Advocates Warn 31 States They Could Lose Votes | PEEK | AlterNet

"The defect may be in place in as many as 31 states that use Premier voting systems in some or all of their counties. The states include AK, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DE, FL, GA, IA, IL, IN, KS, KY, MA, MD, ME, MI, MN, MO, MS, NH, OH, PA, TN, TX, UT, VA, VT, WA, WI and WY. All of these states use the Premier equipment, but the product advisory from Premier indicated that states which use GEMS tabulator versions 1.20.2 and earlier are definitely vulnerable to the flaw."

Premier was known as Diebold, the company whose president guaranteed a Republican win in Ohio in 2004...on machines proven to flip votes. Notice how Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania, three key swing states, are on the list.

Prediction: Unless Obama's early results put him ahead by double-digit percentages, McCain will "win" in a close finish reminiscent of 2000 and 2004. I'll make it clearer: The election will be stolen--again--unless the early voting results put Obama way in front.

Local GOP Chairman distributes racist e-mail | 10connects.com | Tampa, St. Petersburg, Clearwater

Local GOP Chairman distributes racist e-mail | 10connects.com | Tampa, St. Petersburg, Clearwater

The complaint? Black people are voting! Slap My fanny and call Me Tushy! THAT'S bound to scare the cowardly hearts of lily-white racists ALL over the U.S. of part of A.! 

Good.

Miscellanea -- We’re (not) Number One

Miscellanea Archive

"What is it that prevents America from righting herself? Stupid, blind, unthinking patriotism — willful idiots yelling “We’re number one!” while ignoring all evidence to the contrary."

"An exercise in myth-busting" by Hugo Salinas Price. FSO Editorial 10/30/2008

Financial Sense.com:

"The idea that “future generations will pay for our extravagance” in borrowing and financing by our governments is pernicious because it allows us to procrastinate. We can shrug our shoulders and say to ourselves, “Well, sorry kids, but you will have to pay our bills!” We can always find imperious reasons for comitting this deed. “Conditions were dire, we simply had to do it.

What I am getting at, is that our actions always take place in the Present and the effects are always in the Present. Whatever we do here and now, has effects here and now. The idea that we can do something now, and that the effects will come later, thanks to “Finance”, is totally false...”

"...All expenditure is paid in the Present . If you spend your savings, you have paid your expenditure. If you borrowed the money for the expenditure, and spend it, someone else is immediately paying for your expenditure. You don't know who it is, and whoever is paying may not even be aware that he is paying, but Present expenditure is paid for in the Present, not in the Future. 

“Financing expenditure” is a myth. All actions in the Present have effects in the Present. If a nation decides to live beyond its means, the result is not delayed into the future by “financing”. That nation becomes poorer in the here and now, as it spends and spends and spends. “Financing” is supposed to obligate future generations to repair the damage, to restore the vanished wealth. It is highly doubtful that they will be willing or able to do so." (Emphasis Mine.)

Chuck Lasker: Moderate Republicans Unhappy With Party's New Principles

Huffington Post:

"Today, the Republican Party is a ghost of its original self. The Bush administration and Republican Congress increased the size of government, increased debt spending, pulled us into an unnecessary war, squandered our reputation internationally, violated our civil rights, reinterpreted the Constitution, attacked a non-threatening sovereign country, tortured prisoners, enabled monopolies and large corporations to crush individual initiatives, gave additional tax cuts only for the rich at the expense of the middle class, and destroyed any remaining trust Americans had in the government. The current GOP campaign is using lawyers to suppress Democratic votes, using hate, lies and smears, and has adopted an 'ends justify the means' scorched-earth campaign that is literally destroying our Democratic system."

Barack Obama should be the next president of America | It's time | The Economist

"For all the shortcomings of the campaign, both John McCain and Barack Obama offer hope of national redemption. Now America has to choose between them. The Economist does not have a vote, but if it did, it would cast it for Mr Obama. We do so wholeheartedly: the Democratic candidate has clearly shown that he offers the better chance of restoring America’s self-confidence..."

"..Abroad a greater task is already evident: welding the new emerging powers to the West. That is not just a matter of handling the rise of India and China, drawing them into global efforts, such as curbs on climate change; it means reselling economic and political freedom to a world that too quickly associates American capitalism with Lehman Brothers and American justice with Guantánamo Bay. This will take patience, fortitude, salesmanship and strategy..."

"...(Obama's) identity is not as irrelevant as it sounds. Merely by becoming president, he would dispel many of the myths built up about America: it would be far harder for the spreaders of hate in the Islamic world to denounce the Great Satan if it were led by a black man whose middle name is Hussein; and far harder for autocrats around the world to claim that American democracy is a sham. America’s allies would rally to him: the global electoral college on our website shows a landslide in his favour. At home he would salve, if not close, the ugly racial wound left by America’s history and lessen the tendency of American blacks to blame all their problems on racism."

"...There is no getting around the fact that Mr Obama’s résumé is thin for the world’s biggest job. But the exceptionally assured way in which he has run his campaign is a considerable comfort. It is not just that he has more than held his own against Mr McCain in the debates. A man who started with no money and few supporters has out-thought, out-organised and outfought the two mightiest machines in American politics—the Clintons and the conservative right..."

"..In terms of painting a brighter future for America and the world, Mr Obama has produced the more compelling and detailed portrait. He has campaigned with more style, intelligence and discipline than his opponent. Whether he can fulfil his immense potential remains to be seen. But Mr Obama deserves the presidency."

Red State Socialism

DemocraticActionTeam.com

FACT: Of the 32 states which receive more federal dollars than they contribute in taxes, 27 of them (84%) are REPUBLICAN.

Notice #3? Palin's Socialist Tundra? The top 11 "takers" voted Republican; 15 of the top 17; 22 of the top 25. 

Isn't red the color of communism? 

BBC NEWS | South Asia | Pakistan quake rescuers' aid dash

There are other things happening around the world...

What Nobody's Saying: The Bailout Will Kill the Dollar

Populist America.com:

"But besides the direct bill handed to taxpayers for this gigantic con, there is the fact that adding that much to the national debt is also going to drive the dollar down precipitously against foreign currencies. We're already seeing that happen, even while they're just talking about the bailout. The dollar is falling against all major currencies - the Euro, the Yen, the Renminbi and the British pound. And it will continue to fall as the details of the bailout come out."

Poll finds 23% of Texans think Obama is Muslim | Front page | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle

"The Texas numbers are unusual because most national polls show that just 5 to 10 percent of Americans still believe Obama is a Muslim — less than half the number of Texans who buy into the debunked theories."

Sigh...

The Elite Newspaper of the Future | American Journalism Review

A smaller, less frequently published version packed with analysis and investigative reporting and aimed at well-educated news junkies that may well be a smart survival strategy for the beleaguered old print product.

"One of the rules of thumb for coping with substitute technology is to narrow your focus to the area that is the least vulnerable to substitution. Michael Porter included it in his list of six strategies in his book 'Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance.' The railroads survived the threat from trucks on Interstate highways and airlines by focusing on the one thing they could still do better: moving bulk cargo across long distances.

What service supplied by newspapers is the least vulnerable?

I still believe that a newspaper's most important product, the product least vulnerable to substitution, is community influence. It gains this influence by being the trusted source for locally produced news, analysis and investigative reporting about public affairs. This influence makes it more attractive to advertisers."

OpEdNews -- Election 2008: Who Decides? -- The People or the Programmers?

"But might it be possible that the decision next Tuesday lies, not with those 100-plus million voters, but instead with a few dozen programmers who write the secret software for the voting machines that will record some 30 percent of the votes, and also for the computers that compile (i.e., collect and report) 80 percent of the 'official' election returns?

The very idea is too horrible to contemplate, and so it is not contemplated; not by the media, not by most of the public, and not by the Democratic party.

A presidential selection by anonymous programmers is not contemplated, much less discussed and publicized, in the face of compelling evidence that the 2004 Presidential election, along with numerous congressional elections during the past decade, were in fact stolen...

...it comes to this: if the election returns next Tuesday are fair and accurate, it will be because those anonymous programmers have chosen, for whatever reason, not to finagle the election, and not because they face exposure and prosecution – not, that is, because there is any compelling reason for them not to steal the election." (Emphasis Mine.)

What Sarah Palin Is Saying - Anil Dash

"Put simply, if Palin says "Barack Obama consorts with terrorists", she is making the assertion that he supports acts of violence against American citizens and the media will refute this obviously false assertion. If, instead, Palin says he "pals around with terrorists", she's used code-switching to mask the seriousness of the charge, obfuscating her meaning enough to get away with making an assertion that inevitably calls for the imprisonment or even assassination of a political opponent.

This clever use of language only hides Palin's meaning from members of the press. Because writers for traditional media are usually highly educated and pride themselves on their mastery of Standard American English, they can often look down on dialects like AAVE and North Central English. Instead these forms of language being seen as legitimate and interpreted in the social context where they've formed, they're dismissed as being the words of "people who don't even speak proper English!" In the cases where the ideas aren't outright dismissed, there is still rampant misinterpretation of meaning: Reporters wrongly see a term like "palling" as imprecise, when compared to a word like "consorting".

But these words are not imprecise to their intended audience. They are, in fact, clearer than using legalistic terms like "consorting". They amplify the urgency of the statements, and increase the sense for Palin's audience that they're on the same page with her, speaking a language too "plain", too full of "straight talk", for the press to understand. And they're right. Palin has consistently pitted herself against the media, depicting them as hostile and foreign to her campaign, and thus making it even less likely they'd take her less formal-sounding charges seriously." (Emphasis Mine.)

Christian Science Paper to End Daily Print Edition - NYTimes.com

One of the most influential and successful newspapers in the U.S. of part of A. has decided to fold--ahem--its print side and go online.

If this isn't a clear watershed moment in the dying spiral of print papers, then what is?

Annals of Sociology: Red Sex, Blue Sex: Reporting & Essays: The New Yorker

"As the Reverend Rick Marks, a Southern Baptist minister, recently pointed out in a Florida newspaper, “Evangelicals are fighting gay marriage, saying it will break down traditional marriage, when divorce has already broken it down.”"

The article is about the differences between "red states and blue states" on teen pregnancy, marriage and divorce, focusing more on the "moral values voters" rather than Republicans and Democrats. But Rev. Marks' remark is something I have been saying for years and I'm glad to see that there's at least one religious leader who understands that marriage as an institution is already damaged beyond anything the allowing of gays to marry could harm.

Rum industry benefitting from $2.1 billion in taxpayer subsidies | Kevin Colby: News, Culture, Political blog by your favorite antagonist

"A Taxpayers for Common Sense (TCS) analysis has found that both of these liquor conglomerates (Diageo and Bacardi) benefit from a program renewed in the bailout bill. This program, known as a “cover over,” rebates excise taxes charged on rum imported from Puerto Rico or the the U.S. Virgin Islands back to the territorial governments. The governments in turn provide as much as 35% of the rebated revenue back to the distillers to help market rum in the U.S. – to teach Americans to “do the mojito“and find out if they “have a little Captain” in them."

Diageo, producer of Captain Morgan Rum, could receive as much as half the projected $5.4 billion rebate for their new operation in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Drink, anyone?

60 Minutes: The bets that brought down Wall St. | Crooks and Liars

"In essence, speculators bet that homeowners wouldn't be unable to pay back their mortgages, and when those people started defaulting and the speculators tried to cash in their wagers, there was no money to cover the literally trillions of dollars in payouts. What it really boils down to is an unregulated gambling racket that Congress voted unanimously to create and legalize."

Top Overall Donors | OpenSecrets

Somebody's dollars influencing how your tax dollars get used, or more often, misused.

How to Pick a President

Scott Berkun.com

"Fred I. Greenstein, Professor of Politics Emeritus at Princeton University, calls out 6 attributes most related to success in office, a veritable scorecard for our use:

--Effectiveness as a public communicator

--Organizational capacity

--Political skill (well duh, but he explains specific traits)

--Vision

--Cognitive Style

--Emotional Intelligence"

There's plenty more analysis and information here, applying to all major elective offices. Maybe this should be a required course in school.

Oxdown Gazette -- Bush asks Justice to intervene in Ohio voter registration complaint overturned by SCOTUS

Jackbooted troops marching down Main Street next?

Election 2008: Objective journalism the loser - BostonHerald.com

"Did you see that amazing video obtained by the Los Angeles Times of Sen. Barack Obama toasting a prominent former PLO member at an Arab American Action Network meeting in 2003? The video in which Obama gives Yasser Arafat’s frontman a warm embrace, as Bill Ayers look on?

You haven’t seen it? Me, neither. The Los Angeles Times refuses to release it.

And so an incriminating video of Obama literally “palling around” with PLO supporters becomes one more nail in the coffin of “objective journalism.”"

Personal finance urged for Oregon schools - Breaking News From Oregon & Portland - Oregonlive.com

"'I firmly believe the lack of personal finance education early on in life has largely contributed to the current financial crisis our country is facing,' says Melody Thompson, executive director of Financial Beginnings, a Portland-based nonprofit that provides free personal finance classes to middle schools and high schools.

'During the last century, consumers have been pushed more and more toward controlling their personal finances but have not been given the knowledge to be successful.'"

Hurray, Oregon!

George Monbiot: How these gibbering numbskulls came to dominate Washington | Comment is free | The Guardian

"How was it allowed to happen? How did politics in the US come to be dominated by people who make a virtue out of ignorance? Was it charity that has permitted mankind's closest living relative to spend two terms as president? How did Sarah Palin, Dan Quayle and other such gibbering numbskulls get to where they are? How could Republican rallies in 2008 be drowned out by screaming ignoramuses insisting that Barack Obama was a Muslim and a terrorist?...

...It wasn't always like this. The founding fathers of the republic - Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, John Adams, Alexander Hamilton and others - were among the greatest thinkers of their age. They felt no need to make a secret of it. How did the project they launched degenerate into George W Bush and Sarah Palin?

On one level, this is easy to answer. Ignorant politicians are elected by ignorant people."

Happily Oblivious: US Bombs Syria & Pakistan

"Military adventures overseas can escalate into full scale wars, which are costly in both money and lives. These interventions also have a negative impact on how the United States and US citizens are viewed by the rest of the world.

A US official is confirming reports that US forces launched a raid inside Syria on Sunday, which supposedly targeted an Al-Qaeda member. Syrian sources claim that civilians were killed in the raid. Some people may feel that such an action was justified because the Syrian government may not have been cooperative had the US sought permission to apprehend this alleged terrorist. The fact remains that the US congress has not declared war on Syria, and the US did not have permission to invade Syrian territory. When a foreign power sends troops into a sovereign nation without permission, it amounts to an act of war without a declaration of war. That violates long standing international law." (Emphasis Mine.)

Meltdown Retirement Blow Is Softer on Lawmakers

Finance.Yahoo.com

"Although lawmakers have lost value in their thrift savings plans -- the government's version of a 401(k) -- they are also offered a defined-benefit pension plan backed by the U.S. Treasury and largely insulated from Wall Street fluctuations.

That puts Miller and the other lawmakers into an increasingly privileged category -- workers with guaranteed retirement benefits that aren't subject to the vicissitudes of the financial markets.

Market meltdown or no, if Miller, 63, were to retire at the end of this year he'd take with him an annual pension of about $122,000, according to the National Taxpayers Union, a nonprofit advocacy group in Arlington, Va."

Yeah, these guys, the ones who vote on spending Our money while sucking in PAC largesse like a crackpot vegan takes enemas, yeah, they're hurting all right. Hurting Us.

Class of 76 'cleverer' than kids of today - Yahoo! News UK

"The intellect of even the brainiest 14-year-olds has deteriorated dramatically over the decades despite an increase in the number of pupils achieving top grades in exams.

Their cognitive abilities are level with those of 12-year-olds in 1976, the study found."

That's it, blame the kids. Not the educational system or the "greed is good" parenting that puts money ahead of emphasis on children's development.

The Coming College Bubble? - Forbes.com

"Home builders and banks aren't the only ones facing economic headwinds these days. America's undercapitalized independent colleges are staring at a spiral of major threats to solvency as penny-pinching students and parents consider cheaper options, and funding sources dry up. As a result, they could be the next bubble industry to pop."

Talking Business - So When Will Banks Give Loans? - NYTimes.com

Guess what the European economic rescue package forces banks to do? Make loans.

Fraudulent Election 2008 | AfterDowningStreet.org

And even in traditional voting, who you hire and how they are "supervised" can make the path to fraud a cakewalk...

West Virginia Vote Flipping Caught on Tape

Video the Vote

Electronic voting is just perfect for fraud and cheating. No wonder Republicans favor it so much.

Palin’s Nightmare—By Scott Horton (Harper's Magazine)

Seems clueless Palin is afraid of country run by Obama, envisioning "a socialist state in which fundamental American freedoms are undermined." As Scott Horton points out, Palin-drone, one like this?

"That systematically spies on millions of its citizens in direct violation of a criminal statute which forbids such surveillance?

That signs new laws with its fingers crossed in the form of signing statements, so that no one knows whether the laws—or any part of them—will actually be enforced?

That lies to its people about threats from abroad in an effort to build popular support for a series of wars and then cites the existence of those wars as a reason to suppress dissent?"

I should have an "Idiocy" category for Palin and her ilk...

Hugh's List Of Bush Scandals | NetRootsMass

Only 387? It still averages to over one a week for every disgusting week the murderous moron and his hyena cabal mis-ran the country.

A 21st-Century Bretton Woods - WSJ.com

"Today the idea of another monetary rebirth has much to recommend it. The credit bubble that has wreaked havoc on the world's financial markets has its origins in a two-headed monetary order: Some countries allow their currencies to float, while others peg loosely to the dollar. Over the past five years or so, this mixture created a variation on the 1930s: China, the largest dollar pegger, kept its currency cheap, driving rival exporters in Asia to hold their exchange rates down also. Thanks to this new version of competitive currency manipulation, the dollar-peggers racked up gargantuan trade surpluses. Their earnings were pumped back into the international financial system, inflating a credit bubble that now has popped disastrously.

Persuading China to change its currency policy would be a worthy goal for a new Bretton Woods conference."

Breton Woods is the basis for enough conspiracy theories to choke a goat. But it did set a global financial framework that helped the world recover from World War II. My only question is: How do the "new Breton Wooders" expect to change China's policy without inviting China to the parley?

kdka.com - McCain Campaign Volunteer: Attack Story Snowballed Out Of Control

See here, the fact that this incident happened is directly--directly, I said--related to racism. Start with a stupid person (check), acting in a violent manner (check) to smear another person by inference solely based on their skin color (check) without any basis for the incident to be real (check). Then have idiots (the media--check) fan stupidity into a flash-fire of outrage (check) and you have one of the most bizarre incidents in U.S. of part of A. political history.

I hope her self-inflicted wounds fester and rot. It might improve her looks.

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | 'US troops' strike inside Syria

An "October surprise"? A reminder to the electorate aimed at inspiring fear, but only demonstrating the hell-bent incompetence of the murderous moron and the hyena cabal he lopes with?

Or could there be a regional religious framework? But if there is, then the attack is in the wrong place and at the wrong time. So even then, idiocy in service to fascism is the order of the day.

[ The Financial Ninja ]: Really Scary Fed Charts: OCT, Now Crazy Scary

You don't have to understand what these charts are about: simply take in how radical the changes are and you will get a sense that what We're going through is damn unsettling.

U.S. has plundered world wealth with dollar: China paper | Reuters

China can--and has already started to--position itself as an alternative economic base on a global level. But wanting and achieving are two different things. 

Where U.S Taxes Go -- Chart

Brilliant illustration of the way U.S. tax monies are divvied up. If this were an interactive chart I'd waste a day just exploring and getting riled up.

Newspaper Stocks Spiral Ever Lower - Advertising Age - News

Is the death knell sounding, or is there some deathbed rally expected?

Blame game: GOP forms circular firing squad - Jonathan Martin and Mike Allen and John F. Harris - Politico.com

"'If you really want to see what ‘going negative’ is in politics, just watch the back-stabbing and blame game that we’re starting to see,' said Mark McKinnon, the ad man who left the campaign after McCain wrapped up the GOP primary. “And there’s one common theme: Everyone who wasn’t part of the campaign could have done better.”

“The cake is baked,” agreed a former McCain strategist. “We’re entering the finger-pointing and positioning-for-history part of the campaign. It’s every man for himself now.”

A circular firing squad is among the most familiar political rituals of a campaign when things aren’t going well. But it is rare for campaign aides to be so openly participating in it well before Election Day."

And yet, the fix is on...

Daily Kos: Fruit Fly Research in France?! I Kid You Not!

"Sarah Palin has shown herself to be unfit to serve as Vice President more times than I can count -- for her lack of interest in foreign affairs, for her lack of knowledge of the Supreme Court, for her willingness to divide the country into pro-American and anti-American based on political ideology, and on and on.

And while each of these single issues disqualifies her in my mind, none of them really struck home on a deep, personal level. Until today."

Palin is a grade schooler in a world of college graduates, a mental defective trying to operate amidst bright people. That she is a woman is part of this equation only to the extent that her appearance keeps giving her a degree of immunity: Any man uttering idiocy after idiocy in this way would have never made it to the national stage, much less be angling for a bigger role in the near future.

The Free Market's Not Dead - Forbes.com

The Free Market's Not Dead - Forbes.com

"The financial free market in the U.S. ended in 1912 with the passage of legislation to create the Federal Reserve System--the central bank. Before that, financial crises were simply Darwinian: fearful depositors, numerous bank failures, economic contractions, no management of the economic cycle or monetary policy, no safety nets for consumers and no government bailouts. Depositors usually responded with panic, creating bank runs that destabilized institutions and the entire financial system... 

'Free market' does not accurately describe the financial services industry in the world today. Government agencies regulate the entry, exit and combination of financial institutions; they oversee the transparency of financial reporting and securities underwriting; they influence credit and capital policies of lenders; they manage the money supply through which they drive interest rates and inflation expectations; and they provide the electronic system through which vast quantities of cash are transferred." (Emphasis Mine.)

What has died is the notion--idiotic from its inception--that an unregulated market backed by government guarantees would benefit everyone in roughly equal fashion. When you tell the players that their mistakes are covered, and let those players bring in suckers--"clients"--as part of the game, you have the very basis of a financial bubble, whose only possible outcome is failure on a massive scale.

The Raw Story | ACLU highlights 'Constitution-Free Zone' 100 miles from border

"The ACLU says a 'Constitution-free zone' exists within 100 miles of the US border, where DHS claims the authority to stop, search and detain anyone for any reason. Nearly two-thirds of the US population lives within 100 miles of the border, according to the ACLU, and the border zone encompasses scores of major metropolitan areas and even entire states."

Two-thirds of U.S. citizens live under undeclared martial law, in essence, rule by force. Still think fascism is not an issue here?

OpEdNews--What happens if GOP increased their Vote Tampering Margin for 2008 beyond that of 2000 and 2004?

"A highly probable potential outcome of an Obama loss from polls this time around accompanied by exit polls showing an even wider democratic win margin than the previous 2 elections would be the imposition of Martial Law resulting from the “Bush Administration revising Continuity of Government plans, including “civil disturbance” contingencies for suspending the Constitution long before the 9/11 attacks.”

Martial Law would be imposed to insure a smooth transition of a present GOP presidential administration illegally elected twice since the start of the 21st century to the next illegally elected McCain GOP administration. The Bush Admin recently threatened some members of Congress that America may face martial law if they didn’t pass the bailout bill. Wayne Madsen reports FEMA sources have confirmed the Bush admin is putting final touches on plans to declare Martial Law."

Paranoid conspiracy fringe ravings? Chew on this: British media are also envisioning voting fraud scenarios (BBC, The Guardian, The Economist) and the CoG revision, threats to Congress, Army posting on U.S. soil and FEMA changes have come about in the past few months, as GOP prospects drop along with the murderous moron's approval ratings and the economy.  

Since they stole the elections in 2000 and 2004--and We know this--what will it take to do so in 2008? 

See above.

Final Text of Iraq Pact Reveals a US Debacle | CommonDreams.org

"The clearest sign of the dramatically reduced U.S. negotiating power in the final draft is the willingness of the United States to give up extraterritorial jurisdiction over U.S. contractors and their employees and over U.S. troops in the case of 'major and intentional crimes' that occur outside bases and while off duty. The United States has never allowed a foreign country to have jurisdiction over its troops in any previous status of forces agreement."

From world power to paper pussy...cat in 5 short years. All hail the murderous moron! (Stone him, too...)

Secret memos prove Bush endorsed torture | TuscaloosaNews.com | The Tuscaloosa News | Tuscaloosa, AL

"In any event, the White House endorsed the torture tactics in hopes of getting information that could thwart future terrorist attacks and save lives.

Whether that goal was attained is debatable. The only certainty is that use of torture is illegal under the Geneva Conventions, the U.N. Convention Against Torture, the U.S. Constitution and the U.S. Army Field Manual."

Like the murderous moron knows how to read...

Union Card or Master Card -- How a Nation of Workers Became a Nation of Debtors | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet

"Debt it is an important shaper of political and economic consciousness. The more you are in debt, the less likely you are to rock the boat."

Debt and ignorance: Two control tools that very often go hand in hand.

The whole sorry mess in one picture | Wise Bread

"Everything looks fine from the 1950s right up until the late 1990s. New borrowing goes up during expansions and drops during recessions. (Sometimes it even drops below zero in a recession--people are paying off old debt faster than they're taking on new debt.) Saving rises a bit during the early 1980s, when interest rates reached generational highs, then declines pretty steadily as interest rates fell.

Then, starting in about 1998, borrowing just goes through the roof.

How did that happen? It was largely due to two things:

++ China and rich oil-producing countries were making huge profits from our purchases, leaving them with lots of dollars. One thing they did with those dollars was lend them to us.

++ Banks lobbied for and got permission to lend much more money for each dollar deposited. Instead of lending out around $10 for each dollar deposited, they could lend out $30 or $40. And, using houses as collateral, they did just that."

Is the U.S. Ready for a Sane President?

North Star Writers Group - Syndicated Commentary: Opinion, Humor and Features:

"If current projections hold true, America is set to experience a seismic shift in its political landscape in less than two weeks’ time as it elects Barack Obama as its next president... 

What will make a difference: Barack Obama is, by all appearances, actually sane. Consistently, relentlessly boringly non-crazy, in full intellectual flower and in complete command of his faculties. And this alone is enough to distinguish him from all prior occupants of the Oval Office since John F. Kennedy."

New York Times (NYT) Running On Fumes

Silicon Alley Insider:

"Not sure how it came to this so fast, but the New York Times (NYT) is approaching the point where it will have to manage its business primarily to conserve cash and avoid defaulting on its debt. This situation will only get worse as advertising revenue continues to fall, and it will be very serious by early next year.

The company has only $46 million of cash. It appears to be burning more than it is taking in--and plugging the hole with debt. Specifically, it is funding operations by rolling over short-term loans--the kind that banks worldwide are cancelling or making prohibitively expensive to save their own skins(...)"

Banco Popular may ask for US$300mn-900mn from treasury's TARP program, Banking, Puerto Rico news

BusinessNewsAmericas.com

Really? Really? The central bank of Puerto Rico, the single largest local obstacle to Our economic growth, is going to ask for money, despite practically owning the markets for mortgages, credit cards, personal loans, car loans and construction loans?

Or maybe that's why they need the cash injection at taxpayer expense...

Pie Chart of Unequal "Wealth Spreading"

Matthew Yglesias: Spreading the Wealth Around

The comments are interesting, too, if for just two reasons: Reasonably intelligent and for showing how economics can say a lot and prove very little.

Truthdig - Reports - The Idiots Who Rule America

"Our oligarchic class is incompetent at governing, managing the economy, coping with natural disasters, educating our young, handling foreign affairs, providing basic services like health care and safeguarding individual rights. That it is still in power, and will remain in power after this election, is a testament to our inability to separate illusion from reality. We still believe in “the experts.” They still believe in themselves. They are clustered like flies swarming around John McCain and Barack Obama. It is only when these elites are exposed as incompetent parasites and dethroned that we will have any hope of restoring social, economic and political order."

Foreclosure filings spike 71% in 3rd quarter - Oct. 23, 2008

Money.CNN.com

Bailout? It looks more and more like a wipeout..

Any Pay Cuts on Wall Street Yet? | CommonDreams.org

"It is difficult to understand why we should be taxing people who make $40,000 a year to boost the paychecks of bankers who make more than $1 million a year and in many cases more than $10 million a year. Senator McCain has called Senator Obama a socialist because Obama believes that it is okay to impose higher tax rates on rich people than poor people. Senator McCain considers this sort of redistribution unacceptable.

But, if redistribution from the rich to the rest of the country is socialist, what do you call the upward redistribution that Congress approved in the bailout package? It's hard to justify taxing people who make $40,000 a year to benefit bankers who make more than 100 times as much."

And one more tidbit, highlighting the difference between hyena greed and high finance:

"The bailout also did not prevent the banks from paying out dividends to shareholders, as was done in the United Kingdom when they injected capital into their banks. This restriction makes sense not only as a punitive measure but also as a way to help the banks build capital. Every dollar paid out in dividends is a dollar that is not going towards building up capital. Stopping dividend payments should hasten the date at which the banks have sufficient capital without relying on help from the government."

Bush Dismantles Economic Programs for Small Businesses

Alex Jones' Infowars: There's a war on for your mind!:

"Our nation is in the midst of one of the most dramatic economic downturns in modern history. More than ever, America’s 27 million small businesses need the economic benefits the Small Business Act was designed to provide.

None of this seems to matter to President George W. Bush. Although President Bush regularly panders to small businesses in his speeches, his policies paint a different picture. At the same time that President Bush backed the $700 billion dollar Wall Street bailout, he continued to dismantle existing federal programs designed to assist American small businesses.

During his two terms, President Bush has systematically dismantled each and every program established under the Small Business Act to assist American small businesses, especially those firms owned by women, minorities and veterans."

Blackwater sends warship to Gulf of Aden - Lloydslist.com

Blackwater sends warship to Gulf of Aden - Lloydslist.com

Blackwater. Has. A. Fucking. Warship.

F Is for Failure | CommonDreams.org

"The Bush Doctrine, of course, no longer exists. Within a year, it had run aground on the shoals of reality on its very first whistle stop in Iraq. More than six years later, looking back on the foreign policy that emerged from Bush's self-declared Global War on Terror, it's clear that no President has ever failed on his own terms on such a scale or quite so comprehensively."

"Under water" mortgages are growing threat to U.S. - Yahoo! News

How much do you want to bet that at least 15% of the homes built and sold in the last 5 years in Puerto Rico are "under water"? I'd go as high as 25%...

Poll: Political Corruption "Major Factor" in Financial Crisis

Alex Jones' Infowars: There's a war on for your mind!

FOXNews.com - Why the Republicans Must Be Defeated This Year - Opinion

"First, they had their shot at holding power, and they failed. They've failed in staying true to their principals of limited government and free markets. They've failed in preventing elected leaders of their party from becoming corrupted by the trappings of power, and they've failed to hold those leaders accountable after the fact. Congressional Republicans failed to rein in the Bush administration's naked bid to vastly expand the power of the presidency (a failure they're going to come to regret should Obama take office in January). They failed to apply due scrutiny and skepticism to the administration's claims before undertaking Congress' most solemn task — sending the nation to war. I could go on.

As for the Bush administration, the only consistent principle we've seen from the White House over the last eight years is that of elevating the American president (and, I guess, the vice president) to that of an elected dictator."

WorldChanging: Time In the Tank

"Americans are falling behind -- most of us anyway. We're working longer than ever before to maintain a standard of living that once we took for granted. With respect to gas prices, average Americans are much worse off than they were in 1970.

The working poor, in particular, are getting absolutely crushed. Their economic standing has deteriorated even faster than the middle class. A full day's work at the federal minimum wage won't even pay for a single tank of gas. In a car-dependent nation, that means that even basic transportation is quickly getting out of reach for low-income families."

The BRAD BLOG : Election Integrity Filmmaker Sees Own Vote Flipped on ESS Touch-Screens in TN

This election, just like 2000 and very much like 2004, is in the process of being stolen. Bank on it. 

Palin Loses Mind: Claims The Vice President Is "In Charge of the U.S. Senate"

AllVoices.com

This execrable excuse for a candidate needs to be put out of her misery...

globeandmail.com: Strong new class of antibiotics possible

The rising incidence of MRSA (methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus) infections in hospitals and the health risk they present makes this breakthrough a vital point for future treatments. 

Sarah Palin For Vice President

Draft Sarah Palin For Vice President

This blog dates from July 11, 2007.

Yes, you read that right: 2007.

As My father used to say: An idiot can always find more idiots to cheer him--or her--on.

GOP Terrified of American Voters | CommonDreams.org

"John McCain's statement in the debate that ACORN and the liberals are 'on the verge of maybe perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in voter history ... maybe destroying the fabric of democracy' is probably the most overwrought, ridiculous statement by a major-party nominee in living memory.

If you make a charge that serious, you better have something to back it up. McCain has nothing. Nada zero zilch."

Ontario police arrest man in voter fraud case - Los Angeles Times

"The owner of a firm that the California Republican Party hired to register tens of thousands of voters this year was arrested in Ontario over the weekend on suspicion of voter registration fraud.

State and local investigators allege that Mark Jacoby fraudulently registered himself to vote at a childhood California address where he no longer lives so he would appear to meet the legal requirement that all signature gatherers be eligible to vote in California. His firm, Young Political Majors, or YPM, collects petition signatures and registers voters in California and other states."

Obama Shatters Records With Unprecedented Money Grab - FOXNews.com Elections

"Barack Obama's staggering fundraising prowess -- the Democratic presidential candidate raked in a record-breaking $150 million in September and more than $604 million since the start of his campaign -- has raised the game of political cash as well as questions over whether the public financing system is now obsolete.

Public financing, which restricts how much cash a candidate can raise, is meant to curb the influence of money in presidential campaigns. In an interview on 'FOX News Sunday,' John McCain took issue with Obama's war chest, saying the exorbitant amount of cash Obama has raised has created the potential for scandal and lays a 'predicate for the future that can be very dangerous.'"

Given the source for this report, I'd be be much surprised to see anything like it if McCain were the beneficiary of this level of citizen-based financial support. 

The Raw Story | Could the US election be stolen?

"Misinformation has also been used to discourage voters from showing up on election day.

Students in Virginia, Colorado and South Carolina were wrongfully told by voting officials that they could lose their scholarships and their parents would no longer be able to claim them on their income taxes if they registered to vote in their college towns."

The Raw Story | Kucinich calls for probe of bonuses for Wall Street aid recipients

"'When Congress placed restrictions on excessive executive pay, it had no intention of permitting business as usual with respect to bonus structures,' Kucinich said. 'It would add insult to injury to ask taxpayers not only to bailout a firm, but to pay for bonuses as well. The Guardian's report necessitates an immediate inquiry.'"

Now let Me ask this: Are Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich the only two legislators with enough common sense and the stones to ask the most basic and vital questions?

Open Left:: Can't They At Least Try to Hide the Corruption Around the Bailout?

No. Guess not. 

11 Steps for Critical Thinking

Critical Thinking | The Design Matrix

Why don't We learn about this in school? Don't give Me the "That's what they're teaching you," line; it's bogus. What I want is for school to delineate, define and put these critical thinking steps into use every day, until it becomes a part of a person's routing thought processes. 

Let's replace brainwashing via drive with brainbuilding.

A Return to McCarthyism

News For Real:

"These kind of low-grade intellects who fear anything new or anyone different from themselves, have always been around. The only difference is that, over the past 20 years or so, the GOP decided that there were enough of these knuckle-draggers out there to swing elections their direction and that all they had to do to get them to ballot box was to stir them up enough: 'the minorities are living off your tax dollars,' 'the United Nations is an anti-American front organization,' 'Europeans are trying to rope America into a world government,' 'atheist liberals are trying to drive God from public life,' and now, 'Democrats are anti-American.'

And so the GOP stirred and stirred and, lo and behold, they were right. There were enough ignoramuses out there to swing elections to Republicans."

Five Questions That Constantly Need to Be Asked

If Our media sheep asked these Five Questions consistently, challenging so-called leaders (politicians, government officials) to answer them cogently, We'd have a much better democracy.

Iraq civilian death toll nears 100,000 // Current

"Nowhere discussed in the presidential debates, is the impact the continued US occupation of Iraq has caused. As the civilian death toll nears 100,000 (this is based purely on actual news items, so it is the lowest possible estimate), with no resolution in sight, the question remains.

What are we still doing there? Are we helping or hurting the situation? Our initial 'mistaken' intent aside, we are creating a new generation of potential 'terrorists' that grow with every passing day we remain."

10% of the $700 Billion Bailout to Cover Wall Street Banker Pay & Bonuses

Daily Kos: State of the Nation

Smack My belly and call Me Ruthie! Don't that make Me proud!

Bush Once Again Unconstitutionally Claims Right to Spend Funds to Control Iraq's Oil in "Signing Statement" | AfterDowningStreet.org

The murderous moron has exceeded the Signing Statements of ALL other U.S. Presidents--combined--by more than a 2-to-1 ratio. 

In brief, a Signing Statement is a President's way of saying "This is the law of the land, but not upon me." In essence, the Signing Statement is a notice to the citizenry that--for whatever reason--the Oval Office incumbent feels that he does not have to abide by the letter of the law.

In other words, that he is above it. Up until Reagan's presidency, 75 Signing Statements had been issued. Between Reagan, Bush Sr. and Clinton, 859 were issued. The murderous moron is at 1,124...and counting.

Now what kind of person chooses this option?

A) A President who foresees or understands that a conflict may arise between the law as written and approved and a near-predictable scenario, thus seeking legal or political redress.

B) A venal, miserable, cowardly, moral cretin who simply has to proclaim to the world "I da man!" just to be able to say something. That or an outright criminal. You choose.

All Spin Zone: Did John McCain Admit That He Blew It With His VP Pick?

"But what is interesting to note is the apparent backlash to Sarah Palin’s continued toxic presence on the GOP ticket. It will be most enlightening to see what the pundits and GOP intelligencia have to say on the morning of November 5th. But that’s in the future. Yesterday, John McCain kind of did a backhanded slap to Palin, and appears to be regretting his ill-considered choice of a running mate."

Questions Linger About McCain's Prognosis After Skin Cancer - washingtonpost.com

"The gist of the critique is that McCain's cancer was more advanced than his physicians concluded and that the chance of recurrence is consequently higher. Melanoma that spreads widely through the body -- 'metastasizes,' in medical parlance -- is rapidly fatal.

The effort to learn more about McCain's health gained steam after he chose Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate. More than 2,700 physicians signed a full-page ad in the New York Times on Oct. 3 calling for a 'full, public release' of the candidate's medical records. Others urged that microscopic slides of tissue removed before and during his operation be made available for review by independent pathologists."

What Went Wrong - washingtonpost.com

What Went Wrong - washingtonpost.com

The economic collapse happened during the murderous moron's watch, and though its roots ran back into the administrations of Reagan, Bush Sr. and Clinton, the hell-bent-for-greed attitude of the current hyena cabal mutated a riskier environment into a decidedly-toxic sewer.

MWC News - A Site Without Borders - - ROLLING STONE: It's Already Stolen

MWC News - A Site Without Borders - - ROLLING STONE: It's Already Stolen: "

"- While Obama dreams of riding to the White House on a wave of new voters, more then 2.7 million have had their registrations REJECTED under new procedures signed into law by George Bush.

(Robert F.) Kennedy (Jr.), a voting rights lawyer, charges this is a resurgence of 'Jim Crow' tactics to wrongly block Black and Hispanic voters.

- A fired US prosecutor levels new charges - accusing leaders of his own party, Republicans, with criminal acts in an attempt to block legal voters as 'fraudulent.'

- Digging through government records, the Kennedy-(Greg) Palast team discovered that, in 2004, a GOP scheme called 'caging' ultimately took away the rights of 1.1 million voters. The Rolling Stone duo predict that, this November 4, it will be far worse."

Story of Joe the Plumber springs many leaks

SFGate.com:

"What else did Americans learn about Wurzelbacher this week?

Among the factoids gleaned from state and county records:

-- He is registered as a Republican, and voted in the state's GOP primary in March, county elections records show. But he was previously registered, dating back to 2007, in the Natural Law Party.

-- He has lived in McCain's home state of Arizona - in both Mesa and Tucson.

-- He lived in GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's home state of Alaska - in North Pole, from September 1992 to July 1993.

And as comic Bill Maher pointed out, in his 15 minutes of fame, Wurzelbacher has already done more interviews than Palin."

EFF Challenges Constitutionality of Telecom Immunity in Federal Court | Electronic Frontier Foundation

"The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) Thursday challenged the constitutionality of a law aimed at granting retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies that participated in the president's illegal domestic wiretapping program.

In a brief filed in the U.S. District Court in San Francisco, EFF argues that the flawed FISA Amendments Act (FAA) violates the federal government's separation of powers as established in the Constitution and robs innocent telecom customers of their rights without due process of law. Signed into law earlier this year, the FAA allows for the dismissal of the lawsuits over the telecoms' participation in the warrantless surveillance program if the government secretly certifies to the court that either the surveillance did not occur, was legal, or was authorized by the president."

Rockefeller: WH stonewalling interrogation probe - Yahoo! News

"'If White House documents exist that set the policy for the use of coercive techniques such as waterboarding, those documents have been kept from the committee,' Rockefeller said in a statement. 'That is unacceptable, and represents the latest example of the Bush administration withholding critical information from Congress and the American people in an attempt to limit our oversight of sensitive intelligence collection activities.

'As chairman, I will not allow the Bush administration's stonewalling to prevent a full accounting of the facts,' said Rockefeller, whose committee is already investigating whether the CIA's interrogation program was legal.

The White House declined to comment."

Interviews At An Ohio Republican Sarah Palin Rally Expose Racism Against Barack Obama | Prose Before Hos

From an Al-Jazeera report. “It’s a reminder that hate and fear are still powerful sources in American society.”

GDP vs GPI : Which Measures The Economy Best? : The Inspired Economist

"The biggest difference between it (GPI) and GDP is what they class as costs and what they class as benefits. For instance:

Crime: GDP counts this as a benefit because it gives rise to property repairs, legal and medical fees etc; GPI counts it as a cost because it damages to people’s lives and leads to stress.

Volunteer Work and Education: GDP totally ignores these because no money changes hands; GPI values of both as a benefit for a growing economy.

Resources and Pollution: GDP counts both of these as an income, pollution twice over (once for creation and once for cleanup!); GPI counts both as costs.

So under GDP high crime rates, spending all hours at your desk and environmental damage are all good for the economy.

Conversely, under GPI low crime rates, pursuing amateur interests and education and careful stewardship of the environment are all good for the economy."

U.S. industrial output posts biggest fall in 34 years | Reuters

Not a recession? Not a political issue? How about a daily life issue, huh?

Op-Chart - Bulls, Bears, Donkeys and Elephants - Interactive Graphic - NYTimes.com

"As of Friday, a $10,000 investment in the S.& P. stock market index* would have grown to $11,733 if invested under Republican presidents only, although that would be $51,211 if we exclude Herbert Hoover’s presidency during the Great Depression. Invested under Democratic presidents only, $10,000 would have grown to $300,671 at a compound rate of 8.9 percent over nearly 40 years."

Grain piles up in ports

FinancialPost.com:

"'There's all kinds of stuff stacked up on docks right now that can't be shipped because people can't get letters of credit,' said Bill Gary, president of Commodity Information Systems in Oklahoma City. 'The problem is not demand, and it's not supply because we have plenty of supply. It's finding anyone who can come up with the credit to buy.'

So far the problem is mostly being felt in U. S. and South American ports, but observers say it is only a matter of time before it hits Canada.

'We've got a nightmare in front of us and a lot of people are concerned it's going to get a lot worse,' said Anthony Temple, a grain marketing expert based in Vancouver."

When the Federal Government Fails the People

IntelDaily.com

"...(T)he hidden genius of the Founders and Framers was to anticipate how the Republic would most likely unravel under the pressures of money and corruption. Unknown to nearly all Americans is a part of the Constitution that all established political forces have worked hard to denigrate over our entire history. They fear using what is provided as a kind of escape clause in the Constitution, something to use when the three branches of the federal government fail their constitutional responsibilities. What is this ultimate solution that those who love and respect our Constitution should be clamoring for?
 
It is the provision in Article V to create a temporary fourth branch of the government – in the form of a convention of state delegates – that operates outside the control of Congress, the President and the Supreme Court, and that has only one single function: to consider proposals for constitutional amendments, just like Congress has done over our history, but that must also be ratified by three-quarters of the states."

BBC NEWS | Programmes | Working Lunch | Where has all the money gone?

Good question. Why don't We ask it? More to the point, why don't We get a simple and direct answer when the question is so farking obvious?

The Big Picture | Goal: Increase Minority Homeowners by 5.5 Million in a Decade

"Understand this simple fact: In an ultra-low rate environment, where prices are appreciating rapidily (sic), and mortgaes (sic) are being securitized, ALL THAT MATTERS IS THAT THE BORROWER NOT DEFAULT IN 90 days (or 6 Months). The goal was to make a loan that did not default in that period of time, it cannot be put back to the originator.

As a mortgage salesman, you only lose your a fee if a borrower defaults within 3 or 6 months. What do you do to maximize your returns? The best way to do that -- to put people in houses that would not default in 90 days -- was the 2/28 ARM mortgages. Cheap teaser rates for 24 months, then the big reset. By then, it was no longer your problem.

Can you grasp what a monumental change this was? Instead of making sure that borrowers could pay back ALL OF THE 30 YEAR FIXED MORTGAGE, you only had to find people who could afford the teaser rate for a a few months. THIS WAS AN ENORMOUS AND UNPRECEDENTED SHIFT IN LENDING."

78 Ways for Your Small Business to Save Money in this Economy - Inside CRM

It isn't all passive acceptance of macroeconomic issues. Here are some suggestions to face up to the new economic environment and continue the job of beating your competition.

Scientist who did groundwork for Chemistry Nobel now works for $10/h at a Toyota dealership - Boing Boing

After Douglas Prasher's grant money ran out, he shared his research so other scientists could build on it. That research was worthy of a Nobel Prize. It would be great if We recognized Prasher's generosity with a similar prize.

OpEdNews -- BBC TV: "Set up to steal it again" Is 2008 already 'fixed'?

The notion that the 2000 and 2004 elections were stolen is established as a fact. That the 2008 elections are headed that way needs to be treated the same way: As a fact.

Amazon.com: The United States Constitution: A Graphic Adaptation: Jonathan Hennessey, Aaron McConnell: Books

Okay, if this makes one of the finest, most enduring and most important political documents in world history more accessible to the masses, blessed be. But the educational system should hang its head so low in shame it can see the path to shoving it up its own butt.

About those lynch mobs on the campaign trail. - Boing Boing

Racism. It is a fact in U.S. life. It is a fact and weapon in every campaign with an African-American, Hispanic or Asian candidate. And if there's anything uglier than racism--in My mind--it's a racist woman.

This might be sexist, but I expect more of women in this regard. Women are the harbingers of life and for that undeniable, fundamental fact, I expect women to be more in tune with a sense of humanity, one that can grok the obvious notion that racism is stupid. Totally, irrefutably stupid.

So seein' and listenin' to Palin urge racist attitudes and use racial stereotypes to tap into the stupid just brings out two reactions in Me: Disgust and recognition that, at least in the U.S. of part of A., it couldn't be any other way.

Universities Launch Collective Digital Library, 78 Terabytes Large | Gadget Lab from Wired.com

Every once in a while, We get it SO right it's frightening. 

This one is frighteningly exciting in so many ways...

Alan Cumming: Why Is America So Content With Mediocrity?

HuffingtonPost.com:

"Over the last few weeks I have watched with mounting bemusement as John McCain and Sarah Palin have constantly referred to the American work force as the best in the world, how America is a force for good in the world, how America is the best at (fill in the blank here depending on who you're talkin' to, wait for applause, wink, smile, and on).

You know what? I'm sorry to be blunt, and I wish it were not true, but America isn't any of the above. Its poor downtrodden, unhealthy, under-educated and depressed workforce cannot surely believe it towers above all others in some sort of World Worker Idol type way? If so, why are its bosses firing so many of them and giving the jobs to people in other countries?" (Emphasis Mine.)

And one more quote:

"You see, I think that when it comes down to it, American politics is split into people who think it's their duty to care about other people, and those who think it's every man for themselves. That's it. That's why I think the system is systematically flawed and is in dire need of a third party to shake things up a little."

Daily Kos: Put Your Wife's Money Where Your Mouth Is....

"Prove it, Senator McCain. Put your wife's money where your mouth is and show us the tape of Obama supporters calling you a "terrorist" or a "traitor" or shouting "Kill him!" Show us the tape of Obama supporters bringing racist symbols to taunt you. Show us the evidence or stop lying. If you can."

The 35 Articles of Impeachment and the Case for Prosecuting George W. Bush by Congressman Dennis Kucinich - Boing Boing

As far as the Internet audience goes, this is about as wide as exposure gets. And not just the U.S. of part of A., either. If this now hits the mainstream moose-herd, er, media, We could see a major shift against the murderous moron.

Finally.

The Causes of Inflation| The Foundation for Economic Education: The Freeman, Ideas on Liberty

"Even the noblest politicians and civil servants can no longer be expected to resist the public clamor for social benefits and welfare. The political pressure that is brought to bear on democratic governments is rooted in the popular ideology of government welfare and economic redistribution. It inevitably leads to a large number of spending programs that place heavy burdens on the public treasury. By popular demand, weak administrations seeking to prolong their power embark upon massive spending and inflating in order to build a 'new society' or provide a 'better deal.' The people are convinced that government spending can give them full employment, prosperity, and economic growth. When the results fall far short of expectations, new programs are demanded and more government spending is initiated. When social and economic conditions grow even worse, the disappointments breed more radicalism, cynicism, nihilism, and above all, bitter social and economic conflict. And all along, the enormous increase in government spending causes an enormous increase of taxes, chronic budget deficits and rampant inflation."

Europe to U.S.: You messed up the rescue, too - Oct. 13, 2008

Money.CNN.com:

"First you mess up the world's financial system. Then you blow the rescue of it. Now let's show you how to do it properly.

That, in a nutshell, is the less-than-flattering message European governments are sending to the U.S. as they mount their own gigantic bank bailout. The plans, announced Monday after two weeks of dithering, involve Britain, Germany, France and some others recapitalizing national banks that require help, and providing state guarantees and other measures to kick-start the stalled credit market. The details are strikingly different from the U.S. approach adopted by U.S. Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and the Federal Reserve Board. And there's a big reason for that: The Europeans think Paulson got it badly wrong, and have watched aghast as he failed to restore confidence in the world's financial system.

In particular, they now think - and are openly saying - that it was a huge mistake to allow Lehman Brothers to fail. But they also believe that the $700 billion bailout plan was badly misdirected. Rather than buying up toxic assets, as the Paulson plan initially intended, they believe the role of government intervention should be to recapitalize the banks directly in exchange for some control of operations."

Think Your Doctor Knows Best? Think Medical Science is on Your Side? Think again! -- Meditations on Meaning

"In the United States, cash is king and health care is more about economics than about health. 40% of the 17,800 lobbyists in Washington support health care agendas. And the health care agenda is concerned with one thing: more profits. And though there’s nothing wrong with profits, the fact is that focusing on the bottom line oftentimes interferes with saving lives...

...The reason the US has a lower life expectancy than Guam or Puerto Rico is because our lifestyles are the biggest determinant of our health and longevity… yet we continue to pretend that they’re unimportant. Doctors treat the health complications of obesity… rather than pushing for us to adjust our lifestyles and get more active. They treat the health complications of aspartame, rather than pushing us to eliminate Diet Coke from our diets."

Does Religion Make People Nicer?: Only if they think Sky Big Brother is watching - Reason Magazine

"In small hunter-gatherer bands or subsistence farming villages, it's pretty easy to keep track of just how cooperative your neighbors are. But when groups grow to encompass thousands and eventually millions of strangers, a Big-Brother-in-the-Sky can watch how your fellow citizens behave when you can't. And even better, Sky Big Brother can punish them with eternal damnation if they swindle you. One big downside is that groups have different Sky Big Brothers, which means that 'the same mechanisms involved in ingroup altruism may also facilitate outgroup antagonism.' In other words, kill the infidels!"

18 Ideas to Reform Health Care Now | Healthy Habits | Reader's Digest

No quick fixes, here: Steady, practical, focused methods with the Internet as a major factor in the solutions.

UPDATE: 12 Newspapers Endorse Obama Today

Editor & Publisher

Yes, newspapers don't mean as much as they used to. Yes, endorsements aren't votes. But think about this: What other companies come out and state their voting choices in so public a manner?

No Lie Too Brazen For McCain-Palin Campaign

Rick Davis: The last 8 years encapsulated - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com

"McCain campaign manager Rick Davis on Fox News this morning, when asked by Chris Wallace about the Troopergate report issued on Friday:

The reality is there was absolutely no wrongdoing found in the report — 1,000 pages — an enormous waste of time — and the best they could come up with was: no violations of any kinds of laws or ethics rules."

From Page 8 of the Report (download here):

For the reasons explained in section IV of this report, I find that Governor Sarah Palin abused her power by violating Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act. (Emphasis added.)

Lies, lies and lies. Republican values, obviously.

Bank savers run at the click of a mouse | Technology | Reuters

Withdrawals of thousands of dollars by thousands of people via electronic banking. The financial crisis hits home...and hearth.

Why I'd Be a Better VP than Sarah Palin

The Nation:

"Governor Palin was the mayor of a real town of 5,000 people. I have never been mayor of anything, but I have performed for crowds bigger than the population of Wasilla, Alaska, and I can tell you it's no picnic getting the monitors just right, working with cranky and egotistical musicians, changing clothes in dirty dressing rooms and eating bad backstage food, handling the hecklers and technical problems during a show, and then getting on the bus to go somewhere else and do it all over again the next night. Also, my last record sold about the population of Wasilla times forty, and they all seemed to like it."

Funny as hell!

On Outsourcing, the Economy and the United States | VirtualWayfarer.com | A Place For Intellectual Musings

"Unlike China, Japan, India, Mexico or any other foreign nation, the US is not truly an independent currency. As the de-facto world currency, the US dollar is the central quay to which all of the world’s other currencies are tied. When we began artificially deflating our currency we began destabilizing the world economy. Instead of offering a quay that the world economies could tie to, we quickly became a lead weight pulling them down. We can’t have it both ways. We can’t be the world’s economic super power/global currency of choice AND at the same time be de-valuing our dollar to drive up exports. This process began destabilizing the world economies and has, in my opinion, resulted in a lot of the credit and economic issues we’re currently facing. It also helps explain why the US is suffering, but stock markets around the world are in equally - if not worse - shape." (Emphasis Mine.)

The BRAD BLOG : GOP Withdraws 6,000 Bogus Voter Challenges in Montana

Some 6,000 votes "saved" in a state that has the overall impact on the presidental election of the average bowling league. "Save" 6,000 here, lose 6,000,000 overall. Watch closely.

Oxdown Gazette--Failure to Draw Boundaries: WHY ETHICS MATTERS

"Most professions offer some training in ethics. But an ethics code, no matter how detailed, is no substitute for extensive training in ethical decision-making. And many people who enter politics may stumble seriously for lack of sensitivity to ethics. Awareness of boundaries and the ability to draw firm boundaries goes a long way toward protecting oneself from ethical lapses. I doubt politicians get any training in that. And then we’re just left with the person’s own ethical understanding. That, to my mind, is exactly why character and temperament are so important in picking leaders."

McCain-Palin: First Presidential Ticket with Both Candidates Guilty of Ethics Violations

The Washington Monthly

"Proud to be an American!" Yee-haw!!

Is Posse Comitatus Dead? | AlterNet

Active Army troops stationed on U.S. soil violates Posse Comitatus, a central tenet of citizen rights. The orders are suspiciously vague, and given the hyena cabal's track record, ominously vague.

How to Financially Educate Your Children | Wise Bread

A great idea, especially now. It's never too early or too late to do this: Start now.

What the Troopergate Report Really Says -- Printout -- TIME

"But the Branchflower report still makes for good reading, if only because it convincingly answers a question nobody had even thought to ask: Is the Palin administration shockingly amateurish? Yes, it is. Disturbingly so."

Legislative Panel - Palin Abused Authority - NYTimes.com

"Sarah Palin unlawfully abused her power as governor by trying to have her former brother-in-law fired as a state trooper, the chief investigator of an Alaska legislative panel concluded Friday. The politically charged inquiry imperiled her reputation as a reformer on John McCain's Republican ticket."

The perfect Republican bitch. 

Here's more.

Ben Smith's Blog: McCain calls Obama 'decent person,' is booed - Politico.com

Civility is not McCain's strong suit, but--believably--it is even weaker in his partisans.

America the Banana Republic: Politics & Power: vanityfair.com

"What are the main principles of a banana republic? A very salient one might be that it has a paper currency which is an international laughingstock: a definition that would immediately qualify today’s United States of America. We may snicker at the thriller from Wasilla, who got her first passport only last year, yet millions of once well-traveled Americans are now forced to ask if they can afford even the simplest overseas trip when their folding money is apparently issued by the Boardwalk press of Atlantic City. But still, the chief principle of banana-ism is that of kleptocracy, whereby those in positions of influence use their time in office to maximize their own gains, always ensuring that any shortfall is made up by those unfortunates whose daily life involves earning money rather than making it. At all costs, therefore, the one principle that must not operate is the principle of accountability."

US culture derails girl math whizzes

Physorg.com:

"In a report published today (Oct. 10) in the 'Notices of the American Mathematical Society', a comprehensive analysis of decades of data on students identified as having profound ability in math describes a culturally constricted pipeline that puts American leadership in the mathematical sciences and related fields at risk.

According to the report, many girls with extremely high aptitude for math exist, but they are rarely identified in the U.S. because they veer from a career trajectory in the mathematical sciences due to the low respect American culture places on math, systemic flaws in the U.S. public school education system, and a lack of role models."

Demise of a Country

The Automatic Earth: Debt Rattle, October 8 2008: The Last Bank

The parallels with the U.S. situation are not exactly similar, but where Iceland can declare "bankruptcy" and start anew, the U.S is forced--by sheer size and economic importance--to tax its citizens to keep the country going. 

Open Left:: The Hate Machine & The Lynch Mob

"Hilariously, Lorwy called the Keating Five affair 'old news' while simultaneously asserting that Ayres crimes from 40 years ago when Barack Obama was 8 years old is somehow 'new.'

Without going into the laugh-out-loud joke that is Rich Lowry (you could write a book on that mindless dolt), what we are watching more generally is an attempt to turn the Republican base into a 21st century lynch mob. Whether it's using Obama's middle name to imply he's a Muslim, or McCain and Palin saying nothing when a frothing crowd screams 'kill him!' or 'terrorist' in reference to the Illinois senator, the right is doing everything it can to stir up a violent mob. And it's working."

Land of the freak, home of the craven; welcome to the hyena cabal nation. Here's your most recent poster child.

Sarah Palin's IQ? SAT Scores? Idiot.

Clapboard › News (download PDF)

Palin's IQ tested out at 83, where the "normal" range begins at 85. Her GPA in high school? 2.2 on a scale of 4.0.  Her SAT scores? She ranks in the bottom 40 percentile (28 in Reading) and her total SAT score was 841 on both Verbal and Math. (That's commuity college level; cheap community college level.)

IQ tests and achievement tests don't measure much, but they do provide an overall picture of a person's capacity for learning. Toss in 5 colleges in 6 years and you have the portrait of someone who can't work with a system, can't learn on her own and has the intellectual resources of a bale of hay. In other words, the female Bush. Dubya, of course.

A conclusion supported by the news history on Palin's positions and actions that make up the bulk of this report.

Dow plunges 679 to fall to lowest level in 5 years: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance

The Dow Jones becomes the Down Jones...

More drop-off background info here.

The recent--downward--trend.

Let's get Clinton into the picture as well...

And now We're screwed to the max: The murderous moron will face-fart--uh, "assure"--the nation tonight.

Anthrax-Treating Medicine on Emergency Notice

Pharmcast.com

You know, Executive Orders, Army units posted within the borders, threats of martial law, an election slipping away from hyena cabal hands (or is it?) and now an anthrax-related alert? Conspiray theorists must be orgasmic...

What I Learned From Bush? sign

BestPicEver.com

Isaiah 11:6: "...and a little child will lead them."

Fed gives AIG $37.8 billion loan - Oct. 8, 2008

Money.CNN.com

Didn't AIG get $85 billion already? And aren't they a receiving party in the economic screwing known as the bailout? 

New US Intelligence Report Warns 'Victory' Not Certain in Iraq | CommonDreams.org

How can a victory be achieved when the invaded country is thousands of miles away, has fundamental religious and cultural differences, sits atop a vital and volatile economic resource that sits buried beneath the largest region of continuous sectarian violence over the past 1,000 years?

There is no "victory" there. You cannot control that country unless you subjugate it through political and economic might, most of it at the end of a bayonet. That's not an option. You could destroy the country and control the rubble and remnants. That's not an option (or maybe it is; the hyena cabal is certainly pro-bombs.) Or you could somehow brainwash them to think like Us. That's not an option, either.

"Victory" under these conditions means We get out with as few more losses as possible. In gambler's parlance, to stop throwing good money after bad. And that starts by throwing out the bad leaders who sent good people to their unnecessary deaths. 

Seeing the Forest: First Bailout Results Known

A $8 millon "loan" to Republicans? Really? Who'da thunk it?

FEMA sources confirm coming martial law

Alex Jones' Infowars: There's a war on for your mind!:

Uh-huh... Hyenas growling in the midst of it. Here's more: Congress Was Threatened With Martial Law If The Bailout Was Not Passed

National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive 51

White House.gov:

"[2](b) 'Catastrophic Emergency' means any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions;"

(d) "Continuity of Operations," or "COOP," means an effort within individual executive departments and agencies to ensure that Primary Mission-Essential Functions continue to be performed during a wide range of emergencies, including localized acts of nature, accidents, and technological or attack-related emergencies;

(f) "Executive Departments and Agencies" means the executive departments enumerated in 5 U.S.C. 101, independent establishments as defined by 5 U.S.C. 104(1), Government corporations as defined by 5 U.S.C. 103(1), and the United States Postal Service; 

(g) "Government Functions" means the collective functions of the heads of executive departments and agencies as defined by statute, regulation, presidential direction, or other legal authority, and the functions of the legislative and judicial branches; 

(h) "National Essential Functions," or "NEFs," means that subset of Government Functions that are necessary to lead and sustain the Nation during a catastrophic emergency and that, therefore, must be supported through COOP and COG capabilities; and 

(i) "Primary Mission Essential Functions," or "PMEFs," means those Government Functions that must be performed in order to support or implement the performance of NEFs before, during, and in the aftermath of an emergency.

Elections, even national presidential elections, are not considered a "Primary Mission Essential Function", a "National Essential Function" or a "Goverment Function" for the purposes of "Continuity of Operations."

And who makes the call on this "Freeze the power" decision that includes [5](g): "Protecting and stabilizing the Nation's economy and ensuring public confidence in its financial systems"?

Say hello to mah li'l frien': [12] In order to provide a coordinated response to escalating threat levels or actual emergencies, the Continuity of Government Readiness Conditions (COGCON) system establishes executive branch continuity program readiness levels, focusing on possible threats to the National Capital Region. The President will determine and issue the COGCON Level.

KY Jelly, anyone?

MotherJones Blog: Why AIG Went Down

"And even AIG's own employees warned the company that it had no way of knowing how much risk it was exposed to. In a letter (PDF) to the committee, Joseph St. Denis, the firm's former vice president for accounting policy in AIG's Financial Products division, accused AIG executives of stymieing his attempts to make sure the company was properly reporting the liabilities stemming from its involvement in risky financial products, including the $62 billion credit derivative swap (CDS) market. St. Denis, who worked as a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) enforcement official before joining AIG, said Joseph Cassano, the head of the division, 'took actions that I believed were intended to prevent me from performing the job duties for which I was hired.'"

We saw the same pattern with Enron and WorldNet. Greed seems pervasive.

Celebrating Women’s History: 100 Amazing Libraries and Collections on the Web | eLearning Gurus

I'm the guy who in a feminist-led college English literature course, when told there was an upcoming course on "Women Writers" taught by said feminist, piped up to ask "That's a one-hour seminar, right?"

During the first week of class, no less.

True, literature and history are dominated (certainly in amount of information) by men. But I have long wondered, even before My nervy quip, how much further We could have gone--and could go--if women were offered the same breadth of action men have.

Here's several weeks' worth of information to explore the contribution women have made in every field. One hour won't do.

(I got an "A" in the feminist's course. She asked Me to never take another one of her classes.)

Iraq Benchmark Report Card: One Year After the Surge

American Progress.org:

"Total Benchmarks: 3 of 18 Accomplished

On the one year anniversary of President Bush’s State of the Union address justifying his 'New Way Forward' in Iraq, it is clear that the surge has failed to meet its objectives. One year ago, the president pledged that “America will hold the Iraqi government to the benchmarks it has announced.' Despite the fact that the Iraqi government has only met three of the 18 benchmarks laid out last year, an end to U.S. military and financial commitment is nowhere in sight."

Q&A: E-voting security results 'awful,' says Ohio secretary of state

ComputerWorld.com:

"Ohio officials discovered in March that some voting systems manufactured by Premier Elections Solutions Inc., a subsidiary of Diebold Inc., dropped votes as they were being uploaded to a main server. Because the problem is in the tabulator system, it affects votes cast on both Diebold's direct recording electronic (DRE) systems, which are usually touch screen, and paper ballot optical-scan systems. The same central tabulators will be used in more than 30 states next month."

More here, about a computer programmer with sworn testimony blatantly ignored.

Okay, let's add to this to the nauseating broth: University Students Demonstrate Just How Easy it is to Rig an Election.

It's not a matter of "if," or even "how," but "how far."

The party's over for Iceland, the island that tried to buy the world | World news | The Observer

"The nation's celebrated rags-to-riches story began in the Nineties when free market reforms, fish quota cash and a stock market based on stable pension funds allowed Icelandic entrepreneurs to go out and sweep up international credit. Britain and Denmark were favourite shopping haunts, and in 2004 alone Icelanders spent 894m pounds on shares in British companies. In just five years, the average Icelandic family saw its wealth increase by 45 per cent.

But, as a result of the international banking crisis, the billionaires who own everything from West Ham United football club to the Somerfield supermarket chain, Hamleys toy shops and the House of Fraser, are in trouble and the country is drowning in debt."

Hmm, except for some odd examples, Iceland could be, well, you know, the U.S. of part o A., right?

Opinion: New Obama Ad - The American Promise: The New Cult of Change in the Country of Fear | Ad Savvy

"Undoubtedly, we’ve had a very real creeping badness growing in the US over the past 8 years. We have an endless war on terror and constant fear of terrorists and even of our own government. I don’t want to get blown up, or snatched away to some far off dentention center for reading a book on the danger list. The world has changed, and people are hopeless in the face of this insanity. They need some sort of empowering message, something to make them feel good about their government, to make them think their government is finally on their side. Obama, the brilliant politician and marketing genius, has capitalized on that, without offering a single tangible, workable, political solution. The thing is, government is never on your side, and you should never feel good about it. Anyone telling you otherwise is just covering your eyes to the thievery and corruption that goes hand-in-hand with all government. Don’t fall for it, you’re smarter than that, you’re better than that."

Insecure Minds Wired for Pattern-Finding : Discovery News

"It turns out that the less control a person feels, the more likely they are to see patterns or make connections that don't exist."

Conspiracy theorists, anyone?

Will US Troops Be Deployed Against American Citizens?

Contrarian Profits:

"What possible rationale could there be for permanently deploying the U.S. Army inside the United States? One has to assume they would be used for such things as “crowd control,” other traditional law enforcement functions, and a seemingly unlimited array of other uses at the President’s sole discretion. What good could this serve the American people?

Perhaps they will be deployed to assure that the pending elections (or any Florida recounts) will be orderly. Or maybe they will be sent to Capitol Hill to convince a congressional majority that Wall Street deserves a US$700 billion bailout."

OpEdNews - America: Superpower or Super Stupid?

I vote "B"...

TED Spread | Perceived U.S. Credit Risk

Fool.com

"When the economy is strong, the TED spread is quite low. But when the economy weakens in systemic ways, it can skyrocket as banks choose to sock their assets away in Treasuries rather than take a chance that another bank will default. Call the TED spread an indicator of the risk of an economic heart attack.

Historically, the TED Spread has been around 0.5%. Just prior to the past two recessions, 2001-2002 and 1990-1991, the spread exploded to around 1.25%.

When the Paulson financial recapitalization plan failed to pass the House of Representatives yesterday, the TED spread shot up to an all time high of 3.5%. If the economy were a medical drama, doctors would be running around shouting 'Push 500mls of (insert drug name here), stat!'"

Dare I believe Obama can win? - Yahoo! News

"It is not his inevitable fall from grace that I fear. It is the possibility that on Nov. 4, I will find out that my acute craving for a kind and complex leader is not shared by the majority of Americans. That conclusion to this breathtaking story would tempt me, not just to be alienated from American politics, but from the American people. I fear that the worst part of me would bully the best part with cruel words: 'I told you so. Hope is dangerous and naive.'"

Bush and Congress Together Have Run Out the Clock on the Pretense of Attempted Congressional Oversight | AfterDowningStreet.org

Lip service to "proper procedure" and "obeying the law," while constantly looking for and creating exceptions that lead to just outright breaking the law, well, there's a word for that. Actually, two, at this level. One's fascism. The other's treason.

Take your pick.

Best Quote of My Year

Fukung.net

Cracked. Me. Up!

Another Frightening Show About the Economy

This American Life

Following The Giant Pool of Money, also highlighted in Jenius Jots, comes a show that actually deserves a sensationalist title. Look, sometimes the sky is falling, but forewarned is forearmed. In other words, listen to this and be prepared.

Ancient Peru pyramid spotted by satellite - Discovery.com- msnbc.com

There's so much out there We don't know, so much to discover. All We have to do is change Our tunnel-vision from the tons of crap the media throws at Us and rediscover the deep joy of learning something new.

Conservative Publication 'The Record' Endorses Obama - Whisper Dispatch

After 72 years of endorsing Republicans, the very basis for establishing the publication in the first place, means that "The Record" is totally fed up with the murderous moron, the hyena cabal and the decrepit adulterous mummy partnered with the brainless adulterous mommy. 

New surveillance program will turn military satellites on US

ArsTechnica.com:

"An appropriations bill signed by President Bush last week allows the controversial National Applications Office to begin operating a stringently limited version of a program that would turn military spy satellites on the US, sharing imagery with other federal, state, and local government agencies. The government's own watchdog agency, the Government Accountability Office, has warned in an unpublished report that the more expansive program in the offing lacks adequate safeguards to protect privacy and civil liberties."

What is the purpose--which can only be fraudulent--for this idiocy? Military satellites to watch American citizens? Looking for what? 

Jackbooted thugs marching into Our streets, peering into Our homes. Literally.

Get Ready For A Unionized America - HUMAN EVENTS

"What’s so bad about the “Employee Free Choice Act”? The name is positively Orwellian: instead of preserving workers’ ability to make the decision to unionize by secret ballot, it does just the opposite. The bill makes it much easier to create a union at a business -- the union bosses can publicly pressure a majority of workers to sign union authorization cards (thus, the name “card check”). There is no secret ballot -- workers sign the cards in front of other employees and union leaders, and union officials keep the signed cards until they obtain the required number. Under the watchful eyes (and arm twisting) of union organizers, workers will be intimidated into signing."

Obama supports this; the murderous moron threatened to veto it. "Workers' rights" taken to an extreme misleads Obama (he is wrong on this issue) and scares the murderous moron (who ir wrong on most everything.)

5 Presidential Elections Even Dumber Than This One (Somehow) | Cracked.com

Seems to Me that with "The Daily Show," "The Colbert Report," Letterman, Leno and now Cracked, it's the realm of comedy that places Our semi-fubar world into perspective better than any other "serious" source.

Laughing in the chaos: Whistling in the graveyard?

Scoop: Exclusive Interview With Former Diebold Contractor

Let's stop pretending the murderous moron won in 2000 and 2004. He didn't. He--his hyena cabal--stole both elections. 

Sounds extreme? The evidence is, too.

Don't charge teachers for having sex with pupils, it's just an error of judgement, says union leader | Mail Online

This is why unions--especially in edcuation--should be banned.

Fascism: The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics | Library of Economics and Liberty

"Where socialism sought totalitarian control of a society’s economic processes through direct state operation of the means of production, fascism sought that control indirectly, through domination of nominally private owners. Where socialism nationalized property explicitly, fascism did so implicitly, by requiring owners to use their property in the “national interest”—that is, as the autocratic authority conceived it."

Bailout, anyone? 

Rescue law 101: What it says - Oct. 3, 2008

money.cnn.com:

"The Congressional Budget Office said it cannot estimate the net budget effects of the troubled asset program because of the many unknowns about that piece of the bill. However, the agency noted in a letter to lawmakers on Wednesday, it expects the program 'would entail some net budget cost' but that it would be 'substantially smaller than $700 billion.'

Overall, the CBO said, 'the bill as a whole would increase the budget deficit over the next decade.'"

Woo. And hoo. 

Below The Beltway--Blog Archive--George W. Bush’s Legacy: A $ 10 Trillion National Debt

The largest debt increase in history. There's a legacy for an idiot.

'Old-boys club' holding back innovation (ABC News in Science)

ABC News in Science

Not a new story, in fact, a very old story. (Puns are wild today...) But it doesn't change the fact that it needs to become a different story soon...

The Money Meltdown

Nice place to get a handle on what's happening and what will happen in the future. Ten solid resources with a wealth--ahem--of information.

Sarah Palin delivers an adequate performance against Joe Biden in the vice-presidential debate | Palin stops the bleeding, just | The Economist

"The good news for the McCain campaign is that Mrs Palin was confident and assertive, and made no big errors. The bad news is that a mediocre performance counts as good news. But they will take what they can get at this point.

The McCain campaign had lobbied for a constricted debate format: two-minute questions, without long freewheeling exchanges. This worked well for Mrs Palin. It seemed that she had memorised some talking points and was determined not to deviate from them."

cbs2.com - Revised $700 Billion Financial Bailout Rescue Plan Heads To House After Passing Senate

"The core of the plan remains little changed from its conception - the Treasury Department would have $700 billion at its disposal to purchase bad mortgage-related securities that are weighing down the balance sheets of institutions that hold them. The flow of credit has slowed, in some cases drying up, threatening the ability of businesses to conduct routine operations or expand.

At the same time, lawmakers have dramatically changed the measure, insisting on greater congressional supervision over the $700 billion, taking measures to protect taxpayers, and insisting on steps to crack down on so-called 'golden parachutes' that go to corporate executives whose companies fail."

Harness Energy At Home With FLOW Solar-Wind Power System | Device Daily

I get the feeling that if We really wanted to, We could basically solve the energy crisis in about a decade. And by "wanted to," I mean "Work around established interests."

The Real Great Depression - ChronicleReview.com

Let's take a look at history and you know what? It's happening again...

8 Reasons Why the Bailout Bill Will Fail

Contrarian Profits

Motorsports Racetrack Property Aid? Puerto Rico Rum Taxes? In the Economic Rescue Bill?

ABC News

Did anyone in the local sheep herd of a media pick up on this? I bet not.

Bush's sad finale | Reaping the whirlwind | The Economist

"The dismal handling of the financial crisis over the past fortnight is not only a comment on Mr Bush’s personal shortcomings as a leader. It is a comment on the failure of his leadership style over the past eight years.

The convenient excuse for Mr Bush’s performance is that he is at the fag-end of his presidency. Public attention has shifted to the presidential candidates, and the members of the House face the electorate in a month. But this rings hollow: there is nothing about the political cycle that dictates that an outgoing president should have an approval rating of 27% and an army of enemies on Capitol Hill."

AFP: US Senate passes financial bailout, but markets still gloomy

AFP: US Senate passes financial bailout, but markets still gloomy

And Senate Passes Bailout

Another take: U.S. Senate Approves $700 Billion Financial-Rescue

Notice they don't call it a "bailout"...

Analysis: A vote with unforeseen consequences?

Here's why.

The Associated Press: Prosecutor named to probe US attorneys' firings

This won't advance  a freaking inch until the hyena cabal is drop-kicked out of D.C.

The Price of Disgust - Freakonomics - Opinion - New York Times Blog

The Price of Disgust - Freakonomics - Opinion - New York Times Blog

Time is asking the question directly: Why Aren't Americans Buying the Bailout?

Direct answer: Because We're not 100% stupid.

Pelamis 'wave-snakes' inaugurated as part of world's first commercial-scale wave power station in Portugal | Environment | guardian.co.uk

The ocean and the sun, the two sources of power We can tap into for great strides in energy production potential.

Senate to vote on rescue plan Wednesday - Sep. 30, 2008

CNNMoney.com

They're going to keep trying to screw Us until they skewer Our collective butts. 

How journalism failed America at a most critical time | Howard Owens

"Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist David Cay Johnston put it this way:

Journalists, and specially Washington journalists, are generally behaving like lapdogs and generally only asking detail questions around the central premise. This should concern us all. This is the same kind of behavior that we saw during the run up to the War in Iraq, when there was no shortage of critical facts and skeptical sources, but only the usual stalwarts in journalism reported skeptically."