Batshit crazy

Thanks Sam 4 the new sheets.....
miss u

on your PC will cause a virus to attach itself to your computer for the purposes of spying.

on this site - anybody else have that
issue. Well its not really an issue,
I just have never gone on to any other
blogs... ???

How to Get Our Democracy Back
If You Want Change, You Have to Change Congress
By Lawrence Lessig

This article appeared in the February 22, 2010 edition of The Nation.
February 3, 2010
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100222/lessig

Thank you for signing up. Now spread the word!

Passing an amendment will not be easy. To get there, we must all do our part to get Americans to act if we're truly going to restore integrity to Congress. Take a moment to spread the word our efforts to pass the Fair Elections Now Act and bring about change through an amendment to the Constitution. Use the tools we've provided here to get your friends and family to read Lawrence Lessig's response to the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision, and urge them to take action.
http://action.change-congress.org/page/invite/amendment

like smcgee said a few threads back, don't fuck with the sheep

that Dr.'s will not accept the "Health Care" plan
they will opt? out?
Now there is information that is lost in that state-ment.
Like .... what part of the health care plan,
is it single payer, medicare 4 all?? I have no fucking
clue.
My question is - has anyone heard of that comment??
As Dr.'s do NOT want a "Health Care" PLAN??

Spain's super-judge closer to being charged

Last year a conservative group called Manos Libres filed a complaint against Garzon for having launched the investigation in the first place, and the Supreme Court agreed to study it. Varela was assigned to the case.

The magistrate known for indicting Osama bin Laden and Augusto Pinochet may have knowingly acted without jurisdiction by probing Spanish Civil War atrocities, a court said Thursday in a ruling that takes Spain's most famed judge a step closer to being put on trial himself.

Those atrocities — the killings of tens of thousands of civilians by forces loyal to Gen. Francisco Franco during the 1936-39 war and in the early years of the Franco regime — were covered by an amnesty passed by the Spanish Parliament in 1977, two years after Franco died.

But Garzon ignored this and in 2008 launched his probe anyway, Lucio Varela, an investigating magistrate at the Supreme Court, wrote in the 55-page ruling.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/8930819

Saludos friends of Venezuela!

Please find this week's Correo del Orinoco International - English Edition here.

We are pleased to announce that this week's newspaper is dedicated to the military rebellion led by Hugo Chávez 18 years ago, on February 4, 1992. "For Now, Forever: The Day Hugo Chavez Changed Venezuela's Destiny", goes in depth into what sparked the beginning steps that have led to the Bolivarian Revolution. In Caracas, on this February 4, a mass march and rally will take place in the famous Los Proceres Avenue, in Fort Tiuna, concluding with an inspiring speech by President Chávez. The anniversary of this event is now known in Venezuela as the "Day of Dignity"

.....Friends, we are still looking for high-quality writers for the Correo International, and always accept submissions for consideration. We can't promise everyone will get published, but I personally will evaluate each article for publication. Again, please send your suggestions on story topics and themes for future editions.

We're also really happy to announce that next Friday, February 12, is the date of the official launching of the Correo del Orinoco International - English Edition and the website, in both Spanish and English. While we have published three editions so far, our official, official launch date is next Friday.
http://www.chavezcode.com/2010/02/check-out-this-weeks-correo-del-orinoc...

and that would be a carly fiorina ad? geezus; the kettle calling the frying pan black, or something like that

Note to ESPN’s Jemele Hill: Tim Tebow is not Muhammad Ali
posted by Dave Zirin on 02/03/2010 @ 10:45am

....But Jemele Hill chose to take it to an entirely higher level: a level that deeply miseducates her readers and demands a response. She chose to write, "Tebow's decision to appear in this ad should be considered just as courageous as Muhammad Ali's decision to not enter the draft, or Tommie Smith's and John Carlos' black power salute at the 1968 summer Olympics."

Dear Lord, Jemele. Where do we possibly begin to unpack this? Tim Tebow is starring in a 2.8 million dollar ad while being praised by sports writers, pundits, and politicians from coast to coast. In contrast, Muhammad Ali's decision to refuse the draft and say "I ain't got no quarrel with them Vietcong" resulted in getting stripped of his title, being abandoned by almost every significant person in his life, pushed to bankruptcy, and hit with a five year Leavenworth prison sentence, which included revoking his passport. The very same day of his conviction in federal court, the US Congress voted 337-29 to extend the draft four more years. They knew how important Ali was and the full weight of the federal government was hell-bent on breaking his will........
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion/525844/note_to_espn_s_jemele_hill_...

looking forward to read the article u posted about
Hugo Chavez

When I dressed up as a tea bagger.

Lockheed downplays criticism of F-35 program
http://www.star-telegram.com/business/story/1942557.html

The good news, Crowley said, is that the actions of Gates and other Pentagon officials demonstrate the government's commitment to completing F-35 development, getting into production and equipping the Marines, Air Force and Navy.

"We know the Pentagon is fully behind the program and intends to provide the resources to successfully complete this program," he said.

Lockheed has about 7,000 employees in Fort Worth working directly on the F-35, a number heavily weighted toward engineers, software writers and other technical experts.

Tom Burbage, the Lockheed executive vice president and general manager who handles most of the marketing and communications with U.S. and foreign government officials, said he detected no great concerns on their part in the wake of Gates' comments Monday.

did you take pictures? I'd love to see that - and i am sure air ono will enjoy it too, whenever he shows up again :)

i thought you said you dressed up as a chicken or something, or was that a turkey?

I only blog on this site - anybody else have that issue.

Well, it's not for lack of trying.
Other places, they have these weird thingies,
called "topics," that you are supposed to "stay on."
I'm a little unclear on the concept.

crank, you really are a clueless asshole...
the title of ghetto's post:
Corporations shouldn't criticize corporatism.
Submitted by ghettodefender on Thu, 02/04/2010 - 12:25pm.
http://samsedershow.com/node/5637#comment-393525
was a sarcastic comment
and given the predominance of corporations...
perfectly resonable

it was not a conclusion
and you can't differentiate the two
you classed it as a conclusion to launch an attack on him
a very undignified attack

now you can come back at me & class my behaviour from the previous night as undignified & boorish
can't fault you there...
i was being a hyperbolic asshole

now if ghetto used the same logic to point out that my criticism of you isn't valid because...
assholes shouldn't criticise other assholes
this logic excludes the reality that not all assholes are equal
(you're clueless & i'm hypobolic)
consequently, the logic is meaningless syllogism

is ghetto correct in classing all corporations as equal... yes & no
no in the sense that not all corporations are evil
but yes in the sense that we know the type of corporations that he's referring to
the type of corporation everyone here is offended by

i know this post is jumping around so i'll cut to the chase
my conclusion is that your credibility is in tatters
(you really need to curb your hysteria)

Dalai Lama to meet Obama at White House this month

Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters that the meeting would be in February but didn't specify a date. The Dalai Lama's secretary has said the Tibetan monk will be in Washington on Feb 17-18.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/8931070

Doing a live webcast this Friday
sam blue horde Hey folks, wanted to let you know I'll be doing a live webcast on www.theyoungturks.com on Friday at 12 noon est.

I'll be talking about my sense of the Obama administrations success and failures, the demise of Air America, the latest GOP plan to eliminate Medicare and interview Chris Hayes of the nation on the system failure of our political process.

And of course I will take your calls and IM's. Check it out!

to make mince meat of your idiotic post from last night
but i only got the time for one more cup of coffee
and to give sandy, my cyber-babe, a quick virtual kiss on the neck
: )

How you doing ono?

(I'm at work and typing on a tablet so haven't read the last few threadz as close as could have )

~`ordinary's just not good enough today - olp`~
Jamesbenet

Blue Roots Radio

...2x

How awesome is that???
Very cool - I'm happy
bout that.

you forgot to remind me to take out the garbage
it might have been because i was in a booze induced coma

i just opened the door
and there's all these emptied bins (trash cans) out in the alley
shit!
garbage night!

Liberating Tania and feeding the masses:
February 4, 1974
Patty Hearst kidnapped
On February 4, 1974, Patty Hearst, the 19-year-old daughter of newspaper publisher Randolph Hearst, is kidnapped from her apartment in Berkeley, California, by two black men and a white woman, all three of whom are armed. Her fiance, Stephen Weed, was beaten and tied up along with a neighbor who tried to help. Witnesses reported seeing a struggling Hearst being carried away blindfolded, and she was put in the trunk of a car. Neighbors who came out into the street were forced to take cover after the kidnappers fired their guns to cover their escape.

Three days later, the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA), a small U.S. leftist group, announced in a letter to a Berkeley radio station that it was holding Hearst as a "prisoner of war." Four days later, the SLA demanded that the Hearst family give $70 in foodstuffs to every needy person from Santa Rosa to Los Angeles. This done, said the SLA, negotiation would begin for the return of Patricia Hearst. Randolph Hearst hesitantly gave away some $2 million worth of food. The SLA then called this inadequate and asked for $6 million more. The Hearst Corporation said it would donate the additional sum if the girl was released unharmed....
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history.do?action=VideoArticle&id=473...

i'll send you my garbage
so you can sift through it...
it's the standard you've been reduced to

my stomach is queasy
and i thought my head was fine until i started seeing double
unless it was a double post
: )

update: it was a double post afterall
(yo, stop messing with my perception of reality)

Byron Dorgan is kinda pissed about
how long it takes to pass shit.
not in the fine Senators words
of course.
Mary Landrieu is on now.

What the hell is kida - shit I'm
.......well u know.

I'm just surprised.

NYPD Inc,--
Terrorizing the populace and inspiring music.

Feb. 4th, 1999
Unarmed West African immigrant Amadou Diallo was shot and killed in front of his Bronx home by four plainclothes New York City police officers who said they mistook his wallet for a gun. The police fired 41 shots at Diallo.

(Singer Karen Carpenter died today at age 32.)

Why was the vp's senate job done away with? Isn't that what the super 60 senate vote does?

~`ordinary's just not good enough today - olp`~
Jamesbenet

Blue Roots Radio

needs some maintenance work
its running way slow

and her speech is just as annoying as the impaired susan collins

is she a rino or a dino? it's really hard to tell with these peeps, i think blue dog with emphasis on the dog describes all these so called centrist assholes

Getting to Blanche. President Obama scolds Blanche Lincoln over her cowardly stance

http://crooksandliars.com/

So the amoral Corporatists talk about 'civility'? When one is amoral, what are the chances the civility of one's politicial adversaries will not be used, abused, gamed?

Nothing like 'civility' to open the way to complete the PRIVATIZATION of the COMMONS!!!

I'm not impressed with Obama's statements at The Family (The Fellowship) Prayer Breakfast.

I suppose a number of detainees were told they had to remain 'civil' to their torturers. The notion of 'civility' does have its limits.

THE CRIMINAL CLASS that wants to rip everything away from The People in one scam after another does not deserve 'civility'.

Randi seemed a little too worshipful today of Billary's and Barack's performance at the Prayer Breakfast; their performance sounded a bit hollow to me coming from Corporatists who fashion any required living financial/economic sculpture out of humanity in order to make the desired profit -- with the code of amorality in full operation.

AMORAL CORPORATISTS are incapable of any genuine 'civility'.

NBC Cafeteria Celebrates Black History Month With Fried Chicken Special (Update)

I'm sure it was well-intentioned (history, soul food and all) but, unconscious and/or careless soft racism is really something that needs to be called out every fucking time.

"this machine kills fascists"

mistook his wallet for a gun. The police fired 41 shots at Diallo.

They were just protecting themselves silly .. geez don't
ya know

When that story came out - I remember thinking, really
what the F_CK R those F_CKING Cops thinking???? 41 shots is beyond my thought process. just my opinion.

thanks air-ono - miss u ;)

seder's blog
new
Submitted by air-ono on Thu, 02/04/2010 - 3:46pm.

needs some maintenance work
its running way slow

~`ordinary's just not good enough today - olp`~
Jamesbenet

Blue Roots Radio

and crank
you've been scheduled for extermination
(to be continued)

~`ordinary's just not good enough today - olp`~
Jamesbenet

Blue Roots Radio

i got maintence work to do on myself
(be back next month)

here's the movie i'm currently raving about...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sQhTVz5IjQ
it's a rollicking good yarn
"it's a bingo"

(ciao)

i'm more interested in your wake up in fright, i like old movies, you know

Have you ever heard of Frank Luntz? He's the pollster who wrote the talking points for opponents of health care reform. His advice led to claims like "death panels."

And now he's turning his sights to blocking bank reform.
Last week, a leaked memo written by Mr. Luntz told opponents that bank reform is so popular the only way to fight it is to make stuff up -- and he generously offered his suggestions. [1] And this week, in Philadelphia and Chicago, we saw the first attack ads making the Orwellian claim that cracking down on Wall Street -- including a new bank fee to force repayment of the bailout -- is tantamount to a bailout! [2]
It's wrong, it's dangerous and if we don't fight back, it just might work.
That's why we need your help to send Sen. Chris Dodd (CT), chair of the Senate banking committee, the message that false scare tactics must not get in the way of reining in Wall Street.

It's now in Sen. Dodd's hands.
Luntz's clients include Merrill Lynch (now a unit of Bank of America), as well as the failed Freddie Mac and Bear Stearns. He has no interest in protecting taxpayers and neither do the clients he wrote the memo for.
With your help, we pushed needed reforms through the House of Representatives in December -- new consumer protections to end deceptive practices, no more hidden trading on "shadow markets," and rules to deal with banks that grow too big to fail.
But bank lobbyists have stalled it in the Senate and Chairman Dodd now faces the situation that his committee members are listening to bailed out banks argue that reining them in would be another bailout.

We can't stop the deceptive doublespeak of Luntz and Wall Street's lobbyists, but we can put an end to the deceptive practices and wild speculation that brought down the economy. We can, but we need your help to make sure Sen. Dodd doesn't give in to the war of words.

http://www.IllinoisPIRG.org/action/financial-privacy/bank-reform-is-not-...

Blame Congress for holding up DADT repeal

"'The debate may exist in the media, and certainly exists in Congress, but on the ship, if it's talked about at all it with a little bit of confusion about what the big deal is. Don't get me wrong, there is homophobia and there are a few loud, mostly uneducated, mostly very junior, and mostly still well-meaning people who would tell you they think its wrong -- but they're the kind of people who are just saying it because its what they were brought up to say, and even they aren't saying it with much fervor. I can tell you with certainty that if the ban were lifted tomorrow -- no year of preparation -- life would go on exactly as it did before....

... I just want the press to understand that it is the Congress that needs pushing, not the military, and that excuses such as "senior military officials like the CJCS and SecDef are out of touch with the low-level, young guys on the ground" may be true on many issues, but not this one.'"

"this machine kills fascists"

I look forward to our rendezvous tonight at ten, beneath the Dwarf Maples.

I did and posted a picture on the blog - here.

I snuck off work early to catch practice runs at Daytona for the Shootout preceding the 500 on Speed Channel. It's looking pretty wild already. Denny Hamlin hangs a left nearly as gracefully as Zoolander.

that's hilarious

is going to talk on the new Job's Bill
now

Halloween costume was great. :)

Clothes make the man!

my best friend is a huge right wing tool.

He's bitching because he needs health care reform. He's not even 25 years old. Our children have no idea what to do if Obama care fails.

GOP wants Obama to empower them to cut budget

House Republicans are asking President Barack Obama to work with them to cancel already-in-place spending programs.

Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio and Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia sent a letter to the White House on Thursday asking Obama to invoke a provision that lets lawmakers cut money included in past budgets. The White House didn't have immediate comment.

Cantor, the No. 2 House Republican, says Obama has the ability to prove he's serious about cutting the budget.

GOP lawmakers say they need the workaround because Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi has refused to compromise. Obama has been pushing for bipartisanship but giving the Republicans that ability would be a political embarrassment for Pelosi.

(Wonder if he takes them up on it. Freezing domestic spending clearly is just what we need):

Global markets plunge on fears of U.S. jobs report

At the close of trading Thursday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average briefly dropped below 10000 before closing down 268.37 points at 10002.20. Similarly, the S&P 500 fell 34.17 points to 1063.11 and the Nasdaq finished down 65.48 points at 2125.43.

...weighing on global stocks were concerns that the U.S. recovery may be weaker than thought. The Labor Department reported Thursday that initial claims for jobless benefits leapt by 8,000 for the week and the total number of 480,000 was 20,000 higher than consensus forecasts.

This data suggested that hopes for a big improvement in the jobs outlook might be premature. Financial markets across the globe will be closely watching Friday's employment report for January from the Bureau of Labor Statistics . They'll be trying to gauge whether the strong economic growth posted in the final three months of 2009 is paper growth or whether it points to hiring, or at least an end to job losses.

Despite those positive indicators, there were equally troubling ones, however. On Wednesday, Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. , a job placement company, released its latest monthly survey showing that employers in January announced 71,482 layoffs at the start of 2010. It marked the first monthly increase in layoffs since July 2009 .
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/227/story/83759.html

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6134GW20100205

NEW YORK/ORLANDO, Florida (Reuters) - New York's attorney general charged Bank of America Corp, former Chief Executive Kenneth Lewis and former Chief Financial Officer Joe Price with fraud for allegedly misleading shareholders about the acquisition of Merrill Lynch & Co.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission separately said Bank of America agreed to pay a $150 million civil fine and bolster disclosure and governance practices to settle its two lawsuits alleging poor disclosure of Merrill's losses and $3.6 billion of bonus payouts. That accord requires court approval.

Thursday's civil lawsuit by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo could complicate efforts by new Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan to revive the largest U.S. bank.

Moynihan replaced Lewis, who retired under pressure at the end of 2009 after four decades at the bank.

Lewis, 62, joins Countrywide Financial Corp's Angelo Mozilo among major U.S. financial services chief executives to face civil regulatory fraud charges over conduct since a global credit crisis began in the middle of 2007.

Separately, Senator Carl Levin criticized Bank of America for failing to scrutinize questionable accounts by a notorious arms dealer and flag them for possible money laundering.
(continues)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8498993.stm

Insulin injections are currently the mainstay of type 1 diabetes treatment
Scientists in Cambridge have shown that an "artificial pancreas" can be used to regulate blood sugar in children with Type 1 diabetes.
A trial found that combining a "real time" sensor measuring glucose levels with a pump that delivers insulin can boost overnight blood sugar control.
The Lancet study showed the device significantly cut the risk of blood sugar levels dropping dangerously low.
Experts said the results were an important "step forward".
Type 1 diabetes is a chronic, life threatening condition, in which the pancreas does not produce insulin - the hormone that regulates blood sugar levels.

(continues)

/Funny I thought this was already going on\

WASHINGTON, Feb. 4 (UPI) -- Internet search giant Google has asked the U.S. National Security Agency for help in investigating a breach of the company's security, sources say.

Google has said it believes recent "highly sophisticated" attacks on it originated in China, and it has threatened to pull its operations from that country, The New York Times reported Thursday.

Theft of intellectual property had occurred, Google said, and the goal of the attacks was to access Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.

But collaboration between Google and the federal agency responsible for global electronic surveillance raises civil liberties questions, the Times said.

While the agreement will not give the NSA access to information belonging to Google users, it still reopens long-standing questions about the role of the agency.

"Google and NSA are entering into a secret agreement that could impact the privacy of millions of users of Google's products and services around the world," said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center.
http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2010/02/04/Google-asks-NSA-for-help-on-cy...

i have always assumed that google was an nsa black bag operation. just think about the money that was made by people in the know when the google when public.

(sometimes the best secret operations are the ones that are done in plain sight)

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/International/2010/02/04/Police-Opium-based-...

CALGARY, Alberta, Feb. 4 (UPI) -- Two people were arrested in connection with an opium-based drug that police in Calgary, Alberta, warn is a growing and deadly threat.

Calgary police said a middle-age man and woman running a convenience store were arrested Wednesday after undercover officers purchased a drug known as doda, the Calgary Sun reported.

The drug is made from ground up seeds and pods from opium poppies and originated in East India and Afghanistan. The powder is stirred into boiling water to make a tea and give the user an initial "rush" followed by a sense of calm, akin to morphine and opium, the report said.

Staff Sgt. Darren Cave said apart from being addictive, legally it is "no different than selling or buying crack cocaine."

During the arrests, police seized about 120 pounds of opium poppies and 25 pounds of the ground doda and $10,000 in cash, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. reported.

Detective Doug Hudasen told a news conference the drug posed a major threat of becoming mainstream.

"I think it's a wake up call for everybody. It's here and it's an emerging trend," he said.

Last September, Canada Border Services in Calgary seized more than seven tons of opium pods from two trucks, the Sun said.

http://motherjones.com/politics/2010/01/green-jobs-prison-work

Can turning prisons into hothouses of sustainability pay off for everyone?

Bill Would Force CEOs To Say They 'Approve This Message'

A bipartisan pair of House lawmakers have a response to the Citizens United Supreme Court decision that allows unlimited corporate money to flow into elections.

Reps. David Price (D-N.C.) and Mike Castle (R-Del.) told the Huffington Post in a joint statement that they plan to introduce a bill that would force CEO's to take ownership of their company's ads.

For example: "I'm Brian Moynihan, the CEO of Bank of America, and I approved this message."

The two House members plan to push the "Stand By Every Ad Act", which would force a corporate chief to issue a similar message at the end of every commercial.

Price was the lead sponsor of the original "Stand By Your Ad" measure, which became law as a part of the 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act. It was that legislation that led to the ubiquitous claims of responsibility at the end of political ads that we know today.

"Failure to apply 'Stand By Your Ad' to these entities may lead to a regression to the days when disparaging or deliberately misleading ads could be run without voters ever knowing who was behind them," Price said. "If candidates and political parties have to take responsibility for the ads they run, corporations and labor unions should have to do the same."

Castle is running for the vacant Delaware Senate seat and has been a longtime champion of campaign finance reform.

"This bill would simply extend the same transparent disclosures requirement to special interest groups that candidates are currently required to provide in their campaign advertisements," Castle said.

The bill would also require Web and email ads to identify their funding source. The money behind robo-calls would be required to be disclosed up front, surely leading to a steep hang-up rate -- a welcome (perhaps intended) consequence of the bill.

"The Internet and new media have transformed the political landscape, but our legislation to ensure responsible advertising hasn't kept pace," Price said.

Price is a member of the task force of Democrats considering legislative pushback to the Supreme Court decision.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/04/bill-would-force-ceos-to_n_4502...

toniD's Ya Think?

It is safer to assume every single keystroke and audio/video session sent out over the internet is captured and logged...

The NSA is not building those two new HUGE data storage facilities in Texas and Utah for nothing....

Will that, out of money, unemployed boy get a check for his spot on Bill O'Reilly's show? More people saw ol' Sam in that 15 sec spot then have ever seen him in his life. And boy did he look cute in his little bow-tie. Damn shame they were laughin about the death of AAR.

Hahahahahahahahaha.

Club for Growth targets Gingrich
Posted: February 4th, 2010 04:43 PM ET

From CNN Political Producer Peter Hamby

Washington (CNN) – The conservative Club for Growth is hitting back at former House Speaker Newt Gingrich for criticizing the small government group during an appearance in Utah for Republican Sen. Bob Bennett. The Club is actively working to defeat Bennett, who is seeking re-election in November.

Several Republicans are challenging Bennett from his right flank as he seeks a fourth term, largely because of his vote in favor of the Wall Street bailout in 2008. While the Club has said they will oppose Bennett, they haven't said which candidate they will support instead.

But Bennett has the backing of the National Republican Senatorial Committee - which as a rule supports Republican incumbents - and on Wednesday Gingrich showed up in Salt Lake City to lend a hand.

"I wish the Club for Growth would spend as much time and energy to defeat liberal Democrats as they do dividing Republicans," Gingrich told a crowd at Bennett's formal campaign launch, according to the Deseret News. "I try to defeat liberal Democrats. I don't spend much time trying to defeat Republicans."

That prompted the influential conservative group to take a shot at Gingrich for backing "ultra-liberal" Dede Scozzafava in last year's special election in New York's 23rd district. The moderate Scozzafava quit the race after being harangued by conservative activists who supported Doug Hoffman. Democrat Bill Owens eventually won the race.

"Newt has proven time and again that he will support any Republican, regardless of policies and principles," said Club president Chris Chocola in a statement. "That's his right, but the Club for Growth PAC puts principles over party,"

"Newt was wrong about New York-23, and he's wrong about Utah," Chocola continued. "And pretty soon, Bennett will wish Newt never gave him the kiss of Dede."

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/02/04/club-for-growth-targets-...

toniD's Ya Think?

REUTERS
Turkish police have recovered the body of a 16-year-old girl they say was buried alive by relatives in an "honour" killing carried out as punishment for talking to boys.
The girl, who has been identified only by the initials MM, was found in a sitting position with her hands tied, in a two-metre hole dug under a chicken pen outside her home in Kahta, in the south-eastern province of Adiyaman.
Police made the discovery in December after a tip-off from an informant, the Turkish newspaper Hurriyet reported on its website.
The girl had previously been reported missing.
The informant told the police she had been killed following a family "council" meeting.
Her father and grandfather are said to have been arrested and held in custody pending trial. It is unclear whether they have been charged. The girl's mother was arrested but was later released.
Media reports said the father had told relatives he was unhappy that his daughter – one of nine children – had male friends. The grandfather is said to have beaten her for having relations with the opposite sex.
A postmortem examination revealed large amounts of soil in her lungs and stomach, indicating that she had been alive and conscious while being buried. Her body showed no signs of bruising.
The discovery will reopen the emotive debate in Turkey about "honour" killings, which are particularly prevalent in the impoverished south-east.
Official figures have indicated that more than 200 such killings take place each year, accounting for around half of all murders in Turkey.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/04/girl-buried-alive-turkey

Police want backdoor to Web users' private data
by Declan McCullagh

Anyone with an e-mail account likely knows that police can peek inside it if they have a paper search warrant.

But cybercrime investigators are frustrated by the speed of traditional methods of faxing, mailing, or e-mailing companies these documents. They're pushing for the creation of a national Web interface linking police computers with those of Internet and e-mail providers so requests can be sent and received electronically.

CNET has reviewed a survey scheduled to be released at a federal task force meeting on Thursday, which says that law enforcement agencies are virtually unanimous in calling for such an interface to be created. Eighty-nine percent of police surveyed, it says, want to be able to "exchange legal process requests and responses to legal process" through an encrypted, police-only "nationwide computer network." (See one excerpt and another.)

The survey, according to two people with knowledge of the situation, is part of a broader push from law enforcement agencies to alter the ground rules of online investigations. Other components include renewed calls for laws requiring Internet companies to store data about their users for up to five years and increased pressure on companies to respond to police inquiries in hours instead of days.

But the most controversial element is probably the private Web interface, which raises novel security and privacy concerns, especially in the wake of a recent inspector general's report (PDF) from the Justice Department. The 289-page report detailed how the FBI obtained Americans' telephone records by citing nonexistent emergencies and simply asking for the data or writing phone numbers on a sticky note rather than following procedures required by law.

[...]

CNet

Reid Threatens To Bypass Senate With Recess Appointments

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid warned Republicans Thursday that if they use the arrival of Scott Brown as an opportunity to filibuster every Democratic nominee, then his party may have to bypass the legislature and rely on appointments made during recess.

"I hope that we can get more cooperation here. I have been someone, Madam President, who has tried hard not to do -- have the president do recess appointments," Reid said from the Senate well Thursday afternoon. "But what alternative do we have? What alternative do we have?"

Brown of Massachusetts, who will be sworn in later on Thursday afternoon, give the GOP enough votes to filibuster any nominee -- and they've shown a willingness to filibuster any nominee.

That leaves Craig Becker, nominated to the National Labor Relations Board, one of many nominations that could be blocked by filibuster.

A recess appointment is made when the president appoints a job prospect while the Senate is in recess. According to Senate Rule 22, a motion to recess cannot be filibustered

A recess appointee could theoretically serve for nearly two years. A person recess-appointed during the president's day break in February could serve until the end of the next session, which would take the appointee to late 2011.

President Bush made 171 recess appointments and President Clinton made a total of 139 recess appointments, according to the Congressional Research Service. Of President Bush's 171 recess appointments, 99 were to full-time positions, and the remaining 72 were to part-time positions.

UPDATE: Debate about aren't, generally, about process, but about power and the outcome of that process. It didn't take long for a helpful GOP aide to send along quotes from Democrats decrying recess appointments when Bush was the one making them.
Story continues below

SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV): "An End Run Around The Senate And The Constitution." "I will keep the Senate in pro forma session to block the President from doing an end run around the Senate and the Constitution with his controversial nominations." (Sen. Reid, Congressional Record, S.15980, 12/19/07)

REID: "They Are Mischievous." Also, understand this: We have had a difficult problem with the President now for some time. We don't let him have recess appointments because they are mischievous, and unless we have an agreement before the recess, there will be no recess. We will meet every third day pro forma, as we have done during the last series of breaks." (Sen. Reid, Congressional Record, S.7558, 7/28/08)

SEN. DICK DURBIN (D-IL): "The President Basically Says He's Going To Ignore The Will Of The Senate And Push Someone Through, It Really Is Troubling." "When you have an appointment that is this critical and this sensitive, and the president basically says he's going to ignore the will of the senate and push someone through, it really is troubling." ("Bush Sends Bolton To U.N." The [Springfield, IL] State Journal-Register, 8/2/05)

DURBIN: "Could Easily Be Unconstitutional ... Certainly Confrontational." "I agree with Senator Kennedy that Mr. Pryor's recess appointment, which occurred during a brief recess of Congress, could easily be unconstitutional. It was certainly confrontational. Recess appointments lack the permanence and independence contemplated by the Framers of the Constitution." (Sen. Durbin, Congressional Record, S.6253, 6/9/05)

SEN. RUSS FEINGOLD (D-WI): A "Slap To This Institution." "Judge Pickering was never confirmed by the Senate, but in a further slap to this institution, the President put him on the court through a recess appointment." (Sen. Feingold, Congressional Record, S.13289, 10/24/07)

FEINGOLD: "The Administration Could Put In Place The Most Egregious And Political Leadership, And We--The Senate--Could Do Nothing About It." "Is that what we want? It means most likely there will be recess appointments this winter for the 10 major leadership positions in the Department. And what does that mean? Simply stated: The administration could put in place the most egregious and political leadership, and we--the Senate--could do nothing about it. We would have reduced transparency and reduced congressional oversight." (Sen. Feingold, Congressional Record, S.14158, 11/8/07)

SEN. CHRIS DODD (D-CT): "I Think It Is An Abuse Of The Process, Whether Democrats Or Republicans Use It." "Remember, this is written in the Constitution to provide during these long periods when Congress was not going to be around at all and you had to put people in place. Now what presidents do -- Democrats and Republicans -- is wait for a week or two recess to come along and slip someone in. I think it is an abuse of the process, whether Democrats or Republicans use it." ("Democrats Decry Bolton Appointment," Fox News, 8/01/09)

SEN. FRANK LAUTENBERG (D-NJ): A Recess Appointment "Bends The Rules And Circumvents The Will Of Congress." "'[E]ven while the president preaches democracy around the world, he bends the rules and circumvents the will of Congress' at home. ("President Sends Bolton to U.N.; Bypasses Senate," The New York Times, 8/02/05) more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/04/reid-threatens-to-bypass_n_4496...

toniD's Ya Think?

Chris Dodd Seeks Constitutional Amendment To Reverse Supreme Court Campaign Finance Ruling

Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) announced on Thursday that he will introduce a constitutional amendment to reverse the Supreme Court's recent campaign finance ruling.

According to a statement issued by Dodd's office, the senator's amendment would "authorize Congress to regulate the raising and spending of money for state and federal political campaigns, and to implement and enforce the amendment through appropriate legislation."

"In the wake of one of the most radical decisions in the Supreme Court's history of campaign finance jurisprudence, a constitutional amendment is necessary to fully restore the trust and voice of the American people," Dodd said in a statement. "If corporations -- foreign as well as domestic -- are allowed even greater and more direct influence over our elections, our democracy as we know it will cease to exist. I won't stand for that. I urge my colleagues, and the American people, to join me in defense of democracy by supporting this amendment and other interim steps to mitigate the damage done by this decision."

Dodd is not the first Democrat who has sought to upend the ruling, which would allow a flood of corporate money into politics. Earlier this week, Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) and Rep. Donna F. Edwards (D-Md.) introduced their own amendment.

Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Penn.) also suggested introducing an amendment, and Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) expressed his support for changing the constitution.

"I think we need a constitutional amendment to make it clear once and for all that corporations do not have the same free speech rights as individuals," Kerry said at a Senate hearing on Tuesday.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/04/chris-dodd-seeks-consitut_n_450...

toniD's Ya Think?

he government has your baby's DNA

Source: CNN.com

When Annie Brown's daughter, Isabel, was a month old, her pediatrician asked Brown and her husband to sit down because he had some bad news to tell them: Isabel carried a gene that put her at risk for cystic fibrosis.

While grateful to have the information -- Isabel received further testing and she doesn't have the disease -- the Mankato, Minnesota, couple wondered how the doctor knew about Isabel's genes in the first place. After all, they'd never consented to genetic testing.

It's simple, the pediatrician answered: Newborn babies in the United States are routinely screened for a panel of genetic diseases. Since the testing is mandated by the government, it's often done without the parents' consent, according to Brad Therrell, director of the National Newborn Screening & Genetics Resource Center.

In many states, such as Florida, where Isabel was born, babies' DNA is stored indefinitely, according to the resource center.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/02/04/baby.dna.government/?hpt=C1

toniD's Ya Think?

The crisis is not over
By Paul Craig Roberts
Online Journal Contributing Writer

Feb 4, 2010, 00:26

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Readers ask if the financial crisis is over, if the recovery is for real and, if not, what are Americans’ prospects. The short answer is that the financial crisis is not over, the recovery is not real, and the U.S. faces a far worse crisis than the financial one.

Here is the situation as I understand it: The global crisis is understood as a banking crisis brought on by the mindless deregulation of the U.S. financial arena. Investment banks leveraged assets to highly irresponsible levels, issued questionable financial instruments with fraudulent investment grade ratings, and issued the instruments through direct sales to customers rather than through markets.

The crisis was initiated when the U.S. allowed Lehman Brothers to fail, thus threatening money market funds everywhere. The crisis was used by the investment banks, which controlled U.S. economic policy, to secure massive subsidies to their profits from a taxpayer bailout and from the Federal Reserve. How much of the crisis was real and how much was hype is not known at this time.

As most of the derivative instruments had never been priced in the market, and as their exact composition between good and bad loans was unknown (the instruments are based on packages of securitized loans), the mark-to-market rule drove the values very low, thus threatening the solvency of many financial institutions. Also, the rule prohibiting continuous shorting had been removed, making it possible for hedge funds and speculators to destroy the market capitalization of targeted firms by driving down their share prices.

The obvious solution was to suspend the mark-to-market rule until some better idea of the values of the derivative instruments could be established and to prevent the abuse of shorting that was destroying market capitalization. Instead, the Goldman Sachs people in charge of the U.S. Treasury and, perhaps, the Federal Reserve as well, used the crisis to secure subsidies for the banks from U.S. taxpayers and from the Federal Reserve. It looks like a manipulated crisis as well as a real one due to greed unleashed by financial deregulation.

The crisis will not be over until financial regulation is restored, but Wall Street has been able to block re-regulation. Moreover, the response to the crisis has planted seeds for new crises. Government budget deficits have exploded. In the U.S., the fiscal year 2009 federal budget deficit was $1.4 trillion, three times higher than the 2008 deficit. President Obama’s budget deficits for 2010 and 2011, according to the latest report, will total $2.9 trillion, and this estimate is based on the assumption that the Great Recession is over. Where is the U.S. Treasury to borrow $4.3 trillion in three years?

This sum greatly exceeds the combined trade surpluses of America’s trading partners, the recycling of which has financed past U.S. budget deficits, and perhaps exceeds total world savings.

It is unclear how the 2009 budget deficit was financed. A likely source was the bank reserves created for financial institutions by the Federal Reserve when it purchased their toxic financial instruments. These reserves were then used to purchase the new Treasury debt. In other words, the budget deficit was financed by deterioration in the balance sheet of the Federal Reserve. How long can such an exchange of assets continue before the Federal Reserve has to finance the government’s deficit by creating new money?

Similar deficits and financing problems have affected the EU, particularly its financially weaker members. To conclude, the initial crisis has planted seeds for two new crises: rising government debt and inflation.

A third crisis is also in place. This crisis will occur when confidence is lost in the U.S. dollar as world reserve currency. This crisis will disrupt the international payments mechanism. It will be especially difficult for the U.S. as the country will lose the ability to pay for its imports with its own currency. U.S. living standards will decline as the ability to import declines. more...

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_5542.shtml

toniD's Ya Think?

Merck, on researchers: "We may need to seek them out and destroy them where they live."

According to court documents filed in the Vioxx case in Australia, Merck made up a list of doctors it wanted to target.

The email, which came out in the Federal Court in Melbourne yesterday as part of a class action against the drug company, included the words "neutralise", "neutralised" or "discredit" against some of the doctors' names.

It is also alleged the company used intimidation tactics against critical researchers, including dropping hints it would stop funding to institutions and claims it interfered with academic appointments.

"We may need to seek them out and destroy them where they live," a Merck employee wrote, according to an email excerpt read to the court by Julian Burnside QC, acting for the plaintiff.

Merck & Co and its Australian subsidiary, Merck, Sharpe and Dohme, are being sued for compensation by more than 1000 Australians, who claim they suffered heart attacks or strokes as a result of Vioxx.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/drug-company-drew-up-doctor-hit-lis...

toniD's Ya Think?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35243272/ns/world_news-haiti_earthquake/

Jailed missionary left trail of legal troubles

Idaho woman who led ‘rescue’ mission in Haiti faces court woes at home

PORT-AU-PRINCE - The leader of a group of American missionaries charged Thursday with kidnapping for trying to take 33 children out of earthquake-ravaged Haiti faces legal troubles in her home state of Idaho as well.

Laura Silsby, 40, is the subject of several lawsuits accusing her and her Boise-based company, PersonalShopper.com, of failing to pay her employees. She also has a history of failing to pay debts, and the $358,000 house at which she founded her nonprofit religious group, New Life Children's Refuge, was foreclosed upon in December, according to a report in her hometown newspaper, the Idaho Statesman.

The Boise newspaper said Silsby has been named in at least eight civil lawsuits and 14 unpaid wage claims...

Came across this website containing a collection of online streaming TV. I was glad to see MSNBC.

MSNBC Live Stream: http://www.fomny.org/Video/USA/03/msnbc/msnbc-live.htm

Main Web site: http://www.fomny.org/USA-TV.php#bas

toniD's Ya Think?

omcast Corp. said yesterday that it would re-brand its TV, Internet, and telephone services as Xfinity on Feb. 12 to signal to customers that this isn't the same old company.

Comcast will remain as the corporate name, but the company will emphasize Xfinity in advertisements and on 24,000 service trucks and thousands of employee uniforms.

snip...

"Verizon has FiOS. Comcast now has Xfinity. It's rebundling it in a high-tech package. You are rebundling an improved product, an enhanced service," said Marc Brownstein, president and chief executive officer of the Brownstein Group, a Philadelphia brand communication, public relations, and advertising firm.

This re-branding comes as Comcast has struggled to rebuild its reputation because of poor service and problems with its network that resulted in telephone and Internet outages. Its customer-satisfaction rating is among the lowest in the industry, but it has improved slightly in the last year.

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/business/20100204_Comcast_unveils_new_bra...

Poster at DU says:

Has anyone told the stealer of our Internet rights about the Blackwater to Xe change?

Also, Xfinity sounds like a porno service to me.

toniD's Ya Think?

That shit is TAME!

(click for larger)

Try and make sense out of that chalkboard!

"this machine kills fascists"

Report: Shelby Blocks All Obama Nominations In The Senate Over AL Earmarks

"Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) has put an extraordinary 'blanket hold' on at least 70 nominations President Obama has sent to the Senate, CongressDaily (sub. req.) reports. The hold means no nominations can move forward unless Senate Democrats can secure a 60-member cloture vote to break it, or until Shelby lifts the hold.

According to the report, Shelby is holding Obama's nominees hostage until a pair of lucrative programs that would send billions in taxpayer dollars to his home state get back on track. CongressDaily laid out the programs Shelby wants to move forward or else..."

President's day is what, a week and a half away? I say make it a good one, Harry, Barack, and make 70+ recess appointments.

What are the odds of that happening?

Harry says GO!

What are the odds on him following through?

"this machine kills fascists"

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-us-palin-prop...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Records show that Sarah Palin hasn't paid any property taxes on cabins that have been built on two backcountry plots partially owned by the former Alaska governor.

There are no tax assessments for the two-story, house-sized cabins, a workshop and a sauna spotted Thursday in an aerial survey. Property taxes totaling $156.13 were paid on the land in 2009 — but that bill did not include anything for the structures because the local assessor didn't know about the new construction nearly 100 miles north of Anchorage...

...Palin's attorney, Thomas Van Flein, said it is not the responsibility of property owners to report structures that go up on their land...

...Dunivan, however, said owners are required by state law to report any omissions or errors in their tax assessments. Often, the borough learns of new structures in remote areas when neighbors report them. Dunivan said no one has called the borough on the Palin lots, among many in the region to add structures, the flyover survey found...
----------------------------------
Every year I swear an oath (by signature) on a county assessment form, thereby stating that the information is complete and true.

The difference between the property tax on unimproved real estate and the tax on real estate that includes a domicile is enormous.

Batshit crazy
Submitted by SEDER on Thu, 02/04/2010 - 1:28pm.

lmfao

my biggest laugh of 2010

It appeared as if a schizophrenic made that ad. Even the narrator's voice was cracking me up.

Then the costumed guy in the field reminded me of something from "The Shining."

lmfao

"You look so tired-unhappy
Bring down the government
They don't, they don't speak for us"
-Radiohead.
www.sigzone.blogspot.com

Let's simplify "batshit crazy."
Call it "Malloy."

That ad was totally Malloy, man.

"You look so tired-unhappy
Bring down the government
They don't, they don't speak for us"
-Radiohead.
www.sigzone.blogspot.com

RE Taozen at 9:41--

"doda" sounds like something Dubya would name a Bush Crime Syndicate product....

...is weird

"this machine kills fascists"

Comcast unveils new brand name and logo (Xfinity)
Submitted by toniD on Thu, 02/04/2010 - 11:14pm.
omcast Corp. said yesterday that it would re-brand its TV, Internet, and telephone services as Xfinity on Feb. 12 to signal to customers that this isn't the same old company.

Comcast will remain as the corporate name, but the company will emphasize Xfinity in advertisements and on 24,000 service trucks and thousands of employee uniforms.

....

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

How come the Xs?

Certainly has nothing to do with being near the beginning of the Yellow Page listings.

Thanks and g'nite.

Cool, cool, cool, now do you know where the Speed channel is?

would know that answer to your question Helga

Dogs

Job losses from Great Recession about to get worse as government revises employment data

WASHINGTON (AP) — Job losses during the Great Recession have been huge and they're about to get bigger.

When the Labor Department releases the January unemployment report Friday, it will also update its estimate of jobs lost in the year that ended in March 2009. The number is expected to rise by roughly 800,000, raising the number of jobs shed during the recession to around 8 million.

The new data will help illustrate the scope of the jobs crisis. Analysts think the economy might generate 1 million to 2 million jobs this year. And they say it will take at least three to four years for the job market to return to anything like normal.

"It's going to take a long time to dig out of this hole," said Julia Coronado, senior U.S. economist at BNP Paribas.

Wall Street economists expect the January report will show a tiny increase of 5,000 jobs. That would be only the second monthly gain since the recession began. But it probably wouldn't be enough to hold down the unemployment rate, which is forecast to rise to 10.1 percent. That would match October's 26-year high. And it would be the fourth-straight month of double-digit joblessness.

The Labor Department's revisions on employment levels are done every year. They are based on unemployment insurance tax data that companies submit to states.

Jobs remain scarce even as the economy is recovering: Gross domestic product, the broadest measure of the nation's output, has risen for two straight quarters. GDP rose by 5.7 percent in the October-December quarter, the fastest pace in six years.

But hiring is still lagging. Many economists say businesses are reluctant to add workers because it's not clear whether the recovery will continue once government stimulus measures, such as tax credits for home buyers, end.

The debate over health care reform and the scheduled expiration of some Bush administration tax cuts at the end of this year may also cause companies to restrain hiring, many economists said.

"Until some of these uncertainties from Washington get cleared up, businesses, particularly small businesses, are going to be loath to do any additional hiring," said Hank Smith, chief investment officer at Haverford Investments.

High unemployment is likely to hold back consumer spending, which has led most recoveries in the past. That's why many economists think the current rebound will be weak.

Public concern about persistent unemployment has forced President Barack Obama and members of Congress to shift their attention to jobs and the economy and away from health care reform. The Senate will begin working Monday on legislation that would give companies a tax break for hiring new workers, Majority Leader Harry Reid said Thursday.

The budget plan Obama released this week projects unemployment will still be very high — 9.8 percent — by the end of this year.

Instead of adding workers, many companies are squeezing their existing work forces to produce more. Productivity rose by a seasonally adjusted 6.2 percent in the fourth quarter, the Labor Department said Thursday, above analysts' expectations of a 6 percent rise. That was the third straight quarter of sharp gains.

Productivity often increases at the end of recessions as companies ramp up output before hiring new workers. Rising productivity can raise living standards in the long run. But it can also make it easier for companies to put off adding jobs.

A separate Labor Department report on initial claims for jobless benefits said claims rose unexpectedly last week by 8,000 to 480,000. The rise in claims was the fourth in the past five weeks. It disappointed economists, who thought claims would resume a downward trend evident in the fall and early winter. The four-week average, which smooths fluctuations, rose for the third straight week to 468,750.

Most economists say claims need to fall to about 425,000 or below for a month to signal that employers are stepping up hiring.

Still, some positive signs emerged in the productivity report. Hours worked in the fourth quarter rose 1 percent. That was the first increase since the second quarter of 2007. Output rose 7.2 percent, the largest increase since the third quarter of 2003.

To continue increasing production, economists say companies will eventually have to start adding jobs again. That should bring productivity gains back down toward their long-run average of about 2.5 percent.

"You can push your workers but so far," said Anika Khan, an economist at Wells Fargo Securities. "At some point businesses have to begin to hire."

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/sns-ap-us-economy,0,7733390.story

toniD's Ya Think?

if the year ended in march 2009 then a majority of those unaccounted jobs are jobs lost during the reign of bush, aren't they?

Bad news for wolves in Utah. On Tuesday, the Utah state senate passed a bill that would allow officials to remove or destroy any wolf that crosses into areas of Utah unprotected by the Endangered Species Act.

We need to make sure the proposal dies -- so wolves don't.

Axelrod Pressed By Franken, Sanders On White House's Lack Of Leadership On Health Care

Shortly after Barack Obama addressed a Senate Democratic caucus meeting and urged them to push health care reform forward, one of the chamber's most progressive members took the president's closest adviser aside and asked him why the White House wasn't doing more to help.

Sens. Al Franken (D-Minn.) put pointed health-care-related questions to senior adviser David Axelrod following Obama's speech, multiple sources tell the Huffington Post. He was echoed by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-V.T.) The gist of their concern was that the administration has not shown enough leadership to get legislation passed through Congress in the wake of the party's defeat in the Massachusetts Senate election. Franken insisted that "he really needed to know if the White House was going to lead," according to one Democratic aide.

Axelrod, by several accounts, didn't give a response that Franken found sufficient. And as the two continued to talk, Sanders eventually jumped in.

"My message is that the current strategy is failing and we have to stop being on the defensive," Sanders said, in a statement to the Huffington Post. "We also need to realize we're not going to get 60 votes for anything, so we have to look at a very broad, omnibus-like reconciliation bill -- including health care and jobs -- that will pass the Senate with 51 votes."

Details of what transpired after that are scant. Axelrod, meanwhile, did not immediately return a request for comment.

In expressing their concern, Franken and Sanders become the second and third progressive Democratic senator to critique the White House's role in the current health care reform debate. In an interview with HuffPost on Thursday, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), likewise, said that the president's involvement in negotiations has "dried up" since the Massachusetts election.

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs was asked about the growing dissatisfaction with the role the administration is playing during Thursday's daily briefing.

"Well look," he replied, "obviously the president has said in the State of the Union... the president say... obviously the problem exists, it continues to exist -- higher costs, small businesses struggling. That was the case before Massachusetts. That was the case after Massachusetts. I still think that the process is working its way through Capitol Hill."

"I didn't believe that the president was less involved last year since we wouldn't have gotten where we were if the president hadn't been involved," Gibbs concluded.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/04/axelrod-pressed-by-franke_n_449...

toniD's Ya Think?

Disappointment Valley. . . A Modern Day Western. This film examines the plight of America's wild horses and the rapidly deteriorating condition of our wild and beautiful public lands in the majestic, haunting American west.
Through interviews with scientific experts, ranchers, historians, wild horse owners, animal rights activists, environmentalists, movie stars, uranium prospectors and many other colorful characters, the filmmaker examines the origins and effects of the recent "Burns Bill," which gutted the Free Roaming Wild Horse and Burro Act of 1971 and cleared the way for the slaughter and removal of wild horses in America. Greed and corruption take center stage, exposing how the United States’ failed energy policy and the current rape and pillage of western public lands by oil, gas, mining and corporate cattle grazing, is leading to the extinction of America’s wild horses and burros.

The film interviews such experts as, Jim Baca, former Director of the Bureau of Land Management under the Clinton Administration, Randy Udall, energy consultant, Michael Blake, (Writer of Dances With Wolves and Wild Horse Advocate), the Deputy Director of the Bureau of Land Management, environmental attorneys, Sheryl Crow, Viggo Mortensen, Daryl Hannah and more. The film documents the struggle of an animal that has long symbolized freedom, individualism and unbridled passion in America. Documenting wild horses in their authentic, beautiful pure essence (filmed in HD), Disappointment Valley, is a profound film that will awaken and touch all who view it.

http://www.theamericanwildhorse.com/

Last fall we asked you to join us in urging the Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate Monsanto's bad corporate behavior. You did and they are. Thank you!
In the coming months we'll be working with partners and with you to make the most of this window of opportunity. Stay tuned, as many Monsanto-relevant movements are afoot, and their outcome depends in large part on what level of public participation and scrutiny we can bring to bear against on one of the most powerful corporations on earth. We'll need every ounce of support you can muster.

The Monsanto line-up:

* January: DOJ begins investigating Monsanto's anti-competitive market practices.

* February: USDA solicits public comment on its first ever Environmental Impact Statement on a genetically engineered (GE) crop (alfalfa), which includes as a premise of its findings an unparalleled threat to organic standards. We have until February 15th to do something about this. Take Action with PAN Partner, Center for Food Safety»

* March: DOJ & USDA to host a series of "workshops" gathering testimony about the anti-competitive practices of U.S. agricultural conglomerates (a.k.a. "Big Food"). The first will be in Iowa, and PAN's own Dr. Ishii-Eitemann will be there.

* April: U.S. Supreme Court will hear - at Monsanto's urging - its first ever genetic engineering case. This is an appeal of the landmark District court decision to block GE alfalfa, won by Center for Food Safety and would constitute a coup should Monsanto's lawyers convince the higher court to reverse the ban.

* Fall: Stay tuned! (It's a secret)

http://ga3.org/campaign/alfalfaEIS2

Howard Zinn's death yesterday affords us the opportunity to evaluate the remarkable influence he has had on the American public's understanding of our nation's past. His book A People's History of the United States, published in 1980 with a first printing of 5000 copies, went on to sell over two million. To this day some 128,000 new copies are sold each year. That alone made Zinn perhaps the single most influential historian whose works have reached multitudes of Americans. Indeed, Zinn found that his book was regularly adopted as a text in high schools and most surprisingly, in many colleges and universities.

One can easily summarize the argument Zinn makes in that book, as well as on his recent television special on The History Channel and soon to be released DVD, called "The People Speak." America, he charges, was guilty of waging war on those who really made the American nation: Native Americans, African-Americans, the working-class, the poor, and women. American history, as Zinn saw it, was that of a history of "genocide: brutally and purposefully waged by our rulers in the name of progress. He claimed that these truths were buried "in a mass of other facts, as radioactive wastes are buried in containers in the earth."

http://www.hnn.us/articles/122818.html

"Fiscal Conservative In Name Only" ad

it gives a NEGATIVE view on wolves. With everything that is going on
with wolves these days, all's I'm saying is they don't need that kind of
press.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8500077.stm

This is the first time such a double attack has hit Karachi. Although no-one has yet accepted responsibility, the Taliban have often used such tactics in the North West Frontier Province.
The attack is likely to fuel more violence in what is already a volatile metropolis. Karachi is already reeling from weeks of unrest due to targeted political killings.
These started after political tensions boiled over following a similar attack on a Shia procession in December, which killed more than 40 people.
snip

An explosion has killed 10 people at a Pakistani hospital where victims of an earlier bombing were being treated, police and doctors say.
At least 12 people were killed in the first attack on a bus of Shia Muslims heading to a religious festival.
About 50 people were injured in the attack, and were taken to Jinnah hospital in Karachi.
About an hour later there was a large blast just outside the emergency ward of the hospital, police said.
Shia Muslims are marking the end of the Arbaeen religious festival, with Friday being the final and most important day of 40 days of mourning for the Prophet Muhammad's grandson.

Baghdad, Iraq (CNN) -- Car bombs targeting Shiite pilgrims killed at least 27 people and wounded 75 others south of Baghdad on Friday, an Interior Ministry official said.
Police said two bombs blew up in quick succession in Karbala, where the pilgrims had congregated at the shrine of Imam Hussein.
The people were marking Arbaeen -- the end of the 40-day mourning period at the close of Ashura.
Ashura commemorates the martyrdom of Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet Mohammed who was killed in battle in Karbala in 680 A.D. That event helped create the schism between Sunnis and Shiites, the two main Muslim religious movements.
In Baghdad, a roadside bomb exploded targeting Shiite pilgrims killed one person and wounded 15 others.

Submitted by smcgee43 on Fri, 02/05/2010 - 8:57am.
Submitted by taozen on Fri, 02/05/2010 - 8:57am.
------------
No matter it just shows how much trouble being a member of one particular "branch of The religion of peace" can be. I will go out on a limb and say the CIA didn't do these bombings.

I

Ted Nugent: Obama makes me want to ‘throw up’, Rolling Stone publisher ’should die’
Ted Nugent is an angry, angry man.
In a recent interview with culture publication Royal Flush, the so-called "Motor City Madman" let loose with a series of tirades that would make anyone's mother blush.
On President Obama, the southern rocker said he believes "Mao Tse Tung" had arrived, "and his name is Barack Hussein Obama."
"I wanna throw up," Nugent said.
He started off the interview by jabbing supporters of animal rights, claiming he wants to kill 100 more of something every time he hears the two words together in a paragraph.

http://rawstory.com/2010/02/ted-nugent-says-obama-makes-him-want-to

Submitted by smcgee43 on Fri, 02/05/2010 - 8:42am.

I do NOT like the "Fiscal Conservative In Name Only" ad

it gives a NEGATIVE view on wolves. With everything that is going on
with wolves these days, all's I'm saying is they don't need that kind of
press.

___________________

Wolves is much maligned, true, but that ad ain't nothin' compared w/the cruel indignities suffered by Wolverines! as a result of the film "Red Dawn".

(Must confess I ain't heard the ad -- no sound in ye olde hostel -- just seen the Terminator Sheep gettin' caught goin' down on Little Red Tax-Raisin' Hood or God knows what.)

Sidenote, jes fer lagniappe: Panamanians drives like Panamaniacs. And their brains is evidently hard-wired to their horns. Honks, blares 'n blasts is an entire new lexicon to be learnt.

And last: Thrifty oughtta be callt Rent-a-Scam for their insurance bait-'n-switch. Didn't firma them final papers after they tried to charge me $75 for a "cleanin' fee". wtf? Ain't that the cost a doin' bidness? You'd think they'd expect the car to look a little mussed after 8 days a fishin'.

Sen. Al Franken ripped into White House senior adviser David Axelrod this week during a tense, closed-door session with Senate Democrats.
Five sources who were in the room tell POLITICO that Franken criticized Axelrod for the administration’s failure to provide clarity or direction on health care and the other big bills it wants Congress to enact.
The sources said Franken was the most outspoken senator in the meeting, which followed President Barack Obama’s question-and-answer session with Senate Democrats at the Newseum on Wednesday. But they also said the Minnesotan wasn’t the only angry Democrat in the room.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0210/32561.html#ixzz0efg3QI7R

Three US special forces soldiers were killed in northwest Pakistan this week, confirming that the US military is more deeply engaged on the ground in Pakistan than previously acknowledged by the White House and Pentagon (see " The Secret US War in Pakistan," November 23, 2009). The soldiers died Wednesday in Lower Dir when their convoy was hit by a car bomber in what appeared to be a targeted strike against the Americans. According to CENTCOM, the US soldiers were in the country on a mission to train the Pakistani Frontier Corps, a federal paramilitary force run by Pakistan's Interior Ministry that patrols the country's volatile border with Afghanistan. A Pakistani journalist who witnessed the attack said that some of the US soldiers were dressed in civilian clothes and had been identified by their Pakistani handlers as journalists. The New York Times estimates that there are sixty to a hundred such US special forces "trainers" in Pakistan. Capt. Jack Hanzlik, a spokesman for the United States Central Command said there are about 200 US military personnel in Pakistan.

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100222/scahill2

Are these the same bombings?
Submitted by taozen on Fri, 02/05/2010 - 9:03am.

Ted Nugent is an asshole

Submitted by smcgee43 on Fri, 02/05/2010 - 9:17am.

_______________

Unassailable statement of fact.

God, I loves me some reality-based commentary.

'Nuther sidenote: My right-wing low-leanin'-wrong-information Rush-Limbaugh-repeatin' learnt-nothin' dumbshit of a neighbor in Mich. got drunk one fine day and my AK friend (who's been a-stayin' at my place and watchin' my dogs whilst I's gone) made the mistake a lettin' my neighbor (who rails against social welfare of all kinds and yet is in his 50s, never lived on his own, sponges off his mother, w/whom he still lives, and gets medical care -- a lot -- as part of his social assistance) in the house.

This guy, naturally, is a self-described "conservative!" and also a huge fan of (wait fer it!), you guessed it: Ted fuckin' Nugent. Thinks Terrible Ted's the real deal. I were upstairs at the time my neighbor imposed hisself onto and into my house, and they was downstairs debatin' the merits a Mr. Whack 'Em 'n Stack 'Em.

So I axed my neighbor if he was amenable to learnin' sumpin' new about his hero. Bein' not the sharpest knife in the drawer, he sez, just like his other hero, "Bring it ['em] on!" So I consulted Lord Google and directed him to this, which shows what a sweetheart of the rodeo Ted is.

I thought he were gonna cry. Then he got all mad, like it's my fault Ted's an asshole, 'n sez this hit-job smear is alla part a the evil liberal MSM. Now I been gone awhile, but my friend said my neighbor ain't been back since.

(Can you really "make" a transparent asshole look any worse than he already does hisself? When the rock-'n-roll emperor shows his ass, it's kinda yer job to notice that he ain't wearin' no clothes.)

http://www.news-medical.net/news/20100130/New-vaccine-effective-in-preve...

New vaccine effective in preventing TB in HIV patients
30. January 2010 03:19

Investigators from Dartmouth Medical School (DMS) have reported results of a clinical trial showing that a new vaccine against tuberculosis, Mycobacterium vaccae (MV), is effective in preventing tuberculosis in people with HIV infection. The DarDar Health Study, named for Dartmouth and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, found that MV immunization reduced the rate of definite tuberculosis by 39 percent among 2,000 HIV-infected patients in Tanzania.

The study appears in the January 29, 2010 online issue of the journal AIDS,

and it will be published in the March print issue of AIDS.

"Since development of a new vaccine against tuberculosis is a major international health priority, especially for patients with HIV infection, we and our Tanzanian collaborators are very encouraged by the results of the DarDar Study," said Principal Investigator Ford von Reyn, M.D., director of the DarDar International Programs for the Section on Infectious Disease and International Health at DMS.
(continues)
==========
http://www.news-medical.net/health/What-are-Vaccines.aspx
what are vaccines anyway?
=============
http://www.news-medical.net/news/20100123/Vaccination-for-children-Pros-...
Here are some more perspectives on vaccinations for children

http://abcnews.go.com/WN/tea-party-fireworks-speaker-tom-tancredo-rips-m...

Tea Party Fireworks: Speaker Rips McCain, Obama, 'Cult of Multiculturalism'

The opening-night speaker at first ever National Tea Party Convention ripped into President Obama, Sen. John McCain and "the cult of multiculturalism," asserting that Obama was elected because "we do not have a civics, literacy test before people can vote in this country."...
-----------------------------
If I can find out where they meet, I'm gonna join the Cult of Multiculturalism. I wanna see if they wear robes or go nekkid. Or wear robes AND go nekkid.

I want to hear them raise their voices in silent worship.

It'll be really cool to see neo-Nazis join hands with people just before they kill them. (No, wait. That's a feature of the Tancredo Testament. There is a multitude of different cultural brochures at the Tea Party and the details are easy to mix up.)

I'm all for a civics and literacy test prior to voting. The rural citizenry will take a serious hit. Last I checked, rural voters are overwhelmingly xenophobes, which sorta brings us back to the Cult of Multiculturalism, doesn't it?

Sign of the times:

One for the road, via The Poor Man Institute:

Bipartisanshit

"If someone said I could either have an outbreak of raging bipartisanship in Washington, or an outbreak of raging chlamydia in my penis, I would choose the social disease. Because someone figured out a cure for it."

-- The Editors

20,000 Jobs Lost in January as Jobless Rate Falls to 9.7%
By JAVIER C. HERNANDEZ

The United States economy shed 20,000 jobs in January, the government said Friday, deepening concern that relief from the deepest economic downturn in a generation would be slow to come. But even as the economy struggled to start creating jobs again, the unemployment rate fell to 9.7 percent from 10 percent in December.

As the broader economy gains steam and crucial sectors like manufacturing spring back to life, analysts say the recovery appears to be intact. But the nation’s stubbornly high unemployment rate remains a persistent thorn in the side of optimists, and economists expect the situation to worsen before it gets better.

Some forecasts call for the jobless rate to reach nearly 11 percent by year’s end, which would significantly dampen spending by consumers, a critical driver of growth. That has prompted concern that the economy could enter a painful period of slow growth or even fall into another downturn.

“We are turning the corner,” an economist for IHS Global Insight, Nigel Gault, said. “But the gains will probably not be big enough to make serious inroads into the unemployment rate for some time.””

The manufacturing sector showed signs of relief, adding jobs for the first time since the onset of the recession in 2007. Construction continued to suffer, as businesses grappled with a crisis in the commercial real estate market. Temporary jobs increased, a sign that employers were tentatively beginning to expand their ranks.

In its report, the government revised its job loss numbers for November, saying the economy gained 64,000 in that month rather than 4,000. But the numbers in December were much worse than previously stated; the economy lost 150,000 jobs rather than the 85,000 originally reported.

The overall toll of the recession, meanwhile, grew larger: 8.4 million jobs have been lost since December 2007, the government said, nearly one million more than previously recorded. Those numbers jumped significantly from December because the Labor Department on Friday said it had completed a benchmark revision of job losses since April 2008. Job losses in August, September and October of last year were 240,000 worse than original forecasts.

Economists said the declining unemployment rate was probably a statistical quirk and did not indicate the start of a downward trend. The unemployment rate is determined based on interviews with a random sample of Americans, and its results can be erratic. The monthly tally of job losses is considered a more reliable snapshot of the economy because it incorporates data from a large number of businesses.

The dissonance between the tepid recovery for the jobs market and robust turnaround for Wall Street has exacerbated populist tensions.

President Obama has sought to persuade the public that his priority is jobs creation, announcing a series of efforts in recent weeks aimed at clamping down on banks and jump-starting the labor market. On Tuesday, Mr. Obama proposed using $30 billion of repaid bailout loans to help community banks increase lending to small businesses.

Many business owners continue to complain that strict lending standards are hampering their access to funds that would allow them to expand.

Kirk K. Meurer, the owner of store in Cleveland that provides furniture to businesses, has frozen the pay of his 30 employees and stopped buying new cars in an effort to trim costs. He has a $250,000 loan, but he said it has been difficult to persuade his bank to lend any more.

“I’m being very frugal with my decisions,” Mr. Meurer said. “For us to hire, we need to see a turn in the economy.”

Many more Americans, even those with jobs, are feeling the pinch. The underemployment rate, which counts people who have given up looking for work and those who are working part-time because of a lack of full-time positions, has steadily risen over the past year. In January, it touched 16.5 percent.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/06/business/economy/06jobs.html?partner=r...

Good to see you here David!

toniD's Ya Think?

I do that pretty regular but on YouTube.

So I didn't know...that to get to the chat thingee you can click "24 hr community" (on the right side) and then just pick a name (don't have to sign up er nuthin). Then you can "chat n watch."

Snowed out of work again until at least Tuesday. I went by to at least get my paycheck (what there was) but boss had not even bothered to open up. This is really starting to hurt. Another storm here just like the one we had before Xmas--at least 2 ft.
----

MAC I would say Malloy is more guano crazy. Sounds more interesting than batshit most of the time.

---
tD--I don't believe it either--that there's any good news there. If there's anything to it, I bet it's cuz the underemployment rate is rising, like it says in the last paragraph. Of course this is highly unscientific...So whoever can eviscerate me and wear my skin as a trophy. See if I care. I warn them though, I haven't been that conscientious about moisturizing.

Because we are constantly lied to by our media and government leaders.

I did get asked for my digits by a guy who had asked me for them before when I was 17 and we worked together in a restaurant.

He acted all offended that I didn't remember him (when he couldn't even remember the name of the restaurant until I told him). But by that time I did remember him--and everything else. Which is one more reason I said "Nah." (Besides that some crazy guy was running out in the snow as I already leaving to ask my phone number based on something he could barely remember from 25 years ago.)

Boys are weirder than hell. What's wrong with you all anyway? ;)

I'm sure there was some kind of angle I am just not thinking of yet.

toniD's Ya Think?

Fiscal Scare Tactics
By PAUL KRUGMAN

These days it’s hard to pick up a newspaper or turn on a news program without encountering stern warnings about the federal budget deficit. The deficit threatens economic recovery, we’re told; it puts American economic stability at risk; it will undermine our influence in the world. These claims generally aren’t stated as opinions, as views held by some analysts but disputed by others. Instead, they’re reported as if they were facts, plain and simple.

Yet they aren’t facts. Many economists take a much calmer view of budget deficits than anything you’ll see on TV. Nor do investors seem unduly concerned: U.S. government bonds continue to find ready buyers, even at historically low interest rates. The long-run budget outlook is problematic, but short-term deficits aren’t — and even the long-term outlook is much less frightening than the public is being led to believe.

So why the sudden ubiquity of deficit scare stories? It isn’t being driven by any actual news. It has been obvious for at least a year that the U.S. government would face an extended period of large deficits, and projections of those deficits haven’t changed much since last summer. Yet the drumbeat of dire fiscal warnings has grown vastly louder.

To me — and I’m not alone in this — the sudden outbreak of deficit hysteria brings back memories of the groupthink that took hold during the run-up to the Iraq war. Now, as then, dubious allegations, not backed by hard evidence, are being reported as if they have been established beyond a shadow of a doubt. Now, as then, much of the political and media establishments have bought into the notion that we must take drastic action quickly, even though there hasn’t been any new information to justify this sudden urgency. Now, as then, those who challenge the prevailing narrative, no matter how strong their case and no matter how solid their background, are being marginalized.

And fear-mongering on the deficit may end up doing as much harm as the fear-mongering on weapons of mass destruction.

Let’s talk for a moment about budget reality. Contrary to what you often hear, the large deficit the federal government is running right now isn’t the result of runaway spending growth. Instead, well more than half of the deficit was caused by the ongoing economic crisis, which has led to a plunge in tax receipts, required federal bailouts of financial institutions, and been met — appropriately — with temporary measures to stimulate growth and support employment.

The point is that running big deficits in the face of the worst economic slump since the 1930s is actually the right thing to do. If anything, deficits should be bigger than they are because the government should be doing more than it is to create jobs.

True, there is a longer-term budget problem. Even a full economic recovery wouldn’t balance the budget, and it probably wouldn’t even reduce the deficit to a permanently sustainable level. So once the economic crisis is past, the U.S. government will have to increase its revenue and control its costs. And in the long run there’s no way to make the budget math work unless something is done about health care costs.

But there’s no reason to panic about budget prospects for the next few years, or even for the next decade. Consider, for example, what the latest budget proposal from the Obama administration says about interest payments on federal debt; according to the projections, a decade from now they’ll have risen to 3.5 percent of G.D.P. How scary is that? It’s about the same as interest costs under the first President Bush.

Why, then, all the hysteria? The answer is politics.

The main difference between last summer, when we were mostly (and appropriately) taking deficits in stride, and the current sense of panic is that deficit fear-mongering has become a key part of Republican political strategy, doing double duty: it damages President Obama’s image even as it cripples his policy agenda. And if the hypocrisy is breathtaking — politicians who voted for budget-busting tax cuts posing as apostles of fiscal rectitude, politicians demonizing attempts to rein in Medicare costs one day (death panels!), then denouncing excessive government spending the next — well, what else is new?

The trouble, however, is that it’s apparently hard for many people to tell the difference between cynical posturing and serious economic argument. And that is having tragic consequences.

For the fact is that thanks to deficit hysteria, Washington now has its priorities all wrong: all the talk is about how to shave a few billion dollars off government spending, while there’s hardly any willingness to tackle mass unemployment. Policy is headed in the wrong direction — and millions of Americans will pay the price.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/05/opinion/05krugman.html?partner=rssnyt&...

People will never learn.

toniD's Ya Think?

"no one has called the borough on the Palin lots, among many in the region to add structures, the flyover survey found..."

'Americans, you really have to ask yourself, who ordered the government to spy on Sarah Palin?'

Submitted by toniD on Fri, 02/05/2010 - 10:03am
Submitted by Fernando on Fri, 02/05/2010 - 10:37am

_________
I woke up to Bloomberg news radio this morning. If it wasn't so sad how bat shit crazy thes rightwing extremists are it might have seemed like an SNL skit. Bloomberg is a wearing a hearing aid off camera these days but I don't think it will help him hear what WTP are going through.

The station loves to obfuscate the truth,they have many segments with Fox news reporters. I hear joy in their tone as they laugh about Obama's failures to straighten out the fiasco that 8 years of Bushes' unethical capitalism has left U.S

by Joe Sudbay (DC) on 2/05/2010 07:30:00 AM
Good morning.

You should know that the nation's capitol is in a frenzy over the impending snow storm. We're under a "Winter Storm Warning," which includes this prediction:

ACCUMULATIONS...STORM TOTAL ACCUMULATIONS OF 18 TO 24 INCHES.

This is a town that freaks out over 2 -3 inches of snow. And, it's the second big storm of the winter.

John Cole wrote a tweet last night that captures the situation:

I think a lot of the problems in this country can be directly traced to the way the beltway pundit class reacts to... snow.

Yes, it is.

The DNC Winter Meeting started yesterday with a couple fundraisers attended by Obama. We don't expect much news from that event. On the other hand, the teabaggers convention, taking place in Nashville, should be interesting. Sarah Palin is the keynote speaker at the big dinner tomorrow night. (And "Banquet Only tickets (featuring keynote speaker Sarah Palin) still available!")

http://www.americablog.com/2010/02/friday-morning-open-thread.html

MSNBC also reported on some emails Todd Palin sent while Sarah was Governor. More on this when I find the article.

toniD's Ya Think?

"The main difference between last summer, when we were mostly (and appropriately) taking deficits in stride, and the current sense of panic is that deficit fear-mongering has become a key part of Republican political strategy..."

No one gave this hysteria more "creditability" than barack himself by calling for a spending freeze. He could have taken the courageous course with the SOTU and pointed how small the deficit really is relative to GNP. More importantly, barack could have pointed out how essential it is to do whatever is necessary to boost employment. But no, he just said yea, you Reaganites are right, suck it up America.

Ezra Klein

The news of the day, as I mentioned earlier, is that Richard Shelby has decided to place a hold on everything that eats, breathes or moves unless Alabama gets a couple billion more in pork. Before we take a step further on this, it's worth noting that Shelby is doing exactly what Ben Nelson did, but attaching a larger price tag to his demands: He's threatening to obstruct Senate business unless his state gets billions in giveaways. Nelson settled for hundreds of millions. Nebraskans must be pissed.

But put all that aside: Shelby is putting a "hold" on all of Barack Obama's pending nominees. So, uh, what's a hold?

The first thing to understand is that there's no such procedural move as a "hold." It's not something senators have in their special senatorial utility belts. Instead, a "hold" is shorthand for a promise to obstruct all further consideration of a particular piece of Senate business.

The best explanation of how this works came from David Waldman, and I encourage you to read it in full. But here's the short version: The Senate generally uses unanimous consent agreements to set the rules for a bill or a nomination. A hold, in its simplest form, is a promise to object to unanimous consent.

Okay, then what?

The action in question can still come to the floor. But all bets are off. In practice, this means a filibuster of some sort is on. Let's say that Shelby doesn't have 40 other Republicans lined up to stop all Senate business unless Alabama gets its pork. In theory, that means Harry Reid can just call a cloture vote and break his filibuster. Problem solved, right?

Sort of. People think of the filibuster in terms of defeating a bill. But they don't think about the power it has to keep the Senate from doing anything else. But that's the power the hold uses. To break a filibuster, the majority leader has to file for cloture. Then there's a two-day waiting period before a vote. Then there's a 30-hour post-vote debate period. And voting on one bill might require breaking multiple filibusters, because the motion to proceed to debate can be filibustered and the amendments can be filibustered and the motion to vote can be filibustered and each filibuster requires the same lengthy workaround. Even if you can crush every one of these filibusters without breaking a sweat, you've still just seen a whole week -- or maybe much more -- of the Senate's time chewed up.

That's why holds are effective on bills and nominations that people don't care about: The majority doesn't want to waste that much time breaking the obstruction of the minority. This isn't health-care reform, after all. It's the nomination of Sandford Blitz to be federal co-chairman of the Northern Border Regional Commission. Is breaking a hold on Sandford Blitz really a good reason to delay a jobs bill for a week?

But Shelby has likely overplayed his hand. The reason holds work is that they're small enough, and rare enough, that they never rise to the level of something the majority can't live with. Shelby, in putting a hold on all pending nominations, just made holds very big indeed. And he did it for the most pathetic and parochial of reasons: pork for his state. If the Democrats have any sense at all, Shelby's hold is about to become as famous as Nelson's deal.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/02/what_is_a_hold.html

toniD's Ya Think?

Can you really "make" a transparent asshole look any worse than he already does hisself?

"The incident has also continued to have an impact on politics in Berlin, with Germany's army chiefand labour ministerstepping down."

Lethal Nato bombing details leaked

A deadly airstrike in Afghanistan's Kunduz province last September did not comply with Nato's rules of engagement, according to the military organisation's own investigators.

In a leaked document published by the German newspaper Der Spiegel this week, it was revealed that crucial information was withheld from US pilots by the German military, who ordered the attack that killed scores of Afghan civilians.

The newspaper says Nato investigators looking into the September 4 bombing, which claimed 142 lives, found that US fighter pilots were inappropriately ordered to attack two fuel tankers that had been hijacked by the Taliban in northern Kunduz.
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/02/20102573845766182.html

In Pakistan an account of life with the Taliban has emerged from a 13-year-old girl called Meena, who says her own family tried to turn her into a suicide bomber.

There is no independent confirmation of her account but police say they believe she is telling the truth, and her information could be valuable.

Meena told her story to our Pakistan correspondent Orla Guerin.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8499578.stm

http://www.samsedershow.com/node/5641

___________
something good at noon EST

NFL retreats over New Orleans Saints trademark claim

Victory for supporters and T-shirt sellers after league says it will not seek to enforce rights on 'Who dat?' slogan

Cases of Mackinlay's 'Rare Old' scotch whisky have been recovered from the ice outside Shackleton's Antarctic hut.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2010/feb/05/shackleto...

Don't forget Sammy's on the young turks!

http://www.theyoungturks.com/

thats interesting. i always sensed that the religous nuts had a stranglehold on the country and that the military was doing their bidding. i suppose its always just a matter of time till the military realizes they are the power and they simply do away with the figurehead.

still, there's a certain cleverness to clintons comments because it creates a tension between the ruling ayatollahs and the military.

Once more, here is this first MAP of the new decade, January's edition of the Music Alliance Pact.

For those of you who don't know about MAP, it's a collection of music blogs from around the world who band together once a month to shed light on up-and-comers from their home countries. It's sort of like the WTO without the human rights violations.

http://iguessimfloating.blogspot.com/2010/02/music-alliance-pact-februar...

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

MMRules

-

isn't it already a Military State???
just saying....

Chop Chop..Wiki Wiki ! ;)

*Spoken in the voice of Sammy Davis Jr,ofcourse..

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

MMRules

it could be. my perception was that it was a theocracy with the fundamentalism enforced by a military / secret police that was loyal to the ayatollahs. this military was separate from the military that deals with defense and fighting issues*

* this could fall into the category of dan making stuff up since i don't have a link to it.

More on Iran......
Submitted by toniD on Mon, 02/15/2010 - 8:57am.

Iranian revolution anniversary: Will Ayatollah Ali Khamenei remain in power?
By Ramin Jahanbegloo Ramin Jahanbegloo Thu Feb 11, 9:00 am ET

Toronto – Thursday marks the 31st anniversary of the Iranian revolution.

Thirty-one years ago, the Iranian revolution overthrew the Pahlavi monarchy in Iran. No one predicted the downfall of the shah, who believed that he was highly popular with his own people. His greatest tragedy was that he became a victim of his own illusion.

The overriding issue today is whether the Islamic regime that replaced the shah has succumbed to the same illusion – and is thus willing to use force to maintain the status quo and stay in power.

There are several key questions today. Will Ayatollah Ali Khamenei remain in power as the leader of the revolution? Will there be a takeover by the Revolutionary Guards? Will the frustration of Iranian civil society turn into disenchantment with the reformists and become more radicalized and violent? Finally, will the country suffocate from economic turmoil and even a banking collapse?

The staying power of the supreme leader – both that of the individual currently holding the position, Ayatollah Khamenei, and that of the office – will be a key driver of the immediate future of Iran.

It goes without saying that a loss of legitimacy and a disputed succession of the leader in the event of his death could bring on a power struggle among different factions of the Iranian regime, leading to a military coup d’état organized by the joint forces of the Revolutionary Guards and the Basij militia.

The behavior of Iranian civil society a year from now could range from a high wave of emigration among educated youth to a more radical stance and greater support for violence.

As for the Iranian economy, it will certainly be on its deathbed after a prolonged spell of low oil revenues, low foreign investment, high inflation, high unemployment, and corruption. This could be aggravated by political, cultural, and economic sanctions from the West that are now all but certain. And there could be a visible increase in unrest among ethnic minorities in Iran.

On the basis of these critical indicators, one can expect a harsher crackdown and tougher response to opposition groups by paramilitary and security forces in the coming period.

For one, high-ranking clerics in Iran will become even more critical toward a regime that has lost its grip over Iranian reality once and for all and embarks on shooting its opponents to survive. The fate of Iranian politics will be partly decided by grand ayatollahs in the holy Shiite city of Qom – who never supported the religious and political ideas of Khamenei – and the hard-liners within his inner circle.

Ultimately, we are witnessing a fundamental dispute over the ownership of the revolution and the means to safeguard Iranian Shiite Islam. The clerical establishment in Qom will continue to be aligned with those who seek to redefine the Islamic Republic of Iran, and will therefore find itself in open confrontation with the Revolutionary Guards.

If this confrontation unfolds violently, there would no doubt be both casualties and beneficiaries. The likely beneficiaries of such a struggle would be the Revolutionary Guards. With leading reformers and opponents in jail and the street tamed by a military coup, the voices for radical change would fall totally silent. This could lead to military action against Iran, which would certainly inflame the entire region and have catastrophic humanitarian consequences, while enriching and empowering the dangerous and violent components of the security and military apparatus in Iran.

Because all signals point toward a gradual transformation of Iran within a few months into a heavily militarized status quo power, this more ideological style would surely affect both civic reforms in Iran and its integration within the international community. more...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20100211/cm_csm/279603/print

This is a touchy situation right now and you have a little Napoleon as the head of all this. Makes you wonder if the Ayatolah was threatened into backing Ahmadenajad.

toniD's Ya Think?

EU forcing Greece to make deeper cuts
by Chris in Paris on 2/15/2010 06:17:00 AM
Sure, because we all know how easy it is - especially in Europe - to make radical financial changes to bureaucracies. For those pointing fingers now, it would be interesting to see how many substantial changes they have made themselves at home. Lots of talk and cosmetic changes, yes, but substantial? Ha! Somehow it's hard to recall such a rigorous exchange and demands for reform when it was the bankers holding their hands out. This only reinforces who owns all of the western governments and it's not "the people." What's Greek for "go to hell?" Reuters:

Greece must take all appropriate measures to fix its budget deficit and scrutiny of its economic indicators must be heightened, European Central Bank President said on Sunday.

"All of Greece must realize that it must correct a trajectory which has been aberrant," Jean-Claude Trichet said on French TV channel LCI referring to Greece's past mistakes.

"European countries are asking that Greece takes... necessary extra measures to make its recovery plan credible."

http://www.cnbc.com/id/35400183

Greek for "go to hell?" phonetically pa-e ston the-avalo!

toniD's Ya Think?

Dubai World said to propose debt repayment options

TEL AVIV (MarketWatch) -- Dubai World, the holding company within the emirate, may be offering its creditors 60 cents on the dollar as part of an effort to reschedule $22 billion of debt, media reports say.

Reports say that the holding company, with creditors including banks like HSBC, (NYSE:HBC) (LSE:UK:HSBA) Royal Bank of Scotland (LSE:UK:RBS) and Standard Chartered, (LSE:UK:STAN) is offering two options.

The first gives its creditors 60 cents on the dollar after seven years, with no interest paid until after the seven-year period. The Dubai government would guarantee the repayment.

The second option would repay the creditors in full but with equity in property assets of Dubai World's Nakheel subsidiary. And this payment would not be guaranteed by the government.

A spokesman for Dubai World called the media reports speculation. Dubai itself said that it had made no formal restructuring proposals, the reports say.

On the Dubai Financial Market on Monday, the DFM Index closed 0.2% lower at 1.614.21. The most active issue was Emaar, developer of Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building, which finished off 1%.

On Sunday, after the possible debt deal was reported by Zawya Dow Jones, the Dubai General Index fell 3.5%.

"The key here is whether Dubai will be able to secure further federal support and sell some of its assets to smooth out the restructuring process," wrote Ahmet Akarli of Goldman Sachs in a note dated Sunday.

"Abu Dhabi cannot be entirely indifferent to Dubai's financial problems and will probably continue to provide financial support," the analyst said. And Dubai may well be able to sell some prime assets to facilitate the restructuring.

But "the political economy of the restructuring process remains as difficult as ever," he said.

Abu Dhabi is reluctant to provide further support to potentially insolvent Dubai entities while Dubai itself "is on the defensive, trying hard not to compromise the achievements of the past decade and minimize the economic and reputational damage of the debt crisis," he wrote.

And international investors exposed to Dubai are looking to minimize their losses while others aim "to acquire assets at distressed prices," he said.

Given "Dubai's strained finances and Abu Dhabi's reluctance to write a blank check, considerable uncertainty will persist for some time."

In November, Dubai World shook up international financial markets when it said that it was seeking a six-month standstill on repaying $26 billion of debt.

The company avoided default on a $4.1 billion bond tied to Nakheel by arranging a bailout from neighboring emirate Abu Dhabi.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/story/print?guid=BE0D82B0-074A-4DA8-A6D...

toniD's Ya Think?

Washington Post’s Dishonesty On Iran Gas Sanctions

A Washington Post editorial today calling on President Obama to implement gas sanctions against Iran contains this falsehood:

[F]or every expert who argues that a shortage of gasoline would somehow help Mr. Ahmadinejad, there is one who believes it will deepen popular rejection of the regime.

That’s simply untrue. There’s actually a very substantial agreement among experts that gas sanctions will be an ineffective and potentially counterproductive tool against Iran, and that any anti-government sentiment they generated would likely be overwhelmed by nationalist solidarity in the face of outside pressure.

In December, at a hearing of the House Oversight Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs, the four Iran experts testifying were unanimous in recommending against gas sanctions, citing the recent history of such measures helping the Iranian government consolidate power.

At a recent event at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, two leading Iran experts, WINEP’s Patrick Clawson and Ray Takeyh of the Council on Foreign Relations, came out against gas sanctions. Citing the difficulty of enforcing them, Clawson said the U.S. should “not adopt a sanction on gasoline imports into Iran unless we are prepared to sink Venezuelan ships carrying that gasoline… because it’s going to make [the U.S.] look impotent.”

The number of experts who believe that gas sanctions will deepen popular rejection of the Iranian regime is vanishingly small. The only two I can think of are Mark Dubowitz of the neoconservative Foundation for Defense of Democracies and Michael Rubin of the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute. There are probably a few others, but not nearly enough to constitute a serious disagreement among “experts.” Rubin’s view has even been contradicted by a report from his own think tank, as well as by AEI’s director of foreign policy studies, Danielle Pletka, who has said that the Iranian regime “will likely be impervious” to such sanctions.

The main support for gas sanctions comes not from actual Iran analysts, but from pundits and politicians looking for an easy way to “get tough” on Iran. Now they’ll get to cite this editorial as “evidence” for their views.

The analytical consensus can be a hard thing to define, but with gas sanctions it’s not a tough call. The Washington Post obviously has the right to support aggressive and counterproductive measures against other countries. But it also has a responsibility to its readers to honestly and accurately portray the evidence behind its claims, and it has egregiously failed to do so in regard to gas sanctions.

http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2010/02/13/washington-post-dishonesty-...

toniD's Ya Think?

Banksters

Simon Johnson raises important points here, one being that there's a potential that Goldman had conflicts of interest which spilled over into outright fraud.

-Atrios 09:14

Goldman Goes Rogue – Special European Audit To Follow

At 9:30pm on Sunday, September 21, 2008, Goldman Sachs was saved from imminent collapse by the announcement that the Federal Reserve would allow it to become a bank holding company – implying unfettered access to borrowing from the Fed and other forms of implicit government support, all of which subsequently proved most beneficial. Officials allowed Goldman to make such an unprecedented conversion in the name of global financial stability. (The blow-by-blow account is in Andrew Ross Sorkin’s Too Big To Fail; this is confirmed in all substantial detail by Hank Paulson’s memoir.)

We now learn – from Der Spiegel last week and today’s NYT – that Goldman Sachs has not only helped or encouraged some European governments to hide a large part of their debts, but it also endeavored to do so for Greece as recently as last November. These actions are fundamentally destabilizing to the global financial system, as they undermine: the eurozone area; all attempts to bring greater transparency to government accounting; and the most basic principles that underlie well-functioning markets. When the data are all lies, the outcomes are all bad – see the subprime mortgage crisis for further detail.

A single rogue trader can bring down a bank – remember the case of Barings. But a single rogue bank can bring down the world’s financial system.

Goldman will dismiss this as “business as usual” and, to be sure, a few phone calls around Washington will help ensure that Goldman’s primary supervisor – now the Fed – looks the other way.

But the affair is now out of Ben Bernanke’s hands, and quite far from people who are easily swayed by the White House. It goes immediately to the European Commission, which has jurisdiction over eurozone budget issues. Faced with enormous pressure from those eurozone countries now on the hook for saving Greece, the Commission will surely launch a special audit of Goldman and all its European clients.

This audit should focus on ten sets of questions.

1. Which eurozone governments have worked with Goldman, and on what basis, over the past decade? All actions prior to and after the introduction of the euro need to be thoroughly reexamined.
2. What transactions has Goldman facilitated and how has that affected the reporting of European government debt? (Under the Maastricht Treaty, eurozone government debt is not supposed to exceed 60 percent of GDP.)
3. In the case of Greece, the accusation is that Goldman deliberately and in a premeditated manner conspired to hide the true degree of government debt. Is this true, and to what extent has Goldman helped other countries engage in similar transactions, e.g., countries now seeking entry to the eurozone?
4. What is the full extent of Greek and other government liabilities, if these are accounted for properly? Without this reckoning, it is impossible to design a proper level of European Union (or any other) support for weaker eurozone countries.
5. Are there non-eurozone countries that have also been aided and abetted by Goldman in this fashion? For example, are the UK and Switzerland implicated – and thus endangered?
6. Has Goldman extolled the virtues of government debt in Greece, or other countries, while at the same time helping to deceive investors on the true risks inherent in those debts? What were Goldman’s own holdings of these securities?
7. Is there evidence that Goldman has structured similar transactions for the private sector – enabling companies to conceal the level of their true indebtedness? Have securities issued by such firms also been endorsed by Goldman to the buying public?
8. Were Goldman’s US-based supervisors aware of Goldman’s activities in Greece and other eurozone countries? Did they condone activities that undermine the integrity of the European Union?
9. Where was the European Central Bank while all of this was happening? Has the ECB become dangerously enraptured with the new Wall Street and its “techniques”?
10. Did any responsible official really think that what Goldman was constructing was really some sort of productivity-enhancing financial innovation – as opposed to a sophisticated form of scam?

The Federal Reserve must cooperate fully with this investigation. Ordinarily, the Fed might be tempted to sit on useful information, but they can now feel themselves in Senator Bob Corker’s crosshairs. Republican Senator Corker is willing to cooperate with Senator Dodd on financial sector reform, opening up the possibility of legislation that will pass the Senate, but he wants the Fed to lose its supervisory powers. If the Fed refuses to help – willingly and fully - the European Commission with bringing Goldman to account, that will just strengthen the hand of Senator Corker and his allies.

If the Federal Reserve were an effective supervisor, it would have the political will sufficient to determine that Goldman Sachs has not been acting in accordance with its banking license. But any meaningful action from this direction seems unlikely. more...

http://baselinescenario.com/2010/02/14/goldman-goes-rogue-%E2%80%93-spec...

toniD's Ya Think?

Health Care Costs: More Americans Trapped In Increasingly Expensive Plans

To critics, a 39 percent hike in health insurance for some Californians foretells skyrocketing rates for the rest of us. Not so, says the company, arguing the increase only hits a relatively small number of people and the economy is to blame.

But the rhetoric from both sides distorts the reality.

It's true that hikes like the one by WellPoint Inc. apply only to people who buy individual insurance and are unlikely to spread to the majority of Americans covered through their employers. But such hikes also hit a huge number of Americans who mostly went unmentioned in the furor – the 46 million with no insurance at all.

That's because for most people who don't get insurance through their jobs and do not qualify for government assistance, the only option is buying individual policies like the ones in WellPoint's Anthem Blue Cross plan, often with high deductibles.

Raise prices, and people without insurance are even less likely to buy it – healthy people especially. Meanwhile, older and sicker customers pay more and more, running up high health bills in a shrinking pool.

That conundrum is at the heart of a disagreement that has frozen Democratic health reform efforts in Congress. Reform bills would require most of the uninsured to buy coverage, an idea many Americans detest as heavy-handed government.

But without sharing costs across the broadest cross-section of consumers and prohibiting insurers from charging people different premiums depending on their health status, the result is a scenario very much like Anthem's.

"I know the American people get frustrated in debating something like health care because you get a whole bunch of different claims being made by different groups and different interests," President Barack Obama said earlier this week in addressing the Anthem hike. "But what is also true is that without some action on the part of Congress, it is very unlikely that we see any improvement in the current trajectory ... The current trajectory is more and more people are losing health care."

Only about 5 percent of non-elderly Americans have individual insurance, compared with 60 percent who are covered by their employers. The remainder is almost evenly divided between those whose care is shouldered by government and those without any insurance at all.
Story continues below

The cost of employer-sponsored health insurance at big companies rose 7 to 10 percent this year, said Tom Billet of Towers Watson, a benefits consulting firm. Preliminary estimates for next year call for roughly the same increase – much lower than the ones set out by Anthem and other individual insurers.

"The individual market is sort of its own animal, so to speak," he said. more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/15/health-care-costs-more-am_n_462...

toniD's Ya Think?

most definitely dan. Please I wasn't saying you were
off on the comment - it's both, if we can say that.

I'm just a little confused as to the coverage I saw
last week (on the revolution gathering) there seemed
to be a LOT of folks out there supporting the regime.?

Just announced on CNN

More later

toniD's Ya Think?

Waiter, There's an Endangered Rat Snake in My Soup! Snooping into the Bloody Black Market for Wild Meat

http://www.alternet.org/food/145668/waiter%2C_there's_an_endangered_rat_snake_in_my_soup!_snooping_into_the_bloody_black_market_for_wild_meat

Evan Bayh will not seek reelection
By Mary Beth Schneider

Sen. Evan Bayh will not run for re-election, a decision that will shock Democrats and Republicans alike in Indiana.

In prepared remarks, Bayh, 54, cited excessive partisanship that makes progress on public policy difficult to achieve as the motivation for his decision.
Advertisement

“After all these years, my passion for service to my fellow citizens is undiminished, but my desire to do so in Congress has waned,” he said.

“My decision was not motivated by political concern,” he added. “Even in the current challenging environment, I am confident in my prospects for re-election.”

Bayh had never lost an election, from his first win in 1986 as secretary of state, his wins for governor in 1988 and 1992 and his election to the U.S. Senate in 1998 and 2004.

“But running for the sake of winning an election, just to remain in public office, is not good enough,” Bayh said. “And it has never been what motivates me. At this time I simply believe I can best contribute to society in another way: creating jobs by helping grow a business, helping guide an institution of higher learning or helping run a worthy charitable endeavor.”

Only days ago, Bayh’s staff, close associates and Indiana Democratic Party Chairman Dan Parker, who was manager of Bayh’s re-election campaign, had assured an Indianapolis Star reporter hat he would definitely seek a third term in the U.S. Senate. And Democrats recently released a poll showing Bayh easily ahead of both former Sen. Dan Coats and former U.S. Rep. John Hostettler, two of the four Republicans seeking the GOP nomination.

But in his statement, Bayh cited recent stalemates in Congress.

“Two weeks ago, the Senate voted down a bipartisan commission to deal with one of the greatest threats facing our nation: our exploding deficits and debt. The measure would have passed, but seven members who had endorsed the idea instead voted ‘no’ for short-term political reasons,” he said. “Just last week, a major piece of legislation to create jobs — the public’s top priority — fell apart amid complaints from both the left and right. All of this and much more has led me to believe that there are better ways to serve my fellow citizens, my beloved state4 and our nation than continued service in Congress.” more...

http://www.indystar.com/article/20100215/NEWS05/100215009/Evan-Bayh-will...

toniD's Ya Think?

Later

toniD's Ya Think?

Business Opportunity!

Submitted by Cat Chew on Mon, 02/15/2010 - 10:01am.

Caring for Pets Left Behind by the Rapture

*******
Cha Ching !

Maybe I should start a Agnostic one ? ;)

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

MMRules

Cue "Dems are fucked" hyperventilation in 3...2...1..

If all the hair-pulling about Bayh being a corporate douche was genuine, then this should be a good thing. Throw the corrupt bums out, and such! And if a Republican takes his place, at least we'll know our enemy, etc.

Here's an opportunity for Progressives to shine and prove they can provide a strong, honest populist candidate who can run an unbought grassroots campaign and win a Democratic or, even better, Third Party primary in a Red state rife with screeching Tea Partiers.

I can't wait to see who they pick! It's close enough for me to volunteer. I'd drive over in a heartbeat if she or he is worth it and hey it shouldn't be hard to get John Mellencamp to donate a concert or two.

(not holding my breath)

"this machine kills fascists"

http://www.samsedershow.com/node/5658

60th, bring that post with you, I have a different take on it.

Submitted by 60th Street on Mon, 02/15/2010 - 11:57am.
Cue "Dems are fucked" hyperventilation in 3...2...1..

(not holding my breath)
--------------
This is what Asparagus Syndrome will do to ya.

Iran is "becoming a military dictatorship", US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said.
She was speaking to students at a Qatar university during a tour of the region.
She said Iran's elite army corps, the Revolutionary Guard, had gained so much power they had effectively supplanted the government.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8515623.stm