It's called credibility of sources...

fact checking, research.....get the idea yet? Again, rumors started by a person who won't even identify themself is not fact the last time I checked.

Oh, and by the way, why is it okay for this person to stay anonymous and not okay for the source of the infamous tape you like to talk about so much?

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Credibility can be judged from what someone wrote on the chat board. MT wrote that she will join the civilian corp in Iraq. Obviously, she was not credible in that comment. Now there is commentary that it doesn't matter, or that she didn't lie. Gawd, it is so much like this administration it's laughable, but somehow it makes me feel like crying instead of laughing. You say it won't matter in 100 years. Well, it might. The collective lies that got us into this war may matter to the relatives still alive of those killed in Iraq after 100 years. So in a very small but important way it does matter. It is symbolic of the web of lies bringing this whole country down.

By the way the civilian corps would include aid workers, truck drivers, engineers, etc. This was most certainly not a rhetorical question, yet another lie on the part of one of the posters worried about manners.

Wow, if my in-laws (in their 80s) knew that they were looked upon like that, I'd get a black eye (and deserve it) Incidentally, they could do it, too. They travel abroad, work out, all that stuff.

Maybe we should get a little sampling of how many fossilized 70YOs there are out there. I'm embarrassed for you.

It also seems to me that anyone who could endure the worst imaginable torture for 5 years must be made of something.

He has lied to Americans and to the world so many times that if he actually made a mistake and told the TRUTH, nobody would be able to recognize it.

LOL at *pro-terrorist.* Is that the *talking point* word of the day that you studied at the table while drinking your daily dose of Kool-Aid? I'm not pro terrorist by any stretch of the imagination. I'm also not gullible. As far as bizarre, I think people who can't think for themselves, see the forest from the trees and continue to defend a known manipulative, deceitful liar until the end, regardless of facts to the contrary, are beyond bizarre.

And as far as J. C. Penney bills, check the date below. As I said, this is nothing new. I doubt you need to worry about your credit card bills, though. Bush only attacks those who disagree with him or catch him in lies. Ask Valerie Plame.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Walter Soehnge is a retired Texas schoolteacher who traveled north with his wife, Deana, saw summer change to fall in Rhode Island and decided this was a place to stay for a while.

So the Soehnges live in Scituate now and Walter sometimes has breakfast at the Gentleman Farmer in Scituate Village, where he has passed the test and become a regular despite an accent that is definitely not local.

And it was there, at his usual table last week, that he told me that he was madder than a panther with kerosene on his tail.

He says things like that. Texas does leave its mark on a man.

What got him so upset might seem trivial to some people who have learned to accept small infringements on their freedom as just part of the way things are in this age of terror-fed paranoia. It's that everything changed after 9/11 thing.

But not Walter.

We're a product of the '60s, he said. We believe government should be way away from us in that regard.

He was referring to the recent decision by him and his wife to be responsible, to do the kind of thing that just about anyone would say makes good, solid financial sense.

They paid down some debt. The balance on their JCPenney Platinum MasterCard had gotten to an unhealthy level. So they sent in a large payment, a check for $6,522.

And an alarm went off. A red flag went up. The Soehnges' behavior was found questionable.

And all they did was pay down their debt. They didn't call a suspected terrorist on their cell phone. They didn't try to sneak a machine gun through customs.

They just paid a hefty chunk of their credit card balance. And they learned how frighteningly wide the net of suspicion has been cast.

After sending in the check, they checked online to see if their account had been duly credited. They learned that the check had arrived, but the amount available for credit on their account hadn't changed.

So Deana Soehnge called the credit-card company. Then Walter called.

When you mess with my money, I want to know why, he said.

They both learned the same astounding piece of information about the little things that can set the threat sensors to beeping and blinking.

They were told, as they moved up the managerial ladder at the call center, that the amount they had sent in was much larger than their normal monthly payment. And if the increase hits a certain percentage higher than that normal payment, Homeland Security has to be notified. And the money doesn't move until the threat alert is lifted.

Walter called television stations, the American Civil Liberties Union and me. And he went on the Internet to see what he could learn. He learned about changes in something called the Bank Privacy Act.

The more I'm on, the scarier it gets, he said. It's scary how easily someone in Homeland Security can get permission to spy.

Eventually, his and his wife's money was freed up. The Soehnges were apparently found not to be promoting global terrorism under the guise of paying a credit-card bill. They never did learn how a large credit card payment can pose a security threat.

But the experience has been a reminder that a small piece of privacy has been surrendered. Walter Soehnge, who says he holds solid, middle-of-the-road American beliefs, worries about rights being lost.

If it can happen to me, it can happen to others, he said.

(Bob Kerr is a columnist for The Providence Journal. E-mail bkerr@projo.com.)

(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.shns.com.)

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'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?

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.