About Credible Sources

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I'm sorry I go back to this subject and it might have been discussed but can someone tell me the following. I am really curious because I keep seeing posts with people cutting down others and making fun of them and telling them the sources are not credible, but they will post their own sources. So...

Why is Factcheck (supporters of Obama) more credible than an independent fact checking site?

Why is Keith Olberman, Rachel Maddow, and others liberal talk shows more credible than Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity or other conservative rado shows? (although I can't stand Rush and that little pipsqueek leprechaun Hannity), just wondering why the liberal radio shows are more credible than the conservative.

Why are independently written articles by people who some of them do not reside in the US but watch the political and economic scene here in the US, not credible (even though they are giving their opinions of what they see happening), but if there is a good article written about the liberal politicians those articles are credible.

Why are people made fun of and not called credible because they post articles about UFO's, yet our own Astronauts James Lovell, Frank Borman, and Buzz Aldrin actually did see UFOs when they were in space.

Why will people scream and shout and get so totally upset because Bush has not been impeached (which he should be), but when the people who had the authority to impeach him (Pelosi, Reid and others) never pushed for impeachment the same people screaming for impeachment keep silent.

Okay, my post originally started out to be about why some articles/sources are credible while others are not, but I am curious about the last paragraph and would like to hear people's viewpoints on all the issues.

Why is Factcheck (supporters of Obama) more credible than an independent fact checking site?

...in your Iraq stance you would be over there as part of the fight. End of story. No buts, no excuses. You would be over there and not relying on teenage kids and reservists to do your fighting for you.

Likewise, our powers that be (no names mentioned) would have multiple family members over there also. No buts, no excuses, no whining. But of course, they don't.

But of course, your butt sits in your comfy chair in your house as well as our Washington bosses' butts. And you sit in your chair belittling someone who does not support this war, or any war, and does what she can to help peace world-wide. She is an activist, you are not. You are merely a cheerleader for a violent cause as long as it does not involve you directly.

My boyfriend says the ultra-rights are angry cowards. What I have seen illustrated on the conservative board makes me think he is 100 percent correct.

Until they make the "documents" public, as they should, I cant believe everything this lady says .

"Ms. MonCrief admits that she left after she began paying back some $3,000 in personal expenses she charged on an Acorn credit card. "I was very sorry, and I was paying it back," she says"

Sorry, but she has reason to point the finger away from her. If this is all true, where are the documents to prove it? Where is the court transcript, where is the paper trail for the public to view. This is reporting, just like reporting about the Keating 5 and other issues that arise on both sides. Facts are NOT facts just because someone writes a news piece.

What I would tend NOT to believe is government figures as to how many are out there. I know for a fact that a friend of mine in 2000 received $2,000 per month from the VA, in addition to Social Security benefits of a few more hundred dollars, for his PTSD disability, along with free medication from the VA to the tune of 200 5-mg Valiums per month in addition to 200 15-mg Serax tablets per month.

I have no idea what today's monthly payments are to these veterans. After repeated unsuccessful attempts to commit suicide on the pills the VA gave him (with the full knowledge of the VA), he finally succeeded in 2000 and is no longer with us.

I know firsthand what the effects of this disease are. It's not conjecture. It's fact.

As far as a credible site, how about this VETERANS site?

http://www.veteransforcommonsense.org/index.cfm?Page=Article&id=2468&NoMenu=1

Battling the Effects of War

Combat can wound the mind. New science helps vets from Iraq to cope

By Peg Tyre

Newsweek

December 6, 2004

It wasn't the gunshot wound in the arm that bothered Jose Hernandez when he returned home to Cincinnati after serving in Iraq. It was the lock on the front door. He couldn't relax until he secured it twice, three times and sometimes more. Even then he was still on edge. "I kept thinking about the things I saw over there�shooting on the streets, dead bodies and the terror in people's eyes. I couldn't get it out of my mind," says Hernandez, who served in the Army's 101st Airborne Division. He stopped sleeping, withdrew from friends and dropped plans to go back to college. His girlfriend finally demanded that he get help. A Veterans Administration psychiatrist diagnosed Hernandez with posttraumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, a potentially crippling mental condition caused by extreme stress.

Hernandez says he was one of the lucky ones. With a combination of antianxiety medication and talk therapy, his symptoms have begun to fade. Many of the 170,000 men and women now returning from Iraq and Afghanistan may not be as fortunate. When they get home, tens of thousands of them will be grappling with psychological problems such as PTSD, anxiety, mood disorders and depression. Though scientists are learning just how trauma affects the brain�and how best to help patients heal�there are still many obstacles to getting the treatment to the people who need it most. For starters, no one knows how many soldiers will be affected or how serious their problems will become. Early in the war the Army surveyed 3,671 returning Iraq veterans and found that 17 percent of the soldiers were already suffering from depression, anxiety and symptoms of PTSD.

Experts say those numbers are likely to grow. A study of Vietnam veterans conducted in 1980 found that 30 percent suffered from an anxiety condition later dubbed PTSD. Experts say the protracted warfare in Iraq�with its intense urban street fighting, civilian combatants and terrorism�could drive PTSD rates even higher. National Guard members, who make up 40 percent of the fighting force, with less training and less cohesive units, may be more vulnerable to psychological injuries than regular soldiers. Last year 5,100 soldiers who fought in Iraq or Afghanistan sought treatment in VA clinics for PTSD. That figure is expected to triple.

PTSD, a specific diagnosis, is not the only psychological damage soldiers can sustain. And experts say that mental disorders can make the already rugged transition from military to civilian life a harrowing one. Soldiers can experience depression, hypervigilance, insomnia, emotional numbing, recurring nightmares and intrusive thoughts. And in many cases, the symptoms worsen with time, leaving the victims at higher risk for alcohol and drug abuse, unemployment, homelessness and suicide. Sometimes families can become collateral damage. Christine Hansen, executive director of the Miles Foundation, which runs a hot line for domestic-violence victims in the military, says that since start of the Iraq war, calls have jumped from 50 to more than 500 a month.

Without treatment, some conditions such as chronic PTSD can be lethal. Five years after the Vietnam War, epidemiologists studying combat veterans found that they were nearly twice as likely to die from motor-vehicle accidents and accidental poisoning than veterans who didn't see combat. In a 30-year follow up, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine this year, the same combat vets continued to die at greater rates and remained especially vulnerable to drug overdose and accidental poisoning. "We had the John Wayne syndrome," says Vietnam veteran Greg Helle, who grappled with severe PTSD for decades. "We were men, we'd been to war. We thought we could tough it out." Doctors hadn't developed effective treatment for PTSD and besides, says Helle, seeking help was an admission of weakness.

Doctors now know that PTSD is the product of subtle biological changes that occur in the brain in response to extreme stress. Using sophisticated imaging techniques, researchers now believe that extreme stress alters the way memory is stored. During a major upheaval, the body releases massive doses of adrenaline which speeds up the heart, quickens the reflexes and, over several hours, burns vivid memories that are capable of activating the amygdala, or fear center, in the brain. People can get PTSD, doctors say, when that mechanism works too well. Instead of creating protective memories (ducking at the sound of gunfire), says Dr. Roger Pitman, a psychiatry professor at Harvard Medical School, "the rush of adrenaline creates memories that intrude on everyday life and without treatment, can actually hinder survival."

Why some people get PTSD and others don't remains a mystery. Recent studies suggest that a predisposition to the disorder may be genetic and that previous traumatic experiences can make soldiers more vulnerable to it. Once a soldier has it, though, says Dr. Matthew Friedman, executive director of the Department of Veterans Affairs National Center for PTSD, the good news is that the medical community now knows that "PTSD is very real and very treatable."

The challenge, says Friedman, is getting help�counseling or drug treatment�to veterans who need it most. As the Iraq war continues, officials at the Department of Defense and the VA are scrambling. After a rash of suicides among soldiers, they've increased the number of psychiatrists and psychologists in combat areas. Social workers trained to spot PTSD and other mental disorders are assigned to military hospitals around the country. Primary-care physicians at VA clinics and hospitals are now able to access combat records to see if their patients might be at risk for PTSD. Doctors are issued wallet-size reminders on how to spot PTSD and refer patients for further treatment. The VA has recently hired about 50 veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan to do outreach in the Vet Centers, a system of 206 community-based mental-health clinics around the country. But their resources are limited: Congress has set aside an additional $5 million a year for three years to deal with the new mental-health problem.

VA officials admit they're not catching everyone who needs help. National Guard members often do many tours and can be exposed to more combat than regular soldiers. But instead of rotating back to military bases where they can be monitored, they often return to their hometowns where readjustment problems can become a family crisis. If they begin to exhibit signs of PTSD or other psychological problems, they need to get help quickly. The VA will provide mental-health benefits for them for only two years following their service [The article is incorrect: Vet Center benefits are available for the remainder of a combat veterans life, not just two years; however, some physical care benefits are available for only two years].

Regular soldiers get mental-health benefits indefinitely.

Help came too late for Marine reservist Jeffrey Lucey. In July 2003, he returned home to Belchertown, Mass., from Iraq and gradually sank into a deep depression. His family looked on in anguish as he began drinking too much and isolating himself from their close-knit clan. By spring of 2004, he'd stopped sleeping, eating and attending college. When his sister Debra Lucey tried to have a heart-to-heart, "he'd describe the terrible things he'd seen and done," she says, "and he'd always end by saying 'You'll never be able to understand'." Frantic, family members had him committed to a psychiatric hospital but he was soon released. A few weeks later he crashed the family car, and the following month a neighbor found him wandering the streets in the middle of the night dressed in full camouflage with two battle knives he'd been issued in Iraq. Last June, Jeffrey Lucey hanged himself in the basement of his family home.

Shortly before he died, Lucey talked to an Iraq vet turned counselor at his local Vet Center. "He said he'd found someone who could really understand," says Debra. But before he could keep his next appointment, his demons took hold. Now Debra is telling her brother's story in the hope that others find the help they need in time. Psychological problems, she says, are an enemy that no soldier should face alone.

Can you point me to somewhere on Obama website that gets anywhere close to what this guy is talking about? The youtube was made by some obscure person, NOT showing the alleged speaker at any time. I have found no credible source for "barracks and uniforms" anywhere.

Personally I would support an addition to school curriculums that required community service as part of social studies. A local 4-H club leader called me the other day and asked if I could help her find community service opportunities for her 22 kids. I could and I did. I think before this economic mess is done we'll all help each other or we won't survive. There are a lot of opportunities for input on the Obama website. Time might be better spent flooding that site with your thoughts and concerns rather than posting here. I can promise you that I'm doing my part to flood the suggestion boxs, are you?

I worry more about the Clintons continued involvement in the government....like Ole Bill's "Foundation." .

I have read and researched everything about the birth certificate, his association with Ayers and everything else that was lobbied against him. I have found nothing to hold against him with the exception of preacher Wright and time will tell about that. After looking at the "evidence" on Factcheck, I am convinced his b/c is as credible as my own. I do not believe the Health Department of Hiawaii would have certified it if it were not so.

You can rest assured that I read everything about a subject which troubles me and Obama DID trouble me. Having heard him have news conferences and getting right down to business gives me somewhat more faith in him although I am still not convinced that he can undo what has been done the past 8 years and starting even before that, even if his intentions are squeeky clean. We are in for a VERY rocky road IMHO and we need to move on past the issues that have already been settled. The b/c on Factcheck leaves no doubt it is the real deal and the SC isn't going to find any differently...if they even hear the case. You are aware that they did not order him to produce the b/c by Dec. 1? They actually ordered him to answer...which of course he will do, to do otherwise would cause the complainant to win by default and he is not going to let that happen. It is customary in any court to give the defendent X number of days to answer a complaint. I should think you would know that. They can't "order" him to produce the b/c until there has been a hearing. I expect they will turn these frivilous suits back to the lower courts and refuse to hear any more about it.

I got it from blogsforjohnmccain.com. Not sure where you get your info. In fact, I don't even know how I got that story, as I'd never been to this site. Here's an interesting one, too: informationvault.com. The resources are endless. It amazes me that the so-called news stations are in business with their pathetic, identical news coverage. Judge for yourself. They always have exactly the same stuff, and the exact, same attitude.

As for FNC, that's why it constantly leaves all the rest in the dust. While I like Alan Colmes okay as a lib, his remark about Sarah was what I thought to be out of character for him after watching Hannity & Colmes all these years. I'll be writing Roger Ailes/FNC to remind them that FNC is way above those tacky networks, and that this won't be tolerated.

Susan Estrich, another FNC lib I like, has gone after the libs for what they've done to Palin. She's a fair lib. She's wrong on politics, but behaves with class while debating.

Katrina Victims Welcomed in Massachusetts

�Massachusetts will take in about 2,500 Hurricane Katrina refugees in coming days, sheltering them on Cape Cod for up to two months and likely resettling some permanently in the Bay State, Gov. Mitt Romney said Sunday.

Romney said federal emergency officials told him Sunday to prepare for the evacuees, who will arrive in two to three days, and will be temporarily housed at Camp Edwards on Otis Air National Guard Base on Cape Cod.

Otis has many amenities to accommodate the large numbers, including beds, a school, medical facilities, a gymnasium and a movie theater, he said.�

I believe we would be better off in the long run not to let government tinker around in our free market system. Now that they have a foothold, we will never get them out. They will infest everything from here on out. I apologize in advance for being so windy with this post, but this is something I feel strongly about.

I read a LOT of books and a lot of internet material. I stay away from the mainstream media because it is so biased and trivial that I become annoyed and scream at the TV. Once in a while I�m exposed to it accidentally and this only confirms my opinion.

I can�t link you to the source of my New Deal information. My most recent reading on this topic is: New Deal or Raw Deal? By Burton Folsom. You�ll have to hit the library. And reading this is truly �d�j� view all over again.�

All of the programs that FDR tried willy-nilly over his 12 years (3 terms) had noble stated purposes, and very bad unintended consequences. You cannot adjust a single item in our social and monetary system without it causing a cascade of effects. (And by the way, FDR was the only president to serve three terms, at the end of which is own party introduced a bill to limit presidential terms to two!)

In the earlier post I mentioned the NRA (National Recovery Act) which set wages and prices in an attempt to �put more money in the pocket of the working man.� There were higher minimum wages legally mandated for workers in various industries and higher prices set for goods to support those higher wages. The result was that smaller family-owned businesses which had competed on a local level with larger companies through lower prices could no longer do this. Their workers were willing to stay at lower wages to remain in their small towns with these small companies, but that became illegal � treasonous, even. Raising wages and prices made it impossible for the smaller companies to compete against national companies with their purchasing power and distribution systems. Defying the mandates sent men to jail. Businesses closed. Workers were put out of work, and had to move to large cities for jobs, or go on government relief. Wham! A generation of nomads and dependents.

To benefit female workers in Washington, DC, a minimum monthly salary was legislated, but it applied only to women. The result of this was that women lost their jobs to men who were willing to work for the lower wage. It was now illegal to pay these women their former lower salaries. Women were put out of work, another unintended consequence.

Tariffs on imports resulted in a drop in our export business. Then we had too much farm product being grown, not enough being sold, and prices dropping like a stone.

The AAA (Agricultural Adjustment Act) was designed to support crop prices and curb overproduction. Since we had begun taxing imports, fewer countries were buying our exports, so our farm products were rotting in the silos. The government had to destroy tons of it. So farm subsidies were instituted: If a farmer had 1000 acres, he might be offered money to take 10% of that out of production. The choice of which part of his land to designate as out of production was up to him. Most farms have wooded areas or poorly drained areas, etc. So the farmer would choose his poorest acreage - that had never grown a crop. Then he would take the subsidy money and buy fertilizer or use it to irrigate other poorly producing acreage. He would then start producing the crops that the government was guaranteeing good prices for (corn, wheat, cotton) and stop producing his other crops. Suddenly, production of corn, cotton and wheat went up, not down. And now we actually had to import some of the products which our farmers were no longer growing. The consequences were the exact opposite of the intent.

I won�t repeat all the information about the income tax. Let me just say that it is happening all over again, only FDR�s top rate was 79%, and the Obama administration wants 90% of the AGI bonuses, a cap on executive salaries. What�s next?

Excise taxes: Lets tax alcohol more, or tobacco, widgets, or electricity and gasoline to make everyone be �greener.� Taxing us for actual miles driven in our cars, what a great idea! It will be feasible as soon as everyone has a GPS tracker. I�ve heard ideas floating around about taxing internet usage, if they can figure a way to measure it

The WPA (Works Progress Administration) was another way to funnel money to supporters of the administration. If you could bring in the votes, you got to administer WPA funds in proportion to your usefulness. And in turn you could dole out jobs to those who were useful to you. This is in large part how FDR managed to get himself elected to three terms despite an unemployment rate around 20%. He controlled the money and the jobs. He had the ability to squeeze money out of any segment of society he chose. What terrible power to put in the wrong hands. Hiring and firing of WPA workers were cyclical, adding workers in the months before an election, dumping them shortly after, year after year, and it seems nobody caught on. They just agreed to vote whichever way would guarantee them a little work. And those who could not get work had to turn to the government for relief.

The ERA (Emergency Relief Act) supported by the new higher taxes had the unintended consequence of choking off the charitable contributions which had always gone to help the poor. A business owner being taxed at 79% is not feeling very charitable. So the government got to take this over, and become everyone�s benefactor. And these funds were given to governors to administer. Naturally, those states with the right sort of governor and constituency got the lion�s share of �relief.� Both the WPA and the ERA were political patronage systems pure and simple.

And let�s not forget the voter fraud in FDR�s elections. Precincts recorded as 100% for FDR, when republicans in the precinct swore they had voted against him. Precincts recording more votes than registered voters living there. Seems they had an Acorn equivalent even then.

Someone on this board asked what possible purpose this administration could have for bringing down the wealthy. The answers should be obvious. Power. Envy. Covetousness. Revenge. And that favorite word of the new administration: Greed. Got news, though, if you try to take away from me something I have worked for and earned, you are the greedy one, not I.

To some, life is a zero-sum game. The amount of �stuff� available to them is directly reduced by the amount I have. Therefore, I must give them half to level the playing field; maybe a little more than half to make up for the sins of my father and grandfather. It�s like a pie with only so many slices, and they deserve exactly what I have; it�s only fair. But life in America has never been that way. For centuries people have arrived here with nothing but the clothes on their back, taken a menial job, struggled, scrimped, persevered, and ended up owning the company. Others, who were born and raised here, feel they just can�t catch a break and wait passively for somebody else to give them the advantages they feel others have deprived them of.

So when I see this administration starting to take over businesses, cap salaries, tax �excess� profits, legislate personal behavior, and all of the other intrusions that are yet to be disclosed, I am severely creeped out. The un-level playing field is exactly what caused the striving and competition and sparked all the energy and invention this country is known for. Smooth the playing field, give everybody a trophy, and a B on their report card, and I�m not sure what we end up with, but it sure as hades (oh, for the love of pete, the language police won't let me use the other H word) won�t be America.

Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both. Ben Franklin

But you would have to read something other than far-right-wing propaganda, which you probably don't. Try getting a more global perspective and you will be less naive and less gullible. Unfortunately, if you had a more non-partisan world view you would also probably stop attributing all the problems of the world to the leftists. And then who would you have left to insult?

Part of the fault lies with lack of follow-through in Afghanistan but the major problem lies with Pakistan which has been the major breeding ground of the Taliban and terrorists for years. The U.S. pretty did a cut-and-run in tracking down bin Laden.

What is the answer to all this? I don't know. However, I do know that Pakistan's support of terrorism and the Taliban has been in place for a long, long time and is not the result of the Iraq peace movement in the United States, despite what your extremely partisan sources may insist.