Political thread

It is the appropriate forum if we’re talking about the Pretzeldent and any thing
he does like his Medicare Part D fiasco.

Don’t get me started, I’m just off prednisone 1 day, but it’s not enough time to not make me go postal on someone.;)

I still :heart: you Marge

From the prez down to my local city, I am sick of politicians. IL was finally able to convict our ex-gov and our current gov is handing out free health care. It’s great that the kids in IL are getting health care but it is affecting seniors who cannot get health care becaue their previous bills have not been paid due to the current plan. It saddens me to see someone who paid into the system their whole life being turned away because the gov is TRYING to look humane.

The medicare is scaring me. I turned it down due to already paying up the wazoo for my health insurance thru my husband’s work. I recently received a letter saying that I could be penalized for this making my fee larger when I finally join. If that is not for another 20 years, I can’t even imagine what I will be charged:confused: I had a lawyer friend who works with a lot of SS cases and medicare and the like and even he found it all confusing. What does that say for the common person?

Auntie M, you may be a witch, but you are a lovely one!!:)

Mary,
What makes you think that there will be any medicare or SS in 20 years. If the Prez and his Rush Limbaugh types have their way we are supposed to die when we get old and not bother any of their corporate buddies.
The part D drug benefit is a joke. It was set up by pharmaceutical companies for their benefit. I am about ready to fall in the donut hole on coverage so I will be back to paying the ridiculously high prices again.
Larry

Here’s my tale of the stupid Motor Vehicle Agency today.

I go there with every piece of info they ask for.
Go through check point 1, the lady ok’s it all.
Go through Check point 2, the lady ok’s it all.
Go through check point 3 , the same lady at check point 2 again ok’s all the paperwork I have filled out.

Go sit down and wait to be called, get called at check point 4 to have picture taken, this lady says I have to prove I’m Donna so and so because my birth certificate has a different name( maiden name of course). Now my Sicilian temper is flaring and I started to curse out this woman.
Now I’m about to go bezerk, had to go all the way home and get my marriage certificate. Thank God for Danny being with me.
Go back to DMV and the same ass says I can’t feel the raised seal on it. Ready to shoot someone now. I said, feel here stupid, it’s the seal from the city I got married in.
Dumb bitch now says, oh I feel it now
Picture taken, which by the way is horrendous looking:o
Now go sit down and wait to be called.
I get called to another line and pay and get my registration and license.
I say to the lady who handed me both license and registration for my car,
“Have a nice day” The damn bitch looked at me like I was a terrorist, I swear she did and she walked away. What the hell is wrong with people?

Good thing my son Danny was with me, because I’d probably be in jail right now.

LOL Mary would scare the poo out of them in the ER if she showed up in costume. That would be priceless.

[quote=marguerite]….Have amused myself by thinking of you going into labor while wearing one of your absolutely delightful costumes……
[/quote]

donna you would have gotten away with it if you had busted that old bat in the chops. your defense is i’m just coming off pred and my system is driving me insane and i was temporarily out of my mind. it works for others why not you. man its a good thing marge wasn’t with you!!!!!!!!

I agree with the thoughts of DMV workers. I was fined for not getting the sticker on my vehicle renewed. They had been sending it to my previous address and it was only when i noticed it was expired that I went in to renew it. She informed me that the computer that I changed my driver’s license address on was NOT connected to the computer 4 feet away with the info on sticker renewal. I have a hard time believing that considering the age of technology we are in!!!!:mad: And c’mon…how hard is it to work at the DMV?? From the looks of their rumps, it cannot be an overly physical demanding job. Plus they get all the gov. job perks and Mondays off.

Anytime you need me to go Imperial on them, let me know! I’m glad your son was with you, Donna. My children being present is what kept my language civil although my oldest daughter said loud enough for everyone to hear, “Do they know how to do their job, Mommy?”. (I replied just as loud, “NO, honey, they don’t”) God Bless 5 year olds!

And Larry, you are right. SS and all benefits will be spent up in no time.

MVD,
Once when I was in Law Enforcement while pursuing an investigation I had occasion to be in the main office of the State MVD. There on the wall was clock that ran backwards counter clockwise. When I told the guy that worked there that was an appropriate thing for the appropriate place he would have hit me if he hadn’t been afraid of getting arrested.
Larry

How about Homeland Security Chief Michael Chertoff cutting funding back to NY/NJ? His proposal is that there isn’t any main targets for terrorists to attack. Well Mr. New Jersey Man, there certainly is. We have major International Airports in both states, we have tunnels connecting New York and New Jersey, we have bridges that connect New York and New Jersey. New Jersey has so many oil refineries, chemical plants and the regions utility and transportation infrastructure. What is this man thinking? We still have tall skyscrapers in New York that are easy targets for the terrorists.

The Northeast Corridor is very vulnerable to terrorism.

So I am pissed off right now.

😡 😡 😡 😡

[FONT=Georgia][SIZE=3][COLOR=darkorchid]B…[/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Georgia][SIZE=3][COLOR=darkorchid]Do we get to see your drivers license picture???[/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT] 😉 😮 :rolleyes:
[FONT=Georgia][SIZE=3][COLOR=darkorchid][/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Georgia][SIZE=3][COLOR=darkorchid](Notice how I attached flowers so you won’t smack me one?)[/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]

Yuck no Deb, it’s the most horrendous picture I have ever seen.:eek:

I look like the Wicked Witch of the East. 😮 😮

Many thanks to Canada, they arrested 17 terrorist suspects

I am celebrating the death of terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

Another piece of camel dung bites the dust.

Yeah he’s gonna be pissed when he finds out their aren’t any of those promised virgins in Hell.

Sorry for the change of topic, but has anyone else heard anything about George W’s affair with Condi Rice and Laura moving to the Mayflower Hotel? Just curious.

Shan

Oh lord let’s hope they don’t have babies :p

Nope I haven’t heard that one yet Shan lol

Well he is dumb enough to dump a class act like Laura for someone else. He sure carries Rice around on a chip HUM???
LEA

I have been saying this for years. Frank and I used to talk about W and Condi doing the nasty all the time.:eek: Just look at how he looks at her so adoringly.
I haven’t heard anything about this yet.

Marge,

How many times did we talk about what Frank and I said about the
“Village Idiot” and his consort? Pretty much on target. We laughed about it even though we pretty much knew it would come out one day.

Why can’t presidents keep their plumbing in their pants????? Geez is it that hard to be faithful to your spouse????????

Shan,

Where did you hear this? Curious myself.

“….Frank and I used to talk about W and Condi doing the nasty all the time….”

Wow Donna that nearly made me lose my lunch.

[QUOTE=Jerimy]”….Frank and I used to talk about W and Condi doing the nasty all the time….”

Wow Donna that nearly made me lose my lunch.[/QUOTE]

Jer,

Glad to have been of service to you.:D 😀 😀 😀

Your so good to me 🙂

[QUOTE=Jerimy]Your so good to me :)[/QUOTE]

Jer,

I try. 🙂 It’s my purpose in life. 🙂

Hey Brandy,

Ben heard it on Air America (Rhandi Rhodes Show) last Friday, then relayed it to me over the weekend. I looked it up on the web and found a couple of articles about it. The best part was that during a speech Condi was giving last week, she messed up and referred to W as her “husband,” then corrected herself and said she meant “the president.”

Jer, you’re right! Let’s hope those alien-looking freaks don’t reproduce!

[B]N.Korea + missiles =[/B] [I]WHAT THE HECK DOES [/I][B][SIZE=3]Kim Jong Il [/SIZE][/B][I]THINK HE IS DOING?????????????[/I] Axis of Evil …… HELL YES!!!!!

He’s an idiot, him and Saddam will be bunkmates here pretty soon after his government is mysteriously overthrown.

Been waiting the last couple of days to see if anyone would ‘rap my knuckles’ for my error in saying [I]PYONGYANG [/I]instead of [SIZE=3][B]Kim Jong Il -[/B] [/SIZE][SIZE=2](cut and paste disaster – really!!) I guess everyone just shook their heads and quietly laughed, but didnt want to hurt my feelings 😀 [/SIZE]

* Just quickly amending this …… just went into my old post and changed names, in the old forum we couldnt change it after a while, but I guess we are on a “new” forum. P.S. I may seem crazy, but Im not really, I know what i mean even if you guys dont. LOL

Hi,

North Korea over thrown? Ain’t going to happen. The leader is fairly new, but the government itself, or regime, has been in place almost 60 years now. One thing they do great at, is building missiles, according to our pentagon. Don’t let us fool us by making hay over a failed test. After all, we tested our missile defence system now 10 times, with 5 failures. All 10 of these tests new where the other missile was coming from, so even the successful ones are suspect. Why using that system to get N. Korea’s missile was squashed immediatly. N. Korea can rain down on Souel S. Korea, 150 thousand projectiles from those Howitzers over the boarder, in 15 minutes time. That’s according to Tommy Franks who headed that command during his career. Also why we aren’t going to do anything military wise. A million people could be lost before we could even blink. The key here is China. They supply N. Korea with 90% of their fuel, and 45% of their food. One word from China cutting that off, would bring that idiot around tommorrow. Bush keeps insisting that China do the negoitiating for us, and in 4 years now, anyone see any results? China is playing us and Bush is letting it happen. Russia has been supplying Iran all along too. So, there are the two keys to a lot of trouble around this world, and this administation keeps letting them off the hook. Maybe he should have another look into their eyes.

Hi,

This is why we have to consider history, when making decisions on our future. Marg’s #2 statement, I will put in more stark terms. Japan invaded N. Korea back in the 50’s and raped and pillaged the place. In WW2 time, Japan invaded China, and proceeded to rape and pillage, and then kill, a village of 300thousand people in China, just to name a few examples. I don’t believe there is another place like the Asian Pacific Rim countries, where hatred for each other, runs so high. This is why every country involved, ie. the 6 party talks, will never bear fruit. At best, a baren tree with no growth, will be desquised as some sort of treaty, to get us off their backs, and things will continue as they always have.
Regarding #3 statement, America and the private sector are litterally financing China’s military. Via the trade deficits. China, in my opinion, is trying to get any and every American biz to set up shop there. We are being set up for the future. How? Years from now, when China has Tiawan captured in under 24 hours, we will saber rattle that we will bomb you if you don’t get out. China will then say, go ahead, bomb your own American busiiness’ while you are at it. Will we then sacrifice every American biz and person in their nation to do it? You tell me.
On statement #4, China only wants N. Korea, in my opinion, as a stageing point, or missile launch point, for that region. China doesn’t care who is the leader of the government, because that government hasn’t changed in 60 years, and China has controlling intrests on N. Korea. Any mass exodus would have happened already, which in small part over 60 years, it has, but they certainly don’t fear it. S. Korea has one main intrest only, for good reason, and that’s to get those Howitzers and tanks and military might, away from the DMZ boarder. To stand down, on both sides. Remember folks, we only are in a ceace fire position since the 50’s, and no end to that war was ever declared officially. N. Korea in their minds, are still at war with S. Korea and America. This point right here, is what I’d like to see George Bush throw in their faces. Come out to the world with an end to that chapter. Say, I want N. Korea and S. Korea to sign an end to that conflict now. I want that 50’s war closed and done forever. Then we can all move up to more current problems, and get on with life. That would squarely put N.Korea and China and S. Korea and us and everybody else, on the defencive, and put their true intentions right up front for the world to see. You mean you don’t want to end that war? They want to play PR games, then lets play.

Dear Marc:

Your thoughts on the animosity between the Koreas, China, and Japan suggests a solution to the problem. The United States could, as a balance to a nuclear North Korea, offer Japan nuclear weapons and missles to deliver them. It really doesn’t matter whether Japan wants them or not. The important thing is the offer. China has the most direct influence over Kim Jong Il, and they also have the longest memory of what happened at the hands of Japanese soldiers during World War II. I am pretty sure China would do anything in the world to prevent Japan from joining the nukes club, including doing whatever it takes to quash that goofy buffoon, Kim Jong Il.

Did you know that Kim Jong Il has reputedly the largest pornography and Daffy Duck collections in the world? I am glad to know that the people of North Korea are starving to death for something they can be really proud of. Daffy Duck pornography, however, would just be so wrong, on so many levels.

Lee

Hi Lee,

Yes, offering Japan nukes would certainly level the playing field. Isn’t that take though, why we have this trouble in the world. We, America, are already engaged in an arms race once again, by our own buildup, forcing other nations to do the same. We would have to tear down the WW2 treaty agreement we made Japan sign, that says they could never have atomic weapons or nuclear weapons first though. No offer can be made to them until that treaty is disbanded. I’m not so sure that would be a good idea. Personally, I think China loves this guy in N. Korea. Because they can control this nut case much easier then if it was someone who had a brain in their head. China has openly stated, that in 10 to 15 years time, 30% of their population will be educated enjineers. They will have devoloped their society to build and figure out stuff, to a much greater degree then we will have in our society. Put that together with China’s statement to our pentagon years ago, that China is taking a nuclear survivability tact, which says, we don’t have to win, just survive a nuke attack. We will throw everything at you at once, then see who climbs out of the rubble when over. Pretty scary and effective thinking. We build and spend trillions on space junk, and they spend a thousand dollars building a system that takes it all down. Like having a $350 million dollar battle ship sitting there, and a 16 foot zodiac pulls up along side, with 4 people in it, and sinks the darn thing. This is totally what China’s space program is all about. They are finding a way to defeat all the weapons and technology we have up there now. Take our eyes out, then what? They have been testing their internet warfare for some time now. A lot of bugs shutting computer systems down here and there, originate from China. China has never been our friend, and never will be our friend. They appeas us to get our money to finance their projects, laughing all the way to the bank. A simple little thing like China telling the Pope at the Vatican, that no bishop or cardinal in China will be approved until the government ok’s the person getting the title, should send signals of somekind.

Dear Marguerite:

The North Korean missle which failed is supposed to have a range of up to 9,500 miles. This missle only has an accuracy of ten to fifteen miles which means it is only good for blowing up large cities. Some of those large cities in range are New York City, Seattle, Minneapolis, Detroit, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh. I have never heard anyone describe Kim Jong Il using words like balanced, levelheaded, sane, or intellegent. The kindest thing I have ever heard said about him is that he is eccentric. Most people describe him as being detatched from reality.

Is this the type of person that you want to have weapons that can kill millions of people? Maybe more importantly, would Kim Il Jong be willing to use nuclear weapons? The US and the Soviet Union avoided nuclear war because both sides knew the result would be devestating to the civilian population. The principle was called Mutual Assured Destruction or MAD. Since Kim Jong Il has shown absolutely no regard for the people of North Korea, I seriously doubt whether huge casualties would be a deterent for Kim Jong Il. He builds missles when he can’t afford food for his people. His solution to starvation is to publish cookbooks on how to cook grass.

As far as the financial aspects of dealing with North Korea, an untimely death will have a huge impact on one’s personal finances. It doesn’t matter what it will cost us, if we are all dead. I think this is one of those situations where it has to be dealt with, no matter what the cost is.

Lee

Dear Marguerite:

I can really see your point of view and I respect your opinions. I just worry that if you allow lunatics to get their way, it only emboldens them. Adolph Hitler said that if Neville Chamberlain showed even a little bit of intestinal fortitude, then he wouldn’t have militarized the Rheinland and invaded Czechoslavakia. Appeasement only works with sane people. We have already extracted four promises from Kim Jong Il to not build missles or enrich uranium. He has broken each of those promises. I am curious at which point Kim Jong Il starts looking at us as spineless worms, the term Adolph Hitler used to describe Neville Chamberlain. At that point, then heaven help us all.

I don’t like war either, but avoiding war at all costs is much worse. Osama Bin Laden said he decided to attack the United States when the United States pulled out of Somalia after suffering 18 casualties. Serbia invaded Croatia, Bosnia, Slovenia, and Kosovo only after the European countries indicated that they would avoid conflict at all costs. One, just one country standing up to Serbia would have prevented 300,000 deaths. Hitler started a war which cost 40 millions lives because Great Britain said it would avoid war at all costs. Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait because he thought the United States were a paper tiger because they wouldn’t retaliate after the attack on the USS Stark. It’s a lesson that all boys learn on the playground. Try to appease a bully and your life is infinitely worse. Stand up to him, and you may get an ass kicking, but you are almost always better off.

Unfortunately, in this world, there is a sort of calculus of death when you deal with nut case leaders. If he thinks you are unwilling to risk the lives a few then you risk the lives of thousands or millions. It’s a sad world we live in, but that is just the reality of the situation. I wish it wasn’t that way.

Lee

Hi,

Interesting events in India. Trajic to say the least. I wonder how long it will be before Al Quaida is made the convient scape goat for these bombings? Maybe they did. At least till our elections are over, then we’ll find it it was Pakistan or a group out of Kasmir that really did the job. Sould be interesting how this plays out. In our media, that is.

Dear Marc:

Since this is conspiracy Tuesday, you just have to know that the New York Times planned and executed the India attacks. On second thought, the New York Times decided their isn’t a war an terror anymore, so it might be the New York Post doing it to make the Times look bad…….errrrrr….worse.

Lee

Hi,

Well, President Bush, if the economy is doing this great, then why didn’t the poor and lower middle class get a raise along with the elite in congress? If things are so great, then why is your administration, along with your cronies in congress, crafting legeslation to outlaw formation of unions to sneak threw on some bill? Why, after 5 years, are you still getting ’emergency funds’ for the fight on terror, and those costs are excluded from all your budget figures? Why is that deficit projection you set up 2 years ago, so inflated, that you now boast of how the tax cuts have worked? Why has the national debt risen $3 trillion in the last 4 years? Can you look the American people in the eye and say, my policies will not cause future tax increases? Just another manipulated, edited report, coming out of this administration since day one.

[QUOTE=racer13]Hi,

Well, President Bush, if the economy is doing this great, then why didn’t the poor and lower middle class get a raise along with the elite in congress? If things are so great, then why is your administration, along with your cronies in congress, crafting legeslation to outlaw formation of unions to sneak threw on some bill? Why, after 5 years, are you still getting ’emergency funds’ for the fight on terror, and those costs are excluded from all your budget figures? Why is that deficit projection you set up 2 years ago, so inflated, that you now boast of how the tax cuts have worked? Why has the national debt risen $3 trillion in the last 4 years? Can you look the American people in the eye and say, my policies will not cause future tax increases? Just another manipulated, edited report, coming out of this administration since day one.[/QUOTE]

From yesterday’s Investor’s Business Daily:

“Economy: Surging growth has slashed the budget deficit to $127 billion below February’s estimate. Now at only 2.3% of GDP, the unexpectedly small $296 billion shortfall is the clear result of President Bush’s tax cuts.

With individual taxes growing at a 10%-plus rate and corporate taxes rising at nearly 20%, America’s booming economy is washing away federal red ink like a tsunami.

The budget gap is now close to its historical average for the last four decades — remarkable so soon after 9-11, not to mention last year’s devastating natural disasters. It’s all part of a prosperity that has generated more than 5.4 million new jobs in the last three years.

We’re witnessing an astoundingly rapid expansion of the U.S. economy. As economist Lawrence Kudlow notes, “over the past 11 quarters, dating back to the June 2003 Bush tax cuts, America has increased the size of its entire economy by 20%.” And, he notes, that added output is roughly the same size as China’s total economy.

Far from being an accident, this is really the culmination of a successful strategy to solve a national economic calamity.

After the tech-stock craze of the 1990s, we saw a market correction of truly historic proportions. Then the nation was slammed by the 2001 terrorist attacks. The stock market lost an estimated $7 trillion to $8 trillion in value, and the economy began to shrink.

We badly needed powerful tax cuts. With private investment hammered by that double-barreled onslaught, President Bush wisely cut taxes on capital.

As Kudlow notes, investors now keep nearly 50% more of their after-tax capital gains. As a result, business investment has boomed — up 37% since mid-2003. Jobs, too. According to the household survey of job creation, which gauges small business job growth, there were 387,000 new jobs produced in June and 288,000 in May.

The tax cuts’ revenue tidal wave is even reaching state treasuries. As the National Association of State Budget Officers (NASBO) reported last month, “In fiscal 2006, revenues exceeded original budget projections in 37 states. . . . Revenue collections in fiscal 2006 were 3.4% higher than original estimates.” Sales taxes were 1.3% higher, personal income taxes 3.5% higher and corporate income taxes a whopping 12.6% higher than original estimates……

…….Meanwhile, today’s lower deficit may surprise the chattering media, but not anyone who truly understands economics. The latter know that cutting taxes means more wealth for all, but especially for the entrepreneurs who power our economy.

By the way, the so-called “rich” are the ones who pay the bulk of the taxes — and are now paying down the deficit for the rest of us.” (END ARTICLE)

Funny how the people I always hear complaining about how bad the economy is, and how everything is Bush’s fault tend to be from the left coast, the Rust Belt, or northeast urban areas, and tend to be a little unfamiliar with economics. For the very large part of America, life is pretty good. Granted, Bush has made some BIG mistakes on illegal aliens and runaway domestic spending, but things could be much, much worse. John Kerry would certainly have rasied taxes, driven up unemployment, and emboldened our nation’s enemies by being limp-wristed on defense, a la Jimmy Carter. I was 8 when Carter left office, and even I remember what a train wreck that was.

I’ll take “incompetence and corruption” over incompetence, corruption, and socialism any day.

Here Here Marc, you are always right on the target.

The East Coast isn’t to thrilled with the Bush administration either. The economy here in NJ and NY is terrible, only the rich prosper.

Hi again,

Isn’t it intesting how some buy into the economics of dynamic math solutions to back up their claims. Like two or three Fox News economists hand picked by the administration to go out and sell it. Like Ronald Reagan saying David Stockman is the best economist in the country, that’s why I hired him to run OMB, and make my policy work. Then, 3 years later when David said it wasn’t working, or going to work, he was fired instantly. Fire all the other opinions on his advisory boards, then come out with a report. Let’s try traditional economic math, instead of inventing a new way to skew the numbers. Let’s look at the real economy, for the rest of us who aren’t in the top 5 to 10% of income scales. Home ownership. Bush is beating his chest about how ownership is up. Quotes the rise in home sales from his agency reports. When you read a bit farther into that report, 40% of home sales in the last 6 years, were for second homes. Now, I can’t afford to buy another home, so who’s buying all of them? Pretty obvious. So, take that 40% out of the math figures, then redo it properly, you’ll see that for 85% of us, ownership has stayed stagnent at best, if not decreased. Three years ago, under the radar, Bush got a tax law tacked onto a bill, that said, for one year only, any industry that pulls all overseas profit back onto American books, will be taxed at 5%, instead of 35%, like all other business here that don’t do overseas biz. Every industry, by regulation or not, has many different means to move money around, like overseas, to avoid taxation on profits. The payoff to industry was, a $75billion windfall to the pharmacutical industry, $20billion to the oil industry, $10billion to the auto industry, and so on. The payoff for Bush? A huge influx of instant tax cash that won’t show up on the books until about two weeks ago, just in time for the elections. That’s the true reason those defict numbers look the way they do. Take the $4billion out of the economy we gave the airlines after 9/11. The billions handed out like candy to states for security, that’s still sitting in some state’s coffers. The half a trillion to a trillion dollars that has been given the defence war machine, then tell us what the true state of the economy will be when all that goes away, sometime after the 2008 elections. This isn’t about grade school left or right typical thinking. It’s about the whole truth, nothing but the truth, so help me god. Not your version of a half truth. That’s the first thing that needs fixing before the economy can be dealt with, so everybody can enjoy the American dream and the prusuit of happieness, instead of saying the majority of American’s will have to wait until the elete are done with those two, then we can have what scraps that are left and fall threw the cracks. War profiteering, greed and glutony and power, seem to be the real special intrest many subscribe to, and consider the American dream. I don’t want, nor ever advocated any system other then what we have. All I’ve ever asked is for a fighting chance an oppertunity that’s fair to all, and a level playing field. Most only truthfully love the capitolist system for the easy parts, like taking money from a baby. What about the other parts of the system? Like if you don’t manage your company right, you’re out. Reep what you sew. Ask the question to yourself. If you love the system so much, then why do you run to the taxpayers to fix it every time? We didn’t screw it up, you did. You can’t fix it yourself, then tough, no bankruptcie for you. That’s how I ran my biz’s, by taking responsability for the whole capitolist system, not just the easy parts. The number one by-product produced in this nation today in corprate America, when profits go from being fair to obsene, is bad management. That $2billion check GM wrote to Fiat last year, was a result of a board that was asleep at the wheel since GM wrote that contract up in the 80’s. The chairman of Fiat wasn’t asleep though, and excersiced GM’s own clause that you either take the company over as a whole, or you pay us $2billion to get out of it. That alone, cost 7500 jobs out of that big number they announced were going to be laid off. Was one golden parachute effected for those that really screwed up? Was one person in management fired? Delphi goes from the number one in the world on parts supply to bankrupt in 5 years? I know, it’s all labor’s fault. Tell me how Toyota can come over here, set up shop, work under the same system as American biz and taxation rates, and become our number one auot maker in sales in America? Keep their employees happy all along to? But American biz can’t seem to do the same for some reason. On home turf. The 2 richest men in the world both have something in common. They both treated their employee’s and work forces fairly every step of the way. To quote Warren Buffet ” There is indeed a class war going on in America today, and the rich are winning”. He is the only CEO in history that has had a 20% or better ROI for his investors 35 years straight. He knows the real economics.

[QUOTE=marguerite]The reported revenue, as well as costs, is sure to have been “managed” by corporations before reports are forwarded to the government. And this administration is known for manipulating data. How can we be sure that anything we read is accurate?

Regards,
Marge[/QUOTE]
Nope. Those numbers come straight from the IRS and the OMB, neither of which are influenced by the Bush administration in any way. If a person doesn’t like Bush, fine. I think his willful neglect of the illegal alien issue borders on treason, and the outrageous domestic spending he lets slide through his office is shameful. But when people go out of their way to believe they are being lied to about basic economic numbers, in spite of the facts, I have to wonder. And how can we be sure that ANYTHING “reported” by the NY Times, ABC, CNN, CBS, etc. is not slanted? Anything that puts Bush, America, our military, or the economy in a bad light gets front page shout-it-from-the-rooftop coverage, and anything remotely positive about those subjects either gets buried on the back page or spun in a negative light.

There’s the old joke about Pres. Bush and the Pope fishing: The wind blows the Pope’s hat into the water, and Bush says, “Hang on, I’ll get it.” He steps out of the boat and walks on water to the hat, picks it up, and walks back to the boat without getting a drop of water on his shoes. The next day’s NY Times headline reads “BUSH CAN’T SWIM!”. You get the idea.

I know exactly what you mean about corporate honesty and accounting numbers. Here in Birmingham, we have Richard Scrushy of Healthsouth fame. I mean HOW do you overstate earnings by 1.2 BILLION $$$ and keep a straight face? What was he thinking? Thankfully, he was convicted of bribery a couple of weeks ago, along with the former governor, and will probably go to the country club, uhhmm..I mean, prison for a while.

The company I work for bought another operation back in Jan., and the books are so screwed up you would not believe it. Thankfully it’s not publicly traded. I think most corporations don’t intentionally cook the books to inflate earnings or to avoid taxes (most of it is incompetence), but the maybe 5% that do cast doubt on all of corporate America. I’m pro-business/capitalist/Republican/conservative to the core, but cases like Enron and Tyco make my blood boil, when I think about the innocent investors who lost so much. To a large extent, greed is good, because it drives people to do better and to innovate, and moves our entire society forward. But there’s a big difference between healthy, honest competition and fraud.

Hi,

I brought up, years ago here, like in year one of this administration, that one of the first executive orders he did, was overturn Clinton’s order banning the handing out of $15millon per year in bonus money. By the Whitehouse exclusivly. To ripe for abuse, was Clinton’s directive. The ability to hand out up to $25k a year, to any beurocrat. The very first legeslation Bush produced, was the Prescription Drug Plan, and starting in March of 2000, gave speeches for a month, saying this bill will only cost $300billion. Right before he had to take a month off to decide the stem cell issue, a 31 year beurocrat over at OMB said “Oh, Mr. President? My report never said that figure, I said it will cost between $400 and $450billion at least, if not more”. His team paid him a visit, and a decision was reached that said beurocrat would rather keep his pension and job, and go silent, which he did. A reporter sniffed it out and inquired to the tune of an official Whitehouse investagation. All on record. After they investagated themselves, the verdic was no laws were broken, so tough. Then it went away and the media never followed up. That program isn’t even halfway up and running, and it’s all ready at what, $750billion? You’re telling me that the president can’t, in no way, influence every agency, let alone OMB and the IRS? The IRS was Nixon’s and Hoover’s(FBI) favorite tool. These are appointed positions too. That was the start of the PR campaign, that if you say it often enough, it must be true. Those reports on how great his policies were working on terrorism at the end of 2002? Showing how terrorism has gone down globably? Boasted for 3 days to America, before a collage professor spoke up showing where terrorism is going straight up. Then Colin Powel blames a beurocrat for skewing the numbers and using outdated info? Ring any bells? His councel of science which numbers around 10k, first said stem cells were the way to go and we should invest. After 4000 were purged off that council, the new report was very toned down about stem cells. You can’t be that nieve. That’s just a few in the first 2 years, leaving out the war. In 1994, when the R’s took control of congress, there were 1343 ear- marks(porkbarrel) on legeslation that year. In 2005, for the year, it has risen steadily to 14,000 ear-marks. The R’s have total comittee control and absolute power, and are solely responsable for this kind of fiscal raping of our treasury. All on record if you want to look. The number two general was just here visiting our Army base. He apologised to our troops about having to cut everyday living needs and expences down to nothing, so the war training can continue, then handed out 12 special coins with 4 stars on them, to his command, as a thanks for understanding and bearing up to running a military at poverty levels. You keep buying into those reports and speeches, and I’ll keep buying into where the rubber meets the road. Just a choice. By the way, Ted Stevens up in Alaska did get his bridge money, but you saw that in the last budget report, right? Or was that part edited out? The Mexican Army has envaded our boarders over 200 times the last few years. It’s made up primarilly of drug cartel members, and Bush, in this budget, is sending $350million directly to the military of Mexico, not the main government. What’s up with that?

Hi,
In my opinion, the Federal government has very few responsibilities. Things like fighting wars, building highways and bridges, maintaining order, and delivering the mail. That’s about it. If we weren’t spending billions on “entitlements” (not the government’s duty according to the Constitution), we would have plenty of money for our armed services (which IS a duty according to the Constitution). And SINCE WHEN does a Democrat care about deficits? For 40 years, they had the Congress, and spent our tax $$$ like drunken sailors, balancing the budget was never even an issue. But elect a Republican president, have a sharp economic downturn (1999-2000, before Bush was even elected), suffer through 9/11, and suddenly every Democrat in the country is howling about how we can’t afford this and can’t afford that.

My report card on Bush? Domestic spending D-, Economic policy (tax cuts) A+, War on terrorism A-, Judicial appointments A, Foreign policy B, Illegal “immigration” F-. He hasn’t been perfect by a long shot.

And what is it with the Left’s accusations of this being the “most secretive” administration ever? There are plenty of things about our national security that the American public should not know, and has no right to know. I would get so infuriated when the Clinton people would have a TV press conference and tell every last detail about any military operation. “We’re going to launch 20 cruise missiles from ships in the Indian Ocean at 09:20 this morning, and target these terrorist facilities at these locations…” And the intended targets are setting there watching CNN, and have 5 hours notice before heading into their bunker. Don’t TELL me you’re gonna killl bad guys, just DO IT. What good did it do for the NY Times to tell the terrrorists that we have been tracking their money? Who did that help? The terrorists, that’s who. Certainly not you and I. I personally would like to see the writers of that article at the NY Times tried for treason and punished accordingly.

Funny how the people howling about how the Bush administration is “trampling on our civil liberties” and treating detainess “inhumanely” would be the first ones to scream, “Why didn’t he do something?” when another 3,000+ Americans are killed by terrorists. I understand frustration and disagreement, but try to keep everything in perspective.

Hi there,

Ok, some prespective. First, lets get past the Shawn Hannitty diatribe. Regarding secrecy? This administration, from day one, has declared more documents ‘top secret’, then any other administration in history. The highest previous total, in our republic’s history, on documents labeled secret, were 25,000 per year. This administration, at the end of their first year, labeled over 60thousand documents top secret. Now, before your mind pulls the 9/11 card, bear in mind that they broke the record, months before. That figure since, has climbed ten fold, and some of us are a bit concerned about that. Another fact, not opinion. Remember how the R’s went to town on Clinton’s pardons? Sure you do. Everybody remembers a good smear campaign. This was month 1 of this administration, on their way to changing the ‘tone’ in Washington DC. The R’s exposed the reasons Clinton pardoned Mark Rich. Executive orders are protected too. One protection accorded these executive orders, is that the ‘reason’ stays secret for 5 years. Not the name of who a president pardons, just the reason. On inauguration day, at 12:01pm, the reaons hit the wire services, and the game was on. That has been forensicly proven, by the way. Without furthur detail, after 2 months of ‘Clinton Pardon’ headlines and smear, how did Bush fix this problem, that upset so many, and who demanded such power be taken away? By executive order, Bush made the ‘reason’ secret for 25 years. Period. Making government more secret, right? So, we’ve established the R’s are indeed for more secret government, and leaking top secret documents when it serves their means. By fact and action. Not words. Throw in the top secret meeting Cheney had with the energy giants of industry, to set our policies, as another example. The R’s are saying to us Americans, you just follow our policies, you don’t need to know what the details are. That’s a secret.
I choose to look at our government, no matter who’s in place, outside of the Public Relations Department. Obviously, many only have time for the PR view, delivered by radio personalities on TV, not credable sourses. Smear translates into ratings and money. Hear a fact, based on action, just talk over it, deflect, and repete opinion over and over until it becomes the truth. To me, all govenment is, are management issues, not personallity issues. To do the right thing that’s fair and benificial to all. We give the government a pile of money, here’s where we want it to go, now manage it correctly. Pretty simple. Entitlement programs should be done away with? I hope for anyone who agrees, that you aren’t a pro-life advocate. These are life programs, outside of that microbe in a petry dish, that needs soooo much protecting. All the way to the dumpster out back. Never backed by your wallets, and funding is constantly cut by this pro-life group. Against our government money being spent on abortions? Or, are you aginst all that, just for Americans? I can never figure out where this group stands on life issues. Why? Because we give Isreal $4billion per year. Two for defence, and 2 for their domestic spending. Isreal government openly endorses abortion, and has government owned and operated clinics all over the place. Our money has, still is, and always will be, funding abortions. Just not here. All fact and part of our government. Which is it? Life only for Americans? Or life for everyone?
People need to understand just what and who the core of our government is, as pretains to the current administration. Good, bad or indifferent, what an opinion is, who’s side are you on, it doesn’t matter. As long as you understand just how dangerous things can get. There are two people in this administration, that are the most beurocratic savy, absolute experts at beurocratic mess turn-arounds, know in great detail the most obscure laws and regulations buried deep in the bowels of agencies, and government as a whole, and are probably the best at producing cash flow, then any beurocrats in our history, and are experts in legal language and how changing one word, can change the coarse of an agency or beurocracy. Who are they? That’s one, now who’s the other? Ok, ok. Rumsfeld and Cheney. Let’s start with Don. During President Ford’s years in office, things were going down hill fast. Ford brought on this new guy named Don Rumsfeld, as chief of staff, to turn his presidency around. The first guy Rummy recruited, and personally hired, to help this turn around, was a guy named Dick Cheney. One word(or 2) used to describe Don’s management style, throughout his history, is ‘micro-manager’. Cheney was the pitbull, or the ‘bad cop’ person. Those two went threw the beurocracy, produced cash flow, fired, rehired everywhere, changed the way biz was being done, and they found every shortcut there to make end runs around regulations and laws. In 2 years, Ford’s presidency, at the very worst, was back to a break-even point, if not better, and Ford looked good for his legacy. Whether in government or private biz, these two never left, and have been involved in every aspect of our government ever since. Again, good, bad or indifferent, these two can and have, get a whole lot done and changed, in a relitively short amount of time. Look over those 14,000 ear-marks last year, and you’ll find little word changes in regulations and laws, and how an agency can operate within the government, in quite a few. All under our noses. Secret. Well, technically not secret. You just have to look real hard. You don’t ask, I won’t tell policy. Is there any doubt that this administration has punished the CIA since 9/11 for just about everything? The director is appointed by the president, to serve a 10 year term. This administration is now putting the 5th one in place since taking office. If you know the history of the people running our government, why I never voted for Clinton, by the way, then you’d know Cheney and Rumsfeld have had a grudge and hatred and disdain for the CIA going back to the Ford years. Might explain why today, there is so much turmoil in that agency now. Those two have openly said since that time in the 70’s, that the CIA should be marginalized. For the first time in American history, as a recent example, the defence department took over, and control of, rebuilding a nation. The state department always handles that, along with CIA support. Don didn’t like the way Powell did things in Afganistan, and to quote Rummy “Things are going too slow there”. So he grabed the rebuilding of Iraq, and put it under his control. The secratary of defence has power over state, and can set policies, transfer funds around, and run both war and domestic issues, here and abroad? Wow. That’s a lot of power for a cabinate position. Cheney now, has had a personal grudge aginst congress since Nixon. Because they stripped the executive branch of power, that in his mind, wasn’t enough power to begin with. His job is to circumvent the beurocracy and congress on the political side, while Karl Rove keeps everybodies eye off the ball from the PR room. You are seeing, and have been seeing, the details of these two work’s, for the last 6 years. Over the last 40 years really. Bush is just a rubber stamp to them. Just know, that what goes around under the radar, will come around under the radar again. Be careful what you wish for. I wish for an open government with checks and balances. Speaking of rubber stamps. Anyone notice that Condi Rice, who was hired as a Russian consultant to assist Bush’s man, has risen to Bush Family status in 6 years. Amazing how the words ‘what do you want to hear Mr. President?’, can do for a person’s rising star.

Hi,

I got to throw this one in. For anyone into military tactics, you are once agin seeing the best at it. As you see Israel unfold these tactics over the coming days, Sharron has to have a smile on his face. Stricking an airport in Lebonon is pretty standard targeting. But Israel never bombs anything unless there is a message attached to it. This tactic is so effective, more then the bomb itself. First, they go in and hit the runway at the main airfield. That was to get the Lebonon government’s attention, not the Hamas terrorists. Keep in mind, the government is squeeling they are seperate from this terror group. Then, Israel goes back that day, and takes out the fuel tanks at the airport. This was to tell the government, we don’t care how seperate you are, you are now pinned down and staying right here with a front row seat. You’re not leaving town while the going gets rough. Then, overnight, I see Israel bombed every main outgoing road and path of escape, telling Hamas, you ain’t going anywhere either. Thus, in a matter of 2 days, they have all parties concerned, boxed in and pinned down, and contained right in front of them. Now, everybody is sweeting bullets. Not one helicopter or plane can leave the ground. You should see the tone change any time now, and certain parties working a little harder to get this under control and stopped. Isreal, knowing certain groups don’t respect life that much, always manages to put the right lives on the line to test that will. Nobody gets a free pass. Since the 60’s, I’ve always been facinated at how effective this kind of tactical warfare can be. I hate to say this, but we should be doing an exchange program with our and their militaries. We’ll gaurd your boarder, while you go take Baghdad for us. When done, swap back. To bad politics get in the way.

Hi,

Here is a stark example, that hit the papers 2 days after I wrote the above, on law changing threw ear-marks, deception, and right under our nose’s. The Department of Defence, and the Vetern’s Affairs officials implemented a complex series of laws, starting in 2003, to end for many retirees the ban on “concurrent-reciept” of military retirerment and VA disability compensation.
The government owes back pay to roughly 20,000 recipients of Combat-Related Special Compensation and 78,000 recipients of Concurrent Retirement and Disability Pay. Somewhere in the ballpark of 100’s of millions of dollars being withheld.
The R’s, and anyone else, who sit on there hands and sweep this under the rug, you are aginst our military. That first group you hosed, must be the bronze and silver star winners, who went above the call of duty. The second, just amputees who gave body parts for our country. This doesn’t even count the 26,000 plus troops that were removed from war zones, who aren’t on any list. The PSTD ones, and whomever else this administration decided should be in this group. You sure love them when a headline is needed, or a backdrop for speeches is required to make you look good and supportive. As soon as they have left the stage, they turn their backs and screw every single one of them.
THIS IS HOW CASH FLOW IS MADE, UNDER THE RUMSFELD/CHENEY GRAND PLAN. Hold $33billion in homeland security funds for a year that were supposed to be dispersed long ago, change laws how each agency in government does the books, give industry huge tax breaks that generate obsene windfall profits, and low and behold, those economic, edited reports Bush beat his chest over the other day, look pretty good, don’t they?
It, personally, makes me sick every time I see Bush and his men sending off our troops to war, smiling and shaking hands for the cameras, knowing damn well, that will be the easies part they will face, because the real war they will fight, will be upon return, with our own government. You either support them 100%, or you don’t support them at all. Picking out the easiest, socially acceptable parts, then remaining silent on the rest of the truth, is not support in my mind.

Just to add one more, the Army, last week, finally declared ‘no mass’ on Haliburton Corp. The last straw was being charged $45 per case, for Coca-Cola, to the troops fighting the war. No more contracts will be awarded this company, by one branch of our military, the army. This branch of our military, is litterally saying, we can no longer afford an American company engaged in the security of this nation, to supply our troops and drain our troops of needed money that needs to go to living standards and equipment, at the same time. We give, no mass. The troops can’t give up any more life saving equipment and training, because there’s nothing left to give. Re-read my post above, about the general who visited Ft. Lewis one week prior to that announcment. Just 10 minutes down the road from me, is the first, and basically only, Styrker Division. Been doing time in Iraq for some time now. Their claim to fame is, this trick new 6-wheeled vechical that can get them in and out of places in a hurry, or move troops around in a hurry. As a military machine buff, not a bad concept. The 6 rubber tires on each machine, cost $23,000 per set. Here’s the kicker. They are good for 600 miles only. I’ll defer to Lee, the map maker, to tell everyone how far it is from the off-load point in Kuwait, then the drive to Baghdad. Let alone the miles put on while there. Every time I hear a styrker machine or personel go down over there, I cringe and shiver, knowing it’s certainly plausable at least, that their demise was put into motion because they were running on cords, a tire blew or chuncked, caused roll overs, along with the discovered design flaw after they were deployed, and they were turned into sitting ducks. It’s certainly nice to see that easy, safe way, standing in front of our troops on the overpasses of our freeways, waving flags and pounding individual chest’s in self gratifacation, on Fox TV. To bad the ones who are standing behind our troops, watching their backs, just get labeled as traitors. I prefer to save a human first, not make a friend first. As I like to profess. It’s plain choice. Choice comes in many forms, one being a vote.

Hi,

Ok, I just need to get this out of my system too. So, back to military tactics and Israel. As a general over view of the situation, this mess over in Lebonon, is shaping up like this. Isreal is making this a two horse race. Isreal & Hezbollah. The government has no ties with Hezbollah, and they are just like our terrorist group the KKK, that are just recogonized as existing inside their nation. Their way of dealing with an independent group, is to appease them with words. Well known how this group is financed, and who’s doing it, and where we talk bodly internationally, talking about Iran and everybody else. Isreal could care less. Hezbollah is what they want established with all parties in the soup, or All agree to eleminate Hezbollah. You either want them,if so, your nation will take responsability for their actions, or you don’t, and you will eleminate them. Or we will. Isreal knows, that each condemnation heard so far by the parties involved, are to keep their government, and secular leaders, clerics and so on, power intact. One hint of betraying Islam, and the people are gone under those leaders. Everything collapses, and nobody to negotiate with. That’s why, when you put the time line together on certain bombings, like the one Hezbollah cleric screeming his lungs out, around day 3, you start to see those messages I was talking about with bombs. This cleric walked out of his personal home, on the way to make headlines in the town square, when 100 yards away, he turned around to see his house leveled. Then, as he decided to pick up the pace into town, he saw his office building leveled in front of him. Now, I don’t know what people might think at a time like this, but one thought I’d have is “hmmm, wonder if the cross-hairs were, and still are, on me?” So, Isreal said, go ahead and make your speech, because that’s all you can say at this point. Walk into that square and ask the crowd if they have a spare bedroom you can stay in for awhile, and see how that plays.
By day 4, the Lebonon government’s cabinet remained behind closed doors, brainstorming ideas for a solution. Officials and ministers who normally sought out the media, suddenly shut off cell phones or had assistents screen the calls. There were no visits to bombed out sites or buildings, no photo-ops at hospitals with injured, and no firery speeches in defence of the country. Starting on day one at the airport strikes, this government has been reduced to taking no stand, and promising little action. The last thing said by this government to the people was, don’t go farther then 60 seconds from your bomb shelter. Something tells me that action and a stand, one way or the other, will be made, and Hezbollah is the target for all parties for action and a stand, to be taken on. So says Isreal. Nothing more, nothing less right now. Like the old west, they threw the rope over the tree branch, called all townsfolk to see, put all parties neck’s in the noose, and have been tighting it ever since. With hand on the trap door handle. Now, who wants to settle this mess, and who wants to see a hanging? Very effective, and interesting to say the least.
For history buffs, you are seeing today,and for the past 1000 years or so, with Isreal’s military, what America’s military and tactics will be and look like, 20 years from now. That is the real transition going on in the bowels of the pentagon. Learning to fight like everybody else. Unconventionally.

Hi,

American individuals must pay for rescue. Due to a law put into effect when folks? During this administration? Law changed by who? Another example, and we haven’t seen nothing yet. Wait till it’s exposed how words in treaties have been changed too.

Dear Marc:

The rules for rescue is that people who refuse to leave a country, despite state department warnings, travel advisories, and all laws of common sense must pay to be rescued by the United States military. The charge for their rescue is 150.00 dollars. This law has been in effect for more than 25 years. The actual cost of rescuing some ninny who really ought to know better averages over 20,000 dollars and puts the rescue personal at peril. Frankly, if these people disregard official calls to evacuate, then I really can’t understand why our government should rescue them at all. Let’s give Darwin’s Theories the maximum opportunity to improve the species.

I heard on the news today that several of the rescued were actually complaining that their accomodations during their rescue weren’t up to snuff. Apparently, their lobster bisque was almost all bisque with scarcely any lobster at all. The Bush administration, instead of taking these crybabies back into the war zone, dropped the ridiculously low cost of 150.00 dollars, and let them be evacuated for free, yet still they complained.

The rescue of these mental defective ingrates is a ridiculous waste of tax payer dollars. I think arrogance-assisted suicide should be legal.

Lee

Hi Lee,

Well, it’s about time. Now go back and read that law again, and compare it to the original version. Might of been updated in 2002/3 time frame. Rescue teams up here, ie. the National Gaurd and forest, pluck people off our mountain, and bill them, to the tune of $14k on up, and you never see a news blip on that stuff, do you. Think $500 an hour each time you see our military helecopter touch down in Lebonon, let alone what Grease is hosing us on the ship rental. Sounds like your solution for our Americans in Lebonon should be, just flee to Syria and call it good. After all, the state department was only hours behind every other nation in issueing that call to evacuate. We are a week behind every other nation in getting what help is coming, there, and our people out. Lee. Our government is setting up an easy payment plan for these people, which will result in law suits more then likely, over just what you pointed out. For $150?? The beurocracy alone will cost us over a million. Like I said, read the revision good ole Rummy and Uncle Dick got done.
Having been to europe a few times, it was always comforting to know, that whatever happened inside these nations, I new America wouldn’t leave me behind. Providing I wasn’t breaking anyone’s laws, which is only fair. Looks like now, Americans should think about a rescue account, before going overseas. Then we’ll have to wait for our government to sub- out the work, because we sold that infrastucture long ago. You are seeing it play out in front of your eyes. We can’t go to war, get our immediate people out of harms way in any nation on earth, without having to ask another nation’s premission. That makes me a bit nervous.
Here’s where you and I might come together for starters. It’s time to desolve dual citizenships. We are one of what, 3 nations left that allow this? I’m for going to get our citizens anywhere on this planet, stuck in shooting zones, or political pileups and of sane situations, but nobody is going to get the chance to play citizen roulett out of convienunce. Ties right in to immagration too. We pay, you are U.S. citizen only.

Dear Marc:

Those people who ge stranded in the cascades without an emergency locater, or those whose water craft runs out of gas above the Willamette Falls are under different rules then Americans stranded in foriegn countries against the advice of the State Department. In the first instance, the person that needs rescuing can be charged 100% of the rescue costs. In 1985 when I was working for a helicopter company, the operating cost of a larger helicopter was around 1,500 dollars an hour, so the charges can get high in a hurry.

The current rules for rescue of the people in Lebanon allow only a charge of 150 dollars, and that is only for people who entered the country after the travel alerts were issued. People who were in Lebanon prior to the alerts were evacuated for free. I honestly don’t see what anyone could be upset about, unless you think that those who entered Lebanon after the alerts were issued should pay the whole 20,000 dollars their rescue cost the American taxpayers.

Lee

Hi Marge,

Wait till Putin over there in Russia, who’s bringing that country back to czar rule, nationalizes their oil and gas fields.

Medicare pays for Viagra because the [B]”Good Ole Boys” run Washington,DC[/B]

They don’t give a rat’s ass about women or the meds they need. Point in reference, their so called [B]”Drive By Mastectomies”[/B] they send a woman home after 1 day and sometimes the same day, not caring about the complications that arise from having a mastectomy.

They don’t care that people need certain meds to survive or just to make life bearable for some.

Nothing surprises me anymore. Maybe it’s because we have such a high rate of the old guard politicians on Viagra?

[QUOTE=marguerite]Someone in Washington D.C. has a sense of humor. Medicare Part D pays for Viagra but will not pay for Ativan (a commonly used med for panic attacks). Priortize, people!

Regards,
Marge[/QUOTE]

Like my high school history teacher always said, everything the government does, it will eventually screw up, no matter how well-intentioned it is in trying.

Hi M,

C’mon M, the government is about to set a new historical record. Only in session for 99 days. An all time low. Thank goodness there are no pressing issues to handle. They have contributors to get to first, and more vacation time is needed. Taking a que from the Whitehouse.
Hey California. Think it’s hot now? Wait till after the election. Rumsfeld is going to stick it to the economy by shutting down tooling and spare parts production at a certain defence contractor’s plants. Only cost the economy $8billion and 25,000 jobs. Our military doesn’t need spare parts for C-130’s and such. If we do, just crank up a new program at quadruple the cost to re-tool and get production up and running again. The military budget is being balanced on the veteran’s healthcare back, so why shouldn’t it be on the backs of medicare/medicade reciepients too? Sounds like the R’s have a plan. We are going from a service economy to a servent economy.

Racer13,

I don’t mean to sound harsh, but are you ever happy about [I]anything?[/I] I’m no fan of Bush, but I do realize that not every bad thing that happens in the world is his fault, or his administration’s. Given half a chance, you’d probably try to blame him for the Asian tsunami, 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, wildfires, earthquakes, the sun rising, the sun setting, everything.

We understand you don’t like Bush. I don’t care for many of his policies, either. But do honestly think John Kerry would be doing any better?Let’s see, higher taxes (killing the economy), appeasement of foreign enemies (think Neville Chamberlain. How’d that work out?), appointment of wacko ACLU types to judgeships, etc. Yeah, Bush may stink. But we’re definitely stuck with the lesser of two evils.

And I am continually amused at people who say Bush is a complete moron, he’s incompetent, DUMB, etc. Then when he wins an election, or there is a positive swing in public opinion (Saddam’s capture, etc.) then Bush is suddenly “an evil genius! It’s all an act! He really just pretends to be dumb It’s all a conspiracy!”

Not everything that happens in our world is Bush’s fault, or a conspiracy. Just remember, it could be worse. We could have Jimmy Carter back in office.

I’ll take “incompetence and corruption” over incompetence, corruption, and socialism anyday.

Hi,

It’s not about happy, it’s about truth. Many don’t like to face it, and prefer slander as an easy way out. Nice try. So, what you are saying is, your evil isn’t as bad as the other guy’s evil. Talk about lowering the bar. We will never know, will we, if that other evil would have done worse. Even evil doesn’t want to give another evil a chance. Keep up the motto “Never judge a book by its content”.

What a joke this government is and I mean both parties.

Medicaid being cut, hmmmmmmmmmm, let’s see, of all the years I have worked for Drs, the Medicaid payments are way to low. On a $65-75 office visit the Dr gets $10.00. If you have any surgery, Medicaid pays way below the minimum fee. Example, if you deliver a baby by C-Section, the average price for 9 months of care and the surgery is about $1,500- $1,700 being paid by other insurance companies. With Medicaid the Dr gets $10 an office visit for Pre-Natal care for the 9 months and the C-Section he gets $575.00. Now what Dr would want to take on Medicaid patients for that amount of money for 9 months worth of service? I know I wouldn’t. So pray tell how much more will the government cut payments for the poor. Assholes all of Washington.

[COLOR=red]Medicare is all I have, I can’t get SC Medicaid. My Doctor was telling me that he may have to drop me if Medicare payments get much lower. I can’t afford to pick up what they don’t pay now, scary, huh?!?![/COLOR]

Medicare, Medicaid Cuts,
Has anyone noticed in the budget proposed by the administration that the cuts are almost the same amount as the increase in foreign aid. This is taken from a summary in the AARP magazine. Makes you wonder just who that bunch in Washington cares more about.
I guess when you get old or ill you are supposed to die so we can have money for governments that spent most of their waking hours trying to destroy us.
Senator Ted Kennedy(who I am not really a fan of) said the only ones in the United States with guranteed health care are members of congress. Boy did he ever get that one right.

Lea(Larry)

[COLOR=red]maybe I should run for Congress!?!?[/COLOR]
[COLOR=#ff0000][/COLOR]
😮

The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Sad but so true Larry.

If this government would stop sending aid to other countries, there would be plenty of money for programs like Medicare and Medicaid. How much more can the people of this country absorb by sending our hard earned dollars to other countries? We get crap and they get our money. Gee, what’s wrong with this picture? 😡

I only see this problem getting worse as the years go by. 😡

Hi M,

What’s American left to buy? My VW in 84 was built in Pennsilvania, my Hondas in the 90’s were built in Kentucky, and the only time I heard buy American from some redneck, he/she was driving a Ford P/U built in Canada.
Four things to know about our state of economy:
1) Historically speaking, the rich have never been richer then they are today.
2) Historically speaking, Gross profit margins across the board, have never been higher.
3) Historically speaking, tax rates on biz have never been this low.
4) There is a class war, and the rich are winning.

I guess that just isn’t enough. Keep raping the taxpayers for more and more. Those are 4 points made by Warren Buffet, the 2nd richest man in the world, by the way. When asked how his fellow billionairs react to hearing this, he smiles and chuckles and says they don’t like it, but it’s the truth.

Good for Warren… I agree…

[COLOR=red]marguerite[/COLOR]
[COLOR=red][/COLOR]
[COLOR=red]I feel bad but Walmart is all I can afford :confused:[/COLOR]

[QUOTE=marguerite]Salaries for rank and file members of the House of Representatives and Senate are $165,200 per annum with generous medical benefits.

Regards,
Marge[/QUOTE]
At the beginning of 2006
The beginning Rank in the military was paid:
about $7.95 an hour base pay plus housing, clothing and food allowances and a medical program.

At the beginning of 1999
The beginning Rank in the military was paid:
about $5.55 an hour base pay plus housing, clothing and food allowances and a medical program.

Should we not provide better pay and coverage for every US citizen.

I thought this was a good item for this thread. If we don’t do something with this bunch of crooks we are going down the tube.
Lea

SEND THIS TO EVERY ONE YOU KNOW

SOCIAL SECURITY…PLEASE READ
WHY WAIT UNTIL 2008? THERE IS AN ELECTION IN 2006. I HEREWITH FIRMLY STATE THAT I WILL NOT VOTE FOR ANY POLITICIAN, REGARDLESS OF THE OTHER ISSUES, IF HE DOES NOT SPONSOR AND SUPPORT THIS LEGISLATION. THAT INCLUDES EVERYONE STANDING FOR ELECTION IN 2006.

LET US SHOW OUR LEADERS IN WASHINGTON “PEOPLE POWER” AND THE POWER OF THE INTERNET. LET ME KNOW IF YOU ARE WITH ME ON THIS BY REPLYING AND FORWARDING TO EVERYONE IN YOUR ADDRESS BOOK.

IT DOESN’T MATTER IF YOU ARE REPUBLICAN OR DEMOCRAT!

KEEP IT GOING!!!!

2008 Election Issue !!

GET A BILL STARTED TO PLACE ALL POLITICIANS ON SOC. SEC.

This must be an issue in “2008” Please! Keep it going.

———————————-

SOCIAL SECURITY:

(This is worth reading. It is short and to the point.)

Perhaps we are asking the wrong questions during election years.
Our Senators and Congresswomen do not pay into Social Security and, of course, they do not collect from it.

You see, Social Security benefits were not suitable for persons of their rare elevation in society .They felt they should have a special plan for themselves. So, many years ago they voted in their own benefit plan.

In more recent years, no congressperson has felt the need to change it. After all, it is a great plan.

For all practical purposes their plan works like this:

When they retire, they continue to draw the same pay until they die.

Except it may increase from time to time for cost of living adjustments..

For example, Senator Byrd and Congressman White and their wives may expect to draw $7,800,000.00 (that’s Seven Million, Eight-Hundred Thousand Dollars), with their wives drawing $275, 000.00 during the last years of their lives.

This is calculated on an average life span for each of those two Dignitaries.

Younger Dignitaries who retire at an early age, will receive much more during the rest of their lives.

Their cost for this excellent plan is $0.00 . NADA….ZILCH….

This little perk they voted for themselves is free to them. You and I pick up the tab for this plan The funds for this fine retirement plan come directly from the General Funds;

OUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK

From our own Social Security Plan, which you and I pay (or have paid) into, every payday until we retire (which amount is matched by our employer)- we can expect to get an average of $1,000 per month after retirement.

Or, in other words, we would have to collect our average of $1,000 monthly benefits for 68 years and one (1) month to equal Senator! Bill Bradley’s benefits!

Social Security could be very good if only one small change were made.

That change would be to:

Jerk the Golden Fleece Retirement Plan from under the Senators and Congressmen. Put them into the Social Security plan with the rest of us

then sit back…..

and see how fast they would fix it.

If enough people receive this, maybe a seed of awareness will be planted and maybe good changes will evolve.

How many people CAN you send this to?

Hi,

Well, that’s one way. The SS system isn’t broke. It’s just not funded properly. Raise the contribution cieling from $90k to $500k, and it’s funded for the next 50 years. Raise it to $1million, and it’s funded for erternity. I just quoted my economic guru Warren Buffet. He also went on to say that if this was done, I gaureentee not one person making $200k a year on up, would even feel it. Yes, it’s that simple.

Hi,

It just never ends with this guy. Appease leaders while pissing off the people of the world, where hearts need to be won, not bought.
President Bush launched an initiative this month to combat international kleptocracy, the sort of high-level corruption by foriegn officials that he called “a grave and corrosive abuse of power that threatens our national intrests and violates our values.” The plan he said, would be “a critical component of our freedom agenda.”
Ok, that’s a good plan and makes sence. Should have been done a long time ago, but it’s never too late. Let’s see how our leader shows the world just how serious he is, and that commitment to freedom and democracy.
Three weeks later, the White House is making arrangements to host the leader of Kazakhstan, an autocrat who runs a nation anything but free and has been accused by U.S. PROSECUTORS of pockiting the bulk of $78million in bribes from an AMERICAN buisnessman.
Not only will President Nazarbayev visit the White House, but will also travel to the Bush family compound in Maine. This guy has banned oppisition parties, intimidated the press and profited from his post, according to the U.S. GOVERNMENT. But hey, he sits atop massive oil reserves that have helped open doors in Washington DC. Also the same guy who when another ‘stan’ country kicked out our military base, raised the rent to us from $2million per year, to $200million per year, to keep our base there. Something about enviromental clean up over the mess we are making flying jets in and out. Perfectly understandable to Bush supporters no doubt. Just confuses me a bit.
Nothing new though. In April, the prez welcomed to the Oval Office the prez of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, who has been accused of rigging elections. Sec. Rice hosted Nguema, the prez of Equatorial Guinea, who has been found to have millions of dollars in overseas accounts. Before that, Bush gave public speeches saying how great democracy is spreading in places like Egyup, where, without a doubt, their prez election was rigged even more then the one 6 years earlier there. Praised Lebonon and we all know how that’s going. You can take this back all the way to Chalibi, a fugitive from justice in Jordon on bank fraud, who was Bush’s pick to run Iraq in the beginning. Just to name a few examples.
But the Kazakh leader has recieved an especially warm treatment, beings that our government that will host him next month, plans to go to trial in January to prove he was paid off by an American biz man and that guy faces prison, yet no charges have been made aginst the guy who took the bribes. Interesting, isn’t it?
VP Cheney in May, was over in this crooks country, praising him as a friend. A day later, Cheney blasted Russia for retreating on democracy. Agin, interesting who gets let off the hook and who doesn’t.
Put this all together with other facts such as, every single Al Quieda top tier leader, captured or killed by us over the years, were all found and delt with in Pakistan. Every single Arab nation has stabbed us in the back, and held us up for more ransom money to host our military bases, and are laughing all the way to the bank. Anyone see all the new contruction going on all over there? Even building brand new cities. Every single Arab port over there, gets 100% inspection of incoming cargo by them, while they could care less what leaves their nations. Bush has advocated that cargo inspections have to be done over there, not here, to protect Americans from another attack using container shipping. Sounds like a solid plan so far. The border patrol gaurding the south, have found many times, eveidene that Arab people are melding into Mexican society, learning the language, then coming over our borders illegally. No hurry there to stop that though. There are elections and votes to get first.
Now, this is what people need to get their brains around. This isn’t about what American’s think. It’s what the people in all those countries think. What signals they pick up, and what the real picture means to them, not us. After all, this is where the terrorists recruit, arm, and get people to kill us. With such a strong and best friend coalition that Bush built over the years, praising every leader, the people in these nations can surely understand that democracy takes time, while they die of coarse, not us, and they will be better off in say 100 years or so. Hang in there world. Can you feel the love? What did George Washington and Adams say about spreading democracy? Leed by example, don’t export democracy, in short. What did they know anyway?

Hi there,

I just saw an interview with the prez down at the hurricane damaged zones, and when asked about his part in the initial responce to that disasster, he responded “A presidency shouldn’t be judged on a moment’s notice.” Now, is he refering to the moment’s notice he got when that secret service agent wispered in his ear, our country is under attack, where he frooze like a deer in the headlights of a semi-truck, and it didn’t even lift him out of the chair, then he sat there for 20 minutes finishing My Pet Goat before being taken outside for a 20 minute photo op, then getting on AF1? Or the moments notice he got 18 months before about how vulnurable N.O. would be if a hurricane struck that area? From his own agencies report too. Or the moment’s notice 3 days before it hit? The moment’s notice 2 to 3 days after it hit? I guess he’s right. A president can’t move government on a moment’s notice. Unless you want to invade a non-threatening country. I’m sorry. How dare I use that last sentence that came from our top generals as they recieved their orders two days after 9/11 to take an offencive stance on Iraq. Which was a first in American military history.

Hi there,

Just thought I’d help some. Now, the present administration wants everyone to learn and cement into their brains two new words. Islamic Fashism. This way, and why the new term, older generations can hear a word that they have come to hate for obvious reasons over their life, and vote for R’s. Also, using this term, the administration can deflect brains away from individual issues, like what’s going on in Iraq an Afganistan. At least until the election is over.
Some have heard Rummy now, out making American citizens that dissent, ask tough questions, or remotly think about questioning their actions, and is comparing this to being Nazi sympathizers. Appeasers. Fashists too. Dissent and loyalty are two very different words and differing meanings. Over the years of brainwashing by them, those two are now connected. So, in order to make it easy on the R’s, I thought I’d provide two examples of people they are referring to. This way, a clearer picture might emerge and won’t be so hard for some to identfy the who.
1) “I now regret that I did not more openly challenge those who were determined to invade a country whose actions were peripheral to the real threat-al Qaeda.” Retired Marine Lt. Gen. Greg S. Newbold, director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, October 2000 to October 2002, signed column, Time magizine, April 17 issue, published April 9 of this year.
2) ” In the 5 years Mr. Rumsfeld has presided over the Pentagon, I have seen a climate of groupthink become dominant and a growing reluctance by experianced military men and civilains to challenge the notions of senior leadership.” – Retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul D. Eaton, the U.S. general in charge of training new Iraqi military members after the fall of Baghdad, NY Times op-ed, March 19 of this year.
I hope this helps to identfy the liers, nazi sympathizers, fashists, the disloyal, traitors and so on, so you have a clear picture of what one might look like. I’m sure putting a military officers lifetime of work, their rank, and all future retirement benifits on the block if they did speak out at the time, had little to do with it. Or, civilians looseing their defence contract either, or job at the Pentagon.
Read Tommy Franks book, where he said when the time for a vote came, by the 12 Generals sitting at the table in front of him, weather to invade Iraq or not, 9 Generals voted no. The no’s said we aren’t ready equipment wise, and troop level wise to pull it off. At that time. Franks went on to say he regreted going aginst his generals, and like a good solidier, he went with what his boss wanted(Rummy) instead. The yes votes are who are in place running things now. Like the Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff.
Since day one, military personel have been bailing out, or were forced out, that didn’t think like this administration wanted them to, or were told to do. The brainwashing line from Rummy since day one has been, “they were slated for retirement, no big deal.” Just so everybody knows, any tenured military person, from cornel on up, (pardon my Sp.) when taking any assignment, is slated for retirerment after 18 months on said assignment. Nothing says anywhere that they have to retire from the military after that assignment is completed, or the time comes up. Franks himself, was offered another 18 months as the top fighting general, but he refused. Rummy then offered him the Army Joint Chief posistion, and he refused that too. He got out while the getting was good. He knew what was in store, and because he was a part of it, his legacy would have been tarnished even furthur. A lot of fine generals were lost, and lower ranking ones too, that this country desperatly needed, but just couldn’t speak their mind anymore in fear of loosing everything this country owes them, and rightfully so. How have things been going since the ‘yes men’ have been in place? Now doing everything just like Rummy wants it? Without a peep of objection. In no way, is there any fault that should be placed on our military, because they have done, and continue to, win every battle they enter, just as they did in Nam. Rummy is running every aspect of this war for them, and that’s where the correction needs to be made. He has taken the finest fighting force in the world, let American biz bankrupt our military threw war profitering, and now they are all living, working with, training for war, in below poverty conditions. So, as the new administration’s PR campaign starts today, just keep that in mind.

You know, I’m glad you weren’t around in December 1941, because you’d have an aneurysim seeing The Liberal God…um, I mean, FDR, round up second and third generation Americans of Japanese descent and locking them away in detainment camps for years. The Lefties in America just don’t seem to get it at all. We ARE AT WAR, and we were at war [B]long before [/B]our first soldier stepped into Iraq. I would bet that if YOUR family was tragically slaughtered on a hijacked airliner or vaporized by a car bomb on a downtown LA street, you would be the first one howling that we aren’t doing enough about terrorism, demanding Bush to “Do something!”. Have there been mistakes in the war on terrorism? Absolutely. Will there be more? Of course. Have the events unfolded like we planned? Do they EVER in war? What do you think we should do? The typical liberal strategy of declaring victory and running? Interestingly enough, notice how it’s always the [I]RETIRED[/I] Gen. So and So that spouts off. Retired generals and colonels are a dime a dozen, and will always be ready for the camera. Why don’t you ask the soldiers who on the ground there in Iraq and Afghanistan how things are going, instead of basing your opinions on Communist New Network and National Pinko Radio. a large percentage of the soldiers over there are on their 2nd and 3rd tours, and they VOLUNTEERED to go back because they believe the progress they have made is worth it. When you rant and rave about the war on terrorsim, you’re not hurting ME, you’re discouraging THEM, and showing your own ignorance of the situation. And since you’re so convinced going into Iraq was a mistake:

“In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members … It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons. “~ [B]Sen. Hillary Rodham [/B]Clinton (D, NY) (10 October 2002)

“Iraq’s search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power.” ~[B] Al Gore[/B], (September 2002)

And finally one more for you: “The leaders of the modern Democratic Party have made excuses for evil for so long that they cannot recognize evil anymore. The closest thing to it in their vocabulary would be “someone who wears fur.” And of course, they recognize evil in the person of “George W. Bush,” whom they see as the very essence of evil. In fact, Bush may be the only force of evil in the world liberals haven’t wanted to appease.”

Ouch. Painful but so true. It’s also funny that when I see a person blindly ranting on any forum about Bush, the economy, or the war on terrorism, I can usually tell before looking that he lives one of 3 places: the “Left Coast” (California, Ore., Wash.), the urban northeast (NY, NJ, Boston, etc.), or the urban Rust Belt (Chicago, Detroit). You folks should try getting out into the other 80% of the country, where the economy is booming, unemployment is nonexistent, taxes are low, gas is affordable, and life is pretty good. I guess if I lived in the People’s Republic of California, I’d walk around angry, too.

By the way, it’s FASCISTS, not fashists. For better communication, try better spelling and shorter posts.

Well gee, isn’t that great that the economy is booming,low taxes, low prices on gas, unemployment non-existant in 80% of the country. Wow well slap me in the head for living on the east coast.

The whole country should have low taxes, booming economy, low gas prices, non-existant umemployment. Shouldn’t we?

Maybe you should ask the parents, wifes and children of the dead American soldiers if the war is wrong or right. I happen to knew a few who lost their loved ones in Iraq and they are not very happy with the war or the damn Prez. I don’t believe that many soldiers volunteered to go back to Iraq for 2nd and 3rd tours of duty. Most are there because they have no choice in the matter.

It wasn’t right what was done to American Japanese in 1941, but aren’t we suppose to learn from past history mistakes? I think so.

I am not a Leftist either. Why do you feel the need to make personal attacks on members here for posting what they think is right? No one is attacking you on a personal level.

[QUOTE=Brandy]Well gee, isn’t that great that the economy is booming,low taxes, low prices on gas, unemployment non-existant in 80% of the country. Wow well slap me in the head for living on the east coast.[I][B]I don’t mean to sound rude, but if things are that bad there, move.[/B][/I]

The whole country should have low taxes, booming economy, low gas prices, non-existant umemployment. But we don’t. [I][B]If you keep electing big-government tax & spend political leaders, what do you expect?[/[/B]I]

Maybe you should ask the parents, wifes and children of the dead American soldiers if the war is wrong or right. [I][B]I have, andthe families, while being being badly hurt and grieving, could not be prouder of their sons and the mission[/B].[/I]I happen to knew a few who lost their loved ones in Iraq and they are not very happy with the war or the damn Prez. I don’t believe that many soldiers volunteered to go back to Iraq for 2nd and 3rd tours of duty. Most are there because they have no choice in the matter.[I][B]A good friend from my church has a son who returned from basic training 2 weeks ago. The kid is barely 17, he is going to finish his senior year of HS, and will probably go active with the National Guard next summer. I asked him why he joined, and he said that, “Well, somebody’s gotta go. Why not me?”[/[/B]I]

It wasn’t right what was done to American Japanese in 1941, but aren’t we suppose to learn from past history mistakes? I think so.[I][B]I agree. But I think winning a war for survival is more important than infringing slightly on someone’s “civil liberties”, so I fully support profiling of Muslim men at airports. But a bigger lesson to learn from history’s mistakes is Vietnam. The North Vietnamese generals have openly admitted that the only reason they won the war was because of the American anti-war movement, because they were being whipped badly and repeatedly on the ground. So regardless of what we think of Iraq or Afghanistan, will the anti-war crowd just SHUT UP FOR ONCE until this thing is finished? It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. “We can’t win in Iraq, blah blah, blah”, but the truth is, the left doesn’t WANT us to win in Iraq, because they hate Bush more than they the hate homocidal nuts who are out to kill them.[/B] [/I]

I am not a Leftist either.[I][B]Good. But don’t get all your information from the NYT and CNN.[/B][/I][/QUOTE]

I think that’s enough for today.All I’m saying is, don’t let blind hatred of Bush or ANY politician skew your perspective on the issues. Sad to say, for some here, it does.

Hi,

Don’t worry Brandy. He’s just repeting what Shaun Hanitty says over and over on the Fox Opinion Network. Nothing new, and always cutting and running from the truth. He surrendered his brain long ago, and joined the android club. He’s right though. We should rejoice, a new flower shop opened in Baghdad. After all, $3.00 a gallon for gas, has never been more affordable for us Americans. Amazing how a country strife with war and destruction, only pays 5cents a gallon for gas in Iraq, before the government put a 45cent tax on it recently, and Saudi Arabia only pays 79cents a gallon. I know, they don’t have that far to deliver it.

[QUOTE=racer13]Hi,

Don’t worry Brandy. He’s just repeting what Shaun Hanitty says over and over on the Fox Opinion Network. [I][B]I don’t have cable. But I do read some decent newspapers and lots of good history books[/B].[/I]Nothing new, and always cutting and running from the truth. He surrendered his brain long ago, and joined the android club. He’s right though. We should rejoice, a new flower shop opened in Baghdad. After all, $3.00 a gallon for gas, has never been more affordable for us Americans.[I[B]]I paid 2.51 this morning[/B].[/I] Amazing how a country strife with war and destruction, only pays 5cents a gallon for gas in Iraq, before the government put a 45cent tax on it recently, and Saudi Arabia only pays 79cents a gallon. I know, they don’t have that far to deliver it.[/QUOTE]

Actually, I catch about 10 minutes of Hannity a couple of times a year, at my parent’s house. I bet you listen to Air America…oh wait, are they even on the air anymore? Probably not, because anyone that can think for themselves doesn’t buy the stuff their selling. Ask yourself carefully: Why is talk radio dominated by conservatives? Because it makes sense to the average thinking American.

Big spending politicians are in every state my friend, but especially in Washington, DC.

Also I don’t get all my news from the New York Times or CNN. I don’t even read the New York Times.

I listen to news and I take what they say at about 20%. Fox News doesn’t interest me either. They usually sugar coat certain things. They have a way of trying to get people to believe what they say verbatem. Most Americans believe whatever is said on the news or talk radio, well I do feel sorry for them,that they can’t form their own opinions. How sad.

Don’t talk to me about the Vietnam War either, I was pro-war back then and my husband was a Marine who fought there, but when the Prez said we were going to Iraq, my husband said [B]”Big Mistake”[/B], this is going to cost our country dearly with to many young people dying. I also lost many friends in Vietnam and still thought we were doing the right thing. Not so with this war in Iraq.

I will never be pro-war ever again after seeing how it destroyed so many lives.

In case you are interested, my whole family is military and they said this war is wrong too.

Why should I move? My whole entire family is here on the East coast and I will never move away from them. Family means to much to me. But I still say the economy should be good in every state, not just a few.

Wow, I’m staying out of this thread except to say:

You think it’s bad where you are ?

Come on down to America’s third world city…..New Orleans.

War ? which war ?

We are so busy trying to figure out which local or state politician is the biggest idiot of the day, whether the the robbers or the National Guard is stealing our stuff or if the Army Corps of Engineers does know the difference between an ass and a hole in the ground that we forget that there’s other news.

For us, the war is right here

We appreciate everything that has been done for us and given to us but I don’t think there’s anyway this area will make it.

Deadwood seems like a nice quiet place.

[COLOR=”Purple”]I’m way out of my league here, but I saw 2 bumper stickers that Certainly made me smile when thinking about politicians………………….1) YOU! OUT OF THE GENE POOL- NOW! [/COLOR] AND 2) IF WE QUIT VOTING WILL THEY ALL GO AWAY

Hi agin,

Well, I’ll tell you why conservitives dominate radio. I’ve said this long, long ago here, guess you missed it. For the past 30 years, the conservitive right-wing has been building this tactic to what we have today. Far better orginized, better financed, better prepared and so on, without doubt. The D’s reacted too late, tried to build something in 18 months to play catchup in 2000, and have failed ever since. The big factor though, are the listeners, which are all the ‘droids out there called supporters, who at every beck and call, will flood e-mails to whomever the talk jock says to send them to, burn any book or record the person says to do and so on. Rush Limbaugh started this, who is nothing but a radio DJ turned TJ after being fired 7 times at other stations, and found a schtick that works. He will not appear anywhere to indorse a R canadate, unless they pay him a minamum of $10k plus expenses. Why he can go get his drugs on the street at 1 to 2000 at a time, and I have to see a doctor. Ratings. Anger, contraversy mean ratings. Nothing but shout shows ever since. Facts or truth mean nothing anymore. Get the daily memo from Karl Rove on what to shout out each day, then just say the smear stuff over and over and it will become fact or truth. Screen all calls into the station, and only let your side threw. Agin, job well done while the D’s were asleep at the wheel. Fox, is certainly fair and balanced in your opinion. That’s why on Insanity and Combover, Insanity gets a 1000 more on air minutes each year, over the other dolt. Why he gets bought and paid for by Fox, the music concerts and the other guy doesn’t. All the exclusives from the White House where Fox gives them all questions in advance. Murdock said in the beginning, he’s in Bush’s pockit and will be the press outlet for this administration. Never hear of the NY Post being smeared on Fox, do you? O’Rielly blasts the NY Times everyday and is trying his best to put them out of biz. Don’t know if it’s because Fox owns that paper, or Bill has a column running in it, but it’s strange how they never get a mention. I bet those fair papers you read, are owned by him too. By the way, thanks for the tip on where to get real, real cheap gas. Such a deal.
Now it’s your turn to answer one. Tell me why, when this administration took over in month one, Condi Rice relegated terrorism from the number one priority for 3 past presidents, to number 3, right after Russia and missel defence, stopped any meetings with top level cabinet members on terrorism findings, and had deputy personell clear any terrorism stuff with them first, and decide if it had merit for the bosses to see? Now remember, Condi was brought on to handle Russia, and was just a consultant at the time. We’ll save the hard questions for later.

[QUOTE=marguerite]rchudgins,

You have a unique view of the world and the U.S. Have you ever met anyone with tattooed numbers on their arms? Or their children, who were brought up by people who watched their families being marched to the gas chambers? Visit the museums dedicated to these people. The German people are still doing penance because they listened to and silently obeyed the intolerance and hatred spewed by their leaders. Then speak of facists. Our duty as American citizens is to question our leadership.

Marguerite[/QUOTE]

No, my veiw of the world is hardly unique at all. According to many polls over the years, around 30-35% of Americans consider themselves conservative or very conservative. The number of people who identify as liberal is around 10-13%. That work out to about 90 million+ who agree with me, and [I]at most[/I] 39 million who agree with Ted Kennedy.

And yes, I have met 2 people with tattoos on their arms from Nazi camps. What does that have to do with anything? The fact is, there are lots of people in this world who want to see you (and ALL Americans and Jews)either 1. Dead, or 2. Converted to Islam. Period. And in case you haven’t noticed, they are dead serious about it. You think Hitler was evil, just wait.

When you talk about hatred, you need to be directing it at them. They are the enemy here. Talk about “tolerance” with the murderers who beheaded Nick Berg, and let us know how that works out. Read about “hatred” from the president of Iran, who has openly declared that Israel (that would be Jews) should be wiped from the earth. How’s that for tolerance? Don’t forget, it was Jimmy Spineless Carter who pulled support from the Shah of Iran, and let the radicals take over there. We’re still paying for that moron’s mistakes.

And, “our duty as Americans is to question leadership.” Bull***. Our duty as Americans is to help each other, and fight common enemies who want to destroy us. There will be time for debate later. The terrorists just LOVE to hear from people like Micheal Moore and Howard Dean, because by dividing and dicouraging the American people the stooges are doing the fighting for them.

In December1941, there were lots of honest, patriotic, sincere Americans who [B]hated [/B]FDR to the core, because he was “incompetent” and they wanted the U.S. to simply stay out of the war and ignore the obvious dangers. After “FDR’s” military leaders completely dropped the ball on Pearl Harbor, in EVERY aspect (worse than Rumsfeld& Co. EVER have), the leader of the America First movement didn’t call for FDR’s impeachment, or protest to demand Marshall resign and an investigation. No, he ordered all the chapters of the organization across the country to quit criticizing FDR and the war effort, and wholeheartedly support them both. Result: we fought as a unified nation, and won the war. That is what the nation needs today.

Compare that to Vietnam, and the self-inflicted tragedy that happened because some “patriotic” people (mistakenly) felt it their duty to attack America in the middle of a war. How’d that work out again?

There’s no sense debating some of the Bush haters here. I hate some of Bush’s policies, too, but I have enough sense to keep my mouth shut about our leadership when some of my friends overseas ask me about the war on terrorism.

Dear Freinds:

I am not a conservative because I am brain dead.

I am not a conservative because I’m an android.

I wasn’t converted to conservatism by Sean Hannity.

If I say something conservative, it isn’t a Sean Hannity diatribe.

I’m not conservative because I stopped thinking a long time ago.

I’m not a conservative becuse I cut and run from the truth.

I’m not a conservative because I am close-minded.

I’m not a conservative because I am intolerant.

I’m not conservative because I’m un-informed.

I’m not conservative because I like to smear, although it is kind of ironic when I get called all of the above for simply having a different point of view.

I used to be a liberal. Hell, I would still like to be a liberal. It would be nice if there wasn’t evil in the world. It would be nice if the Great Society of the 60’s hadn’t been a abject failure. It would be nice if government wasn’t the least capable entity in our society for solving problems, with the exception of national defense.

I’m conservative because I grew up. I’m not saying liberals didn’t grow up. It’s just my developement took me to this place, and I’d appreciate it if people would stop calling me names and casting aspersions on my character for being true to who I am.

Lee

Iran Contra, sound familar. That was a Republican debacle, with Regan and Daddy Bush smack dab in the middle of it. If we support the Jews the Arabs hate us, if we support the Arabs the Jews hate us.

Why aren’t we looking for Osama Bin Laden? If we found Saddam, why can’t we find the terrorist who ordered the attacks on Sept 11?

Why does this great country of ours always thinks it knows whats best for other countries? Still trying to figure that one out.

Our duty as Americans is to question our leaders, I thought that’s what democracy was all about, freedom to do that. Should we stand idlely by while some of them destroy our own country?

Freedom does come with a price, but does it always have to be a war with many deaths? Maybe. Just wish this great nation of ours didn’t step up to the plate first. It usually has some hidden agenda behind it, whether it’s Dems or Reps.

I love my country, I love, honor and respect every person in the Armed Forces

RCHudgins, have you ever been in the military? Have you ever seen the look that the Armed Forces call “THE STARE”? It’s a deep, blank stare from all the atrocities they have seen. Alot of them never recover from it.

I think one important thing to note about Conservatives and Liberals is that By and large we both want the same thing for our country — success and peace. The problem is that usually we have (at least) two different viewpoints on how to achieve these goals. I am a conservative, that doesn’t mean I walk lock step with GWB. There are MANY things I disagree with him about:

1) Illegal Immigration or amnesty
2) Spending increases over the last 5 years — some of it has been neccessary due to the global war on terror.
3) Dubai ports deal
4) Harriet Miers — bad idea!!
5) Iraq — to an extent… I don’t think we had nearly enough troops.

I will say this; I believe that Iraq is part of the overall war on terror. There are many pieces of intel that have come out since the start of hostilities there that have proven that Saddam had connections to Al Qaeda BEFORE the war began. If nothing else, he had connections to Hezbollah and the PLO. So the claims by some on the left that the connections to terror didn’t start until after we invaded are just absolutely false.

Brandy, I agree, we do need to question our government. I don’t begrudge you that!

Jim C

Now, for something different.

With the problems in New Orleans I suggested this idea on a NOLA forum and got responses that seemed greatly divided.

We have little police protection
We have the National Guard in
Looters still roam the streets
on and on.
Judges are letting people out of jail in droves beacuse of the few beds available. If a 16 year old is arrested for murder, he’s out by 4 am because of a lack of space.

I suggested that 4 of the area housing projects that are sitting empty be turned into jail “camps”. Two 12′ electrical fences be installed around each project with a 12′ wide area between the fences patrolled by military MP’s with dogs and orders to shoot to kill.

Each inmate is given 2 changes of clothes, towels and basic sundries and a sleeping bag / bedroll.

Army mobile kitchens are brought in to feed the inmates until kitchen facilities can be built.

The inamtes will renovate the housing projects from top to bottom. Each inmate works 8 hours per day plus attends a 2 hour class on basic spelling, reading and writing.

1 building in each comples is to be gutted for kitchen and feeding facilities as well as one building in each group is to be renovated into a class room building.

Inamtes may choose between several basic construction clases that are 2 hours per day for one month.
Basic carpentry, masonary, bricklaying and electrical.

The inamtes are responisble for their housing unit and are given tools, supervision and materials to complete the work.

At the end of each 4 week period, all inmates are evaluated on progress and behavior. Any problems including not working, not passing, behavior problems are then transferred to a new project just starting up.

Those who have sucessfully advanced in the 1st four week session continue at the same project, but are offered advanced classes for the above as well as offering classes in food service, lawn maintaince & small engine repairs, blueprint reading etc.

Those not advancing will be moved to a different start up project to start the process all over again, those who advance are now also offered advanced electrical, AC & heating basics, computer basics and GED programs.

The inamtes will be the ones who install their own Air Conditioning in the bui;ldings and learn the proper maintaince and upkeep.

The whole point of the program is to get people off the streets while at the same time offering them a way out through education and learning a trade while at the same time learing the skills to co exist with others in a socially responsible manner.

At the end of 1 year, those who have passed classes and work projects may petition to work on the outside for the city for 8 hours a day helping to rebuild the city. Should there be any problems, they start the program all over again.

When I posted these ideas in a city that overrun with murder. crime, ignorance and one of the highest levels of welfare there was a direct split between responces.

60 % +/- wanted to elect me “KING” of New Orleans
40% +/- wanted to know if I was related to Hitler.

I saw it as a common sense concept to try and restore order, give a second chance of education and to help get the rebuilding moving.

Thoughts ?

Mike,

I’d appoint you King if it would help New Orleans. How can people be so blind in certain areas that need the help the most. Well that’s our government

They’ll rebuild Iraq first.

Your ideas are wonderful.

Jim,

There is also alot of Intel, that also says this administration was very wrong
in certain areas.

I have voted both Dem and Rep, but this administration is doing harm and I do believe one day, alot more INTEL will prove that to be correct.

Just my opinion, like everyone else’s opinion here.

[COLOR=”Purple”]BODY BY NAUTILUS, BRAIN BY MATTEL…………Remind you af any particular politician?[/COLOR]

Hi there,

Well, rchudgins, I was fair. Going to answer my question now?

First, I’ve refered to a man as ‘our president’, ‘Bush’, or ‘President Bush’, then went on and spoke my peace on his, or their’s, policies and methods.
Let’s see some of your words now, all through this post, and the other one. Please excuse any spelling errors or length of this thread. I apoligize to you now for having to endure such things.
To paraphrase and not out of context, they are your words, and you do own them.
1) Sending Jimmy “I never met a dictator I didn’t like” Carter to…
2) ..then came September 11th. Thanks Bill.
3) I would also support Bob Riley if it ment he would leave the state and NEVER come back. What a spineless weasal RINO he is. The guy’s a bold face lier.
4) John Kerry would have emboldened our nation’s enimies by being limp wristed, a la Jimmy Carter.
5) ” I’ll take incompetence and corruption”….
6) To a large extent, greed is good.
7) The liberal God…I mean FDR.
8) Retired (American) generals and colonels are a dime a dozen and will always be ready for the cameras.
9) (refering to American institutions) Communist News Network/National Pinko Radio
10) Leaders of the Dem. Party made excuses for evil, and they don’t recognize evil anymore. The closest thing in their vocabulary would be “someone who wears fur”.
11) I guess if I lived in the People’s Republic of California, I’d walk around angry too.
12) Will the anti-war crowd just SHUT UP FOR ONCE until this thing is over.
13) Jimmy Spineless Carter
14) and “Our duty to question leadership.” Bull****.
15) The North Vietnese generals have openly admitted the only reason they won the war was because of American anti-war movement.

Pretty much sums your position up and how you feel about Americans and coming together for anything. Our president has said in 3 to 6 major speeches now, that we are fighting the war in Iraq, because Osama bin Laden says that’s where it should be fought. Knowing you indorse that with all your heart, and that you believe and indorse communist generals too, over American generals and colonels, and American leaders, when are you going to stop supporting the enemy, let alone taking orders from them???? And, who’s the facsist? Agin, sorry for the length and spelling.

[QUOTE=racer13]Pretty much sums your position up and how you feel about Americans and coming together for anything. [B]If by “Americans” you mean the rabid anti-war Micheal Moore/Dick Durbin crowd who happen to be American citizens, no, I see no point in “coming together” with them. [/B]Our president has said in 3 to 6 major speeches now, that we are fighting the war in Iraq, because Osama bin Laden says that’s where it should be fought. [B]Would you rather it be fought in downtown Chicago or Los Angeles?[/B]Knowing you indorse that with all your heart, [B]I don’t. I wish Bush would let our military go into Pakistan in force, where UBL is probably hiding. But that would no doubt be criticized as “rash, reckless, and incompetent” by people like you. You’re going to hate him no matter what.[/B]and that you believe and indorse communist generals too, over American generals and colonels, and American leaders[B]No, but when the communist in charge of the invasion of South Vietnam says decades later that the “American” anti-war movement won the war for them, I have to examine the facts. In his [U]1985 [/U]memoir about the war, Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap wrote that if it weren’t for organizations like Kerry’s Vietnam Veterans Against the War, Hanoi would have surrendered to the U.S.[/B], when are you going to stop supporting the enemy, let alone taking orders from them???? [B] I don’t do either. That’s why I’ll probably never vote for a Democrat for President.[/B]And, who’s the facsist? [B]It’s [U]f a s c i s t[/U][/B]Agin, sorry for the length and spelling.[/QUOTE]

Don’t think for a minute that I agree with Bush on everything, by ANY means. His domestic spending is more LBJ than Reagan, and he has wilfully neglected the illegal alien issue. But when you’re in the middle of a war for survival, at least respect the leadership. I didn’t think much of Clinton, but if 9/11 had happened in say, 1997, I would still have gotten behind the troops and had the sense not to demand a premature pullout from the war zones.

Hi,

Show me anywhere, where I said any of those things you insinuate and accuse. Like leaving or never wanting to go to war. Don’t cut and run this time agin.

You believe the commies. In 1968, I visited my aunt in S.F. She was on vacation from her job. I asked her if we are winning the V.N. war. Her reply was, the war has been lost for some time now. The President has issued a memo saying just that.(LBJ) Why?? Because the S.V.N. government is so inflitrated with communists, that it can never be rescued. Quite startaling knowing I was getting my draft card. Lots of books written on that too, that aren’t commie propaganda.
The military won every battle they entered there. That war was lost politically. Just likes going to happen with this one. Might want to check out the latest status report out of the Pentagon to get a clearer picture of how things are going.
Oh, by the way, my aunt was working in the Saigon embassy, as personal secratary to the consulat general from 1962 to 1970. Saw the memo herself. I know. She’s not a commie. Not to be believed. Keep goose stepping on America. Watch out for any mushroom clouds and stay scared. So far, your only solution has been ‘everybody put on a happy smile, ot JUST SHUT UP’, then those terrorists will see and hear that, they’ll be soooo scared, and all commit suicide.” Ohh, they already are. Sorry. Also, sorry my dyslexea too makes you mad. You ought to see a thread like this before I correct most stuff with spelling. I’m trying to learn from you. Fascist. Fascist. Facsist. Facsist. Facsist. One more thing. It’s Pakistan that won’t let our military in there, not President Bush. I thought you new all the facts?? One through 15 on the above post, sums up your respect for leadership, an Americans as a whole. A true uniter, not a divider, cause you’re the decider.

Well let me tell you a true story about Vietnam. It wasn’t the war demonstrations that caused us to pull out. It was the fact that our men at certain times were not allowed to shoot the enemy, even if he was standing right in front of you.Fact. How’s that crap and that was a Dem Prez, the idiot and his generals running the war for most of the years we were there. If one of our guys happen to shoot an ox, the government made restitution for the dead ox. This is all true believe me.What the hell kind of war was that? I’ll tell you, the rich got richer from that war especially LBJ the jerk.

There are alot of things people don’t know about the Vietnam War.:mad: They blame it all on the demonstrators of the anti-war movement because a Vietnamese General says so in his memoirs and I’m the Tooth Fairy, do you think for one moment most people believe that. Please let’s get serious. Just because I say I’m the Tooth Fairy doen’t make it truth.

I could go on and on with some more stories about Vietnam.

I am waiting for any response. I could tell you horror stories of what happened in Vietnam to our great Armed Forces. I will not say how I came to know the Vets who told me their stories, just know they came from the Vets themselves.

War is a terrible thing and I find that most people who aren’t or never will be in the Armed Forces are the ones who want War. It’s not a damn game for God’s sake, it’s real and people are dying for no good reason. I still have yet to hear the reason we went to Iraq and it’s not about Saddam. I say as usual, it’s all about who’s going to make the most money out of it.

Let’s send the President’s daughters, nieces and nephews over to Iraq. You will never see that happen.

Let’s send all the damn politicians sons, daughters and nieces and nephew’s to Iraq. You will never see that happen.

Wars are always fought with the lives of the middle and lower class ranks.

Hi,

Anyone notice Britain busted several terrorist groups late last week? Funny how those didn’t make any headlines, or this administration didn’t boast about them. No primary vote needed, so no news on them I guess. These won’t be let go, or arrested, for just knowing about them and not saying anything, like the big one that got headlines. Interesting.

Did anyone watch Katie Couric interview the Prez last night?

To me it was the same old, same old, boring questions and answers.

Hi,

Bush “We got the terrorists on the run!”
NATO Commander “We need more troops in Afganistan to fight the re-surgency!”
Bush “We are winning. We got them on the run!”
Allied Commanders “We need more troops in Iraq to fight(insert any name for them)”.
Bush “We are safer today because of me! We got them on the run!”
America’s generals “We need more troops, not a shift in troops, to fight the re-surgency in Iraq!”
Bush “We got them on the run! Terrorists are declining accross the world!”
Pentagon “There are now 65 countries where Al Queada is firmly intrenched now!”
Bush “We got them on the run!”
U.S.Boarder agents “We need more troops, not secrataries. Terrorists are coming over our boarders!”
Bush “We got them on the run!”
For the very first time on vidieo from an American Muslum citizen “I ask all American Muslum citizens to stand up and rallie your support to defeat these invaders!”
Bush “We got them on the run!”
Question George. Where the heck are they running too????
Answer. Right after getting training in Iraq, everywhere but there.

Hi,

Here’s what people don’t understand with the stuff I express here. On one subject, the military. I’ve said from day one, the military has done it’s job, even above and beyound the call of duty, in every war or circumstance they have been asked by any commander in chief to go into. They, by constitution, are the tool our country uses. No more, no less. They don’t start wars or end wars, politicians do. Period. They have won every battle they entered into in Viet Nam, and in Afganistan and Iraq up to today, as examples. Nine times, I went to our Army base here during the hieight of VN, to stand and cheer out battions parade by before going. Where were you, when plenty of seats were open? Over a dozen times at our gateway airport, meeting troops returning home, while they had a layover to home. Where was everybody then? At Fort Lewis, the stands held 3000 people, but only 250 of us were there, each time I went. Where were all of you at airports, greeting and applauding troops? I’ll tell you where. Sitting on your hands, keeping silent, for the sole reason, IT WASN’T SOCIALLY EXCEPTABLE AND POPULAR. Now it is, and you can’t get enough of it. Safe and easy. Just like everyone likes it. Look at ME! See everybody, I love our military, just to keep friends, and hide behind those real reasons.
My rub is with poiliticians, and the main reasons will follow, because everybody is being brainwashed, and don’t care that it’s going to be a long fight. Well, I do care. Let’s see a bit down the road, where our military will still be needed, and how we are preparing for that.
Rumsfeld has cut every future military weapons, fighter jets, everything programs, to pay for today.
Our OWN American companies war profited, and are bankrupting them.
Since this war has started, there have been 30,000 plus troops removed from the war theaters, that AREN’T counted, or on any list. Just in limbo inside the pentagon.
Our troops are being trained today, with less and less time to do it in properly, with less equipment and living conditions, and our own generals are saying, we are now working in poverty conditions at every single military base in America. Just get a body over there. Who cares?
The divorse rate, among OFFICERS accross the board, the leaders of men, since the first entry into Afganistan, is at 70% plus and climbing.
The DOD won’t release the figures for those that only have stripes on their sleeves. Wonder why?
Rumsfeld has ordered that reporting of deaths in Afgan and Iraq, will NOT include deaths incured by mortar fire, car bomb deaths and a few other small things, because they just don’t count enough. Why they are now out boasting how deaths have decreased over the last 6 months. See? We are winning. Witheld deaths from the public in June and July. Why?
Lt. Col. Barry Johnson said Friday, the U.S. is including in it’s tabulations of secratarian violence only individuals killed in drive-by shootings or by torture or exacution. Makes for a better headline I guess. Not included as an example, are people who died in a highly coordinated bombing that leveled an apartment building in Baghdad. Go count the bodies in morgues accross Iraq, and numbers all of a sudden don’t match up with administration speeches. But hey, who cares about that, right? Well, I do.
Let’s see how treatment is going for returning troops now, and their future well being.
Rumsfeld has been trying hard, to boost out of pockit expences paid by veternans, by 30 plus precent, on their Tri-care plan.
The DOD is now trying to get legeslation going, to reduce the high intrest rates our soldiers are paying, on American biz to help our troops. The PAY DAY LOAN industry. So many troops, are having to borrow money to pay bills here at home, before they get paid for their service to America. What’s wrong with this picture? Let’s keep our fighting military focused on fighting, while their wives or husbands stress out trying to pay rent, and keep from loosing everything, while their loved ones are fighting for us. I’m sure those phone calls to them every week over there, help them stay focused, and mentally make them feel safer and on high alert trying to stay alive.
Rumsfeld is dileberatly shafting the National Gaurd, and the entire RESERVE units. How? By making sure each and every one of them, has at least one day left in their contract, to fill their requirement of service to our country. Why? Because that contract says, if not tottally fullfilled, you only get half benifits after retireing, if that. Tell that to our young men after doing forced volunteering with 3 tours of duty, then coming home to find out the regular military boys and girls get all of theirs. You wonder why recruiting is at an all time low. The military retired commrads are telling them that, because our military recruiters keep seemingly forgeting to include that part when signing on the dotted line.
How can our military leaders, leading young men into battle, do it at maximum effeciancy, when all this domestic turmoil is going on in their personal lives in America? Tell me. Please. How is a LONG war going to be fought a year from now under these poverty conditions in the military AND at their homes? How much concentration will be lost when a soldier needs to save his or hers life? Please tell me.
These points are just a few examples of what I’ve been speaking up for from day one writing congress and anybody who will not reject an e-mail.
While everybody else sits on their hands, stays silent, and continue the self agandizing of themselves.
Might explain why Bush wants to all of a sudden start talks with nations instead of taking Texas to war somewhere else too. He knows he can’t now. Makes me feel safer alright.
Iran, on a moments notice, with their Navy, can shut down the world’s shipping lanes over their, cutting off all oil to the world. Sure we can defeat that. Without doubt. But our Navy commanders are saying today, if that should occure, it would take us a minimum of TWO weeks to get those lanes opened agin. Think of the economic cost to the world, let alone us, that would occur. Wonder why Michealmooreajad is telling us to shove it at every turn?? Iran has a 7 million strong civialian force, that is ready to act as a human shield unarmed, that will walk and die straight towards our ground troops if needed. Iran’s prez said just that in an open speech 2 years ago. Don’t believe that? I’ll go along with the number, but this is exactly how Iran defeated Saddam in Iraq, for god’s sake. You believe Saddam would use WMD’s and any means to defeat anybody or anyone, but you don’t believe them? Wake up folks. Our future military will not be able to handle that if things presist the way Rumsfeld is selling them out today. Russia is just waiting, along with everybody else. Sure America, you need to keep fighting and get those terrorists. You bet there are WMD’s in Iraq. Knowing how they went bankrupt fighting in Afganistan for 11 years. I sure trust Putin alright. Bush looked into his eyes and convinced me he has our intrests at heart. The Bush families’ best friend, the nation of Saudia Arabia, just allowed the Islamic religious police to ban CATS and DOGS. Why? Because they are a western influence. Period. I’m feeling safer by the day, knowing that our military is being sold out, our allies are now working more, and harder aginst us, while we pay them to do it to us, taking money out of soldiers pockits to get headlines and votes. I said in the beginning, that if I was making decisions, Afganistan today would still be smouldering, I’d have UBL’s head on a silver platter to show the world right after sending 800 to a 1000 Army rangers up that hill to Tora-Borra, to get him. Which was what that 32 year veteran in the CIA, who Bush picked to be first in, because he knew that joint the best from our CIA 13 year involvement in Afganistan while Russia was fighting in there, who pleaded and pleaded with the administration to get them now, was refused, and Rumsfeld made the decision to sub-out the work to a foriegn nation, war lords on horseback, to do it instead. He told that CIA guy, to stand and hold his position, and the rest is history.
I’ll continue alone, to speak out and be un-popular, just as I did with the VN war, and speak for the soldiers who have no voice, or avenue to express it, who aren’t on any list, who are forgotten, swept under the rug, before, during, and after, in huge numbers, and fight for their future and America’s future safty. While the rest of you sit on your hands, remain silent about all that, ignore the truth, so you can pat yourselves on the back today, and say how much you just love the military fighting people in America. Just because it’s socially popular.
I knew, and have known, this will be a long fight. Just don’t whine and cry when your taxes are raised, to pay for the DOD bills coming due between 2010 and 2015, that Rummy is putting on your kid’s shoulders today, then whine and cry that the military got broke somehow, putting our saftey at risk, like it’s some kind of surprise, and thank god there will be a D in power to take the blame for all that. I hope your heart feels real good just having someone to blame. I want our future military, along with today’s, to be prepared at all times, fully trained and equiped with the best America has to offer. We owe that to them, don’t we?? Are votes and soundbites worth all that? To you, they are. As long as somebody else, other then you, are the ones dieing. Your silence says it all. Good night and good luck.

Hi,

Didn’t think you could bury this thread that easily did you?:)

Our President, showing the world an example of democracy and freedom, just keeps on giving.
In one of those bills he sent congress these last 2 weeks, you know the ones, the sign it, or you’re a traitor and siding with terrorists bill, until election night at least, he did the following:
In one paragraph, ‘Every single person serving this present administration from the top on down(all 8 years worth), shall be exempt from being charged or prosacuted, for any war-crimes that may have resulted, perpatraited or are related to this administration’.
Well, well. That’s big of him. Why not all administrations? Why would changing the law, by installing a new law, now have to be done? Why does this law look an awfully like a presidencial pardon in disquise? What could possably anybody be afraid of? After all, he’s told us he’s in line with the constitution.
Hail to the king! King George 1st

PS. If we are at war, WW3 and all, why does our President have to keep reminding us of that? The military coming back in body bags should be enough for us as a reminder. Why? Because we aren’t. He has a domestic war here to fight and win first.

Hi,

Just needed a press confrence to confirm it. Karl’s word of the month is “adapt”. When our President was asked the other day about torture, and methods, like water-boarding, he said he can’t divulge these things because if he did, the enemy will adapt. He-he-he(with shoulders bouncing up and down)
I can understand that. Just need an answer that I can’t figure out yet, or how its’ done. Maybe you all can help.
What does one do or change, mentally and/or phisically, when “adapting” to water-boarding??? Learn to hold your breath longer?? Naw. That never works. Hmmmm. I need help on this one.:)

Dear Marc:

I am suprised you haven’t heard of the genetically altered waterboard proof terrorist yet. You are usually so well informed about these things, I wonder how you missed that one. When they perfect the explosive proof terrorist, then we are all in for big trouble.

Lee

[QUOTE=racer13]Hi,

Didn’t think you could bury this thread that easily did you?:)

Our President, showing the world an example of democracy and freedom, just keeps on giving.
In one of those bills he sent congress these last 2 weeks, you know the ones, the sign it, or you’re a traitor and siding with terrorists bill, until election night at least, he did the following:
In one paragraph, ‘Every single person serving this present administration from the top on down(all 8 years worth), shall be exempt from being charged or prosacuted, for any war-crimes that may have resulted, perpatraited or are related to this administration’.
Well, well. That’s big of him. Why not all administrations? Why would changing the law, by installing a new law, now have to be done? Why does this law look an awfully like a presidencial pardon in disquise? What could possably anybody be afraid of? After all, he’s told us he’s in line with the constitution.
Hail to the king! King George 1st

PS. If we are at war, WW3 and all, why does our President have to keep reminding us of that? The military coming back in body bags should be enough for us as a reminder. Why? Because we aren’t. He has a domestic war here to fight and win first.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for bringing this like this to light. Theres so much stuff to sift through that sometimes I read it and don’t realize what I’m reading.

I just hope we have a decent choice in the nest election and “Bush’s Brain” is retired forever. Even with watching the news and “trying to keep up”, it wasn’t until I rented ” Bush’s Brain” tjhat the picture became clear.

Hi,

Thanks Lee. I was starting to sweat there knowing there has to be an answer. My lefty brain side thinking agin.
I always thought my body “adapted” while waiting to heal up, and my brain devoloped a “stratagy” to deal and work within kinda long term, in the mean time. Guess I’ve just been adapting on both fronts. Learn something everyday.

Dear Marguerite:

So you are saying things are going to get better or worse, unless they stay the same. I can’t find fault with that logic.

Isn’t this the first time I agreed with you on this thread?

Lee

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A lot has happened since 17 Sep. The R’s can’t see to do anything right? Where is Rove?

While many mischaracterization occur this one is being used nation wide.

Republicans are tagging Democratic opponents across the country for wanting to “give Social Security benefits to illegal immigrants.” But nobody’s proposing paying benefits to illegals, not until and unless they become US citizens or are granted legal status.

The charge is a mischaracterization of an amendment offered during debate of the immigration bill that passed the Senate last May with a healthy bi-partisan majority, 62-36. The amendment would change current law to prevent immigrants from getting credit toward future Social Security benefits from taxes paid before they have legal permission to work.

The measure has become a popular campaign issue for Republicans, particularly incumbent House members who raise it against their Democratic challengers. We have counted 29 GOP ads attacking Democrats with various versions of this misleading claim. Similar misconceptions about the measure were spread as part of a chain e-mail last spring and summer.

Along with this latest swarm of ads comes some related mischaracterizations, including a claim that the Senate plan “pays foreign workers more than Americans.” The Senate bill does have provisions to ensure that guest workers are paid no less than Americans. But no guest worker could be hired if a US citizen accepted the job.

As the USA is the only super-power left, and has taken on the role of being the world’s police, what’s going on in US politics plays an important role to the rest of us too. Of course I won’t take it on me to represent all but you 300 million (congrat’s on reaching that number for better or worse), but I think I can say that about two thirds of the “western” world’s population would be very relieved if the electorate of the States decided it was time the “pretzeldent” (wonderfully put) was “lame duck’ed” for his remaining two years.

Did you know that only 30% of the Brit’s still support having British troops in Iraq?

Have a nice election-day:) !

It took until Wednesday, June 8, 2005 for the war in Iraq, to have more than half of the American public believes the fight there has not made the United States safer. A very slow process for those of us who felt that way before the war.

[COLOR=red]I think I’m gonna vote for Governor Sanford D-SC, he scares me less[/COLOR]

Our track record has not been good at nation building. Looking back a Viet Nam. It appeared that in the Gulf War we had maybe learned our lesson to some degree. Even under the Clinton administration we had international support. While other countries have been involved in Iraq for all practical purposes it has been the US and the Brits. Both now have stiff opposition at home. Why because there was no real basis for us to be involved. The United Nation took the right position on this one.

That said it would be just as wrong to leave the situation in total chaos. We need to have a plan is flexible and will deals with reality. The current boarders in Iraq are a modern contrivance. Setting different boarders should be considered. Involving the other countries in the area should be considered. All things should be on the table to a allow a reasonable solution. Solution reasonable for those people not the USA. When George W. Bush was in Texas his opinion was that we should not be involved in nation building.

Hi there,

Many, many months ago, I mentioned the fact that we are building the world’s largest embassy in Iraq, on the river banks in Baghdad, along with a secret military base. Why Bush is stalling and doing his best to set up the military to take any an all blame for anything less then an outright victory. Our President, out of his own mouth said, history in 20 years will look back and see Iraq was just a ‘comma’ in the grand scheme of things. A lot of blood and treasure for just a comma in my opinion.
Once those two objectives are in place, he will declare victory, then for the next 100 years or so, we’ll run terrorist operations out of Iraq to quickly arrive on locations that are hot.

Hi M,

” To the people of the United States of America. We are declaring victory on this part of global terrorism, by being the first American outpost, ie. embassy and base, in America’s history, to be established in the Middle East. Future administrations will now be able to fight the war on terrorism from a point of strength, that now lies in their region. It will allow America to be safer, by fighting terror over there, instead of attacking American’s here, and the bonus being, we will now cut 2 weeks off minimal deployment times our military has to contend with now. America, now, will be safer having permanence in that region, that is diplomatically and militarilly defenable by all means the United States of America has to offer. ”

Sounds like victory to me Marg. Has all the elements Rove likes to see. Saying certain words and all. That’s what I think will be said and done before 2008 elections. Wild card being OBL cropping up or got sloppy and got caught.

I hate it when K.Rove says he’s proud to be a Norwegian!

Dear Marguerite:

Didn’t Ken Lay commit his crimes under the Clinton administration? Wasn’t he prosecuted under the Bush administration? As for lying, who was it that sanctimoniously poked his finger at the American people and said “I never had sex with that fat pig, Monica Lewinsky”?

Just checking up on accuracy.

Lee

Sex and War. Seems I prefer a Prez who lies about sex rather then one who lies about war and the reasons why we went to war. At least Clinton was a happy man.:D Just my opinion.

[B]Halliburton subsidiary abused rules[/B]

By Anne Plummer Flaherty, Associated Press Writer

The Halliburton subsidiary that provides food, shelter, and other logistics to U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan exploited federal regulations to hide details on its contract performance, according to a report released Friday.

The special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction found that Halliburton’s
Kellogg, Brown & Root Services routinely marked all information it was giving the government as proprietary, whether it actually was or not. The government promises not to disclose proprietary data so a company’s most valuable information is not divulged to its competitors.

By marking all information proprietary—-including such normally releasable data as labor rates- the company abused federal regulations, the report says.

In effect, Kellogg, Brown & Root turned the regulations “into a mechanism to prevent the government from releasing normally transpaarent information, thus potentially hindering competition and oversight.”

Halliburton spokeswoman Cathy Mann did not provide immediate comment.

The Iraq reconstruction audits have routinely found significant problems with contracting and rebuilding in the country, ranging from high costs for security and overhead to alleged fraud and lack of oversight.

Sen. Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, chairman of the Democratic Policy Committe, said that in 13 oversight hearings on the War in Iraq the committee
found more then $1 Billion in waste, fraud, abuse and what it called “shoddy work” by contractors.

“I’m convinced that this is the biggest waste, fraud and abuse in the history of this country,” Dorgan said.

If the Democrats take control of the Senate, he said, they will launch oversight hearings on war matters ranging from faulty intelligence leading up to the war to wrongdoing by contractors.

This is quite a long article, but I thought perhaps it might be of interest to some of you:

Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz lobbied Clinton in ’98 to start Iraq war and topple Saddam
By Jason Leopold
Online Journal Contributing Writer
February 20, 2003

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfield and Deputy Secretary Paul Wolfowitz undertook a full-fledged lobbying campaign in 1998 to get former President Bill Clinton to start a war with Iraq and topple Saddam Hussein’s regime, claiming that the country posed a threat to the United States, according to documents obtained from a former Clinton aide.
This new information begs the question: what is really driving the Bush administration’s desire to start a war with Iraq if two of Bush’s future top defense officials were already planting the seeds for an attack five years ago?
In 1998, Rumsfield and Wolfowitz were working in the private sector. Both were involved with the right-wing think tank Project for a New American Century, which was established in 1997 by William Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard, to promote global leadership and dictate American foreign policy.
While Clinton was dealing with the worldwide threat from al Qaeda and Osama Bin Laden, Rumsfield and Wolfowitz wrote to Clinton urging him to use military force against Iraq and remove Hussein from power, because the country posed a threat to the United States due to its alleged ability to develop weapons of mass destruction. The Jan 26, 1998, letter sent to Clinton from the Project for the New American Century said a war with Iraq should be initiated even if the United States could not muster support from its allies in the United Nations. Kristol also signed the letter.
“We are writing you because we are convinced that current American policy toward Iraq is not succeeding, and that we may soon face a threat in the Middle East more serious than any we have known since the end of the Cold War,” says the letter. “In your upcoming State of the Union Address, you have an opportunity to chart a clear and determined course for meeting this threat. We urge you to seize that opportunity, and to enunciate a new strategy that would secure the interests of the U.S. and our friends and allies around the world. That strategy should aim, above all, at the removal of Saddam Hussein’s regime from power.”
“We urge you to turn your Administration’s attention to implementing a strategy for removing Saddam’s regime from power. This will require a full complement of diplomatic, political and military efforts. Although we are fully aware of the dangers and difficulties in implementing this policy, we believe the dangers of failing to do so are far greater. We believe the U.S. has the authority under existing UN resolutions to take the necessary steps, including military steps, to protect our vital interests in the Gulf. In any case, American policy cannot continue to be crippled by a misguided insistence on unanimity in the UN Security Council,” says the letter.
The full contents of the Rumsfield and Wolfowitz letter can be viewed at the Project for the New American Century.
Clinton rebuffed the advice from the future Bush administration officials saying he was focusing his attention on dismantling al Qaeda cells, according to a copy of the response Clinton sent to Rumsfield, Wolfowitz and Kristol.
Unsatisfied with Clinton’s response, Rumsfield, Wolfowitz, Kristol and others from the Project for the New American Century wrote another letter on May 29, 1998, to former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Senate Republican Majority Leader Trent Lott, saying that the United States should “establish and maintain a strong U.S. military presence in the region and be prepared to use that force to protect our vital interests in the Gulf—and, if necessary, to help remove Saddam from power.”
“We should take whatever steps are necessary to challenge Saddam Hussein’s claim to be Iraq’s legitimate ruler, including indicting him as a war criminal,” says the letter to Gingrich and Lott. “U.S. policy should have as its explicit goal removing Saddam Hussein’s regime from power and establishing a peaceful and democratic Iraq in its place. We recognize that this goal will not be achieved easily. But the alternative is to leave the initiative to Saddam, who will continue to strengthen his position at home and in the region. Only the U.S. can lead the way in demonstrating that his rule is not legitimate and that time is not on the side of his regime.”
The White House would not comment on the letters or whether Rumsfield and Wolfowitz possessed any intelligence information that suggested Iraq posed an imminent threat to the United States at the time. The letters offered no hard evidence that Iraq was in possession of weapons of mass destruction.
The Clinton aide said the former president believed that the policy of “containing Saddam Hussein in a box” was successful and that the Iraqi regime did not pose any threat to U.S. interests at the time.
President Clinton “never considered war with Iraq an option,” the former aide said. “We were encouraged by the UN weapons inspectors and believed they had a good handle on the situation.”
Rumsfield, Wolfowitz and Kristol, however, disagreed; saying the only way to deal with Hussein was by initiating a full-scale war.
“The policy of ‘containment’ of Saddam Hussein has been steadily eroding over the past several months,” Rumsfield, Wolfowitz and Kristol wrote in their letter to Clinton. “As recent events have demonstrated, we can no longer depend on our partners in the Gulf War coalition to continue to uphold the sanctions or to punish Saddam when he blocks or evades UN inspections . . . It hardly needs to be added that if Saddam does acquire the capability to deliver weapons of mass destruction, as he is almost certain to do if we continue along the present course, the safety of American troops in the region, of our friends and allies like Israel and the moderate Arab states, and a significant portion of the world’s supply of oil will all be put at hazard . . . The only acceptable strategy is one that eliminates the possibility that Iraq will be able to use or threaten to use weapons of mass destruction. In the near term, this means a willingness to undertake military action as diplomacy is clearly failing. In the long term, it means removing Saddam Hussein and his regime from power.”
Those alleged threats posed by Iraq and the advice Rumsfield, Wolfowitz and Weekly Standard Editor William Kristol first offered the Clinton administration five years ago have now become the blueprint for how the Bush administration is dealing with the Iraq.
The existence of the Rumsfield and Wolfowitz “war” letters is just another reason to question the Bush administration’s desire to go to war with Iraq now instead of dealing with other pressing issues. Because the letters were written in 1998 it proves that this war was planned well before 9–11 and casts further doubt on the claims that Saddam Hussein was involved in the 9–11 terrorist attacks.

Jason Leopold spent two years covering California’s electricity crisis as bureau chief of Dow Jones Newswires. He has written more than 2,000 news stories on the issue and was the first journalist to report that energy companies were engaged in manipulative practices in California’s newly deregulated electricity market. Most recently, Mr. Leopold has reported on Enron. He was the first journalist to interview former Enron President Jeffrey Skilling following Enron’s bankruptcy filing in December 2001. Mr. Leopold has broken numerous stories on the financial machinations Enron engaged in and his investigative pieces on the company have been published in The Nation, Salon, The Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, The San Francisco Chronicle, CBS Marketwatch, Time magazine, The New York Times, Forbes, Entrepreneur and numerous other national publications. Mr. Leopold is also a regular contributor to CNBC and National Public Radio and has been the keynote speaker at more than two-dozen energy industry conferences around the country. Mr. Leopold left Dow Jones last April to write a book about California’s electricity crisis.

The views expressed herein are the writers’ own and do not necessarily reflect those of Online Journal.
Email [email]editor@onlinejournal.com[/email]
Copyright © 1998-2003 Online Journal™. All rights reserved.
You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notice from copies of the content.

Bear in mind that the “evil” Halliburton won the general services contract under the CLINTON Administration……

And since when have the Dims given a rip about government waste, deficit spending, intelligence failures, etc.? They were in charge of congress for 40 years, and didn’t care about those things then. Remember, it was Carter who pulled the rug out from under our ally the Shah of Iran and by default put the radicals in power there. How’s that working for us?

And it was Clinton who gutted the CIA in the ’90’s (We don’t need no steenking spies on the ground! We have spy satellites!) and it was Clinton’s gal Jamie Gorelick’s actions that directly paralyzed the FBI and CIA prior to 9/11.

Have the Republicans made mistakes? Absolutely.

Will we be better off with Dims in charge of congress? Let’s see….higher taxes (kill the economy), unwillingness to sanction NK and Iran (those bullies will love that), coddling of terrorists, abandoning Iraq to Iranian terrorists, obstruction of sensible judicial appointees…Nope. I’ll take an “incompetent” semi-Republican over a bald-faced left wing America-hating Democrat (John Conyers, Nancy Pelosi, Russ Feingold, etc.) anyday.

Everybody hoping for a Dim sweep in November will be disappointed if they actually get it. I hate to say it, but our 2 main choices are :Republicans-bad. Democrats-worse.

As far as the war in Iraq:
“In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members … It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons.” ~ Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D, NY) (10 October 2002)

“Iraq’s search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power.” ~ Al Gore, (September 2002)

Hi,

Well?? What mistakes have the republicans made “absolutly”? Seem to have left that part out I see. How telling. Stay the coarse now. I know it’s hard to think of any. Un-tax and Spend R’s really sink the economy? Paying terrorists to do our bidding in the beginning? Paying terrorists now to stop shooting at us? Anything?

Major Republican/Bush Admin. mistakes:

1. Failure to enforce illegal “immigration” laws.
2. Failure to control runaway domestic non-defense spending
3. Failure to reform Social security (optional PRIVATE ACCOUNTS!)
4. Failure to use overwhelming force in Iraq and Afghanistan

Those are the big ones, IMHO

Just my opinion here, when Clinton was in office a hell of alot more people were doing better then with the economy we now have. I know there have been many,many mistakes on both sides of the aisle. But this war has put us in such debt, that I wonder what the future holds for my grandchildren and the country for the next 20 years.

Have you heard the joke about Clinton sitting in the Oval Office? One evening an aide walks in and the President is sitting leaned back in his chair looking out the window at the view. “What a beautiful sunset”, she says. Smiling, Clinton looks over and replies, “Thank you.”

The recession was over before he was even elected, but another one began before he left office, yet the left-leaning media somehow give him credit for the boom of the mid-’90’s. The economy (outside NY and California, aka tax hell) is doing VERY well, so I’m not sure what you mean by people doing better under Clinton. A larger % of Americans own homes now than ever, and unemployment here in Alabama is 3.4%, the lowest in decades and below the minimum “floor” level that economists talk about.

If there is one thing history has proven, all a President has to do to have a booming economy is to cut taxes and get out of the way. JFK did it. Ronald Reagan did it. And G.W. Bush has done it:

“The Big-Bang Story of U.S. Private Business
The economic power of lower-tax-rate incentives is once again working its magic.

By Larry Kudlow

Did you know that just over the past 11 quarters, [B]dating back to the June 2003 Bush tax cuts, America has increased the size of its entire economy by 20 percent? In less than three years, the U.S. economic pie has expanded by $2.2 trillion, an output add-on that is roughly the same size as the total Chinese economy[/B], and much larger than the total economic size of nations like India, Mexico, Ireland, and Belgium.

This is an extraordinary fact, although you may be reading it here first. Most in the mainstream media would rather tout the faults of American capitalism than sing its praises. And of course, the media will almost always discuss supply-side tax cuts in negative terms, such as big budget deficits and static revenue losses. But here’s another suppressed fact: [B]Since the 2003 tax cuts, tax-revenue collections from the expanding economy have been surging at double-digit rates while the deficit is constantly being revised downward[/B]”

Hi,

Have you heard the joke going around the oval office lately? Fix the numbers with fuzzy math, then lie to the public until the election is over. I know you like these 3 day and 3 week forcasts that Kudlow puts out, along with the administration’s reports.
David M. Walker, the head of the GAO , or more directly, our accountant in chief, says this about our debt. “This is about our country’s future, along with our kids and grandkids future. We, the people, have to rise up to make sure things get changed. The American public needs to tell Washington, D.C., it’s time to steer the nation off the path to ‘financial ruin’. Be concerned about the $8.5 trillion national debt that has every possability of growing into a $46 trillion debt in just decades.”
The vast majority of economists(not Kudlow) and budget analysts agree the ship of state is on a disastrous course due to ever lasting debt being racked up under this present administration.
By the way. If you love the true capitolist way of operating an economy(like I do), then why are you the first to run to the taxpayers of this nation to fix it all the time? Why do we, the taxpayers, have to pay for bad management of a buisness?
You forgot to mention something about those 2003 tax breaks as usual though. Which is getting every industry a huge tax break by letting them declare all overseas money in one year to be taxed at 5%, instead of the customary 35%. Big oil got $20 billion windfall, auto industry $10 billion windfall, pharmacutical industry $75 billion windfall, and so on and so on. That produced huge numbers of incoming tax money which this administration touts as the economy bringing this money to the table. A real false economy is the only thing this administration has produced.

By now all have pick ways to vote on issues and canidates. There are several issues on our ballot…

Comments by Tony Blair on Storm over Blair ‘Iraq disaster’ remarks see the following link…
[url]http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/11/18/iraq.blair/index.html[/url]

Just my opinion, I personally do not think we need to send more troops to Iraq

I have a gut feeling that our country will be there longer then a few more years. It seems to me like this is turning into an even bigger disaster and the Iraqi people being suppressed for so long don’t know a damn thing about how to run a democracy.

[SIZE=”3″]How many more of our Men and Women will have to die for this blunder? [/SIZE]:(

Would be interesting to hear what you guys think of Hillary C. running for President.

so, does it make sense to provide medical care for those illegally in this country?

secondly, should ‘free’ medical care be better than one retirees and those on social security are getting?

thirdly, why are medical care and various associated options so complicated (i recently took over my mother’s care and finances)?

patience is a virtue to strive for,
ferenc

[QUOTE=Allaug]Would be interesting to hear what you guys think of Hillary C. running for President.[/QUOTE]

I would love to see Hillary run for President, but she will never win because they play way to much dirty politics in Washington.

ferenc,

Don’t hold your breath waiting for answers to those very logical and important questions. Those are the kinds of questions that politicians and sidewalk critics will avoid addressing at any cost.

Your president Bush said that he would veto the bill that went against his will of getting billions of dollars more to wage the war in Iraq indefinitely.

Does this mean that he can get whatever amount of money for any cause he wants by vetoing any decision made on “The Hill”?

If so, this should be on the “Scare Me the Most”-thread!!

Can anyone tell me if I’m right or wrong here?

Dear Allaug:

It just isn’t as simple as all of that. Any veto can be overridden by a 2/3rds vote in the House and the Senate. Any legislation can also be ruled unconstitutional in the Supreme Court. In American politics it is very important to keep checks and balances so that one branch of the government doesn’t trample over the other two. President Bush would be wise to veto any bill in which Congress oversteps its bounds, which this spending bill clearly does. By imposing time limits for a withdrawl in Iraq, Congress is encroaching upon the authority of all presidents. The Congress does have the power of the purse, and if they wish, they can simply cut all funding for the war, and the troops would come home at the earliest possible date. If that is what they truly wish to happen, then they should vote to cut all funds for the war. But they don’t want that to happen or they don’t have the political courage to vote for a complete defunding of the war. Either way, it points to the fact that the spending bill with a schedule withdrawl of troops and the threatened veto were nothing more than Democrat versus Republican politics and posturing for the 2008 election.

A sigh of relief is hereby uttered on behalf of the rest of the world!

Dear Allaug,

As one who is actively protesting the war, I am sorry to tell you that Bush will veto the bill and the war will continue to be funded as is — unfortunately, it appears there will not be enough votes to override the veto. Lee has described the “possible?” political motives behind the Democratic bill. The bottom line is that the war will continue and those of us who are against it will continue to work hard to put pressure on our politicians to come together and end this illegal, immoral war!

Thank you so much for your concern, Allaug.

Peace ~

Bush is so isolated that he only gets information that supports what he believes. So sad and tragic for all of America.

Rule of law and justice — Lewis Libby commutation stands as a testimony of this administrations dedication to that principle!

Bush said the sentence was just too harsh. Too harsh, even though it was the minimun jail time by sentencing guide lines. This for a administration that wants the justice department to push for longer jail times. No wonder many are critical of the Decision to commute Libby. Mr. Libby was convicted of four felony counts for lying during a C.I.A. leak investigation.

Senator Barack Obama said in a statement that the commutation of Mr. Libby’s sentence “cements the legacy of an administration characterized by a politics of cynicism and division, one that has consistently placed itself and its ideology above the law.”

Senator Graham suggested a pardon of convicted perjurer Scooter Libby would be a good idea. Forget all that stuff about the rule of law and trusting the judicial system. Somehow those principles go out the window. Here is some of Graham’s suggestions to then President Clinton and the Senate:

“Don’t put your legal and political interests ahead of the rule of law and common decency.” Lindsey Graham, in his Senate Trial Statement, offering advice to President Clinton.

“Don’t lie under oath to a federal grand jury…” Lindsey Graham, in his January 16, 1999 Senate Trial Statement, explaining how a president could avoid impeachment.

“But also I believe even during a time of war, the rule of law applies. ” – Lindsey Graham, Justice Alito’s confirmation hearing.

“When he chose to lie, when he chose to manipulate the evidence, the witnesses against him and get his friends to go lie for him…” – Lindsey Graham, in his January 16, 1999 Senate Trial Statement, explaining when President Clinton became impeachable.

“After being begged not to lie to a grand jury and end this matter, he chose to lie.” Lindsey Graham, in his Senate Trial Statement, advocating impeachment.

“Let’s go to Judge Nixon. Judge Walter Nixon, convicted and removed from office, for what? Perjury before a grand jury.” Lindsey Graham, in his Senate Trial Statement, noting the precedent for treating perjury as an impeachable offense.

“But if you believe he committed perjury and you believe he obstructed justice, the reason he did it was to fix his case.” Lindsey Graham, in his Senate Trial Statement, explaining why perjury is serious business.

The time has come for a viable third party. Not just a indipendent but a true third party.