government checks like Social Security and public assistance generally hit consumers’ mailboxes.
No need to worry. Bush and Halliburton are making it just fine!
Worse still, Bush's DINO BFF, Speaker Nancy "impeachment is off the table" Pelosi, sided with Bush and the GOP, and dressed down Congressman Pete Stark for his remarks.
ReplyDeleteI have the story up on my blog.
As my readers point out and I agree, the voters of San Francisco can't wait until November, 2008. They must mount a recall effort to remove Pelosi from office.
There's one big thing that gets me about the Bush Veto on the children's insurance -- I read his remarks afterwards and he essentially said hh did it to prove he was still relevant. He vetoed kids having healthcare as part of a temper tantrum.
ReplyDelete>>The president has repeatedly discussed his support for the program, but says SCHIP should not be expanded to cover more middle-income families.>>
ReplyDeletePersonally, I think he's right. It should not be expanded to cover more middle-income families ... it should be expanded to cover ALL families.
He has a hell of a lot of nerve saying that middle-income families that are living paycheck to paycheck and are one devastating illness away from total poverty dont deserve to have decent healthcare ... especially since he recently used taxpayer money to have his colon checked out, and Cheney keeps using taxpayer money to have his pacemaker fixed.
I'm sorry Mr Bush -- you cant use my tax money anymore for your healthcare. You can afford insurance on your own.
Oh wait, I was incorrect. He cant get insurance on his own -- how silly of me. He and Herr Cheney have pre-existing conditions ... man, it's a good thing Voltron has to pay taxes to keep his idols and heroes in good health.
ReplyDeleteI wonder, Voltron, does the tax money that Herr Cheney pays go towards keeping you and your family in good heatlh? Or do you have to do that on your own? Does it bother you that your tax money pays for Cheney's heart procedures considering that with his Halliburton stock, he makes probably 750,000% more than you do? Why is it I never hear Republicans who whine so much about tax-payer money going to pay for poor people's healthcare complain about using it to pay for the Fuhrer and his puppet (that would be Bush) to have their healthcare?
When will Republicans stop being so damn hypocritical?
mch, you'd better read fast I don't know how long Larry will let my post stand.
ReplyDeleteIf it were ONLY for "poor" children, I'd be with you on it. But what they're trying to do here is extend coverage to illegal aliens, adults, and even the wealthy. While TAXING THE POOR to do it.
This is supposed to be funded by increased tobacco taxes. And who smokes? By and large the poor.
The bill was underfunded from the get go, and would only slide further into debt with the continued demonization of smokers.
So basically, you're against tax breaks for the "wealthy", but want to increase taxes on the poor to give benefits to illegals and adults?
OH and btw, I have health insurance through my employer. So yes, I take care of myself.
-- So basically, you're against tax breaks for the "wealthy", but want to increase taxes on the poor to give benefits to illegals and adults? ---
ReplyDeleteFascinating how you have no problem putting words in my mouth. If we got rid of some of the tax breaks on the wealthy, we wouldnt have to raise taxes on the poor. Besides, the money that is currently being used to blow up little kids in Iraq would more than pay for the program. As for raising taxes on cigarettes -- nope, Im for banning tobacco entirely.
Oh, and healthcare for illegal aliens? You bet. It's called being Pro-Life -- you might try it sometime. Id much rather save the lives of people wanting to live here than continue killing those who cant leave their own country.
-- OH and btw, I have health insurance through my employer. So yes, I take care of myself. --
No, your EMPLOYER takes care of you. Let me ask you, if that benefit would disappear in the next fiscal year, what kind of shape would you be in if one of your kids came down with pneumonia? What about if you came down with pneumonia or meningitis? See, if Republicans had their way entirely, you would be out of a job because FMLA would not exist.
Sit down sometime and look at the bills that Republican lawmakers have opposed and supported for the past 20 years ... see what kind of sorry-ass shape your life would be in if they had won all of them.
Voltron, You are the victim of the biggest con-game ever played in the history of mankind. Republican lawmakers fool you into thinking they are pro life (they aren't) and that they are pro-democracy (they aren't) and that they are cutting your taxes (they haven't, aren't and won't) just so that idiotic gullible fools like you will keep voting them into office so they can give THEMSELVES AND THEIR FRIENDS tax breaks and more money.
ReplyDeleteNo mch,
ReplyDeleteI EARN it. It's part of my pay for MY LABOR. Unless you think I should work for free?
And as to SCHIP, had the Dems merely reauthorized the bill as it was, it would have passed with a majority of Republican support.
The "expanded" version was their way of trying to backdoor the failed immigration and universal health care plan that grassroots activism (the people) killed.
You think Republicans are trying to do an end run on the constitution?
Don't let the Dems do it either.
Our votes count.
And on that note, I gotta go.
ReplyDelete-- Our votes count. ---
ReplyDeleteLuckily for you, MY vote counts. Like I said, your life would be in sorry shape if Republicans ruled all.
George Soros is a good man, him and Warren Buffet despite being 100 times richer than any of you clowns on your best day, they constantly speak out against corruption and support the poor, the little working class guy and speak out about dangerous policies that enrich the few elite but create long term inbalances in the economy that can have devasting consequences for EVERYONE.
ReplyDeleteYou go Pete Stark! Stark is a rarety in Congress for an additional reason besides having a spine and a set of cojones: He's a veteran. He was in the Air Force, 1955-57. John Boehner, the #$!%&## who accused Stark of "endangering our troops," spent eight weeks in Navy boot camp and then got dismissed because he had a "bad back." Riiight.
ReplyDeleteWho Hijacked Our Country
This is the most succinct, well-written post I have read regarding Rep Stark's speech and it clearly shows typical conservative obfuscation: zero in on one minute part of a whole and disregard the importance of what was said in totality.
ReplyDeleteJesus had no problem calling a spade a spade.
ReplyDeleteAnd he had some pretty foul words for Herod, the man who killed so many infants trying to get to Jesus.
There's nothing wrong with condemning the murderers. And Bush, and his followers, are the murderers.
They murder in a suit and tie, and think themselves the better for it.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteReally Lydia?
Do you really think "most Americans" think Republicans send our troops to Iraq to "get their heads blown off for the president's amusement."???
Is this what political discourse in our country has come to?
I believe that some may think invading Iraq was wrong, some may think the president was misguided or improperly managed the war there. Some may even think he manipulated evidence to invade.
I seriously doubt that "MOST" Americans think he giggles with glee at every report including deaths of our troops.
From what I can see, only you and Larry and a few others think he's having a great time through all of this.
So much for your "prayers" for him eh Lyd?"
Yeah, its kinda like you hippocrite repuggies saying ANYONE who opposes the war is against the troops or unpatriotic or in league with the terrorists.
I SERIOUSLY doubt that most Americans think people that oppose the war are in league with terrorists, support terrorists, dont support the troops or want to see the troops killed or their country be defeated.........yet you hippocrires dont have ANY problem whatsoever when its you guys playing slimy politics and making outrageous statements......you didnt oppose those statements one bit because I called you on it many times and we debated those very points Volt..
So quit yer whining you gutless hippocritical pussy!
And while youtr at it why dont you stop impersonating me you gutless waste of skin!
ReplyDeleteVoltron said " I also noticed Bela Pelosi has rebuked Stark for his comments................Why dont you take Pelosi and shove her up your ass like a tampon you gutless pussey troll.
ReplyDeleteNot many on this blog support Pelosi so once again your point is meaningless.
MCH said...
ReplyDeleteThere's one big thing that gets me about the Bush Veto on the children's insurance -- I read his remarks afterwards and he essentially said hh did it to prove he was still relevant
Oh he's relevant alright.
Like a Pilonidal Cyst.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteI never claimed you couldn't exercise your "Freedom of Speech" Lydia.
You obviously do exercise it, and I wouldn't try to stop it even if that were in my power.
But do you think outrageous statements and hyperbole is how we should be discussing the political future of this country?"
No its you and your ilk that think outrageous statements and hyperbole is how we should be discussing politics you oproved that time and time again.
And its you clowns who believe in an eye for an eye, well you clowns, would probably enjoy the old saying he who lives by the sword eventually dies by the sword.......unless of course your on the wrong end of that one.
I read his remarks afterwards and he essentially said hh did it to prove he was still relevant.
ReplyDeleteKa-Ching!
The Motherfucker from Midland is a petty, insolent, sociopath, who is so desperate to remain relevant in his final 400+ days in office that he jettisoned healthcare for America's poorest children, just to gratify his ego.
Bush's behavior is typical of men who suffer from micro penis syndrome. They feel small and impotent and the only way they can derive power in the world is to harm those around them who are vulnerable. He doesn't belong in the White House: Bush belongs in a mental institution where he can receive treatment.
You piece of shit trolls just cant hang with me because I shred your riddiculous talking points and make you look likre the imbred incoherent fringe wacckos you truly are............so you had yo get reinforcements to deal with me JUST like you did with Worfeus 2 years ago.
ReplyDeleteYou cant hang with me Volt Every time you come in here with your Reich Wing BS for the last month i've made you my bitch within 5 minutes i've owned you...........so of course you bring in your slimy little troll buddies to obfuscate and derail.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteIf it were ONLY for "poor" children, I'd be with you on it. But what they're trying to do here is extend coverage to illegal aliens, adults, and even the wealthy. While TAXING THE POOR to do it.
You know that just shows how utterly uninformed you are about the things you speak of.
First, its Bush who wants to give health care to the illegal aliens.
This bill is to extend the coverage to middle income families who otherwise could not pay for medical care for their children.
Second, one of my best friends daughter was born with a rare form of Bone Cancer and her leg was amputated because of it when she was just a few years old.
My friend makes a good living, just under 6 figures, but he has wife, and other kids to feed so obviously he needs health insurance to pay the hospital bills, which are over 100,000 dollars.
Now heres the rub that son of a bitches like you, just ignore.
Since his daughter was born with the disease, its considered a pre-existing condition, and no insurance company in the world will touch her.
So without the S-Chip program, she'd be dead by now.
And her story, is like millions of childrens stories in this country, and they will all suffer and many will die, because of this pig of a man who's water you are carrying in here.
So allow me to once more invite you to go take a long walk off a very short pier, and take the rotten sons of a bitches who think like you, with you.
Christopher said...
ReplyDeleteI read his remarks afterwards and he essentially said hh did it to prove he was still relevant.
Ka-Ching!
The Motherfucker from Midland is a petty, insolent, sociopath, who is so desperate to remain relevant in his final 400+ days in office that he jettisoned healthcare for America's poorest children, just to gratify his ego.
Bush's behavior is typical of men who suffer from micro penis syndrome. They feel small and impotent and the only way they can derive power in the world is to harm those around them who are vulnerable. He doesn't belong in the White House: Bush belongs in a mental institution where he can receive treatment."
Christopher, your EXACTLY right..........I was thinking that very thing when I saw his press conference, and that was SO AWESOME when that reporter actually said that, it was like he read my mind.
Millions of kids are born in this country with pre-existing conditions every year, and are uneligble for health insurance because of it.
ReplyDeleteAnd families making 50, 60, 70 thousand a year or even 100,000 per year, can't afford to pay the outrageous hospital bills that your free enterprise medical system produces.
They need help.
And they deserve help.
And because of tight fisted warmongering self righteous pricks like you, lots of them will suffer, and many will die.
And thats just the cold, hard truth.
National health care is the sign of an "enlightened society".
ReplyDeleteLike Canada, or most of Europe.
But here in the "good ole" USA, we have too many lowbrows and dull witted people, for anything good like that to exist in America.
When America gets its act together, then maybe we can join the rest of the civilized world.
But for now, we're stuck in the dreggs, because the bar has to be lowered to accomodate the throwbacks like you.
We have spent 700 BILLION dollars to slaughter people in the middle east who never did anything to us, but the right wing cocksuckers can't spend a few more billion to save our own children, right here at home.
ReplyDeleteVoltron said...
ReplyDeletemch, you'd better read fast I don't know how long Larry will let my post stand.
If it were ONLY for "poor" children, I'd be with you on it. But what they're trying to do here is extend coverage to illegal aliens, adults, and even the wealthy. While TAXING THE POOR to do it.
This is supposed to be funded by increased tobacco taxes. And who smokes? By and large the poor.
The bill was underfunded from the get go, and would only slide further into debt with the continued demonization of smokers.
So basically, you're against tax breaks for the "wealthy", but want to increase taxes on the poor to give benefits to illegals and adults?
OH and btw, I have health insurance through my employer. So yes, I take care of myself."
The majority of CHIP people are making $40,000 or less and even those few making $80,000 are not rich.........$80,000 is far from rich from a family...............its funny how you consider $80,000 RICH when it comes to paying health insurrance but yet those making $500,000-a billion are NOT rich when it comes to paying their fair share of taxes.
As for smoking.........better for the poor to die and decrease the surplus population so you and Adolph Bush dont have to pony up for their health insurance aye Dolt?
Now for some facts while a large amount of the poor certainly DO smoke 29% vs 20% of those above the poverty line it is MORE the working class who have the money to buy ciggarettes.......see the poverty line is roughly $12,000, now a person that smokes about a pack and a half a day would spend about roughly $12,000 a year on ciggarettes.......so are you saying the poor spend their ENTIRE incom or most of it on ciggarettes?
More Conservative BS and rhetoric!
ReplyDeleteAnd the only good thing about it is that this veto, combined with 7 years of utter disaster under republican rule, will make it a very cold day in hell indeed, before anyone occupying a dwelling other than a doublewide will vote for the cocksuckers of the right wing again.
ReplyDeleteBARTLEBEE said...
ReplyDeleteWe have spent 700 BILLION dollars to slaughter people in the middle east who never did anything to us, but the right wing cocksuckers can't spend a few more billion to save our own children, right here at home."
Projects say it will be WELL over a trillion before it has any hope of ending..............so to phrase it right these fools have no problem flushing a trillion dollars down the toilet based on lies with NOTHING positive ever to result while they cant spend millions on health insurance for children and the working poor.
Doltron said...
ReplyDeleteOH and btw, I have health insurance through my employer. So yes, I take care of myself."
Thanks for demonstrating the neocon philosophy of self first and everyone else can go to hell.
What it is is 2 things:
ReplyDelete1) Bush is doing it to feel important and relevant so he can thump his chest and act like a big man
2) the repugs are playing obstructionist, trying to stop Congress from getting anything positive done while trying to label or rather tarr and feather them as the tax and spend party of waste and big government.
In other words Slimy dishonest politics and lies as usual.
Perhaps some day Voltron, you'll find a woman drunk enough to copulate with you.
ReplyDeleteAnd if so, and you're not shooting blanks like I'm fairly sure you are, you might just pop out a little rug rat of your own.
Mini Voltron.
And you'd better pray to the god of selfish inbred pricks, that the kid isn't born with a disease.
Because if she is, something tells me your truck drivers salary, nor your 480 credit rating is going to produce the hundreds of thousands of dollars you're going to need to keep her alive.
Then maybe you might learn a little compassion for your fellow Americans.
ReplyDeleteI doubt it, but you might.
If you rejects are the best the repug party has to offer it is in deeper trouble than even I imagined..........Folks we are witnessing the death throes of the Conservative movement.
ReplyDeleteLike a very stupid jackass would say........I think the Conservative movement is in its last throes!...........BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!
People like voltron demonstrate another Conservative trait, which is fear & suspicion & loathing of anything outside their narrow field of experience. They protect their sphere of comfort by keeping it very small. To open their minds is too scary for them to deal with.
ReplyDeleteIn general, as the country falls apart they assign blame to unimportant-by-comparison illegal immigration or welfare cheats or whatever is the current conservative-speak. They are particularly vulnerable to propaganda used to inflame their pathetic prejudices.
Liberals and Conservatives are wired differently. We are barely of the same species.
I'd like to open their minds.
ReplyDelete:|
With a screwdriver.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteOur votes count.
Oh you can bet on it.
They'll be counted against you for the rest of your lives.
And by the way. Last time I checked, smoking cancer sticks isn't a necessity.
ReplyDeleteIncreased taxes on cigarettes means poor people who smoke will smoke less, and thus live longer.
Which is why Voltrons against that kind of "sin tax".
Mike said...
ReplyDeleteAs for smoking.........better for the poor to die and decrease the surplus population so you and Adolph Bush dont have to pony up for their health insurance aye Dolt?
Absolutely.
Clearly the idea of poor people cutting back on tobacco consumption is contrary to their goals.
The trouble is, bartlebee, if we led them by the hand to experiences outside their narrow-think, let them see for themselves something beyond themselves, we and they would interpret the scene differently.
ReplyDeleteI have a conservative friend and after a heated discussion about the Rawanda genocide I had him watch the movie "Sometimes In April" (which, mho, describes that horror even better than Hotel Rawanda). What he saw, even with all the history explained in the film, was Africans are prone to murder.
There is no opening a truly conservative mind.
You think Republicans are trying to do an end run on the constitution?
ReplyDeleteDon't let the Dems do it either.
Our votes count."
NO, I KNOW repugs are trying to destroy rather than do an end around to the Constitution...........funny though the Constitution clearly opposes imprisoning people without cause, denying Habeous Corpus, Denying a fair trial, not providing proper legal representation, not following proper rules of evidence and interrogation (no tortured confessions) etc..........BUT it clearly says NOTHING opposing health insurance for Children..............wonder if the Patriotic Founding Fathers were in league with or supporing the terrorists or wanted them to win.........aye Dolt!
I disagree that smokers alone should fund SCHIP.
ReplyDeleteBad habits aside, why should only one segment of our population pay for the nation's poorly-insured children?
I'll tell you why.
Smokers, i.e. poor people, are the least likely to protest.
In doing this, the pathetic 110th bypasses the more affluent who are likely to be pissed about a tax and who will speak out.
These children belong to ALL of us.
mirth said...
ReplyDeleteThere is no opening a truly conservative mind.
Give me a 20oz straight claw framing hammer, and a can of WD 40 and I might not open it, but I'll sure loosen it up a bit.
:P
Oh and lets not forget the Constitution clearly opposes spying on citizens.......but NO WHERE does it oppose health insurrance for children.
ReplyDeletemirth said...
ReplyDeleteI disagree that smokers alone should fund SCHIP.
Bad habits aside, why should only one segment of our population pay for the nation's poorly-insured children?
Oh I have to disagree with you there wholeheartedly.
Cigarettes are stupid. Really really stupid. I know I smoked em for 15 years. They do nothing to help you, and are a slow and steady source of poison into the body.
Taxing them is whats called a "sin tax" and it is a brilliant way to feed the coffers without putting a burden on people.
No one "needs" cigarettes to live. They may like them, but no one "needs them". Its not like gasoline, which you need to get to work, and the doctors, and the store to buy food. Its not like clothes which you need to walk around in public.
Its not like paper which you write letters on, or toothpaste that keeps your mouth healthy. Its not like food, or lumber, or anything else we consume in mass quantities.
Cigarettes are a weakness in the disguise of a pleasurable activity, and they are not required for sustaining life, finances, health, shelter, education, etc.
No one needs them, not the rich and certainly not the poor.
And no one's going to "suffer" because they cost a little more.
Taxing the cigarettes was a brilliant move to fund S-Chip and I applaud it 150 percent.
And lets not exaggerate the numbers on the poor who smoke as opposed to everyone else.
ReplyDeleteMikes numbers clearly show that only 9 percent more poor people smoke then others. That doesn't qualify smoking as an activity for the poor.
Mike said...
ReplyDeleteNO, I KNOW repugs are trying to destroy rather than do an end around to the Constitution...........funny though
Thats 100 percent true.
The republicans have made it clear in no uncertain terms, that they no longer feel the Constitution is needed for our country to continue and they have been working like the devil to remove it from the republic.
Bush took an oath to support the constitution at all costs, right before he began tearing it up.
ReplyDeleteActually Bartlebe, from what i've read, their talking point is even MORE dishonest than that, 12% of this countries population is below the poverty line, and of that 12%, 29% smoke.......so according to these statistics about 4% of our nation or 11 million people are below the poverty line who smoke.
ReplyDeleteI'm not familiar with the statistics regarding what economic level smokes the most...but you can be damn sure there are enough of them in the lower rungs of society or the 110th wouldn't be laying this tax burden on them exclusively.
ReplyDeleteAnd in doing that, they bypass citizens most likely to protest.
Afterall, smokers should be punished! Right?
Detering people from smoking an activity that is harmful to both themselves and others and one that raises insurance premiums is really not much different than deterants we have right now to speeding, not wearing a seatbelt, drunk driving etc......
ReplyDeleteI'm sure my last statement wont be very popular and i'll get ripped for it...........but thats just the way I see it...........there a lot of things going on that infringe with personal freedoms that I dont agree with or think too harsh but raise taxes on cigarettes isnt one of them.......people want to smoke they can pay up for all the cancers and health ailments that are a direct result of their weakness or they can quit.
ReplyDeleteCigarettes are a weakness in the disguise of a pleasurable activity...
ReplyDeleteActually, the cigarette makers in the USA add something to the tobacoo which makes them highly addictive.
Doctors report their patients trying to quit struggle as much as a patient trying to kick heroin.
The question then becomes, if heroin is illegal, then why aren't cigarettes? Might it have something to do with the very powerful tobacco lobby in Washington DC?
George Soros is a good man...
ReplyDeleteMy sources tell me that Mr. Soros will bankroll Cindy Sheehan's challenge to Speaker Botox in November, 2008.
Botox should be afraid, very afraid.
Mike said...
ReplyDeleteI'm sure my last statement wont be very popular and i'll get ripped for it...........but thats just the way I see it...........there a lot of things going on that infringe with personal freedoms that I dont agree with or think too harsh but raise taxes on cigarettes isnt one of them.......people want to smoke they can pay up for all the cancers and health ailments that are a direct result of their weakness or they can quit.
Its pretty popular with me.
ANd its true. Smoking isn't "helping" the poor people none. In fact it hurts them.
And they don't have the medical coverage to pay for it when it does.
mirth said...
ReplyDeleteAfterall, smokers should be punished! Right?
Raising taxes on smokers isn't punishing them.
Its helping them.
Helping them to either cut back a little.
Or to help pay for Childrens health care, which is a good thing.
ReplyDeleteWell said Christopher, as usual.
ReplyDeleteMike, I am not a smoker and I agree that smoking is bad (altho it certainly isn't the cause of all cancers, nor is it of many if not most other health ailments)and that people should stop smoking.
My earlier question was Why should one portion of our population pay for a national health insurance?
What select evildoers do we next punish with taxation to fund national programs?
I restate:
Poorly insured children belong to ALL of us. We EACH have a moral obligation to ensure their health.
Worf belched up:
ReplyDelete"Increased taxes on cigarettes means poor people who smoke will smoke less, and thus live longer."
AND:
"Taxing the cigarettes was a brilliant move to fund S-Chip and I applaud it 150 percent."
Gee Worf, you can't have it BOTH ways. If you fund SCHIP on the backs of smokers (who you believe will quit with the increased price) then the money that SCHIP gets will go down over the long run won't it?
Evidently since you think that's a "brilliant move", you must hate children.
"Clearly the idea of poor people cutting back on tobacco consumption is contrary to their goals."
Actually, if you want increased funding for SCHIP, it's against YOUR goals not mine.
Mirth, you wont get a BIT of arguement from me that this Congress is spineless.......BUT I honestly dont think raising the tax on cigarettes is spineless or JUST focusing on the poor.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all the Tobacco Industy is a POWERFUL lobbying force secondly as my statistics show a far LARGER amount of working class AND wealthy smoke when looking at absolute numbers than the poor.
"Raising taxes on smokers isn't punishing them.
ReplyDeleteIts helping them."
Thanks.
I don't recall ASKING for your help though.
And while your at it, please STOP trying to help me. I can't afford much more of your "help".
Oh and btw, if you have any idea of how much MORE you're going to help me let me know. I may have to take on extra work to pay for it.
ReplyDeleteMirth its NOT one portion of our population affected by raising the tax on smoking thats the Reich Wing lies and dishonest talking points. I didnt make those numbers up, I got them from Wiki, the BLS and other reputable sites.
ReplyDeleteWere did Dolt get that number out of his ass.
Dont fall into or validate their dishonest talking points.
Like I said it costs roughly $12,000 a year to smoke a 1 1/2 packs a day the poverty line is below $12,000 a year it doesnt make sense that the poor would have 100% or more of their income as disposable.........dont they buy food, clothing, shelter, medical needs etc....
This is directed at no one:
ReplyDeleteWhen taxes must again be raised, for instance to fund Bush-decimated environmental protections (and of course this assumes we will ever again be that advanced a society), should we tax superficial thinkers?
Because I posit that superficial thinkers have done far more damage to this country than all of the smokers throughout all of our history.
Voltron said...
ReplyDelete"Raising taxes on smokers isn't punishing them.
Its helping them."
Thanks.
I don't recall ASKING for your help though.
And while your at it, please STOP trying to help me. I can't afford much more of your "help"."
So your "POOR" now duncetron because the point YOU raised is raising tax on smoking affecting the poor YOU DID NOT mention the working class OR the wealthy troll.
interesting I never knew a "poor" trucker especially one without kids..........so you are implying you make LESS than $12,000 a year aye Dolt?
It's okay for the 110th to tax evil smokers, but it not okay in an election cycle to raise taxes nationwide.
ReplyDeleteSheesh.
mirth said...
ReplyDeleteIt's okay for the 110th to tax evil smokers, but it not okay in an election cycle to raise taxes nationwide.
Sheesh."
LOL, never said that......in fact, I think the tax on the wealthy.....those making over $250,000 should go up and the middle class should get some kind of tax break if possible although I realize alternate energy and environmental investment should take prescedence.
Hey, heres an idea rather than giving tax cuts for nothing how bout giving tax breaks to people installing solar panels or buying more efficient cars and air conditions and to energy companies building cleaner renewable energy sources like Wind, solar, nuclear, LNG etc.....rather than giving tax cuts to the wealthy and the big oil companies for absolutely NOTHING.
ReplyDeleteHow about you have to earn those tax credits and how about they spur investment in our country and in an effort to be self sufficient from imported oil.
No Mikey, not poor yet. YET being the operative word.
ReplyDeleteThe point is the MORE you guys want to help someone, the MORE they have to pay for it.
Maybe, just maybe if you'd all quit "helping" so much, they'd be able to pay for their own services?
But that's no good is it? It's harder to put strings and guidelines on how people spend their own money.
It's all about POWER and CONTROL Mike. When the government "gives" you something, THEY get to say how and when and how much you can use it.
"Because I posit that superficial thinkers have done far more damage to this country than all of the smokers throughout all of our history."
ReplyDeleteI have to agree with ya there mirth.
(of course I have a different idea of just WHO the "superficial thinkers" are...)
Mike, with all due respect, taxing 'evil' smokers to fund a needed healthcare program that is intended to care for children across the country, instead of raising a national tax during an election cycle, is EXACTLY what the chickenshit 110th is trying to do.
ReplyDeletemirth said...
ReplyDeleteMy earlier question was Why should one portion of our population pay for a national health insurance?
Why shouldn't they?
No one forces them to smoke.
Thats why they call it a "sin tax".
Don't wanna pay it? Don't smoke.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteNo Mikey, not poor yet. YET being the operative word.
The point is the MORE you guys want to help someone, the MORE they have to pay for it."
Yeah kinda like spending a trillion on a senseless war based on lies..........who do YOU think is funding this war.......its the tax payers and I dont want to spend my tax money on this evil waste of resources and life.
So just like you dont want your tax dollars spent on crap you dont believe in neither do I.........and CHIP is a spit in the bucket compared to the trillion spent on this war that is based on lies.
You guys talk about smokers as if they're some sort of indigenous demographic.
ReplyDeleteThey're not.
Deciding to smoke is a decision, not a condition.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteGee Worf, you can't have it BOTH ways. If you fund SCHIP on the backs of smokers (who you believe will quit with the increased price) then the money that SCHIP gets will go down over the long run won't it?
Evidently since you think that's a "brilliant move", you must hate children.
The names Bartlebee.
And apparently thats the only thing you can't read, since "smoking less" doesn't not constitute "quitting".
Moron.
Bartlebee:
ReplyDeletePlease see the comment @ 2:28.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteActually, if you want increased funding for SCHIP, it's against YOUR goals not mine.
Once again, raising cigarettes a dollar a pack may in the fantasy world in which you live, end smoking in America, but the rest of us walking around on planet earth know that at most, it will cause people to smoke a little "less".
AND even "smoking less" STILL reduces the revenue for SCHIP, doesn't it?
ReplyDeletemoron
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteThanks.
I don't recall ASKING for your help though.
Its our pleasure.
BARTLEBEE said...
ReplyDeletemirth said...
My earlier question was Why should one portion of our population pay for a national health insurance?
Why shouldn't they?
No one forces them to smoke.
Thats why they call it a "sin tax".
Don't wanna pay it? Don't smoke."
EXACTLY!!!!!
I cant drive my motorcycle 150mph without getting a ticket and paying a fine............that doesnt sop me of course LOL!!!
I have the choice to do it and pay the price or abstain just like smokers do.
Like Bartlebe said its a sin tax.........smoking isnt a neccessity of life, after you meet the neccessities of life then you use any disposable income to buy luxeries that you want to indulge in.
And smoking is CERTAINLY not a neccessity, i find it foolish that the poor struggling to meet the real neccessities of life like food, clothing, shelter would squander their limited money on something that harms themselves and others.
Like I said we get fined and ticketed for not wearing seatbelts, speeding, driving drunk etc....very much like a sin tax.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteAnd while your at it, please STOP trying to help me. I can't afford much more of your "help".
Of that fact I am sure.
Perhaps instead of killing yourself slowly with cigarettes, we could find you a quicker more effective method?
You sound angry there old buddy...........maybe you should go smoke one of those death sticks to calm down!
ReplyDeletemirth said...
ReplyDeleteBartlebee:
Please see the comment @ 2:28.
I saw it.
A, they don't "add" anything to cigarettes to make them more addictive.
Cigarette tobacco contains naturally created nicotine, which is one of the most addictive drugs known to man.
B. Heroin shouldn't be illegal. Its a natural opiate derivative, and people should be allowed to take into their bodies whatever the hell they want to take into their bodies. Any natural drug should be legal, and people should be held accountable for what they do on them.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteAND even "smoking less" STILL reduces the revenue for SCHIP, doesn't it?
moron
Well since right now there is no tax on cigarettes for S-Chip, applying a tax, regardless of the amount people smoke or don't smoke due to it, would be more, now wouldn't it?
Moron.
"Any natural drug should be legal, and people should be held accountable for what they do on them."
ReplyDelete"People" WILL be held accountable I'm sure. After you get your "Universal" health care passed, ALL the rest of us will.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteOh and btw, if you have any idea of how much MORE you're going to help me let me know. I may have to take on extra work to pay for it.
In your case I'd be willing to write in an exception to the bill, to permit you to smoke as much as you like, at no additional cost.
In fact, I'd be willing to add a clause to provide you free cigarettes for life.
:|
Or 10 years, whichever comes first.
Yeah, there's real secure funding.
ReplyDeleteAnd when those darn smokers slow down and the funds drop, and the base that needs help grows larger over the years, that'll be Republicans fault too won't it?
Voltron said...
ReplyDelete"Any natural drug should be legal, and people should be held accountable for what they do on them."
"People" WILL be held accountable I'm sure. After you get your "Universal" health care passed, ALL the rest of us will."
Which is as it should be little troll.
see its all sour grapes to YOU..........because you KNOW once your moronic DECIDER is booted off the throne its all over for you clowns, America is sick and tired of your lies, ignorance and dishonest BS!
How about just not taxing me in the first place. I'll buy my own.
ReplyDeleteVoltron said...
ReplyDeleteIt's harder to put strings and guidelines on how people spend their own money.
Its not a string or a guideline.
Its a tax.
You decide how to spend your money. And if you're a spineless simpleton who's life is so empty, so barren and devoid of intelligence that the only pleasure you can find is to suck on a rolled up peice of paper containing carcinogens, then thats your choice.
Don't like it? Don't smoke.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteHow about just not taxing me in the first place. I'll buy my own.
No ones taxing "you".
Unless you're a cigarette.
Yes Worflebee,
ReplyDeleteIt's a TAX when you TAKE our money from us under threat of jail.
But then when you give it BACK to us as "help", THAT comes with strings and guidelines attached. And power and control for those who pass all these bills "helping" people.
Smokers are a weak lot. They can't get through a day without their oral fixation filling their bodies with cancerous carcinogens and foul, dirty smoke.
ReplyDeleteThey're weak.
And like I always knew, you're weak.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteIt's a TAX when you TAKE our money from us under threat of jail.
Once again, no ones taxing you. They're taxing cigarettes.
Don't like it? Buy something else.
I'm not "weak" Barf, I have a disease.
ReplyDeleteI'm a "victim". Quick, I need a special interest group to advocate for me!
A disease is contracted, not selected.
ReplyDeleteBARTLEBEE said...
ReplyDeleteVoltron said...
It's a TAX when you TAKE our money from us under threat of jail.
Once again, no ones taxing you. They're taxing cigarettes.
Don't like it? Buy something else."
Yeah thats a free market econmy Duncetron.........I believe Greenspan called it the substitution effect.
Lungtron said...
ReplyDeleteIt's a TAX when you TAKE our money from us under threat of jail.
Well, the tax is included in the price, so the only way to acquire a pack of cigarettes without paying it, would be to steal them.
And last time I checked, yes, stealing will land you in jail.
So you're confessing to not only being a weak willed smoker, but a theif too?
maybe if you stop spending your money on cigs you'll spend it more productively.
ReplyDeleteBTW.....I see you DIDNT address my point about about people having to EARN tax credits rather than feeling entitled to them.
All GWB is doing is government welfare for the wealthy and for corporations he's like Robin Hood only he steals from the working class and poor to give to the wealthy elite.
Is it REALLY a "free market" there Mike?
ReplyDeleteLast time I looked, tobacco was a LEGAL product. Why is our government on a campaign against private companies making a LEGAL product?
If you don't like tobacco, BAN it outright.
And Barf, isn't Alcoholism a "disease"?
"So you're confessing to not only being a weak willed smoker, but a theif too?"
ReplyDeleteI was expanding my argument to include ALL taxes.
I have no problem with smokers.
ReplyDeleteNone at all.
But when money is tight for kids dying of cancer, I also have no problem with taxing "luxuries" that are not essential to help save kids lives.
Obviously you do.
No, there are plenty of sin and luxery taxes............there are taxes on yacts, fancy cars, alcohol, gas guzzlers etc.......the trouble is you cry like a little bitch when something the government does affects YOU personally but say nothing or defend them them as the Constitution or personal freedoms are destroyed by the thugs and crooks YOU support.
ReplyDelete" Mike said...
ReplyDeletemaybe if you stop spending your money on cigs you'll spend it more productively."
Your missing MY point Mike.
Why do you have the right to tell anyone HOW to spend their own money?
Maybe somewhere down the road somebody will think you could spend YOUR money "more productively"...
(as far as "earned" tax credits go, how can you get a "refund" on taxes you haven't paid?)
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteAnd Barf, isn't Alcoholism a "disease"?
Alcholism can be passed on via heridity.
There are no studies to support that nicotine addiction is heriditary, or even long term.
Nicotine addiction is short term and ends when the smoker stops smoking.
Volt said "If you don't like tobacco, BAN it outright."
ReplyDeleteNo thats YOUR style to take away choice and to help the very thing you claim to be opposing.........kinda like your war on drugs that puts boatloads of power and money into the hands of organized crime........or the war on terra that inflames hatred and helps the terrorist recruit far more who hate us and want to do us harm than they ever could on their own.
Heckuva job repuggies you fail miserably at every war you ever start.
Sin taxes are as old as Rome.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of the people helping the poor, via some "luxury" or "indulgence" has been around for thousands of years, and has worked everytime its been employed.
Voltron said "(as far as "earned" tax credits go, how can you get a "refund" on taxes you haven't paid?)"
ReplyDeleteBehold the troll tring to create my arguements FOR ME and put words in my mouth I never said.
If you cant counter what i'm actually saying why dont you just run away like you always do when I hand you your ass!
And there have been people like you Volt for thousands of years too, who'd rather save a buck on a pack of smokes rather than help some kid keep from losing their liver to cancer.
ReplyDeleteThats an ugly, ugly trait.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteWhy do you have the right to tell anyone HOW to spend their own money?
No ones telling you how to spend your money.
But the govt has the legal authority to level taxes and levy's on goods and services.
Don't like it?
Find a new country.
Yes Mike, and it's YOUR style to try to drive a private company making a legal product out of business simply because you don't like the product.
ReplyDeleteSame outcome. Lack of personal choice, and theres the rub for the dems, if they ban it outright they can't tax it to death. Then they can't control it.
And Mikey? LOTS of products that were deemed unhealthy or detrimental have been banned.
But thanks for showing the true soul of the republican, who'd rather save a buck on a pack of smokes than save kids lives.
ReplyDeleteThe true republican spirit, in all its glory.
Adding a buck to a pack of cigarettes won't "drive the tobacco companies out of business".
ReplyDeleteIf you think it will, then thanks for showing how stupid you are.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteYour missing MY point Mike.
Why do you have the right to tell anyone HOW to spend their own money?
Maybe somewhere down the road somebody will think you could spend YOUR money "more productively"...
Everyone take a good, long look at this comment. It epitomizes the mind of the republican.
To him, his addiction, his "weakness" is somehow bound to the rest of us. To him, he simply HAS to smoke, and if someone raises taxes on cigarettes, we're FORCING him to pay it.
We're all just twisting his arm to pull the lever on the cigarette machine, and light up.
Its our fault, that Voltrons too weak to control himself.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteSame outcome. Lack of personal choice, and theres the rub for the dems,
Most adults consider the decision to smoke a "personal choice".
Except the weak ones.
ReplyDelete"BARTLEBEE said...
ReplyDeleteAnd there have been people like you Volt for thousands of years too, who'd rather save a buck on a pack of smokes rather than help some kid keep from losing their liver to cancer.
Thats an ugly, ugly trait."
And that's a cheap, cheap shot and you know it.
Of course we need to take care of those who REALLY need it. But why do the rest of us ALWAYS have to pay for someone else's lack of foresight or stupidity?
Your friend from earlier who makes nearly 6 figures? WHY didn't he have health insurance BEFORE he had the child? And if he only owed 100k, why didn't he make arrangements to pay over time?
AND there ARE other forms of medical assistance besides SCHIP.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteAnd that's a cheap, cheap shot and you know it.
A cheapskate who's unwilling to pay a buck more for a pack of smokes to save kids lives I'd say deserves a cheap shot.
Only it wasn't a cheap shot.
ReplyDeleteIts the truth.
Whats cheap is you.
I was responding to Mike with that comment Barf,
ReplyDelete" Mike said...
maybe if you stop spending your money on cigs you'll spend it more productively."
Well, maybe if we make it too expensive for Mike to ride his motorbike he'll spend THAT money more productively.
In fact, maybe we should take in tax EVERYBODIES discretionary income. After all, we could spend it on childrens health. Yeah, that's it, for the kids!
(You guys DO like kids, right?)
Where do you draw the line?
Well if a bucks OK, then how about TWO?, Is two good? How about THREE?
ReplyDeleteAnd not everyone smokes. How about we tax your Pepsi too? Everybody knows it rots your teeth. It's bad for you. Maybe if we tax it you won't drink so much. AND it's for the children!
You know, now that you got me thinking about this, there's ALL KINDS of things we could tax.
ReplyDeleteWho could complain?, after all it's for the kids!
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteYour friend from earlier who makes nearly 6 figures? WHY didn't he have health insurance BEFORE he had the child? And if he only owed 100k, why didn't he make arrangements to pay over time?
You're an idiot. He did have health insurance. For himself and his wife. You can't buy health insurance for a child that doesn't exist yet.
And as for paying 100,000 dollars "over time", God you're stupid. If you don't have the funds the hospital won't do the advanced treatments necessary so you can't even get the advanced treatments or therapy's or prosthetics like the titanium leg the sChip program bought her.
Additionally, hospitals use "billing companies" now, which don't take small payments on large bills. Instead they're turned over to collection agencies who suit you, ruin your credit and seize your assets.
We're talking about a little girl who lost her leg her you inbred son of a bitch.
But thanks for showing what a slimeball peice of shit you really are.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteAnd not everyone smokes. How about we tax your Pepsi too?
I'd have no problem paying a tax on luxury items like cigarettes, soda pop, booze, etc.
But we'll start with the cigarettes, which are not consumables like soda, but are merely indulgences.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteI was responding to Mike with that comment Barf,
I know asshole.
And I responded.
The Lunger said...
ReplyDeleteAND there ARE other forms of medical assistance besides SCHIP.
Not ones that your war hasn't cut assitance too.
And not ones that they qualify for.
These are real people, and this little girl is a real person.
And theres millions like her.
But go ahead. Seal your fate Ebenezer. After all, are the work houses all filled? Have the prisons reached their maximum capacities? And if they'd rather die then go to those places, then let them do so, and decrease the surplus population.
Thanks for showing us once again what a worthless wretch you really are.
Actually Barf,
ReplyDeleteMost insurance policies for "families" DO include the possibility to cover potential children in the future.
AND as for:
"Additionally, hospitals use "billing companies" now, which don't take small payments on large bills. Instead they're turned over to collection agencies who suit you, ruin your credit and seize your assets."
Not true at all. Had my hips replaced several years ago, my insurance covered MOST of the 80k it cost but not ALL. I still owed a bundle, and as long as you make a minimum payment they can't touch you.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteMost insurance policies for "families" DO include the possibility to cover potential children in the future.
Not like you're thinking nimrod.
When you have a kid with bone cancer, they drop you.
Idiot.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteNot true at all. Had my hips replaced several years ago, my insurance covered MOST of the 80k it cost but not ALL. I still owed a bundle, and as long as you make a minimum payment they can't touch you.
Bullshit. That particular hospital might have cut you some slack, but most hospitals back here go through third party billing. And if you don't have the insurance to cover it, they won't offer the advanced treatments. The treatments she needed to live like a normal girl.
As for your hip replacement, thats amusing. A dried up old trucker who smokes and needs a hip replacement.
You must be one scary dude.
And what about familes that don't have insurance? So they neglected insurance. Maybe money's tight, and they couldn't make their premiums. What about them?
ReplyDeleteJust f$#k their kids, huh?
In your world, just screw em.
Because God knows you can't pay a buck extra for a pack of smokes to save a kids life.
Not in your world.
You know its amazing. To listen to the republican scum who are always talking about the children.
ReplyDeleteRemember that peice of human shit, Gonzales? Who when his head was on the chopping block kept crying "but I gotta stay for the kids".
He could like, cheat, violate the constitution, all in his words, "for the children".
But when it comes to tacking on a buck to a pack of smokes you cocksuckers start crying like stuck pigs.
Absolutely amazing.
"We're talking about a little girl who lost her leg her you inbred son of a bitch."
ReplyDeleteYes we are. And IF she really needed the help, no problem. As I said I'm all for it.
But there are thousands? tens of thousands? hundreds? more just like her, AND we could get emotional and call names over EVERY single one of them.
AND of course they NEED adults to take care of them so we have to make sure THEY'RE healthy too.
But unless you're advocating universal health care, WHERE do you draw the line?
WHY is one of the MOST important events in life, the choice to have a child taken so cavalierly?
WHEN should a person look at their lifestyle, current financial situation, or health and say "Maybe this isn't the right time to have a kid"? Or maybe say "gee, I need to start PREPARING for having a child and the possibilities that may come with it"?
When and Where does any personal responsibility come into play?
Can I suggest a therapy to help you quit smoking?
ReplyDeleteI recommend laying your head down on your 5th wheel, right before they hook up a 48 foot trailer.
Try that, and let me know how that works out for you.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteBut unless you're advocating universal health care, WHERE do you draw the line?
Try reading my 12:42 post again genius.
Yeah? What about the Dem scum that say the EXACT SAME THING. Everything is "for the children".
ReplyDeleteAnd it's NOT simply about a "buck a pack" for smokes. It's WHERE DO YOU STOP?
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteYeah? What about the Dem scum that say the EXACT SAME THING. Everything is "for the children".
Newsflash genius.
They're not the ones that vetoed the childrens health care bill.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteAnd it's NOT simply about a "buck a pack" for smokes. It's WHERE DO YOU STOP?
Thats a stupid question that doesn't deserve a response.
Thats like saying we shouldn't be paying any taxes, because "where do we stop?".
Taxes pay for vital services.
A sin tax is not new.
We need money for S-Chip because guys like you spent it all murdering Arabs in the middle east.
So we decided to tax cigarettes to save the kids.
If you don't like it, maybe you should have not spent close to a trillion dollars murdering the Arabs kids, huh?
Ah yes, you ARE advocating national health care.
ReplyDelete< sarc >I'll just sit back and wait for Hillary or Edward's health police to barge in and take me for my government mandated annual physical now.
If I need anything drastic, I hope they have the budget left to do it with, or that they don't think I'm too old for it to be economical...
< /sarc >
You're fine with a vote to spend 700 billion to butcher Arabs in a tiny country that never had a chance of presenting any kind of threat to us, but you balk at a sin tax to save our own kids.
ReplyDeleteMCH was right. You're just too far gone for reason.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteAh yes, you ARE advocating national health care.
Gee.
You're quick.
Lungtron said...
ReplyDeleteIf I need anything drastic, I hope they have the budget left to do it with, or
Not once you guys get done sqaundering it on your murder in the middle east.
"We need money for S-Chip because guys like you spent it all murdering Arabs in the middle east."
ReplyDeleteBULL!, Like I said earlier, IF they had just voted to continue it as it was even WITH increased funding it would've passed.
It failed because it was a backdoor attempt to pass their immigration and universal health care package.
Lungtron said...
ReplyDeleteIf I need anything drastic
Then we'll give you a 38 with one round and a pack of smokes.
Voltron said...
ReplyDeleteBULL!, Like I said earlier, IF they had just voted to continue it as it was even WITH increased funding it would've passed.
Not bull asshole. FACT.
You spent almost 700 BILLION (with a B) to murder children in the middle east.
And now you cry at the idea of S-Chip for working class AMERICAN families.
And whats wrong with national health care?
ReplyDeleteOh yea, I forgot.
Inbred.
Yeah, I know.
ReplyDeleteEverybody's life is valuable.
Except those who disagree with you.
Oh well, maybe I'll give up on the inbreds and just move to an enlightened country, like Canada or somewhere in Europe.
ReplyDeleteWhere the educated folks live.
"And now you cry at the idea of S-Chip for working class AMERICAN families"
ReplyDeleteUh, NO actually.
I cry at the idea of SCHIP for illegal aliens, adults and the wealthy...
Its like Chris Matthews said on Real Time last night.
ReplyDelete"did you ever get the idea that they're playing chess, and we're playing checkers?"
Hipreplacement Joe said...
ReplyDeleteI cry at the idea of SCHIP for illegal aliens, adults and the wealthy...
Show me where in the bill it says that S-Chip will be given to the "wealthy" or to adults.
And as for the kids of illegal aliens, you seem to have no problem with businesses hiring them to pick your fruit. In fact, republicans encourage that.
ReplyDeleteBut when their kids fall ill, "fuck em" right?
BARTLEBEE said...
ReplyDelete"Oh well, maybe I'll give up on the inbreds and just move to an enlightened country, like Canada or somewhere in Europe.
Where the educated folks live."
Good idea!
Try the Scandanavian countries. They have quite a few of those Arabs your whining about.
Maybe you'll see WHY their becoming "enlightened"...
Yea, you're such a heroic brave man, huh?
ReplyDeleteSuch a big hero with your black lung and plastic hip, and your "screw the kids" doctrine.
What great admirable hero's you republicans are.
Bart why the rush to expand the welfare state to families that are not even poor, but have above average incomes. Congress tried to expand the scope of this program to families with incomes of $85,000. That level of income is hardly poor. Granted, it's not a king's ransom, but it is ABOVE the median income by more than 50%.
ReplyDeleteThe median income is $55,000 and this proposal would have moved families from private insurance to welfare.
Unless you Liberal-Marxists really want to redistribte the wealth, what's the purpose of the drastic expansion of this program?
Lungtron said...
ReplyDeleteMaybe you'll see WHY their becoming "enlightened"...
Clearly you've never been to Europe, or likely Canada for that matter.
If you had, you'd know that they enjoy a much better quality of life than we do here.
They're smarter, better educated, much more humane, and most importantly, civilized.
Hey TT. Blow me.
ReplyDeleteScroll up and try reading my last few hours of posts explaining why.
If you can't do that, then go smoke a cigarette.
"BARTLEBEE said...
ReplyDeleteOh well, maybe I'll give up on the inbreds and just move to an enlightened country, like Canada or somewhere in Europe.
Where the educated folks live.
5:44 PM"
Enlightened? Why are Canadians coming to the US for medical care, and not vice versa.
And 85,000 is dogshit.
ReplyDeleteCrap. I couldn't live on 85k and I'm single.
Try doing it with a family of four when you've got a kid with lukemia you half baked cowpie.
"BARTLEBEE said...
ReplyDeleteAnd 85,000 is dogshit.
Crap. I couldn't live on 85k and I'm single.
Try doing it with a family of four when you've got a kid with lukemia you half baked cowpie.
5:54 PM"
Half the country lives at $55,000 or below.