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Other related messages found in our database No stop to offshoring
Sorry I read an article that said that American only products that was originally in the stimulus package had to be taken out as we are borrowing the money for this stimulus package from the Chinese and the leader of China and Obama had a very tense conversation over that provision. Obama backed off because where else would we borrow the money from. Does that sound like someone who is going to stop offshoring?
Did you hear what he said about OFFSHORING?
We are not getting our jobs back ever!!!!! Supposedly we work a NONSKILLED, LOW WAGE job which needs to be OFFSHORED so that we can become educated to BUILD A WINDMILL.
GIMMIE A BREAK. Sure, I will go back to school to learn SMART ENERGY, oh yeah....there is no class in that.
WHO VOTED FOR THIS GUY? I tell you who has a NONSKILLED job, OBAMA.
McCain is not pro-offshoring. He is for a tax structure...
that enourages businesses to STAY here, not offshore. As I said in post above, we have the second highest corporate/business tax rate in the entire world. Not only does that force our businesses offshore, no foreign enterprises want divisions here either. That is just common sense to me, and it should not be a Democrat or Republican thing. It should be a do what is best for America thing. That is why toeing the party line drives me over the top. I mean both parties. People act like they have to vote Democrat even if they don't think he is the best guy because they will turn to stone if they vote for a Republican. And the same for the other side. It needs to be NOT about the party anymore, and I just wish people would educate themselves and we would start holding politicians responsible, and when they don't do what they say they will do, don't vote them in time after time after time. I just wish politicians would get back to doing the job of taking care of US, not themselves.
If you put an even higher tax on MTSOs, they will just cut our money further or offshore everything. If that is your goal, tax them higher. Makes no sense to me, but if that is your goal..vote Obama. You may get a tax cut, which won't amount to a hill of beans, but it won't matter if you don't have a check at all will it?
Obama is not against offshoring. Have you listened to hm at all?
The global economy....citizen of the world...Didn't he say that the way to combat offshoring was better education so that our children could compete for those jobs? Basically saying that Americans were not qualified for a lot of jobs that were being offshored? Gee, I was SURE I heard him say that!!
Voting against Obama is voting against far left socialism. Voting against Obama is voting against changing my life in a way I don't want it changed. So yeah, I am most definitely, confidently, WHOLE HEARTEDLY voting against Obama.
If he REALLY wanted to stop offshoring he would STOP raising taxes on corporations so that we don't have the second highest corporate tax rate in the world. But if he did that, he could not pay for all his gimmes, now could he?
Yeah, that makes sense. No more tax BREAKS for those who already offshore, and tax them more. Yeah, that would make ME want to bring my business back to America.
That makes NO sense.
Okay, I can agree with pressure to stop offshoring...
but at the same time you as a consumer have to be ready to pay higher prices for things...because American workers demand higher salaries for jobs than Indians, Mexicans, Chinese, etc. do. Nothing wrong with that, but the American consumer has to support that by not wanting cheap goods at the stores. We can't have it both ways.
Okay then don't complain because offshoring has lowered your MT wages. n/m We have records of it. NM EHR records
EHR is not just about voice recognition. It is about getting hospitals to have their records computerized instead of paper charts so that they are easily accessible.
Medicare and Medicaid already have a program in place that will subsidize a hospital's cost to change to EHR so that it makes it easier for them to process claims.
I did look at the records
of McCain and Obama. I always research who I'm voting for before I vote. I don't want to be one of those uninformed voters like the ones that were interviewed and said they had no problem with Sarah Palin being Obama's VP. I mean....come on. If you are that misinformed that you don't even know the candidates VP choice....you shouldn't be voting.
My problem was that I didn't have faith in either McCain or Obama. I voted for McCain because I felt he was the lesser of two evils and I didn't want to throw my vote away by voting for an independent. I'm not doing that any more. If I think an independent is better, I'm bucking both parties. Maybe if both parties lose, they may open their eyes and see that both parties have screwed up and both parties have p!ssed us off.
voting records...yes, let's go there...
Obama -- most liberal senator in the senate based on his votes. Biden -- 3rd most liberal. That means more government, more spending, more programs...no thanks. As for "voting with Bush..." Anything that passed was also voted for by the majority of Democrats. As President Obama can't vote for anything, as Bush can't, so I don't see how Obama is going to change anything. That's how it works. Nice try, no cigar (no pun intended).
JM did not adopt Obama's exit strategy. If anyone did, Bush did...he's the President now and the strategy is being applied now. Obama admitted on O'Reilly that the surge succeeded beyond anyone's wildest dreams. That one he voted against too. Biggest national security/foreign policy decision during the war and he voted against it. Enough said.
If you had watched his speech, he outlined it. He said his administration would be completely transparent. I believe him. Obama says he is going to change things. He doesn't say how. You believe him.
Oh good grief. You don't even know what pork barrel spending is, and it is the same on both sides. It is attaching things to bills to help your financial supporters back at home and selling your vote to get the earmark. Has nothing to do with social programs. Both sides do it, and it needs to stop. Politicians should be there to take care of ALL of us...not their fatcat supporters, and yes...Obama has fat cat supporters...Moveon.org to name one.
Boy, you have that class warefare mantra down. Trouble is, you buy it, I don't. I know better. Name one evil corporation who does not employ tens of thousands of Americans, who will loose their jobs if Obama taxes them into oblivion. Name just ONE.
American imperial delusions of grandeur. What does that even mean?? Look at T. Boone Pickens again. He said: "Yes, drill EVERYWHERE, drill NOW. But that is not enough." John McCain says the same thing.
Some of us actually READ RECORDS.
nm
Checking adoption records
I agree. I think the media is way out of line with that. Judge Roberts and his wife should be commended and respected for having the love and compassion in their hearts to adopt these children.
The more I see of him, the more respect I have for him and the more I like him.
No one should have to release their medical records...
to run for office. If one has to release them they all should. What is Obama's family history? Is he on antihypertensives? Is he on any kind of mood altering meds? Does he have high cholesterol? lol. That is none of my business, and neither is McCain's medical record.
First of all, Obama did not seal his records....sm
Only the person named on the birth certificate has access to a copy of it. He got a copy and presented it, period.
Secondly, he did not seal his college records. The colleges did this. Apparently it is common practice with presidential candidates as they are flooded with requests during the campaign.
looked at her financial records lately?
she is definitely not a poor girl in my opinion. I think she could afford to buy her own clothes...
"People have to start looking at records
when they are voting" so what in McCain's record was so appealing? Firstly, he cheated on his wife who was in a horrible car wreck, and then eventually married for money. Not much appealing going on there. Secondly, his record of Keating-5 not very appealing. Thirdly, he doesn't know anything about the economy, handled himself erradically; that's not appealing to me, for sure. So as far as the choice, Americans have chosen the right person for prez in these dire times.
"A prez/rep has of the people has to hold the constituents thoughts in mind when they are voting." If I understand this, I think you mean the prez/rep has to remember why they were voted into office. What has Obama done in one week that has not shown that he is doing just that? He most certainly has done, in one week, a lot that the American people who voted for him want done. So far, so good.
"People have to get involved by writing to their reps." Did you write to Bush when he invaded a country without reason, when he was killing hundreds of thousands of innocent people? Did you write to your rep when he and his cronies sanctioned torture? Did you write to your rep when they put in jail PFCs for the Abu Ghraibe deal, which goes much higher than Private First Class!! Did you write to your rep when Katrina hit and thousands of people were stranded, and some even killed by police officers who are sworn to help people, when they had nothing to drink for 5 days? Did you write to your rep when Halliburton stole Billions of bucks? Did you? No? didn't think so. So much for your involvement.
computerized medical records
Probably a dumb question, but what does Pres. Obama mean by computerizing medical records, and how does that hurt/help us?Yes, and check the voting records for how many times...
he voted "present." He has never made an executive decision in his life. He has not managed a government of ANY size. In Congress you have committees and panels and discussion and debate and it takes weeks to get anything done. That does not work in the white house...you can't get a committe or a panel or vote present. She has more executive experience than he has. Fact. And she is the #2 on the Republican ticket. He is the #1 on his ticket. I agree with Joe Biden's initial assessment.
When will McCain release his medical records? sm
>> John McCain has not yet released his medical records to the public. McCain is 72 years old, and has been diagnosed with invasive melanoma. In May of this year, a small group of selected reporters were allowed to review 1,173 pages of McCain’s medical records that covered only the last eight years, and were allowed only three hours to do so. John McCain’s health is an issue of profound importance. We call on John McCain to issue a full, public disclosure of all of his medical records, available for the media and members of the general public to review. >>
By LARRY MARGASAK, Associated Press WriterMon Apr 10, 4:55 PM ET
Key figures in a phone-jamming scheme designed to keep New Hampshire Democrats from voting in 2002 had regular contact with the White House and Republican Party as the plan was unfolding, phone records introduced in criminal court show.
The records show that Bush campaign operative James Tobin, who recently was convicted in the case, made two dozen calls to the White House within a three-day period around Election Day 2002 — as the phone jamming operation was finalized, carried out and then abruptly shut down.
The national Republican Party, which paid millions in legal bills to defend Tobin, says the contacts involved routine election business and that it was preposterous to suggest the calls involved phone jamming.
The Justice Department has secured three convictions in the case but hasn't accused any White House or national Republican officials of wrongdoing, nor made any allegations suggesting party officials outside New Hampshire were involved. The phone records of calls to the White House were exhibits in Tobin's trial but prosecutors did not make them part of their case.
Democrats plan to ask a federal judge Tuesday to order GOP and White House officials to answer questions about the phone jamming in a civil lawsuit alleging voter fraud.
Repeated hang-up calls that jammed telephone lines at a Democratic get-out-the-vote center occurred in a Senate race in which Republican John Sununu defeated Democrat Jeanne Shaheen, 51 percent to 46 percent, on Nov. 5, 2002.
Besides the conviction of Tobin, the Republicans' New England regional director, prosecutors negotiated two plea bargains: one with a New Hampshire Republican Party official and another with the owner of a telemarketing firm involved in the scheme. The owner of the subcontractor firm whose employees made the hang-up calls is under indictment.
The phone records show that most calls to the White House were from Tobin, who became President Bush's presidential campaign chairman for the New England region in 2004. Other calls from New Hampshire senatorial campaign offices to the White House could have been made by a number of people.
A GOP campaign consultant in 2002, Jayne Millerick, made a 17-minute call to the White House on Election Day, but said in an interview she did not recall the subject. Millerick, who later became the New Hampshire GOP chairwoman, said in an interview she did not learn of the jamming until after the election.
A Democratic analysis of phone records introduced at Tobin's criminal trial show he made 115 outgoing calls — mostly to the same number in the White House political affairs office — between Sept. 17 and Nov. 22, 2002. Two dozen of the calls were made from 9:28 a.m. the day before the election through 2:17 a.m. the night after the voting.
There also were other calls between Republican officials during the period that the scheme was hatched and canceled.
Prosecutors did not need the White House calls to convict Tobin and negotiate the two guilty pleas.
Whatever the reason for not using the White House records, prosecutors tried a very narrow case, said Paul Twomey, who represented the Democratic Party in the criminal and civil cases. The Justice Department did not say why the White House records were not used.
The Democrats said in their civil case motion that they were entitled to know the purpose of the calls to government offices at the time of the planning and implementation of the phone-jamming conspiracy ... and the timing of the phone calls made by Mr. Tobin on Election Day.
While national Republican officials have said they deplore such operations, the Republican National Committee said it paid for Tobin's defense because he is a longtime supporter and told officials he had committed no crime.
By Nov. 4, 2002, the Monday before the election, an Idaho firm was hired to make the hang-up calls. The Republican state chairman at the time, John Dowd, said in an interview he learned of the scheme that day and tried to stop it.
Dowd, who blamed an aide for devising the scheme without his knowledge, contended that the jamming began on Election Day despite his efforts. A police report confirmed the Manchester Professional Fire Fighters Association reported the hang-up calls began about 7:15 a.m. and continued for about two hours. The association was offering rides to the polls.
Virtually all the calls to the White House went to the same number, which currently rings inside the political affairs office. In 2002, White House political affairs was led by now-RNC chairman Ken Mehlman. The White House declined to say which staffer was assigned that phone number in 2002.
As policy, we don't discuss ongoing legal proceedings within the courts, White House spokesman Ken Lisaius said.
Robert Kelner, a Washington lawyer representing the Republican National Committee in the civil litigation, said there was no connection between the phone jamming operation and the calls to the White House and party officials.
On Election Day, as anybody involved in politics knows, there's a tremendous volume of calls between political operatives in the field and political operatives in Washington, Kelner said.
If all you're pointing out is calls between Republican National Committee regional political officials and the White House political office on Election Day, you're pointing out nothing that hasn't been true on every Election Day, he said.
WASHINGTON — Director Leon Panetta says agency records show CIA officers briefed lawmakers truthfully in 2002 on methods of interrogating terrorism suspects, but it is up to Congress to reach its own conclusions about what happened.
Panetta's message to agency employees came one day after Speaker Pelosi said bluntly the CIA had misled her and other lawmakers about the use of waterboarding and other harsh techniques seven years ago.
Panetta wrote that the political debates about interrogation "reached a new decibel level" with the charges.
He urged agency employees to "ignore the noise and stay focused on your mission."
Pelosi Accuses CIA of 'Misleading' Congress on Waterboarding
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday accused the CIA of misleading Congress about its use of enhanced interrogation techniques on terror detainees.
"Yes I am saying the CIA was misleading the Congress, and at the same time the (Bush) administration was misleading the Congress on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, to which I said that this intelligence doesn't support the imminent threat," Pelosi said at her weekly news conference.
"Every step of the way the administration was misleading the Congress and that is the issue and that's why we need a truth commission," she said.
Under a barrage of questioning, Pelosi adamantly insisted that she was not aware that waterboarding or other enhanced interrogation techniques were being used on terrorism suspects.
"I am telling you they told me they approved these and said they wanted to use them but said they were not using waterboarding," she said.
Growing increasingly frustrated throughout the briefing, Pelosi slowly started backing away from the podium as she tried to end the questioning.
As she backed out, she continued to accuse the CIA of not telling Congress that dissenting opinions had been filed within the administration suggesting the methods were not lawful.
The CIA immediately disputed Pelosi's accusation, saying the documents describing the particular enhanced interrogation techniques that had been employed are accurate. CIA spokesman George Little noted that CIA Director Leon Panetta made available to the House Intelligence Committee memos from individuals who led the briefings with House members.
"The language in the chart -- 'a description of the particular EITs that had been employed' -- is true to the language in the agency's records," Little said. "The chart I'm referring to is, of course, the list of member briefings on enhanced interrogation techniques."
Republicans also questioned Pelosi's charge.
"It's hard for me to imagine anyone in our intelligence area would ever mislead a member of Congress," House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said at his weekly news conference. "They come to the Hill to brief us because they're required to under the law. I don't know what motivation they would have to mislead anyone."
The top Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., told FOX News that Pelosi's accusation against the CIA is "not credible."
"I am afraid she has disremembered what she went through," he said. "We have had not only the records from the CIA but the contemporaries who were there with her had other views on it, so I am afraid that this is not a credible explanation."
Pelosi said she was briefed only once on the interrogation methods in September 2002. She acknowledged that her intelligence aide, Michael Sheehy, informed her about another briefing five months later in which Bush officials said waterboarding was being used on CIA terror detainee Abu Zubaydah.
Pelosi said she supported a letter drafted by Rep. Jane Harman, D-Calif., the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee who also attended the briefing in February 2003, and sent to the Bush administration, raising concerns over the technique.
Pelosi's account has changed several times in recent weeks as she has sought to clarify what she did or didn't know about the interrogation methods that she is pushing to investigate.
Pelosi said last month that she was never told that the controversial interrogation methods were being used. But a national intelligence report later showed that she was briefed seven years ago on the tactics while she was on the House Intelligence Committee.
Her spokesman then said the speaker thought the techniques were legal and that waterboarding was not used.
Democrats will hold a series of hearings on Justice Department memos released last month that justified rough tactics against detainees, including waterboarding and sleep deprivation.
While Democrats want the hearings to focus on what they call torture, Republicans have tried to turn the issue to their advantage by complaining that Pelosi and other Democrats knew of the tactics but didn't protest.
This whole Rove thing is not about outing anyone, it is about the uranium and Wilson finding no evidence that Saddam was trying to buy it. Great article. Link is below.
article Why Bush Can't Answer Cindy By Marjorie Cohn t r u t h o u t | Perspective
Thursday 18 August 2005
Cindy Sheehan is still waiting for Bush to answer her question: What noble cause did my son die for? Her protest started as a small gathering 13 days ago. It has mushroomed into a demonstration of hundreds in Crawford and tens of thousands more at 1,627 solidarity vigils throughout the country.
Why didn't Bush simply invite Cindy in for tea when she arrived in Crawford? In a brief, personal meeting with Cindy, Bush could have defused a situation that has become a profound embarrassment for him, and could derail his political agenda.
Bush didn't talk with Cindy because he can't answer her question. There is no answer to Cindy's question. There is no noble cause that Cindy's son died fighting for. And Bush knows it.
The goals of this war are not hard to find. They were laid out in Paul Wolfowitz's draft Pentagon Defense Planning Guidance in 1992, and again in the neoconservative manifesto - The Project for a New American Century's Rebuilding America's Defenses - in September 2000.
Long before 9/11, the neocons proclaimed that the United States should exercise its role as the world's only superpower by ensuring access to the massive Middle East petroleum reserves. To accomplish this goal, the US would need to invade Iraq and establish permanent military bases there.
If Bush were to give an honest answer to Cindy Sheehan's question, it would be that her son died to help his country spread US hegemony throughout the Middle East.
But that answer, while true, does not sound very noble. It would not satisfy Cindy Sheehan, nor would it satisfy the vast majority of the American people. So, for the past several years, Bush and his minions have concocted an ever-changing story line.
First, it was weapons-of-mass-destruction and the mushroom cloud. In spite of the weapons inspectors' admonitions that Iraq had no such weapons, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, Rice, and Bolton lied about chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. Bush even included the smoking gun claim in his state of the union address: that Iraq sought to purchase uranium from Niger. It was a lie, because people like Ambassador Joe Wilson, who traveled to Niger to investigate the allegation, had reported back to Cheney that it never happened.
The Security Council didn't think Iraq was a threat to international peace and security. In spite of Bush's badgering and threats, the Council held firm and refused to sanction a war on Iraq. The UN weapons inspectors asked for more time to conduct their inspections. But Bush was impatient.
He thumbed his nose at the United Nations and invaded anyway. After the "coalition forces" took over Iraq, they combed the country for the prohibited weapons. But they were nowhere to be found.
Faced with the need to explain to the American people why our sons and daughters were dying in Iraq, Bush changed the subject to saving the Iraqis from Saddam's torture chambers.
Then the grotesque photographs emerged from Abu Ghraib prison outside of Baghdad. They contained images of US military personnel torturing Iraqis. Bush stopped talking about Saddam's torture.
Most recently, Bush's excuse has been "bringing democracy to the Iraqi people." On June 28, 2004, he ceremoniously hailed the "transfer of sovereignty" back to the Iraqi people. (See Giving Iraqis What is Rightly Theirs). Yet 138,000 US troops remained in Iraq to protect US "interests."
And Iraq's economy is still controlled by laws put in place before the "transfer of sovereignty." The US maintains a stranglehold on foreign access to Iraqi oil, private ownership of Iraq's resources, and control over the reconstruction of this decimated country.
For months, Bush hyped the August 15, 2005 deadline for Iraqis to agree on a new constitution. But as the deadline came and went, the contradictions between the Shias, Sunnis and Kurds over federalism came into sharp focus. The Bush administration admitted that "we will have some form of Islamic republic," according to Sunday's Washington Post.
So much for Bush's promise of a democratic Iraq.
The constitutional negotiations are far removed from the lives of most Iraqis. When journalist Robert Fisk asked an Iraqi friend about the constitution, he replied, "Sure, it's important. But my family lives in fear of kidnapping, I'm too afraid to tell my father I work for journalists, and we only have one hour in six of electricity and we can't even keep our food from going bad in the fridge. Federalism? You can't eat federalism and you can't use it to fuel your car and it doesn't make my fridge work."
Fisk reports that 1,100 civilian bodies were brought into the Baghdad morgue in July. The medical journal The Lancet concluded in October 2004 that at least 100,000 Iraqi civilians had died in the first 18 months after Bush invaded Iraq.
Unfortunately, the picture in Iraq is not a pretty one.
Bush knows that if he talked to Cindy Sheehan, she would demand that he withdraw from Iraq now.
But Bush has no intention of ever pulling out of Iraq. The US is building the largest CIA station in the world in Baghdad. And Halliburton is busily constructing 14 permanent US military bases in Iraq.
George Bush knows that he cannot answer Cindy Sheehan's question. There is no noble cause for his war on Iraq.
Marjorie Cohn, a contributing editor to t r u t h o u t, is a professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, executive vice president of the National Lawyers Guild, and the US representative to the executive committee of the American Association of Jurists.article
My mom, not Cindy Sheehan, is Bush’s biggest problem
Thursday, August 25, 2005
By John Yewell/City Editor
With Cindy Sheehan gone home to take care of her stroke-stricken mom, President Bush can enjoy the last week of his Texas vacation free of the distraction of her encampment outside his ranch. But a grieving liberal mom whose son died in Iraq demanding an audience may not be Bush’s biggest problem.
His biggest problem may be my mom.
My mother is a lifelong Republican. She got it from her father, a yellow-dog Republican if ever there was one. As unofficial GOP godfather of Fillmore, Calif., he collected absentee ballots every election for his large family and marked them himself. No sense in taking chances that someone might vote for a Democrat.
So when my mother called me the other day and told me she was considering registering as a Democrat, I was, well, stunned. Somewhere in a cemetery plot near Fillmore a body is spinning.
For the last year or more my mother has been gradually expressing ever greater exasperation with President Bush, the war, and the religious right. “Have you heard about this James Dobson guy?” she asked me on the phone, referring to the head of Focus on the Family. “If they overturn Roe vs. Wade, that’ll be it for me,” she said.
Then she mentioned Cindy Sheehan.
For all the efforts to discredit Ms. Sheehan, what she accomplished in drawing attention to the human cost of the war, if my mother’s opinion is any indication, crossed party lines. There’s a Mom Faction in American politics, and while it isn’t a monolithic Third Rail, it’s at least and second-and-a-half rail. When their children are dying on a battlefield of choice, you touch it at your peril.
My mother has her fingers on the pulse, and scalps, of many such women. She’s a hairdresser with a clientele that has been coming to her regularly for decades. Now grandmothers, these women were moms during Vietnam, in which over 50,000 American sons and daughters died. They worried then about their kids’ safety, now they’re worried about grandkids - theirs or someone else’s. Most are pretty mainstream, most Republican, and most, my mother tells me, pretty much fed up with George Bush.
There is other evidence of trouble on the Republican horizon. According to the latest compilation of state polls produced 10 days ago by surveyusa.com, of the 31 states Bush won in 2004, he now enjoys plurality job approval in only 10. This includes a 60 to 37 percent disapproval rate in the key state of Ohio, and a 53 to 44 disapproval rate in Florida.
A recent assessment from the influential and scrupulously nonpartisan Cook Political Report reads: “Opposition to and skepticism about the war in Iraq has reached its highest level, boosted by increased American casualties, a lack of political progress inside the country and growing signs of an imminent civil war. Given the centrality of the Iraq War to the Bush presidency and re-election, a cave-in of support for the president on the war would be devastating to his second-term credibility and influence.”
If Republicans are wondering where Cook is finding this “cave-in of support,” they could start looking in worse places than my mother’s one-chair salon, where Cindy Sheehan found sympathetic ears.
According to various reports, Bush and his team concluded that granting Sheehan an audience would only have encouraged other malcontents to demand similar attention from the president. Whatever the rationale, the decision alienated the clientele of Natalie’s Beauty Shoppe.
In the end my mother decided against changing her registration. Any criticism she might have of Bush, she decided, would be more credible if she stayed in the party, a sophisticated conclusion I admire and applaud.
Although Democrats can’t count on being the automatic beneficiaries of such dissatisfaction, Bush’s refusal to acknowledge fault, his “because I’m the Daddy and I say so” attitude, doesn’t work for a lot of women anymore. Women resent being patronized, and that’s how many view the president’s treatment of Cindy Sheehan.
The next election may be 14 months away, but when my mom and a lot of others like her walk into their voting booths, they may well be reflecting on their children and their choices, and which party is less likely to put either in harm’s way.
John Yewell is the city editor of the Hollister Free Lance. He can be reached at jyewell@freelancenews.com.
It's the name of an article. Hello??? nm thanks for the article!
Thank you for this article..its not too long for me to read, as others have suggested (the mentality of many in America and our downfall, if you ask me..dont want to spend the time to research, read, decide with their own mind..too much paper work to sift throught, oh please!)..as I care about what is going to happen to America and frankly the world..Bush has opened a Pandoras box and heaven help us all for the future..I dont get scared much about anything in life but what Bush has done sure concerns me to the max..Took an ant hill and created a mountain of monsters..
Here's another article Clinton Claimed Authority to Order No-Warrant Searches Does anyone remember that?
In a little-remembered debate from 1994, the Clinton administration argued that the president has inherent authority to order physical searches — including break-ins at the homes of U.S. citizens — for foreign intelligence purposes without any warrant or permission from any outside body. Even after the administration ultimately agreed with Congress's decision to place the authority to pre-approve such searches in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court, President Clinton still maintained that he had sufficient authority to order such searches on his own.
The Department of Justice believes, and the case law supports, that the president has inherent authority to conduct warrantless physical searches for foreign intelligence purposes, Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee on July 14, 1994, and that the President may, as has been done, delegate this authority to the Attorney General.
It is important to understand, Gorelick continued, that the rules and methodology for criminal searches are inconsistent with the collection of foreign intelligence and would unduly frustrate the president in carrying out his foreign intelligence responsibilities.
Executive Order 12333, signed by Ronald Reagan in 1981, provides for such warrantless searches directed against a foreign power or an agent of a foreign power.
Reporting the day after Gorelick's testimony, the Washington Post's headline — on page A-19 — read, Administration Backing No-Warrant Spy Searches. The story began, The Clinton administration, in a little-noticed facet of the debate on intelligence reforms, is seeking congressional authorization for U.S. spies to continue conducting clandestine searches at foreign embassies in Washington and other cities without a federal court order. The administration's quiet lobbying effort is aimed at modifying draft legislation that would require U.S. counterintelligence officials to get a court order before secretly snooping inside the homes or workplaces of suspected foreign agents or foreign powers.
In her testimony, Gorelick made clear that the president believed he had the power to order warrantless searches for the purpose of gathering intelligence, even if there was no reason to believe that the search might uncover evidence of a crime. Intelligence is often long range, its exact targets are more difficult to identify, and its focus is less precise, Gorelick said. Information gathering for policy making and prevention, rather than prosecution, are its primary focus.
The debate over warrantless searches came up after the case of CIA spy Aldrich Ames. Authorities had searched Ames's house without a warrant, and the Justice Department feared that Ames's lawyers would challenge the search in court. Meanwhile, Congress began discussing a measure under which the authorization for break-ins would be handled like the authorization for wiretaps, that is, by the FISA court. In her testimony, Gorelick signaled that the administration would go along a congressional decision to place such searches under the court — if, as she testified, it does not restrict the president's ability to collect foreign intelligence necessary for the national security. In the end, Congress placed the searches under the FISA court, but the Clinton administration did not back down from its contention that the president had the authority to act when necessary.
WASHINGTON, Oct. 12 — A former deputy director of the White House office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives is charging that many members of the Bush administration privately dismiss its conservative Christian allies as “boorish” and “nuts.”
The former deputy director, David Kuo, an evangelical Christian conservative, makes the accusations in a newly published memoir, “Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction” (Free Press), about his frustration with what he described as the meager support and political exploitation of the program.
“National Christian leaders received hugs and smiles in person and then were dismissed behind their backs and described as ‘ridiculous,’ ‘out of control,’ and just plain ‘goofy,’ ” Mr. Kuo writes.
In an interview, Mr. Kuo’s former boss, James Towey, now president of St. Vincent College in Latrobe, Pa., said he had never encountered such cynicism or condescension in the White House, and he disputed many of the assertions in Mr. Kuo’s account.
Still, Mr. Kuo’s statements, first reported Wednesday evening on the cable channel MSNBC, come at an awkward time for Republicans in the midst of a midterm election campaign in which polls show little enthusiasm among the party’s conservative Christian base.
While many conservative Christians considered President Bush “a brother in Christ,” Mr. Kuo writes, “for most of the rest of the White House staff, evangelical leaders were people to be tolerated, not people who were truly welcomed.”
The political affairs office headed by Karl Rove was especially “eye-rolling,” Mr. Kuo’s book says. It says staff members in that office “knew ‘the nuts’ were politically invaluable, but that was the extent of their usefulness.”
Without naming names, the book says staff members complained that politically involved Christians were “annoying,” “tiresome” or “boorish.”
Eryn Witcher, a spokeswoman for the White House, said that the administration would not comment without reading the book but that the faith-based program was “near and dear to the president’s heart.”
Suevon Lee contributed reporting.
There is an article on
the Common Dreams website that is pretty much a transcript of what was said, on all sides; you can read it and decide for yourself whether or not it was biased. I think it was pretty fair; they included both sides of the argument.
Article. Attacks, praise stretch truth at GOP convention
By JIM KUHNHENN, Associated Press WriterWed Sep 3, 11:48 PM ET
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and her Republican supporters held back little Wednesday as they issued dismissive attacks on Barack Obama and flattering praise on her credentials to be vice president. In some cases, the reproach and the praise stretched the truth.
Some examples:
PALIN: "I have protected the taxpayers by vetoing wasteful spending ... and championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress. I told the Congress 'thanks but no thanks' for that Bridge to Nowhere."
THE FACTS: As mayor of Wasilla, Palin hired a lobbyist and traveled to Washington annually to support earmarks for the town totaling $27 million. In her two years as governor, Alaska has requested nearly $750 million in special federal spending, by far the largest per-capita request in the nation. While Palin notes she rejected plans to build a $398 million bridge from Ketchikan to an island with 50 residents and an airport, that opposition came only after the plan was ridiculed nationally as a "bridge to nowhere."
PALIN: "There is much to like and admire about our opponent. But listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform — not even in the state senate."
THE FACTS: Compared to McCain and his two decades in the Senate, Obama does have a more meager record. But he has worked with Republicans to pass legislation that expanded efforts to intercept illegal shipments of weapons of mass destruction and to help destroy conventional weapons stockpiles. The legislation became law last year. To demean that accomplishment would be to also demean the work of Republican Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, a respected foreign policy voice in the Senate. In Illinois, he was the leader on two big, contentious measures in Illinois: studying racial profiling by police and requiring recordings of interrogations in potential death penalty cases. He also successfully co-sponsored major ethics reform legislation.
PALIN: "The Democratic nominee for president supports plans to raise income taxes, raise payroll taxes, raise investment income taxes, raise the death tax, raise business taxes, and increase the tax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions of dollars."
THE FACTS: The Tax Policy Center, a think tank run jointly by the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute, concluded that Obama's plan would increase after-tax income for middle-income taxpayers by about 5 percent by 2012, or nearly $2,200 annually. McCain's plan, which cuts taxes across all income levels, would raise after tax-income for middle-income taxpayers by 3 percent, the center concluded.
Obama would provide $80 billion in tax breaks, mainly for poor workers and the elderly, including tripling the Earned Income Tax Credit for minimum-wage workers and higher credits for larger families.
He also would raise income taxes, capital gains and dividend taxes on the wealthiest. He would raise payroll taxes on taxpayers with incomes above $250,000, and he would raise corporate taxes. Small businesses that make more than $250,000 a year would see taxes rise.
MCCAIN: "She's been governor of our largest state, in charge of 20 percent of America's energy supply ... She's responsible for 20 percent of the nation's energy supply. I'm entertained by the comparison and I hope we can keep making that comparison that running a political campaign is somehow comparable to being the executive of the largest state in America," he said in an interview with ABC News' Charles Gibson.
THE FACTS: McCain's phrasing exaggerates both claims. Palin is governor of a state that ranks second nationally in crude oil production, but she's no more "responsible" for that resource than President Bush was when he was governor of Texas, another oil-producing state. In fact, her primary power is the ability to tax oil, which she did in concert with the Alaska Legislature. And where Alaska is the largest state in America, McCain could as easily have called it the 47th largest state — by population.
MCCAIN: "She's the commander of the Alaska National Guard. ... She has been in charge, and she has had national security as one of her primary responsibilities," he said on ABC.
THE FACTS: While governors are in charge of their state guard units, that authority ends whenever those units are called to actual military service. When guard units are deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, for example, they assume those duties under "federal status," which means they report to the Defense Department, not their governors. Alaska's national guard units have a total of about 4,200 personnel, among the smallest of state guard organizations.
FORMER Arkansas GOV. MIKE HUCKABEE: Palin "got more votes running for mayor of Wasilla, Alaska than Joe Biden got running for president of the United States."
THE FACTS: A whopper. Palin got 616 votes in the 1996 mayor's election, and got 909 in her 1999 re-election race, for a total of 1,525. Biden dropped out of the race after the Iowa caucuses, but he still got 76,165 votes in 23 states and the District of Columbia where he was on the ballot during the 2008 presidential primaries.
FORMER Massachusetts GOV. MITT ROMNEY: "We need change, all right — change from a liberal Washington to a conservative Washington! We have a prescription for every American who wants change in Washington — throw out the big-government liberals, and elect John McCain and Sarah Palin."
THE FACTS: A Back-to-the-Future moment. George W. Bush, a conservative Republican, has been president for nearly eight years. And until last year, Republicans controlled Congress. Only since January 2007 have Democrats have been in charge of the House and Senate.
___
Associated Press Writer Jim Drinkard in Washington
allay any of my doubts about SP. If she were an 18-year-od college student, this would be a flattering piece. As a VP candidate, shallow, uninformed, asking polite questions, flashing some gam. No thanks. If you think she is qualified -- let the press ask her some questions!!! If not, put her in a wet T shirt poster and be done with it.
okay, in going to the site you posted, and going to the subheading of what you'll pay in taxes, with Obama, I will pay $1118 less and with McCain only $325 less -
Now for me, that is a no brainer! Of course if I am worried about the economy in general, and my household in particular, I would have to choose Obama!
In your other post above, you wrote: This country has laws to protect people from being murdered, from having their lives taken from them by another person.
Those "people" are called "citizens" under the Constitution, and the "phrase" you refer to that defines citizens is found under article XIV reads as follows:
Amendment 14 - Citizenship Rights Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
As you can see, the words fetus, embryo, or twinkle in my daddy's eye are NOT included in the definition. One must be born first in order to be a citizen and receive protective services.
IMHO, when life begins is mostly a matter of philosophical and/or religious belief and not something to be legislated.
What does this say for our future? If what this writer is saying is true (or evenly remotely a little bit true) looks like a lot of hard times ahead. What I found of particular interest is the paragraph that talks about unemployment (the last 3 lines are in all caps). What would happen to this country if unemployment reaches 30-40 percent? Would we be able to survive? Are there any plans in the future that Obama had promised during his campaign that will turn things around. He had a lot of plans/ideas during his campaign, but now all I hear him keep saying is "it's going to get worse" or "it's really bad", but not hearing of any of those plans.
Also, I didn't realize that there were so many people receiving welfare and food handouts in this country (11 million?). There shouldn't be any reason for this. Not well Wall Street execs, politicians, etc. are still flying on luxury private planes and certain politicians are staying in $9 million dollar ocean front homes.
I'm just wondering if people who read this are following along and believe a lot in this article may come true or could happen what are you doing to prepare?
Here's what really stands out in this article - "Obama, on the other hand, is seeking to duplicate the failures of the president he is replacing, only on a far greater scale."
According to Article 20......... sm
Obama became POTUS at noon, regardless of whether he was sworn in yet or not. I believe this article was enacted to cover situations exactly like this one where the timetable may be a little behind and to prevent confusion over who is POTUS in the event something should happen during the inauguration that would require the POTUS's attention, such as a terrorist attack or acts of war, etc.
Article
Posted below is an article. Please read. No it is not gossip or made up, it is real and it is disgusting. Obama has done nothing about this and will not.
Racism of the Congressional Black Caucus
President's spokesman cites 'membership policies' as explanation
At least three times racism has raised its head in the new administration of President Obama, and now his chief spokesman has cited "membership policies" as an explanation for the all-whites-are-banned practice of the Congressional Black Caucus.
Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs responded to the question from Les Kinsolving, WND's correspondent at the White House, following the conclusion of today's press briefing at the White House.
"To your knowledge has the president ever disagreed with the expressed hope that children 'could live in a nation where they would not be judged by the
color of their skin but by the content of their character' as made by Dr. King," Kinsolving asked.
"Has he ever … ," Gibbs asked. "Disagreed," Kinsolving finished.
"Not that I know of, no. I think he believes that's the goal of this country," Gibbs said.
Kinsolving continued, "Since the members of Congress who have applied to join the Congressional Black Caucus have been turned down because, as the black caucus' William Lacey Clay put it, 'they are white and the caucus is black,' my question: Does the president hope the caucus will stop this racial discrimination?"
"I will certainly look into. … I don't know what … prompted Mr. Clay," Gibbs said.
"There have been three of them who have applied and they've been turned down because they are not black, and that is the policy of the Congressional Black Caucus, and if you can ask the president, I would be delighted to hear," Kinsolving said.
"I think the first thing to do is ask members of … ," Gibbs aid.
"I have. I have," Kinsolving confirmed.
"… what their membership policies are," Gibbs said.
As WND reported, U.S. Rep. Pete Stark, D-Calif., was refused permission to join the organization because of his race. Kinsolving recently documented in his WND column how Anh ("Joseph") Cao, the Vietnamese-American Republican from Louisiana who defeated the re-election bid of New Orleans Democrat William Jefferson, expressed an interest in joining because the district he represents is predominantly black.
Also, in 2007, Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tenn., who is white, pledged to apply for membership during his election campaign to represent his constituents, who were 60 percent black. It was reported that although the bylaws of the caucus do not make race a prerequisite for membership, former and current members of the caucus agreed that the group should remain "exclusively black."
Kinsolving reported Clay said, "Mr. Cohen asked for admission, and he got his answer. He's white and the caucus is black. It's time to move on. We have racial policies to pursue and we are pursuing them, as Mr. Cohen has learned. It's an unwritten rule. It's understood."
Kinsolving said Clay later issued an official statement from his office: "Quite simply, Rep. Cohen will have to accept what the rest of the country will have to accept – there has been an unofficial congressional white caucus for over 200 years, and now it's our turn to say who can join the 'the club.' He does not, and cannot, meet the membership criteria, unless he can change his skin color. Primarily, we are concerned with the needs and concerns of the black population, and we will not allow white America to infringe on those objectives."
Charges of racism arose
after posting of a video showing top Obama economic adviser Robert Reich saying he wanted to make sure economic stimulus money didn't go to just "white male construction workers." Also as WND reported, Democratic Party strategist Donna Brazile admitted she swiped Obama's complimentary blanket from his inauguration ceremony and then joked it was not a criminal offense because, "We have a black president ... this was free."
Also,
outrage erupted over the inauguration benediction by Rev. Joseph Lowery, the 87-year-old civil rights pioneer, for asking God to help mankind work for a day when "white would embrace what is right."
Obama, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus while on Capitol Hill, reacted to the benediction with a smile.
What I took from the article
I read it and understood it to say that when you pledge allegiance you are supporting the country. You are pledging your allegiance to the ideals of the US. Therefore, you are pledging to the constitution, not an individual leader (especially since that leader could be the next Hitler, Mussolini or Castro - no, I'm not talking about Obama, I'm talking about any past, present or future president.
Nowhere in the pledge does it say to pledge yourself to a person or a religion.
In the article he says..
"But even after learning of all of the deceit and murder committed by our government, I still have strong positive feelings for the United States. My forefathers fought and died for liberty. My ancestors struggled to deliver a nation ruled by laws and justice, instead of by the whims of men. My people gave their blood, sweat and tears to throw off the yoke of the British monarchy and to defeat the ambitions of Hitler, Mussolini and Hirohito in World War II."
Another good point I read from the article was a message "to the good and honorable people in the military" - they have sworn an oath to protect and defend the US from all enemies foreign "and domestic". They need to remember that they have sworn their allegiance to the ideals of the constitutional form of government which our ancestors fought so hard and in some cases made the ultimate sacrifice - to defend.
I copied a lot of the info above from the article just because if I was saying it myself, this is how I would word it. It's just a very simple message that makes a lot of sense to me.
Swear your allegiance to defend the Constitution and everything good our country stands for. Protect our country from all enemies whether they are foreign or here on our own land. This is what our forefathers fought for to make a safe place for us, and what our founding fathers had in mind when they wrote the Declaration. But don't swear your allegiance to a specific person or a religion/ religious figure head. You can be an athiest or believe in a different religious figure-heads other than God, and still support the United States and all it stands for.
Anyway...that's what I took away from the article.
Another article
I found this article. Know your busy with work and stuff, but just wanted to pass it on. My understanding is this lady and others are trying to get it so that nobody can have a garden in their own yard anymore.
I have to do more reading up on it, but a link you might want to read whenever you have time. Not too too long.
I just say, if they start taking our rights away to have our own gardens what is next. I could be wrong about it, but everything I'm reading that is my understanding of the bill they are trying to pass.
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