How we got here II:Glass Steagall

I wonder if Hillary will take credit for the sub-prime collapse?

you know how following Bill around is the same and being President at the time.

going out to drink!

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

I am looking forward to The Obama Speech tomorrow, this one will be for all the money.

Obama has painted himself into a corner with all this "I never knew The Rev felt that way" stuff.

No one is buyin that line...

Obama has to try a new approach tomorrow. Perhaps he will try to explain the difference between a 3% church and an 97% church. In other words, it's all a matter of interpretation.

Happy Saint Patricks day everyone! :)

Since there was a lot of drinking this weekend and today, I'll repost that strange pissing story from the last thread.

Boy Says Teacher Forced Him To Urinate In Lunchbox During Class

ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. -- Orange County Public Schools is investigating claims that a student was forced to use a lunchbox as a toilet in front of his class at Meadowbrook Middle School.

The teacher will not be coming to school. She will be relieved of her duty with pay as the school district investigates, officials said.
"If you gotta go, you gotta go," student Quonterious Thomas told Eyewitness News in an interview Monday.

Thomas, 13, says his language arts teacher, Jameeka Chambers, gave him two options when he had to go to the bathroom at Meadowbrook Middle School in Orange County. She said he could wait until the end of class or use her lunchbox in the back of the classroom.

The sixth grader said he used her lunchbox.
"If I had waited any longer, I would have peed on myself and that would have been even more embarrassing," Thomas said, adding that his entire class of 19 students and his teacher watched.
When Thomas told his mom, she said she didn't believe it at first and later realized how traumatized he was.

"I have never, in all the days been living, ever heard about anything happening in all my life. This is a really big shocker for me," said Shameka Bryant, Thomas' mom. continued...

http://www.wftv.com/news/15620442/detail.html

its more polite than go screw yourself

belly dancer vid from Sat! :)

Bush to host Iraq ally Saakashvili during war protests.
President Bush’s Coalition of the Willing has dwindled since its original strength in 2003. Of 14 major partners in the Coalition, eight leaders were defeated in elections, two stepped down, two were term limited, and two remained in office. This week, Bush will be hosting one of his few remaining allies, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili, to discuss “common efforts to advance freedom and security around the world.” Saakashvili’s trip will coincide with “the height of the war protests on Pennsylvania Avenue.”

http://thinkprogress.org/2008/03/17/bush-to-host-iraq-ally-saakashvili-d...

--It made national news?
Submitted by impeachnow on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 6:31pm.--

Helloooo... :) We live near eachother...

S.P.I.T. = Stupid Pissed Idiotic Teens ;)

Now kids play nice with people on here.

You never know who the powers that be really are. ;)

As Sammer says... "Play Nice"

7 in 10 Iraqis want foreign forces out
As 5th anniv. of invasion looms, poll paints mixed picture of Iraqi attitudes.

http://www.rawstory.com/news/mochila/Bush_celebrates_St_Patrick_s_Day_03...

Alice, do you got a URL of that belly dancer video?

That is quite a good exercise.

March 17, 2008
Chinook Salmon Vanish Without a Trace
By FELICITY BARRINGER
SACRAMENTO — Where did they go?

The Chinook salmon that swim upstream to spawn in the fall, the most robust run in the Sacramento River, have disappeared. The almost complete collapse of the richest and most dependable source of Chinook salmon south of Alaska left gloomy fisheries experts struggling for reliable explanations — and coming up dry.

Whatever the cause, there was widespread agreement among those attending a five-day meeting of the Pacific Fisheries Management Council here last week that the regional $150 million fishery, which usually opens for the four-month season on May 1, is almost certain to remain closed this year from northern Oregon to the Mexican border. A final decision on salmon fishing in the area is expected next month.

As a result, Chinook, or king salmon, the most prized species of Pacific wild salmon, will be hard to come by until the Alaskan season opens in July. Even then, wild Chinook are likely to be very expensive in markets and restaurants nationwide.

“It’s unprecedented that this fishery is in this kind of shape,” said Donald McIsaac, executive director of the council, which is organized under the auspices of the Commerce Department.

Fishermen think the Sacramento River was mismanaged in 2005, when this year’s fish first migrated downriver. Perhaps, they say, federal and state water managers drained too much water or drained at the wrong time to serve the state’s powerful agricultural interests and cities in arid Southern California. The fishermen think the fish were left susceptible to disease, or to predators, or to being sucked into diversion pumps and left to die in irrigation canals.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/17/science/earth/17salmon.html?ei=5065&en...

Submitted by TheRealWFC on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 8:11pm.
Alice, do you got a URL of that belly dancer video?

:)

And yeah..I do...the price is correct English..

URL = Uniform Resource Location or the web site address

It probably was a video that was only on satellite or cable that hadn't made it onto a web site yet.

Like Bush/Republicans wanted .... how many Bearn Sterns would be holding that money?

Free Democracy

Alice :)

You know there are millions of examples of so called incorrect english on blogs and on the internet including from self appointed grammar cops. We should be polite and "play nice" as Sam Seder requested since this is his blog.

By the way using my initials does make me a real WFC.

U.S. Sen. Barack Obama waited 16 months to attempt the exorcism. But when he finally sat down with the Tribune editorial board Friday, Obama offered a lengthy and, to us, plausible explanation for the presence of now-indicted businessman Tony Rezko in his personal and political lives.

The most remarkable facet of Obama's 92-minute discussion was that, at the outset, he pledged to answer every question the three dozen Tribune journalists crammed into the room would put to him. And he did.

Along the way he confronted the starkest innuendo that has dogged him and his campaign for the presidency: the suggestion that the purchase of an adjacent lot by Rezko's wife subtly subsidized the Obamas' purchase of their home on Chicago's South Side. "This notion that somehow I got a discount and Rezko overpaid is simply not true ... simply, factually, incorrect," Obama said Friday, adding that he didn't need any intervention from Rezko to grease the purchase of the house.

snip

We fully expect the Clinton campaign, given its current desperation, to do whatever it must in order to keep the Rezko tin can tied to Obama's bumper.

When we endorsed Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination Jan. 27, we said we had formed our opinions of him during 12 years of scrutiny. We concluded that the professional judgment and personal decency with which he has managed himself and his ambition distinguish him.

Nothing Obama said in our editorial board room Friday diminishes that verdict.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-0316edit1mar16,0,2616801....

Chicago Tribune stands by Obama endorsement!!

Why is it 'not' St Patrick's Day today?

The occasion is celebrated all over the world
You may be celebrating St Patrick's Day today as normal, but, at least according to Catholics and Anglicans, you're making a slight mistake. Why is that?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/7300466.stm

Robert Kelley
Battling the Inland Sea
Floods, Public Policy, and the Sacramento Valley

"Of late historians have become increasingly interested in the vast re-ordering of the environment involved in the creation of America. Nowhere was this more true than in the Sacramento Valley where re-ordering edged into folly. Battling the Inland Sea is a powerful evocation of the losses and gains involved in battling the mighty Sacramento River. But more than this, it is an exploration of the national will as it sought to rearrange nature herself with such mixed results. Here is history dealing with the most elemental forces of land, water and engineering as they are shaped by public policy. Here is the profound drama of value and symbol which occurs when Americans come into conflict with forces over which they can exercise, as Robert Kelley shows, only the most transitory and pyrrhic victories."–Kevin Starr

the text at - books.google.com

or http://tinyurl.com/ywaapy

Excellent - very readable

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

Audit finds more than 200K public-records requests unanswered
Nick Juliano

The Freedom of Information Act is predicated on the notion that the government's documents are the property of its citizens and that people should have easy access to them.

Two years after President Bush signed an executive order designed to strengthen FOIA compliance and reduce backlogs of pending requests, an audit of public information procedures finds some progress but persistent problems. Hundreds of thousands of requests remain unanswered, and compliance with electronic requests has not kept pace with technological innovation.

"Many of the same old scofflaw agencies are still shirking their responsibilities to the public," said Tom Blanton, director of the National Security Archive, which released the Knight Open Government Survey audit Monday.

One of the key goals of Bush's executive order, signed in December 2005, was for federal agencies to reduce their backlog of pending FOIA requests. The Knight audit found about 200,000 requests were still pending, and that some agencies' backlogs actually had increased in the two years since Bush signed the order.

The Department of Homeland Security was one agency where pending FOIA requests increased, from 82,544 in fiscal year 2005 to 83,661 in 2007, according to the audit. DHS "set an overarching goal of eliminating FOIA backlog" by the end of last year, but it did not augment this plan with "manageable interim targets," according to the report. DHS backlog reduced by only 25 percent during the audited time period.

The FBI was another agency singled out for failing to meet backlog-reduction targets. It "set several goals to process older requests ... but failed to meet all of them and pushed the completion dates back a year on two occasions," according to the audit.

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Audit_finds_more_than_200K_publicrecords_0...

Re: Why is it 'not' St Patrick's Day today?

Any holier than thou self appointed grammar cops better write BBC News and chastise them about the use of "english" in this story posted above.

;)

New Yorker: Abu Ghraib abuses were 'de facto US policy'
Nick Juliano

Photographer wanted to expose 'what the military was allowing to happen'
Some of the most iconic images of the Iraq war came not from photojournalists on the front lines, but US soldiers carrying point-and-shoot digital cameras. In its latest issue, the New Yorker profiles the woman who snapped many of the photos depicting abuse at Abu Ghraib prison that the same magazine revealed nearly four years ago.

Like many of the soldiers in charge of the detained Iraqis at Abu Ghraib, Sabrina Harman had little experience running a prison. As Philip Gourevitch and Errol Morris report, she and others in her Army Reserve unit didn't stick out at the prison, "where almost nothing was run according to military doctrine."

The low-ranking reservist soldiers who took and appeared in the infamous images were singled out for opprobrium and punishment; they were represented, in government reports, in the press, and before courts-martial, as rogues who acted out of depravity. Yet the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib was de facto United States policy. The authorization of torture and the decriminalization of cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment of captives in wartime have been among the defining legacies of the current Administration; and the rules of interrogation that produced the abuses documented on the M.I. [Military Intelligence] block in the fall of 2003 were the direct expression of the hostility toward international law and military doctrine that was found in the White House, the Vice-President's office, and at the highest levels of the Justice and Defense Departments.
The article, which appears in the March 24 issue of the New Yorker, has not been posted online, but the magazine has posted additional photos and videos to augment the report.

Gourevitch and Morris trace Harman's evolving reactions to the horrors she witnesses -- "ricocheting from childish mockery to casual swagger to sympathy to cruelty to titillation to self-justification to self-doubt to outrage to identification to despair" -- through interviews and excerpts she sent home from the prison. In one October 2003 letter to Kelly, the woman Harman called her wife, the young MP writes what could now be seen as a grim foreshadow to the war in which American soldiers are still fighting and dying.

"These people will be our future terrorist," she writes one night after witnessing interrogators poking one detainees genitals with a stick and handcuffing another to his top bunk. "Kelly, its (sic) awful and you know how fucked I am in the head. Both sides of me think its (sic) wrong. I thought I could handle anything. I was wrong."

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/New_Yorker_Abu_Ghraib_abuses_were_0317.htm...

You're near the bees..I'm near you... :)
Submitted by Alice on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 8:09pm.
------------------------------------
Hey Neighbor! it sure would be cool to be out and about wearing some sammy fan club hat or tie or ring and be able to spot others in the same club.
in fact I'm ging to the store right now I'll be wearing brown jeans and a white shirt if you see me say hello
(yes i know the liklihood of running into you is zippo in fact with my luck I'd run into someone like POT 97, sheeeit)

Bold Attempt to Settle Religion Issue

Buffeted by criticism of his controversial Christian pastor while continuing to quell rumors that he is a Muslim, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill) took a bold step today to settle questions about his religious faith once and for all.

“I am converting to Judaism, effective immediately,” Mr. Obama told reporters at a press conference in Scarsdale, New York, adding that he would change his middle name from “Hussein” to “Murray.”

As a sign of commitment to his new faith, the Illinois Senator said that he anticipated being Bar Mitzvahed sometime between now and the crucial Pennsylvania primary and that he would no longer campaign on Saturdays.

In a subtle sign of the shift in his religious affiliation, Mr. Obama’s signature catchphrase “Yes, we can,” was nowhere to be found in his speech, replaced instead by “L’Chaim.”

While some political observers praised Mr. Obama’s conversion to Judaism as a shrewd tactic to put the issue of his religious identity to rest, the move raised the ire of one of his harshest critics, former Rep. Geradline Ferraro.

“Barack Murray Obama wouldn’t be in the position he’s in if he wasn’t Jewish,” said Ms. Ferraro to herself.

http://www.borowitzreport.com/

Kristol issues a correction: ‘I regret the error.’»
In his New York Times column today, Bill Kristol asserted that Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) “was in fact in the pews” when pastor Jeremiah Wright blamed the “arrogance” of the “United States of White America” for much of the world’s suffering. As Marc Ambinder pointed out, this claim was false; Obama was on his way to campaign in Miami. Kristol has now printed a (misspelled) correction in the online version of his column:

In this column, I cite a report that Sen. Obama had attended services at Trinity Church on July 22, 2007. The Obama camapaign [sic] has provided information showing that Sen. Obama did not attend Trinity that day. I regret the error.

This is the second time that Kristol has had to issue a correction to his NYT column since it began in early January.

UPDATE: Jay Ackroyd received a response from the New York Times public editor, who confirmed that Kristol was “wrong”:

Dear Reader,

Thank you for writing. Mr. Kristol has affixed to the top of his column a correction on this issue. You are correct, he was wrong.

Sincerely,

Michael McElroy
Office of the Public Editor
The New York Times

http://thinkprogress.org/2008/03/17/kristol-issues-a-correction-i-regret...

Letting the Market Drive Transportation
Bush Officials Criticized for Privatization

By Lyndsey Layton and Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, March 17, 2008; A01

It took a few moments for Tyler Duvall, the top policymaker at the Department of Transportation, to digest the news from the Hill. But when he realized what it meant, he was stunned.

Last year, Congress decided not to dictate how the department could spend its discretionary funds. No earmarks, no strings, no arm-twisting from lawmakers to direct money to bus systems or other mass-transit projects in hundreds of communities nationwide.

Duvall and other top department officials were staring at nearly $1 billion. And they knew exactly how to spend it.

They used the money to seed five high-profile experiments, in New York, San Francisco, Minneapolis, Miami and Seattle, that feature "congestion pricing" -- tolls that increase when traffic is heavy. The idea is to reduce traffic by discouraging some motorists from driving during peak hours.

"It's almost sort of un-American that we should be forced to sit and be stuck in traffic," said D.J. Gribbin, the department's general counsel and liaison to the White House, who worked closely with Duvall on the project.

For Gribbin, Duvall and Transportation Secretary Mary Peters, the goal is not just to combat congestion but to upend the traditional way transportation projects are funded in this country. They believe that tolls paid by motorists, not tax dollars, should be used to construct and maintain roads.

They and other political appointees have spent the latter part of President Bush's two terms laboring behind the scenes to shrink the federal role in road-building and public transportation. They have also sought to turn highways into commodities that can be sold or leased to private firms and used by motorists for a price. In Duvall and Gribbin's view, unleashing the private sector and introducing market forces could lead to innovation and more choices for the public, much as the breakup of AT&T transformed telecommunications.

But their ideas and actions have alarmed transit advocates, the trucking industry, states struggling to build rail projects and members of Congress from both parties.

More here:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/16/AR200803...

I got a email from another blogger with a link related to my St. Patricks day post:

St Patrick's Day Parade Is Not a Moveable Feast In Dublin

Friday January 11 2008

The Catholic Church may have been forced to switch St Patrick's Day to March 15, but the Dublin parade will go ahead as usual on March 17.

Bishops had decided to move the feast day back after it was discovered the festivities would clash with the second day of Holy Week, which is early this year.

But festival organisers confirmed yesterday they would hold the national parade in Dublin on the traditional date to avoid confusion.

"Our festival office has been inundated with phone calls from people wanting to know when St Patrick's Day will be celebrated this year," said Donal Shiels.

"We would like to take this opportunity to clear up any possible confusion in relation to the date well in advance of the big day and to confirm that the festivities will be held on March 17. We have invested a lot of money to market this date and sell it around the world. Moving it would confuse a lot of people.

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/st-patricks-day-parade-is-not-a-...

Thanks for the email about Dublin. :)

as it is the deception...

Nah, just reality

Thank you for writing. Mr. Kristol has affixed to the top of his column a correction on this issue. You are correct, he was wrong.

I think it would be more correct to say "Mr. Kristol... 'is' wrong."

Ya know, as an ongoing condition of wrongness.

;)

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

Alice, I want to see the belly dancer video 8-)

That would be so bellicious.

Animals are such agreeable friends - they ask no questions, they pass no criticisms.

George Eliot, English novelist (1819 - 1880)

Please have a beer for me. ;)

Do you know any POT97's in the real world? They exaggerate and obfuscate and marginalize thinking that others believe them or they are making a point... Sometimes they just come out and lie if they have to. Then when you press them on a matter because it actually involves something like their performance and they fold. You hear squeaky little voices from them. They sometimes will eek out an excuse for who to blame for their ridiculous positions on matters. They act like it was someone else's fault the whole time. Real slimy.

Happily others know what they are looking at when they are in the room together. Sometimes in extreme circumstances we all smile knowingly and nod. Those unspoken moments are pure comedy to me when I watch it go on.

I'll have a beer for you smcgee43, thanks! :)

And maybe I can post from a bar too!

When you come to a blog with the arrogance to cause trouble nothing we say will get it to stop. Even nic stealing.

http://www.samsedershow.com/node/2658#comment-164731

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

Submitted by TheRealWFC on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 8:49pm.

I'll have a beer for you smcgee43, thanks! :)

And maybe I can post from a bar too!

`

I've seen too many people posting from bars in this age of wireless.
It's no wonder politic blogs seem like a drunken get together sometimes.

Oh well that is reality, get used to it.

The sign of trolls on the blog. SPIT!!

KO is truely enjoying his #1 story today.

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

My parents are both Aquarius == air or the wind

Sis is Aries == fire

I'm Taurus == earth

Earth Wind and Fire

: )

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

As someone that voted for Obama I'm wondering how badly he was hurt by all the mistakes his campaign made in the last month?

Specifically -

Nafta doublespeak

Preacher advisor problem

Close friend Tony Rezko turning out to be a criminal

Top campaign advisor calling opponent a monster

`

I could list more but I'm very concerned about all the mistakes that should have never been made.

toniD, registration with antispam features has cut trolling/spam way down in this blog and others as well

any word on sunshine jim? is he here under a pseudonick?

Busy! My Sister was visitin' last week & I took her back to Jersey for the weekend. Now I gotta catch up. Feh! Thank jayzeus I ain't involved or interested in the dem primaries, eh?

*smiles*

*

FYI - I am The Real WFC just like my real initials :)

Submitted by TheRealWFC on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 7:56pm.

For your information my real initials are WFC. As nicknames here are made available to the first person to register it with the blog powers that be, then there should be no problem with myself using my real initials.

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

Really, gap? Hmmmmmmm?

Just thieve another nic, add another identity, then rationalize it (in your own little psychotic pea-brain, of course), eh, LEGION?

You give honest, hard-working shit-disturbers, like gare (the house PieceOfShit), a bad name. Or would that be a good name?

Bruhahahahaha!

*

Later, kiddies. L@L'll be burnin' some midnight oil ce soir.

Lost state still has independent streak

Lost Calif. State Still Has Independent Streak More Than 60 Years After End of Movement

MICHELLE LOCKE
AP News

Mar 17, 2008 15:04 EST

In extreme Northern California, far from the bright lights of Hollywood and the foggy charms of San Francisco, is a place unknown to most people: a handful of counties that once sought to make themselves into a separate state called Jefferson.

The idea lasted only a few days in 1941 before it was quashed by the attack on Pearl Harbor. But for a few who remember its history, the movement embodies the mindset of this sparsely populated country that still longs for more autonomy.

"We've always fostered an independent streak up here," said Pete LaFortune, executive director of the Chamber of Commerce in Yreka (pronounced why-REEK-ah), about 270 miles north of San Francisco.

More than six decades later, many residents of the mountainous region along the California-Oregon border continue to complain that their concerns are overlooked and undervalued by decision makers in more populated areas.

The State of Jefferson began as part publicity stunt, part political gesture. Even today, the movement is made up of tourist-friendly whimsy intertwined with more serious themes of discontent.

In the Palace Barber Shop on Yreka's main drag hangs an animal skull decorated with the XX brand adopted by the Jeffersonians of 1941 to signify their disgust with being "double-crossed" by authorities.

"A lot of the laws and different things that affect us are voted on by people who've never been here and don't know anything about us," said John Lisle, a barber at the shop, which stands on a site that is said to have offered haircuts since Yreka was a Gold Rush town.

Another barber, Richard Pease, agreed: "When we vote on something, it doesn't make much difference at all because one precinct down there outnumbers the whole county here. You vote, but you feel like your vote is going down the tube."

Siskiyou County, home to Yreka, has about 46,000 residents spread over 6,400 square miles. Although registered Republicans have only a modest edge over registered Democrats, residents are often at odds with more liberal parts of the state.

The 1941 secessionists were angry about the region's poor roads, which became useless in winter.

"Our Roads are Not Passable, Hardly Jackassable," went the rallying cry.

http://www.rawstory.com/news/mochila/Lost_state_still_has_independent_st...

Submitted by rctowns on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 9:12pm.
any word on sunshine jim? is he here under a pseudonick?

--whats with SJ?

hows he feeling is he still sick?

was having connectivity problems? not sure.

re http://www.samsedershow.com/node/2658#comment-164680

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

fyi, I have no idea who you are at-large but you must hate that the owner of this blog requested that people posting play nice without the "shit disturbing" and trolling that you engage in.

It is obvious that you certainly are not a liberal with the type of personal attack & trolling hate without any reason you engage in. I suggest that you run along to your hate blogs and throw your unamerican personal attacks elsewhere.

and fyi goofy kid at-large, I have every right to use my initials just as anyone has.

you are done for tonight mr "Bruhahahahaha!" personal attack troll

is live - on the air NOW.

Zeitgeist - The Movie

Submitted by Liberal-at-large on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 9:15pm.

earth2 liberal-at-large Sam Seder doesnt want your trolling hate
new
Submitted by TheRealWFC on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 9:32pm.

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

I always wondered why they just don't ban shit throwing trolling idiots like that @large kid.
He seems to be violating every request/rule the admins said here.

Sometimes its hard to admin a blog though.

how is Idaho??? Cold? Beautiful country..

4.2 million accounts breached
by Chris in Paris · 3/17/2008 09:20:00 PM ET · Link
Discuss this post here: Comment (0) · reddit · FARK ·· Digg It!

During the authorization process? Pathetic.
A security breach at an East Coast supermarket chain exposed 4.2 million credit and debit card numbers and led to 1,800 cases of fraud, the Hannaford Bros. grocery chain announced Monday.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23678909/

∞♥∞

My dad always wanted to move there...

Krugman: The big bailout is coming
by Chris in Paris · 3/17/2008 10:54:00 AM ET · Link
Discuss this post here: Comment (0) · reddit · FARK ·· Digg It!

It's not if, it's when. The only question left is how well we implement the bailout. Do we trust the people who led is into this abyss to do it properly? I sure as hell don't, but that's probably what we're going to get. In case I haven't mentioned it in the last ten minutes, McCain's economic team is central to the economic problems we are facing, so don't forget it.
As Bear goes, so will go the rest of the financial system. And if history is any guide, the coming taxpayer-financed bailout will end up costing a lot of money.

The U.S. savings and loan crisis of the 1980s ended up costing taxpayers 3.2 percent of G.D.P., the equivalent of $450 billion today. Some estimates put the fiscal cost of Japan’s post-bubble cleanup at more than 20 percent of G.D.P. — the equivalent of $3 trillion for the United States.

If these numbers shock you, they should. But the big bailout is coming. The only question is how well it will be managed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/17/opinion/17krugman.html?ref=opinion

Bank of England injects $10 billion into UK banks
by Chris in Paris · 3/17/2008 08:45:00 AM ET · Link
Discuss this post here: Comment (0) · reddit · FARK ·· Digg It!

Let the market self regulate? This is getting to be painfully expensive and there is no end in sight.
The Bank of England said it would offer five billion pounds of three-day funds later on Monday in an exceptional fine-tuning operation designed to bring overnight interest rates down.

"This action is being taken in response to conditions in the short-term money markets this morning," the Bank said in a statement.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/23669851

Cat and Girl versus Legitimacy

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

WP, you know how to tell when someone is a real psychotic like that @large kid?

1) when you have no idea what the hell they are talking about

2) when they troll blogs like this with nonsense shit disturbing rants like the mad at the world @large did ranting with words like psychotic that clearly labels them for what they are

oh well... the blogs and internet are full of idiots like that kid

nothing new

How they come here and want to take over!

Later!

In all of this bloggerata stuff I'm still wondering where the belly dancer video is? ;)

As the old saying goes - Hope springs eternal

day by day

fading - in pain

got her act together -ready to go. Lessening her ties to this world.

doing excellent - "In the circumstances" I begin to say,
but that lessens her excellence.

How is she doing you ask? I say "excellent," and that alone feels right.

Her excellence is very beautiful.

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

Later toniD you informative poster

I linked you to it up above - at

http://www.samsedershow.com/node/2671#comment-165900

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

Yellowstone's wild, free-roaming buffalo herd is under siege.

The Bush Administration is turning America's greatest national park into a killing ground for hundreds of mighty bison -- better known as American buffalo.

We must speak out against this cold-blooded cruelty NOW -- because every week, more of these noble creatures are being herded into cattle trucks to be slaughtered.

This winter alone, more than 1,000 wild bison have been brutally killed by the National Park Service and the Montana Department of Livestock -- or shipped to slaughterhouses.

And come May, newborn calves are just as likely to be killed as their mothers.

We cannot stand by and let this massacre continue: Send a protest message now.

Right now, it's still winter in Yellowstone, and these unsuspecting buffalo are following historic migratory routes in search of food at lower elevations where there is less snow.

When the buffalo venture near or beyond the park's boundary, they will continue to be rounded up and killed -- unless we start a national outcry.

What makes this sacrifice so senseless is that it's all to protect 12 to 16 domestic cows and steers that graze near the park from the theoretical risk of a disease -- brucellosis -- that has never been transmitted from bison to cattle in a natural setting.

Yes, you read those numbers right: 1,000 wild bison slaughtered to protect a little more than a dozen cows outside the park that have most likely been vaccinated against the disease, or easily could be.

Please speak out and stop the slaughter. Yellowstone's buffalo are a national treasure: America's last, free-roaming herd. The National Park Service should be their guardian, not their executioner.

Our goal this week is to create a virtual "stampede" of 50,000 protest messages that will convince the National Park Service to call a halt to the killing.

Together, we must speak out to spare the lives of Yellowstone's surviving buffalo so that they can again roam wild and free.

http://www.nrdconline.org/campaign/Act_Now_To_Protect_Buffalo

Interesting word there of "Bloggerata" WisePolitics.

I didn't even know it existed.

WisePolitics on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 9:56pm.
new
Submitted by jbenet on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 9:59pm.

I linked you to it up above - at

http://www.samsedershow.com/node/2671#comment-165900

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

Obama has been struggling to deal with the comments of Rev. Jeremiah Wright for several days, since videotaped sermons surfaced in which Wright said, among other things, that African-Americans should sing "God Damn America" instead of "God Bless America."

Obama pointedly ended a speech at a community college in western Pennsylvania Monday morning with the words "God Bless America"—an uncharacteristic closing for him.

earth2 liberal-at-large, Sam Seder doesnt want your trolling hate
Submitted by TheRealWFC on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 9:32pm.

fyi, I have no idea who you are at-large but you must hate that the owner of this blog requested that people posting play nice without the "shit disturbing" and trolling that you engage in.
___________________________________________________________________

Don't worry too much about stupid trolls like that RealWFC.

It's typical of rude unthinking kids that like to shit disturb blogs and such with hating rants. Sure the admin should ban trolls like that @large one bu† †hey have their hands full just doing what they are doing with content.

On to politics and strange conspiracies :)

Part 1 just started in repeat I guess here on the East coast.
Opinions?

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

Odd isn't it what folks miss in thier upbringing?

Brought up in the world of the 3%, Obama has never stopped to understand how the 97% looks at America and what they find unacceptable.

Thank you for letting us go through this with you and with her...

Winter Soldiers? one huge mp3 or something like that? All I can find are single vids that I can't keep to watch at home...

My guess is that Obama is actually telling the truth about his deep involvement in the church, but lying (very badly) about knowing nothing about its pastor’s excesses.

The idea that he didn’t realize until a few days ago that mainstream America would view Wright’s remarks (which even Barack himself now describes as “appalling”) as explosive and unacceptable is a troubling indication of Obama’s enclosure in a politically correct bubble, and his profound estrangement from the faith and patriotism commitments of ordinary Americans.

This is so beautifully written and I almost hate to intrude, but when I read Alice's response further down @ thanking you for allowing us to go through this with you...having gone through my own loss recently I just wanted to let you know that I will keep you all in my thoughts and that I wish I could help in some small way if there was a way to do so.
Peaceful gentle thoughts being sent your way.
N-kitti

Alice
Submitted by jbenet on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 9:56pm.
day by day

fading - in pain

got her act together -ready to go. Lessening her ties to this world.

doing excellent - "In the circumstances" I begin to say,
but that lessens her excellence.

How is she doing you ask? I say "excellent," and that alone feels right.

Her excellence is very beautiful.

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

Mel & Britney Have Been 'Meeting Regularly'

By Ken Lee
March 17, 2008

Mel Gibson and Britney Spears's dinner over the weekend wasn't their first meeting.

The pair and their families have met a number of times since Spears checked out from her second hospitalization last month, a source tells PEOPLE.

"Mel and his wife Robin clearly saw a woman in crisis and wanted to extend themselves in any way possible," the source says.

"There's just a handful of people in the world who understand the kind of intense attention that Britney goes through, and how to raise a family with some semblance of privacy and how to keep one's family intact and out of the limelight," the source adds.

"There are no expectations, there is no agenda. It's simply an act of human kindness – one neighbor reaching out to the other."

Gibson and Spears used to be neighbors when the singer previously lived in Malibu.

http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20184804,00.html

you were pretty clear too t.

ha

anyway....
Kevin © on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 8:36pm. - snarky much?

So ready for pool weather.

You mean how to act "white"? Do you think the coloreds have the mental capacity to lead this country? We don't mind Sambo for President here.

The 97% has nothing to do with race. I has everything to do with Love of America. Goddamn America is offensive to all in the 97% while at the same time easily explained by the 3% as normal reaction to life in America.

puhleez.

someun pass me a paper bag. PLEASE!

wow - thanks

makes me tear up

you know -- just a little communication and sharing.

Just in those simple words

it is a help Nk. Thank you.

: )

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

James? How is your sister?

or I would have.

I'd like to know what you think.

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

for what? Why is he saying "goddamn America"?

warcomeshome.org

ivaw.org

This is my predictions for Obama, the media, AAR and his various supporters.

Everything fades eventually-Obama's charm will of course fade, the question has always been when and will it happen in time for it to help Hillary.

My opinion is that the Wright scandal is the final tipping point. I can feel a change happening-people are reaching a state of being just a little weary of Obama and his holier than tho speeches.When he gives his speech on Race tomorrow look at how people react. I don't think this one is going to work with the public although the press will still support him.

The next step will be people will get annoyed by him, and finally people will start to mock him. Hillary will end up with more actual votes by the convention and national polls will show her beating Maccain and Obama losing to Maccain and the super delegates will be forced to pick her. Hillary will again offer Obama the Vice presidency knowing Obama will reject it and he will.

The craven media, which is responsible for drawing the nation into the war with Iraq and which has supported Obama because he shifted the blame from them to Hillary, and her alone, will have to find someone else to blame and will focus on Maccain.

AAR having alienated half of its audience will suffer financial setbacks and in short order go off the air.

The various moronic supporters of Obama will as often happens in these circumstances forget they ever supported him.

No one listens to a wolf-but lets see if I'm right.

SNL was just ahead of the curve.

he may be referring to social injustice.

Joe L. Allbrighton, for example, is rich. He owns media companies. And he is also the CEO or Riggs bank. Joseph Bush has a majority share of Riggs.

They have had to deal with fines for not keeping details of monies that were transfered to Dubai to fund the 9/11 attacks. Media companies like the God Damn America line from a black preacher because it works on the Southern Strategy.

Again, it comes from the same fascist right that own the media companies.

Doesn't matter. Race is always a good thing to talk about. Even during an election. It's important that we learn to love one another and there will be bruises. To be expected.

Fact is the gap between the haves and have nots have widened considerably. In this country and also as compared to some of the poorest places in the world.

So there is an interesting dynamic. If Obama is going to kindle hope, this would be a good time to tell us where that comes from. I'm confident he will.

James
I am glad that with a few simple words that I could help ease a small minutia of the experience you and your family are going thru at this time. Know from my experience, that being truely present for your sister and for yourself during this time is the greatest gift you can give to yourself and to your family. It is by being truely present and open and honest at these times that our hearts allow us the strength to make it thru each moment with the dignity we all wish for and deserve. And know, that if I am here, then I am available for you if you need an ear or should I say "an eye or two". And know that I have found my way thru it all to the otherside of it all more whole than before, but I know that you cannot see that far at this time and you shouldn't even try. Take things one moment at a time and you will find your way as you help your family find theirs as well.
N-kitti and her fur kitties

Nefferkitti on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 10:30pm.
Submitted by jbenet on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 10:47pm.
wow - thanks

makes me tear up

you know -- just a little communication and sharing.

Just in those simple words

it is a help Nk. Thank you.

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

I watched it last night -very good.
Parts 3 & 4 on next Sunday. It is amazing what
our forefathers went through to make a great country.
I never knew that Mr. Adams defended & won his case
on the British Soldiers who supposedly killed 8 men
in a fight. There is more to it than that - you have to either watch the movie or read the book.
My opinion is it is well done.

I was able to get a ticket to see Sen. Obama when he comes to Charlotte, NC this Wednesday, 3/19.... i'm glad he's not waiting until after PA to come through.....

hopefully I'll be able to post some pictures from inside the "Grady Cole Center" on wed. night.....

So far - I am quite impressed with the quality of the creation of the 'period' of the piece. Granted I spent many years in theatre so I tend to have an eye for this kind of thing when watching something set in another time.
The historical events from the point of view of Adams and the portrayal of his relationship with his wife I am impressed with - When studying this history growing up we never really heard about the women at all, and later on my memory of the input of Abigal comes from the play 1776 which I saw on Broadway a few years ago.
Part 2 will cover the Continental Congress so that I cannot comment on yet. Except for the wigs...I cannot imagine how uncomfortable they must have been.
N-kitti

no hbo -- John Adams
Submitted by jbenet on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 10:54pm.
or I would have.

I'd like to know what you think.

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

The rate at which some of the world's glaciers are melting has more than doubled, data from the United Nations Environment Programme has shown.

Average glacial shrinkage has risen from 30 centimetres per year between 1980 and 1999, to 1.5 metres in 2006.

Some of the biggest losses have occurred in the Alps and Pyrenees mountain ranges in Europe.

Experts have called for "immediate action" to reverse the trend, which is seen as a key climate change indicator.

Estimates for 2006 indicate shrinkage of 1.4 metres of 'water equivalent' compared to half a metre in 2005.

Achim Steiner, Under-Secretary General of the UN and executive director of its environment programme (UNEP), said: "Millions if not billions of people depend directly or indirectly on these natural water storage facilities for drinking water, agriculture, industry and power generation during key parts of the year.

"There are many canaries emerging in the climate change coal mine. The glaciers are perhaps among those making the most noise and it is absolutely essential that everyone sits up and takes notice.

http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/031708EA.shtml

Fernando Thank you for asking.
re http://www.samsedershow.com/node/2671#comment-165927

=The I Ching told me yesterday
30. Li / The Clinging, Fire
changes to
23. Po / Splitting Apart

=The lower trigram stands for the earth, whose attributes are docility and devotion. The upper trigram stands for the mountain, whose attribute is stillness.
This suggests that one should submit to the bad time and remain quiet.

Which is hard for a hammer wielding Thor - bull in a china shop - kind of guy like myself. The familial relationships exist despite the circumstances.

=It is early morning and work begins.
The mind has been closed to the outside world in sleep; now its connections with the world begin again.
The traces of one's impressions run crisscross.
Activity and haste prevail.
It is important then to preserve inner composure and not to allow oneself to be swept along by the bustle of life.
If one is serious and composed, he can acquire the clarity of mind needed for coming to terms with the innumerable impressions that pour in.
It is precisely at the beginning that serious concentration is important,
because the beginning holds the seed of all that is to follow.

The warning---
=Nine in the fourth place means:

=Its coming is sudden;
It flames up, dies down, is thrown away.

=Clarity of mind has the same relation to life that fire has to wood. Fire clings to wood, but also consumes it. Clarity of mind is rooted in life but can also consume it. Everything depends upon how the clarity functions. Here the image used is that of a meteor or a straw fire. A man who is excitable and restless may rise quickly to prominence but produces no lasting effects. Thus matters end badly when a man spends himself too rapidly and consumes himself like a meteor.

=By cultivating in himself an attitude of compliance and voluntary dependence, man acquires clarity without sharpness and finds his place in the world.

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

Except for the wigs...I cannot imagine how uncomfortable they must have been.

N-kitti

Thanks for the input.
The depiction of the case that Adams took and won about the British soldiers - the Boston Massacare- that is one of the items that I think makes this worth watching altho I must admit that besides having known about it already, I wasn't planning on watching this program...but living in the hotel I do not have that many channels to choose from and HGTV was a repeat...I know that sound shallow, but its not...just have too much going on that I wasnt really thinking about getting into something so serious at the moment on TV.
Thanks again - glad you enjoyed it.

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

That's what I infer from Rev. Wright. Obama is a smart operator, and I think he will talk sense to white and black America about what blacks experience in this society. Most whites haven't a clue, and actually believe America has conquered racism.

What ever is going on - my thoughts are with you &
your family. One day @ a time!!

I try & educate myself any way that I can.
My schooling is very vague that I don't remember much.
I love to read - I have books piled up to the ceiling that I want to & are reading. I can never learn enough.
I am doing on-line classes to get my
Associates Degree in Vet. Tech.

*Looking forward to parts 3 & 4 next week. It is pretty intense to watch. Fascinating, absolutely fascinating.

did that miniseries start and is it on demand?

Adams has such a poor impression in my mind. I'm hoping there is something in this perspective that gives me some hope. He is so depressing, really.

Continued learning is the key to keeping our minds functioning and stimulated and the essence of being human.
I think its fabulous that you are doing all that you are to keep yourself learning and growing.

Neffer
Submitted by smcgee43 on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 11:26pm.
I try & educate myself any way that I can.
My schooling is very vague that I don't remember much.
I love to read - I have books piled up to the ceiling that I want to & are reading. I can never learn enough.
I am doing on-line classes to get my
Associates Degree in Vet. Tech.

*Looking forward to parts 3 & 4 next week. It is pretty intense to watch. Fascinating, absolutely fascinating.

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

Flagstaff, Arizona - One of the great natural wonders of the world - the Grand Canyon of the Colorado River - is threatened by uranium exploration. Three conservation groups filed a lawsuit Wednesday challenging the approval of up to 39 new uranium drilling sites within a few miles of Grand Canyon National Park.

In December, the Kaibab National Forest granted British firm Vane Minerals approval to conduct exploratory uranium drilling on national forest lands along the park's southern boundary with no public hearing and no environmental review. It is the first of five such projects slated for the area.

"Grand Canyon simply isn't the place for uranium development," said Taylor McKinnon of the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the plaintiff groups. "Our national treasures deserve better than the calamity of an adjacent industrial zone."

Filed by the Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club, and Grand Canyon Trust, the lawsuit claims that the U.S. Forest Service violated the National Environmental Policy Act and two other laws when it approved the uranium exploration using a "categorical exclusion," the least rigorous analysis available to the agency.

http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/031408EB.shtml

"I don't believe this - I really don't believe this BULLSHIT" smcgee

Monday 17 March 2008

According to the current plans being crafted in Washington, you will. Bear Stearns, one of the longstanding giants of Wall Street investment banking, is now on life support, the victim of its own excessive greed and bad judgment. Apparently, the wizards who run the show at Bear Stearns (I will resist the temptation to use initials) somehow couldn't see an $8 trillion housing bubble in the US economy. They made highly leveraged bets on assets backed by mortgages.

These bets have turned bad in a big way. Bear Stearns would now have less value than a corner lemonade stand, if not for the generosity of the Federal Reserve Board. The Fed lent money to Bear Stearns under terms no private lender would have agreed to. The risk it will end up with a substantial loss on its loans to Bear Stearns is quite large, with no prospect for any real return on its investment.

This raises the obvious question: Why is the Fed, an agency of the government, using our tax dollars to keep Bear Stearns and its rich managers and shareholders above water? After all, the government supposedly doesn't have enough money to provide kids with health care and childcare, to guarantee families decent housing or to meet a long list of other needs. Why do we have the money to lend tens of billions of dollars to Bear Stearns at below market interest rates?

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/031708J.shtml

Yes it started last night and repeated tonight.
I am sure it is available on demand as well as being repeated again during the week.
However, as I still live in a hotel, I do not know what the regular TV cable schedule looks like anymore as its now going on 2+ years...so I am not sure when this repeats for the rest of the week. But I think if you have Tivo you can program it to tape any episode of John Adams that comes up...but I do not know how that works.

Hope this helps.

Nefferkitti on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 11:14pm.
Submitted by Fernando on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 11:27pm.
did that miniseries start and is it on demand?

Adams has such a poor impression in my mind. I'm hoping there is something in this perspective that gives me some hope. He is so depressing, really.

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

According to Rasmussen, Obama's favorable rating has dipped to 47 percent since Thursday, a drop of five points.

At the same time, his unfavorable rating has jumped from 44 percent to 50 percent among all voters.

Among white voters, that number goes up to 54 percent.

I'm so sorry. I hate hotels.

I hope you are having fun anyway and are far from foggy bottom.

Feras Al-Chalabi, a fund manager at Odey Asset Management, was more gloomy. “We do not believe the true extent of the credit crunch will be revealed for some time yet,” he said.

Investors who cannot stomach the risk might turn to traditional havens such as commodities. The bull run experienced by precious metals such as gold and soft commodities such as wheat and grapeseed is expected to continue.

Concerns are also rising about how current market volatility might affect pension funds. Morgan Stanley said that since the start of this year alone, the 10 per cent drop in the FTSE All-Share (and larger declines in overseas markets) and declining property values had added about £40bn to the FTSE350 pension fund deficit.

However, the National Association of Pension Funds points out pension funds are long-term investors. It argues stock market volatility will not have an enduring effect on pensions.

Most retirement schemes, prompted by changes to annual disclosure requirements on the value of pension schemes, have also been taking steps in recent years to minimise their exposure to the volatility of financial markets, particularly stock markets.

There are also implications for borrowers.

Financial Times
http://tinyurl.com/2ddh9p

Thank you 'nando, but please remember, however frustrating this situation may get for me - being stuck living in the hotel - it is still quite a nice hotel and even if it were not such a nice hotel... it is still far better than most people after Katrina had, and is still far better than the 99.9% of the world's people who live on less than $2 a day.
I may have my moments...but I never forget how truely lucky I am in the overall scheme of things.
BUT I do thank you very much for understanding. It helps to know that others do understand.

Nefferkitti
Submitted by Fernando on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 11:42pm.
I'm so sorry. I hate hotels.

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

(Protect yourselves)

Insight: Commodities swamped in rush to safety

By David Roche

Published: March 17 2008 15:58 | Last updated: March 17 2008 15:58

Commodity prices are hitting new highs almost every day. There seems to be no limit to where prices can go. Well, get ready: the big fall is coming soon.

In the current turmoil, there has been a rush into commodities. The volume of funds escaping risky assets and their derivatives has been enough to cause bubble-like euphoria in commodity prices. With global equity market capitalisation almost 10 times the notional value of commodity derivatives, the rush to commodities by investors has been like squeezing a quart into a pint pot.

The speculative element in commodity markets has grown sharply; non-commercial trades now constitute more than half of all trading, with hedge funds the biggest movers into the market. And in 2007, global equity funds switched away from financials and real estate into commodities in a big way.

But that’s about to change. Global growth is declining fast. Recession will ensue and no region or asset class will be immune from its ravages. Contrary to received wisdom, economic decoupling is unlikely.

Financial Times
http://tinyurl.com/3d29lv

they are all scrambling now
http://announce.ft.com/

smcgee43 on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 11:31pm.
and
smcgee43 on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 11:34pm.

put the two together and it makes perfect perverted sense.

split enz 'our day'

Yes we're waiting now
For something burning far away
Tear the old age down for good
Welcome the young one

I'm shaking like a leaf
Wound up like a spring tonight
You say this ain't no place for children
Oh God, I hope that what we've done is right
Am I vain to feel as if the world
Owes anything at all to me
Searching, burning, tossing and turning
Desperately

And so we're waiting now
Waiting for our child to come
Can't imagine what the future holds
Just hoping there is one

==
[my sis has cancer-s]
~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

No worries
I am far away from foggy bottom...DC is just too conservative overall a town for me.
NYC tri state area is where I call home.

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

I hope you had a laughter and love filled day.

I think even if we own a spoon, we are already ahead.

Let's hope this depression catches none of us. Let's hope if one of us is so unlucky that leprechauns have wings. And let's hope we all become leprechauns.

I just had a vision of sorts.

wow.

Think of the State of the Union address. Whom ever you want giving it, imagine the room. I looked at it from all three candidates and my expectations for the future should each be so lucky.

All three came in a flash and came with context. Really weird.

thank you

: )

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

pick a good one please

[not the snow-puff(?) marshmallow man al a 'Ghost Busters']

~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

You do understand "nando - as do the majority of the members here. I just pray that no one else but me has had to experience this "house-less-ness" twice in their life time if EVER...let alone before they reach the mid point of their lives.
I know that I have a very blessed life when it comes to what one truely needs to live...but I am still human and have been hitting my "wall" of tolerance for my current situation only because there are a number of contributing additional stressors ie events that have occurred right before, concurrent and soon after the tree vs house event in Jan '06. As such, my human-ness is seemingly getting the better of me more and more often as this draws out. While I know how truely fortunate I am, I still have the same emotional need for a "true home" that most people have and find with their family...my family is now gone...so I struggle all the more because the house as a building is what I am missing to help me create that "true home" which I know rationally is not needed, but emotionally I feel I need.
It will be finished and built and I will get past this state of limbo...and move forward. I just need to be as patient as I know I can be....just sometimes its a bit hard to remember to do that...
I guess I need to be my own leprechaun for now.

you are correct Neffer
Submitted by Fernando on Mon, 03/17/2008 - 11:59pm.
I think even if we own a spoon, we are already ahead.

Let's hope this depression catches none of us. Let's hope if one of us is so unlucky that leprechauns have wings. And let's hope we all become leprechauns.

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

All I can see is the single vids..I was looking for one long mp3 of all the people who spoke....

I lived out of a suit case several times in my life. My house was left for my wife to take care of with my new born child.

Once she was born, I felt a need to make sure she had a future. That future put me on the road for extended periods of time. My wife and I became a bit estranged and divorced so my house was hardly my house and I forced myself to stay home. I hate hotels.

I remember trying to build a future for my daughter and Thanksgiving would come around. There were no dishes from my family nor her mothers for the meal and I was forced to buy new. That was awful. Threw the "new" dishes away as soon as nobody was looking.

I got something from my Grandmother. It's not much but something. It's in Mexico but it's mine. I'll get it soon. My Grandmother died just last year. Today, St. Paddy's is her birthday.

In ten, it will be toniD's! Her birthday is mañana.

I was going to send this out to Nancy Pelosi

but I think you might like it.... : )

Message To My Girl

Though I'm frightened by the word
Think it's time I made it heard
So I sing it to the world
Simple message to my girl

No more empty self-possession
Vision swept under the mat
It's no new years resolution
It's more than that

No there's nothing quite as real
As a touch of your sweet hand
I can't spend the rest of my life
Buried in the sand.

==
Why Nancy you may ask?
Because she's the only hope we got to stop this madness---

No more empty self-possession
Vision swept under the mat
It's no new years resolution
It's more than that
~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

THank you James, that is just the sweetest thing anyone has sent out to me in a long time. Thank you. And may all things peaceful and and serene be sent your way.
:)thanks
N-kitti

bless you neffer -- all good things to you.
new
Submitted by jbenet on Tue, 03/18/2008 - 1:02am.
I was going to send this out to Nancy Pelosi

but I think you might like it.... : )

Message To My Girl

Though I'm frightened by the word
Think it's time I made it heard
So I sing it to the world
Simple message to my girl

No more empty self-possession
Vision swept under the mat
It's no new years resolution
It's more than that

No there's nothing quite as real
As a touch of your sweet hand
I can't spend the rest of my life
Buried in the sand.

==
Why Nancy you may ask?
Because she's the only hope we got to stop this madness---

No more empty self-possession
Vision swept under the mat
It's no new years resolution
It's more than that
~`~`~`~`~`~
Jamesbennett

»

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

I am sorry your lost your grandma last year - celebrate her b-day today and happy b-day ToniD!!

And I understand your hatred of hotels now. I traveled a great deal for business and have gotten used to them as a result. But, even so, this is getting to be a bit too long to be living in a hotel...but then again - I know that I am lucky to have this suite as home until my house is done so I will not complain - as best I can anyway...but I do understand your point of view of course.
Thanks for sharing it with me.

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

I've heard 6:35 of this one already

http://ivaw.org/wintersoldier/testimony/rules-engagement/vincent-emanuel...

and that is enough for me...my heart can't take it...

I depend on him to post his podcast by midnight and its not there.

God Damn Mike Malloy.
too much? really? ok....

...

I hope maggiesboy saw it too...he does something with these 50's cards...

:)

Nah... but we should check our air ono policy manual first to be sure.. ;)

mp3

ram

Time for me to get to bed - have an appointment at 10:30AM so am hoping to get some sleep.
Will not make it for S and M live and literally hope to make it to my appt on time.
Have a good night and morning everyone.

Reality. TV. Two more reasons to read.

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.
---Ray Bradbury

Definitly time for me to get off the computer.
Sorry about the double post.
G;night again sederistas

Personally I adore hotels...

I'm sure you'll wind up soon, and are in now, the perfect place for you...

(I sound confident huh?) :)

Does James Brolin live in the penthouse.. ? (kidding)

Sweet dreams sweets..

Book

her agile, impassioned collection of essays, Storming the Gates of Paradise: Landscapes for Politics, Solnit returns to familiar ground—the California earth blasted away by the devastating hydraulic mining of the gold rush, and Nevada’s dry, alkaline lake beds, home to Burning Man and the US military.

...

“Borders don’t exist in nature, but they can be made,” Solnit observes. If we look long enough at geography—or simply close enough—other shapes emerge. Writing of the nonarable soil of the Nevada military bases, she notes that “the wars fought in the Middle East have been fought here first, in strange ways that could make those wars more real but instead make them more removed.” With Solnit as guide, the land does not end.

I liked the images in that comic yesterday. That's cool putting them in motion.

You worked hard on that post and it is appreciated!!

Thanks Kevin, Neffer!!

And thanks Nando! From one Dino to another!

; )

Many blessings, and many happy returns!

Raise your hand if you wanna have sex with Cicero... :)
~A.

Woke up early today for some reason.

What a surprise when I came to the blog!

Race For The White House Debut: Good, Bad & Ugly
By: Logan Murphy @ 7:00 PM - PDT

MSNBC debuted the program Race To The White House today in Tucker’s old time slot and the review from the C&L staff is mixed at best. We realize that it’s the first run for this show, but the faces and format are all familiar and there is definitely room for improvement. Host David Gregory does an admirable job, although he loses control of the panel, allowing the lone wingnut to dominate the conversation by yelling and spewing delusional talking points over the other panelists — something we were hoping to see less of.

Download | Play Download | Play (h/t Heather)

Rachel Maddow, Eugene Robinson and Chuck Todd were spot on, as usual. Where the show stumbles is the presence of Joe Scarborough and his rampant, fact-free ranting which drops the IQ of the show by double digits. The panel discusses the tanking U.S. economy and the mortgage meltdown and the Scar defends President Bush saying it wasn’t deregulation that caused the current crisis, it was greedy homeowners:

Scar: “This is not the type of economy it was in 1992 when Bill Clinton got elected. It’s not the economy stupid, yet, for most voters out there.”

Gregory:”Rachel, there’s a big disagreement about that.”

Maddow:”Yeah, Joe, if you were running for reelection on the basis of a platform right now that the economy’s actually secretly awesome, we just can’t tell, I don’t think that you’d be reelected. [snip]

Scar:”This did not happen because of deregulation, this happened because homeowners got more home than they could afford, they got interest only loans, they gambled wildly because they wanted to turn it around and make hundreds of thousands of dollars and guess what? The market changed! [snip] You know what, no consequences. Gamble, go to Vegas, lose your money and you know what? We’re going to blame it on GEORGE BUSH!”

Joe has his own MSNBC morning show where he can yell and brow beat his co-hosts all he wants, isn’t that enough? The cheesy graphics are distracting and the sound effects and music are a little annoying. We give Race For The White House a C+. Lose the Scar and it automatically jumps into B territory.

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/03/17/race-for-the-white-house-debut-...

UPDATE: The Huffington Post has another clip from the same show with Scarborough getting caught on-air stuffing a brownie in his face. Watch the clip here.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/17/whoops-joe-scarborough-_n_91976...

have a good day today (and every day)

more home than they could afford.

just keep repeating that as loud and long as you can. maybe like all the other conservative lies about reality you can get some kool aid drinkers to believe it.

(pay no attention to the banker behind the curtain robbing you blind)

Translation of Χρόνια πολλά is many years!

that'll teach me to use the internet for research. i suppose in a way it means happy birthday.

It is used for Birthdays, toasts, lots of events you'd like to wish the person well.

I just wanted to let you know what it meant.

Mr Bubble speaks on his last of four bubbles
by Chris in Paris · 3/18/2008 06:17:00 AM ET · Link
Discuss this post here: Comment (0) · reddit · FARK ·· Digg It!

Is this guy for real? He played a critical role in building this financial mess along with the Republicans. He never spoke out against this growing problem and only helped feed it. Why anyone gives him an ounce of respect is beyond me but he ought to be publicly shamed for his actions and inactions.
Writing in the Financial Times, the former Fed chief said much of the financial system's risk-valuation models failed, not because they were too complex but because they were "too simple to capture the full array of variables governing that drive global economic reality."

"The crisis will leave many casualties. Particularly hard hit will be much of today's financial risk-valuation system," he wrote.

While insisting that current risk management models and econometric forecasting methods remain "soundly rooted in the real world," he said risk management can never be perfect.
Proving again that's he's a complete ass as well as first class idiot.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080317/bs_nm/economy_greenspan_dc

Be back after a snooze!

Thanks agin, all, for the Birthday wishes!

Solar 12 (9-0.0.5.7)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

red electric moon ~ kin 29

ACTIVATE in order to PURIFY,
BONDING FLOW
seal the PROCESS of UNIVERSAL WATER
with the ELECTRIC tone of SERVICE.
guided by the power of SPACE.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
◄ 12.19.15.3.1 ≈ uuc imix ►

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said Tuesday that the U.S. economy is in a "sharp down climb," although economists differ over whether it is in recession. In an interview with NBC's "Today," Paulson cited "turbulence in our capital markets," but added that "we're all over it." He said the government's economic stimulus package could create between 500,000 and 600,000 jobs, and that the key task is to prevent turmoil in the markets from spilling over into the broader economy. However, he also reiterated "great confidence" in the strength of U.S. markets.

===

all i want to know is who is going to eat all that fast food that these 600K people will be cooking and serving?

from this person advertising on the blog

http://www.samsedershow.com/node/2675

At least He's being honest..

By VALERIE BAUMAN, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 1 minute ago

ALBANY, N.Y. - With his predecessor's term doomed by a sex scandal, brand-new Gov. David Paterson tried to come clean about his own skeletons just hours after assuming office by acknowledging a years-old affair.
Con't-YahooNews

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

Obama set to speak on race at 10:15 am ET in Philadelphia.

Yeah,sorry about letting Turkey bomb ya first..Let's have peace..Iran & N.Korea next ? What an arse !

By DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writer
50 minutes ago

IRBIL, Iraq - Vice President Dick Cheney, delving into internal Iraqi politics, pushed a Kurdish leader on Tuesday to play a helpful role in passing legislation to foster national reconciliation and forge a new agreement for U.S.-Iraq relations in years to come.

After a rally with troops, Cheney flew to Irbil in the Kurdish region of northern Iraq for a meeting with Massoud Barzani, head of the regional administration in the semiautonomous area.
Con't-YahooNews

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

is it summertime yet....geez this cold weather just refuses to leave

Is that what Bernanke will take out of the prime rate today?

That's a bunch. It will limit what he can do after that.

http://money.cnn.com/2008/03/17/news/economy/fed_response/index.htm

whos's that? never heard of him, only wright and obama on my tv since friday!

thats what "people" are hoping for. personally i would be happy if they reveresed it and restored value to the dollar. it was originally supposed to be 0.75. don't know how the sunday night .25 figures in.

you are right, they are almost out of bullets.

hahaha thats funny kevin

true, i need another hooker scandal or blonde in trouble story.

would be catastrophic. She's on vapors now.

But I don't know that lowering rates now doesn't increase risk. I don't understand how Greenspan could not have known this was going to happen. He should be hanging from his toes on some public square for what he has done.

He should have spoken up when they were promising to pay for this horrible war with oil profits. If anything, I hope the impending financial disaster adds importance to the need to send Rumsfeld, Cheney, Rice, and George to the Hague.

and Wolfowitz, and Armitrage, and Doug Feith, and Liz Cheney, and ....

Wall Street rallies to aid Lehman
By Helen Power in London and James Quinn in New York
Last Updated: 10:17am GMT 18/03/2008

Wall Street's leading investment banks have rallied around ailing rival Lehman Brothers after the Federal Reserve Bank of New York urged them to support the institution in order to try and preserve financial stability.

It is understood the New York Fed contacted key executives at a number of leading banks, including Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Morgan Stanley, to discuss Lehman's situation over the weekend.

By yesterday morning, the banks' prime brokerage departments - which service hedge fund clients - were under strict instructions not to do or say anything in the market that could damage Lehman.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TONID----r u 1, 2, 12? I hope you have a blessed day!

Troubles as Light as Air,Love as Deep as the Ocean

Friends as Solid as Diamonds,Success as Bright as Gold.

These are My Wishes for You.

do you know if he will be on the span?

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

true, but our monetary policy is out of sync with the rest of the world. the liquidity isn't doing any good if the banks aren't making loans to businesses. it feels like the taxpayer is being held hostage for all the bad debt the banks took on while stuffing record profits in their pockets. once the government steps in and takes the debt off their hands the crisis will magically disappear.

while this admin is on their way to the hague, there's a lot of ceo's and boards of directors that should be on their way to levenworth.

i just don't buy this conservative bullshit that the only reason we have a problem is because some schmoe took out an arm to get themselves a house. lets make sure we don't ask who was encouraging them.

Once again the sophisticated Chinese are attacking and mocking the Dalai Lama. What a cruel country-what will they do next-sell poisonous toys to children?

i was strangely attracted to these little magnetic toys they're recalling

according to bloomberg:

Goldman's 'Liquidity Position Stronger Than Ever", CFO Says

will have it. BRB.

MSNBC MORNING JOE REPORTING ON REV. WRIGHT: IS THERE A DOUBLE STANDARD? YES!!!!!

The choice of Joe Scarborough by MSNBC to host a morning show is an example of political cowardice by Dan Abrams its program director. Other than Keith Olbermann, MSNBCs lineup is decidedly right of center. Scarborough along with lapdogs Willie Geist, and Mika Brzezinski are over the top on the patriotism thing. Rev. Wright's sermons should not be a basis for condemning Obama. Rev. Wright's 1st amendment rights should clearly be protected especially in the context of a sermon. Furthermore, Scarborough has drunk the Republican Kool-aid for so long that his comments are skewed and lack objectivity. Like many other Republican leaders, their comments are based upon hunches and not facts

On the other hand, CNN's Situation Room commentator Jack Cafferty stated yesterday that he had experienced fiery sermons by clergy that he did not agree with that in no way would cause him to leave his church. The idea that a black man going to a black church should be responsible for some of his pastor's sermons provides a double standard to an African American candidate. It is a sorry comment on the white dominated media. Because of Keith Olbermann I have made MSNBC my cable news channel of choice If things do not change, I am going to move elsewhere.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_sdrobny_080318_msnbc_morning_joe...

Spitzer & Silverstein: The Amicus Brief

Prescient New York real estate baron Larry Silverstein became primary lease-holder on the World Trade Center a mere six weeks before 9/11. It had never changed hands before. For a down payment, Silverstein put up only $14 million of his own money, and his friends at the powerful investment bank Blackstone Group kicked in another $111 million. After 9/11, Silverstein demanded a whopping $7 billion insurance payout, in the form of two $3.5 billion payments. He argued the two different plane crashes were two separate “occurrences” of two separate attacks.

The Megaphone has now learned that as attorney general, Spitzer got involved behind the scenes, and in the courts, filing a amicus curiae (“friend of the court”) brief on Silverstein’s behalf on Jan. 15, 2003. For years, this brief languished in the files of the public records room on the 17th floor of the Second Circuit Court in Manhattan, until it was discovered and brought to The New York Megaphone by NYC attorney and author Carl Person. The court ended up agreeing with Spitzer and Silverstein, over-turning the decision of a lower court. Spitzer helped mid-wife a fat compromise and an eventual $4.5 billion payout for Silverstein. The Megaphone’s multiple requests for comment from Governor Spitzer were ignored.

http://www.opednews.com/maxwrite/linkframe.php?linkid=54701

"People have been saying they're shooting our people like dogs," Tenzin Norgay, the spokesman for the Tibetan Center for Human Rights and Democracy, told ABC News, citing his sources inside Tibet. He spoke just a few hours after a deadline set by the Chinese government expired for the protestors to stop or face a crackdown. The protests, he says, continued, and so did the retaliation.

"From reports we have been able to gather, the military forces, they do not tolerate anything more than a few minutes and then immediately they begin shooting or beating. And if the crowd goes out of control they shoot indiscriminately," Norgay said.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=4468783&page=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjvNSpsPu1k

Thanks for the Birthday wishes.

I'm watching the span and they have two guys talking about the economy. One is from Cato and he's a jerk. He said that he didn't think that the gov't eliminated the Bank Reform Act and especially under the Bush admin.

https://pol.moveon.org/pac/donate/foxattacksobama2.html?r=3495

Happy Birthday to toniD
Happy Birthday to toniD
Happy Birthday to "OUR" dear toniD
Happy Birthday to YOU :)

the span just loves having these liars on...heritage foundation, AEI seem to be always on

Anyone have the time on that???
I hope to god its not on during Marc & Sammy's show.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2uCFzIwXmM

10:15 am im lead to believe

Lucille, I loved your poem

MMR, heh! Cute cartoon!

At 10:15 ET today in Philadelphia, Obama is expected to give a major speech addressing race and the controversy over his pastor, Jeremiah Wright.

just relax today...no ouzo i hope!

10:15 - - why not 10:19 or 10:34.
Anywho - - is that eastern time?

Lucille feeling better I hope?

I don't understand what is happening this time.

Is it up because of the Fed's rate cut today?

This is truly wierd.

Affirmative action foes point to Obama
Say candidate is proof effort no longer needed

WASHINGTON - Leading opponents of affirmative action are increasingly seizing on Illinois Senator Barack Obama's historic run for the presidency as proof that race-based remedies for past discrimination are no longer necessary.

Influential Republicans and a growing number of policy specialists at conservative organizations, including the Goldwater Institute, Project 21, and the Manhattan Institute, are citing the fact that large numbers of white voters are supporting Obama, who leads in the race for Democratic delegates, as evidence that affirmative action has run its course.

Ward Connerly, a black conservative who is leading a national effort to ban racial preferences, vowed to use Obama's success as evidence for anti-affirmative action ballot initiatives his organization is promoting in five states. Connerly, who helped dismantle affirmative action policies in California universities and public hiring in the 1990s, said he has donated $500 to Obama's campaign.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/03/18/affirmative_action...

Follow the logic of the panic stricken Federal Reserve
by Chris in Paris · 3/18/2008 08:44:00 AM ET · Link
Discuss this post here: Comment (0) · reddit · FARK ·· Digg It!

American wages have barely moved in decades, resulting in less expendable income for purchasing. The US economy revolves around the American consumer spending. Estimates vary from 2/3 to 70% of the overall economy is from consumers. With less money to spend, the GOP Congress worked with fancy-schmancy financial people on Wall Street to make credit easy. Credit cards for everyone and never pay them off. When that gets maxed out, make it even easier to buy a house (no proof of anything required) and then lower interest rates (thanks Alan!) so consumers can borrow against the value of their house because real estate will *always* go up.

Slight hiccup and some bank we never heard of overseas has a run and needs to be bailed out. No problem, lower interest rates again. This weakens the dollar so oil - which every good American needs for their gas guzzler - becomes more expensive. Hmmm, better help Wall Street make loans easier, so give them billions to make loans at below inflation rates. What? They don't want to give away loans? They want to hunker down and deal with their own funny money deals? Well, lower them again. And again. And probably again. We need consumers to buy, but since they don't save, it needs to be on even more credit. Oh, they don't have any credit or money left because their retirement accounts are crashing and they're afraid to spend more because of the warning signs in the economy and maybe they will lose their jobs?

Well? Cut rates again, maybe that will help. At least it will help Wall Street and that's all that matters. Just tell people that inflation is low, even though it's higher than wage increases. See if that works.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080318/ap_on_bi_ge/fed_credit_crisis;_ylt=A...

At 10:15 ET today in Philadelphia

cnn.com and foxnews.com are saying they will carry the speech live online at 10:15 ET

Texas Democratic conventions to go on as scheduled

Texas Democratic leaders said they will not delay the March 29 conventions that will help determine how many delegates are awarded to Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama or set up "unnecessary" verification processes to review those who already cast their votes.

Clinton's camp sent a letter Friday asking that the March 29 conventions at the senatorial district or county level -- the next step in the state's hybrid of a primary election and caucus -- be delayed until signatures from the conventions held March 4 could be verified.

The party said no.

http://www.star-telegram.com/news/story/533262.html

Federal judge orders return of endangered species protection

PHOENIX - The Center for Biological Diversity and Maricopa Audubon have won a federal district court lawsuit against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to continue Endangered Species Act protection for the desert-nesting bald eagle, found mostly in Arizona.

The victory resulted from a challenge of the FWS's 2006 rejection of an Oct. 6, 2004, Center and Maricopa Audubon petition to increase protection for the eagle and its habitat and from a challenge to the agency's nationwide effort to remove Endangered Species Act protection from all bald eagles.

On March 5, Federal District Judge Mary Murguia reversed the FWS's 2006 decision, calling it ''arbitrary and capricious, and contrary to law.'' She reinstated Endangered Species Act protection for the eagle and its habitat in Arizona and ordered the FWS to complete a re-evaluation of its 2006 decision within nine months.

http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096416836

Good morning.

Big week for John McCain. He's on a taxpayer funded photo op excursion around the world. Pretty bold for a guy who beats up on wasteful spending to use government money to finance what is basically a campaign trip. Then, he's got the fundraiser in London, hosted by a British Lord. Imagine the outrage if a Democrat sent out a fundraising invite with the words "by kind permission of Lord Rothschild OM GBE."

But, most important of all, McCain is going to release is February FEC report. We'll see if McCain is breaking the campaign finance laws. If he breaks the spending cap, he's broken the law.

Actually, it's a big week showing what a hypocrite McCain is. The traditional media is too obsessed with Obama's pastor to pay attention to McCain's hypocrisy and criminality. But, the political reporters know McCain. He lets the ride on the bus with him. Maybe McCain will start giving them all pet nicknames like Bush did. The reporters love stuff like that. It shows how cool they are...so much cooler than the rest of us.

What are you hearing?

http://www.americablog.com/2008/03/tuesday-morning-open-thread_18.html

wow. I've never read toniD so redundant. I wonder if she got into the champagne?

'Bush administration officials removed bald eagle habitat protection to benefit their developer friends who seek to divert stream flow critical for eagles."

its a whole bunch of stuff. overseas overnight sorta rallied so starting at 4am the futures went up. they tend to lead the overall market. then premarket goldman sachs and lehman both reported better than expected numbers for the quarter. on the downside, consumer prices are up again this month, although that is getting discounted.

one item i read suggests that in the abscence of any real bad news the market would trend up till the fomc announcement at 2:15. at that time its anybodys guess how the market will interpret their actions, but whatever, to expect the rest of the day to whipsaw around.

now, none of this goes without saying that the market could turn on a dime with any significant news...

PALENQUE, Mexico (AP) - Indians from Mexico, the United States and Canada gathered before dawn March 10 to light incense, pray and sing in the shadow of ancient Mayan pyramids, asking the contaminated earth for forgiveness.

More than 200 leaders from 71 American Indian nations were joining in this jungle town at a conference to offer indigenous wisdom about ways to save the polluted planet.

''Our Mother Earth is being polluted at an alarming rate, and our elders say that she is dying,'' said Raymond Sensmeier, a Tlingit leader from Yakutat, Alaska. ''The way the weather is around the world ... a cleansing is needed.''

http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096416857

if we don't develop the land the terrorists win!

NBC5i link here.

http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096416860

Bush officials removed bald eagle habitat protection
new
Submitted by dan on Tue, 03/18/2008 - 10:04am.
if we don't develop the land the terrorists win!

FORT WORTH, Texas -- Controversy surrounding the longtime minister of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is not deterring a Texas divinity school from honoring the Rev. Jeremiah Wright at a ceremony later this month.

nbc5i

Price of Iraq war now outpaces Vietnam
John Byrne

Price only exceeded by World War II

"Major combat operations in Iraq have ended," declared President George W. Bush aboard the USS Lincoln in 2003. "In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed."

Five years later, the Iraq war rages on.

According to two prominent economists, in a study the White House has not disputed, the cost of the war now outpaces the total price of the 12-year US conflict in Vietnam. It's now nearly double the total cost of the Korean War.

The costs of maintaining a US presence in Iraq now runs a tab of about $435 million a day -- $3 billion a week, or $12 billion a month. The US has siphoned some $500 billion taxpayer dollars into Iraq, for a war that was supposed to be "sharp" and brief. Interest payments add another $615 billion, and the price tag of repairing a depleted military is projected at $280 billion.

Only World War II, in terms of inflation-adjusted dollars, was more expensive, according to a recent study by Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz and Harvard University public finance Professor Laura Bilmes. Both served in the Clinton administration.

Their price tag? $3 trillion. The White House has not disputed the study.

Writing in the San Fransisco Chronicle today, Zachary Coile draws on the study and compares it with the costs of previous US wars.

The price tag in Iraq now is more than double the cost of the Korean War and a third more expensive than the Vietnam War, which lasted 12 years. Stiglitz and Bilmes calculate that it will be at least 10 times as costly as the 1991 Gulf War and twice the cost of World War I.

Only World War II was more expensive. That four-year war - in which 16 million U.S. troops were deployed on two fronts, fighting against Germany and Japan - cost about $5 trillion in inflation-adjusted dollars.

The latest numbers are a far cry from the cost estimates made by war supporters in the run-up to the March 2003 invasion.

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Price_of_Iraq_war_now_outpaces_0318.html

In September 2002, White House economic adviser Larry Lindsey told the Wall Street Journal the war would cost between $100 billion and $200 billion. He was immediately excoriated by others in the administration. White House budget director Mitch Daniels called the estimate "very, very high." Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld called it "baloney."

Dalai Lama Says He Will Step Down As Political Leader if Tibet Violence Spirals Out of Control

GAVIN RABINOWITZ
AP News

Mar 18, 2008 06:30 EST

The Dalai Lama threatened Tuesday to step down as leader of Tibet's government-in-exile if violence committed by Tibetans in his homeland spirals out of control.

The rioting prompted Premier Wen Jiabao to denounce the Dalai Lama's supporters as separatists and accuse them of instigating the violence in Tibet's capital of Lhasa. It was China's highest-level response to date to the unrest.

http://www.rawstory.com/news/mochila/Dalai_Lama_to_resign_if_violence_wo...

thanks

Seven out of 10 Iraqis want foreign forces to leave: poll
LONDON (AFP) - More than two-thirds of Iraqis believe US-led coalition forces should leave, according to a poll conducted for British television ahead of the fifth anniversary of the Iraq invasion.
The ORB/Channel 4 News survey suggested that 70 percent thought multinational forces should withdraw.

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Seven_out_of_10_Iraqis_want_0317.html

The Rise of American Incompetence

We used to be the world's most skillful entrepreneurs and managers. Now we're laughingstocks. What happened?

http://www.slate.com/id/2186547/

over the weekend i went to a school fund raiser. i was talking with a fairly conservative gentleman, and he started to explain to me how everything wrong right now can be laid at the feet of the peace movement and environmentalists. he insists that if we drilled for oil in the gulf (which i think we do) and opened up alaska (the intent of the oil companies being to sell that to japan) that we could oil back down to $15 barrel which would bankrupt the arabs and make the future safe for israel...

i think he could tell i was incredulous, but as he walked away, he said something we've heard around here before:

"it would serve this country right to elect a democrat for the next four years. after they completely ruined the country just like carter did, we could go back and elect republicans to fix everything".

whats funny is that this guy is living a modest retirement, so he doesn't really benefit from anything the republicans do.

10:37.2am EST yet?

there is always a bubble of upward movement on markets whenever there is speculation on rate cuts. In this case people are hedging how much. I expect a short tumble after the news. It could also be a proverbial spiral down the drain however. One can't know right now. I find the sudden news of Lehman's good health to be some what suspicious. If it's a facade the damn will break.

France mulls Olympic ceremony boycott

PARIS - France's Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner says the European Union should consider boycotting the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics if violence continues in Tibet.
ADVERTISEMENT

The head of the European parliament and media watchdog Reporters Without Borders are calling Tuesday for such a boycott. Kouchner says the proposal is "interesting."

Kouchner is telling reporters in Paris that the idea should be considered by EU foreign ministers meeting later this month.

He insists France had no plans to boycott the entire Olympic Games, saying that would not be "just."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080318/ap_on_sp_ol/oly_france_olympic_boyco...

did you see my earlier post from the uk telegraph which claimns the fed was twisting arms over the weekend telling all the other brokerages to stfu about lehman?

Cheney ties Iraq, al-Qaeda again after fielding question from his own official biographer

Vice President Dick Cheney, in a press conference during a surprise visit to Iraq, again stated that it was "pretty clear" there was a link between Iraq and al-Qaeda before Sep. 11.

Reminded of the release last week of an exhaustive Pentagon report which concluded that there were no ties between Saddam Hussein and the terror network, Cheney answered, "Well, it says no operational link. But there was, as I recall from looking at it, extensive links with Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Egyptian Islamic Jihad was the organization headed by Zawahiri, and he merged EIJ with al-Qaeda when he became the deputy director of al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden's number two.

"Now, was that a link between Iraq and al-Qaeda?" Cheney asked rhetorically. "Seems to me pretty clear that there was."

When someone else asked him to reiterate his specific claim, Cheney replied, "You heard what I said. I was very precise."

The person who first prompted Cheney at the press conference about the link was Stephen Hayes, according to the White House's own transcript. Hayes, a conservative columnist and, coincidentally, the official biographer of Cheney, wrote a book entitled 'The Connection: How al Qaeda's Collaboration with Saddam Hussein Has Endangered America' that made the same argument as the vice president's about a purported link between Saddam and al-Qaeda.

Additionally, Hayes concluded in a November 2003 article for the conservative Weekly Standard that "there can no longer be any serious argument about whether Saddam Hussein's Iraq worked with Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda to plot against Americans."

Last week, after the release of the Pentagon report, Hayes wrote another piece for the Standard which insisted that the report actually underscored Cheney's case rather than undermined it.

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Cheney_ties_Iraq_Qaeda_again_at_0318.html

amazing how wrong all of those thugs were. Stunning incompetence - the rhetoric of idiots.

but ultimately, I think any attempt to cover it up with manipulation of their bottom line will be looked at like fraud.

Holy shit will fly on the floor if all decorum turns out to be nothing more than smoke and mirrors. That would make the great stock market crash look like a day at the fair.

down is the new up
climb is the new free-fall
*shakes head*
Denial will never die in DC.

Mark Twain, "Denial ain't just a river in Egypt."

Gordon Brown has promised that the Government will hold a full-scale inquiry into the mistakes made in Iraq before and since the invasion five years ago.

His concession marks a significant break from his predecessor, Tony Blair, who steadfastly refused to hold a wide-ranging inquiry into the war.

Mr Brown, however, insists it is not the right time for an immediate investigation as the situation in Iraq remains "fragile" and British troops are still trying to bring stability to the country. The Prime Minister said: "There is a need to learn all possible lessons from the military action in Iraq and its aftermath."

On the eve of the fifth anniversary of the invasion on Thursday, Mr Blair's former chief of staff, Jonathan Powell, warned it could take "decades" to bring calm to Iraq. He also admitted the British and US governments had seriously underestimated the scale of the task before them in 2003.

Mr Brown's promise came in a letter to Sunder Katwala, general secretary of the Labour-affiliated Fabian Society, who had urged him to mark the anniversary by announcing a public inquiry.

"There will come a time when it is appropriate to hold an inquiry," said Mr Brown. "But whilst the whole effort of the Government and the armed forces is directed towards supporting the people and government of Iraq as they forge a future based on reconciliation, democracy, prosperity and security, we believe that is not now."

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/there-will-be-a-public-inq...

Sam is on at 11:00am does Obama have no respect?

They just now decided to take down the one mic they had and put in two new mics.

how the pentagon missed the tie thru kevin bacon remains a mystery...

Poll Shows Opposition To Hillary Winning Nomination Via Super-Delegates
By Eric Kleefeld - March 18, 2008, 9:43AM
A new USA Today/Gallup poll casts some doubt on the political viability of Hillary Clinton's strategy to secure the Democratic nomination via super-delegates. By a 55%-37% margin, Democratic and Dem-leaning respondents said it would be "flawed" and "unfair" if Obama were to win more elected delegates but see Hillary override him via the supers.

This opinion is held by 77% of Obama supporters — expected, because the question specifically posed him as the pledged-delegate winner — but also among 28% of Hillary's supporters. Almost two-thirds of independents said such an outcome would be unfair, and one-third of indies said they would vote Republican or stay home if it were to happen.

http://tpmelectioncentral.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/03/poll_shows_oppos...

I'm glad you reminded me of that. I don't think we should wait on the debate.

I'm listening to Kennedy on C-span3 tell us how all the blather from the defense department is made up... that there is nothing there. This was in 2002. We all know he gets steam rolled in the days to come.

Americans really did nothing to help Ted defend truth.

So J.P. Morgan is guaranteed a no fail purchase of Bear-Stearns?

Well, back in 1919 George Herbert Walker (the grandfather of George Herbert Walker Bush (Bush 41) and great grandfather of George Walker Bush (Bush 43)) forged permanent ties to the banking establishment J.P. Morgan and Co. George Herbert Walker was valued as a "premier deal-arranger", skilled at operating with a confidntiality that is described as "mysterious".

So -- SURPRISE! SURPRISE! -- who will be PROFITTING in this win-win deal now? Another Bush insider?

Look for the scam, folks!

all that matters to the bankers is that they get their money out first. this is why they hated spitzer so much.

Also, a point I haven't heard about this Pastor Wright stuff:

Pastor Wright is not calling for an OVERTHROW of our government's separation of church and state. However, 1.) John McCain has sought support of the radical religious leaders who do seek to end separation of church and state and 2.) Hillary Clinton belongs to the infamous secret group called The Fellowship the goal of which is for politicians to seek to end of separation of church and state.

I just want to say, it appears -- again -- that the DOUBLE STANDARD is quite alive if Senator Obama must disavow the anti-exploitation statements his pastor makes, but McCain and Hillary Clinton are not forced to explain their associations to anti-separation of church and state!

This needs to be the speech in which Obama casts away any ties to The Rev and the 3% !!!!

This will be Obama last chance to once and for all state his love for the 97% and America!!!

I hope Obama has seen the Light!!!

it shouldn't be a surprise that spitzer would work behind the scenes on a real estate deal. i believe most of his money comes from commercial real estate development.

Obama needs to explain the 20 years it took him to see that The Rev was a 3%er!!!!

What took so long?

in the context of where he was preaching and what he was preaching about, it isn't racist or hate speech, something which the necons and the 97% wade in with their evangelists and psuedo patriotism.

Better Late than never to come to the Light of the 97%!

But what will Obama do about to make the videos go away?

c-span 3 iraq war debate 2002
new
Submitted by Fernando on Tue, 03/18/2008 - 10:31am.
amazing how wrong all of those thugs were. Stunning incompetence - the rhetoric of idiots.

da HOUSE - NOW

how Presidential is this man :)
He can speak the english language
I have not heard this in almost 8 yrs.

Stocks are way up today!
Submitted by toniD on Tue, 03/18/2008 - 9:45am.
I don't understand what is happening this time.

Is it up because of the Fed's rate cut today?

This is truly wierd.

» ================================

Were there more worker lay-offs/firings? That always perks them up.

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