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DEL.ICIO.USTaxes, insurance, honorable officials
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Thinking Right’s weekend free-for-all. Pick a topic:
• Taxpayer champions? They don’t get any better than U.S. Sens. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and Jim DeMint of South Carolina. Despite alienating colleagues in both parties, the two have persisted in their campaign to end pork-barrel politics — the so-called earmarks that got us the Bridge to Nowhere. All three presidential candidates have come around. Maybe. Clinton and Obama have signed on to a one-year moratorium, though they were defenders until recently.
• France’s last World War I veteran, Lazare Ponticelli, died this week at 110. It should be noted that only one World War II veteran remains in the Georgia General Assembly, the able and hardworking John P. Yates of Griffin. A first-class guy, he chairs the Defense and Veterans Affairs Committee.
• Another class act who served our nation in World War II, former Atlanta resident and Delta pilot Joseph H. Moss, made the largest individual donation ever to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, $25 million. His interest started with a story he read in the AJC about a little Mexican boy who needed a kidney transplant — a transplant he helped finance.
• Insurance Commissioner John Oxendine is outraged that the General Assembly has approved legislation allowing auto insurance companies to raise rates on everything except required minimum coverage without his approval. While he understandably objects to the loss of power to be the rate czar, he should cheer the state’s willingness to let the free market work. It’s the right policy. When consumers have access to information — and they do — competition works.
• The General Assembly should not vote out a proposed regional transportation sales tax that allows voters in one county to impose a tax on a neighboring county whose voters reject it. Too, voters should know the specific projects their money will be spent on when they go to the polls.
• Things just happen. Bishop Thomas W. Weeks explains how his wife, the Rev. Juanita Bynum, came to be on the ground with a man’s foot making rapid contact with her body: “I did push her and subsequently other things took place.” Lesson learned? “No matter how much you feel you are right in a push, it’s unjust according to the law.” Interpreter, please. Is that the same as saying that a technicality in the darn law won’t let you smack ‘em when they deserve it?
• Hillary Clinton is of two views about Barack Obama. One is that he’s inexperienced, naive, all talk and unworthy of being president. The other is that he’s an inspired choice to be VP.
• Words of regret for all in public office who fritter away their opportunities to make a difference: “I look at my time as governor with a sense of what might have been,” said Eliot Spitzer in resigning as governor of New York.
• The military commander for the Middle East, Adm. William J. Fallon, announced his resignation — and properly so — after a magazine article portrayed him as opposed to the commander in chief’s policy on Iran. Esquire described him as the lone voice against military action to stop Iran’s nuclear program. Retired admirals and generals can disagree publicly on possible military action. Fallon chose the honorable course. He’s retiring March 31. As with the U.S. attorneys, the president’s critics in and out of Congress find scandal where none exists in personnel changes.
• House Democrats rebound — joining in bipartisan agreement to reduce the yearly tax on cars, trucks and motorcycles used as personal vehicles to $10, a sum to be spent on a statewide trauma network. The vote was 166-5. The proposed constitutional amendment goes now to the Senate and, with its approval, to voters. More good news: A bill imposing a $1 tax on telephone and wireless service died this week. I hate these hidden taxes disguised as “fees.” Quit.
• The Georgia Senate passed a resolution to name the I-95/I-16 interchange near Savannah in honor of Justice Clarence Thomas. Insufficient. Name the state’s judicial building for him. Or Thomas County.
Permalink | Comments (85) | Post your comment | Categories: Column
Comments
By TW
March 14, 2008 8:07 AM | Link to this
Dollar at new low…
Gold over $1000…
Oil insane…
Iraq a quagmire, at best…
No link to al qaeda (Pentagon)…
Just in time for ‘w’ to wave his Toys R Us cowboy hat and ride off into the sunset – smoking a cigarette, no doubt.
At least Spitzer’s w******* got paid.
By Jim's a Cherry Picker
March 14, 2008 8:22 AM | Link to this
Hi Jim,
How about something on Sonny’s nanny state:
“Six days is plenty” to allow liquor sales in Georgia, the governor said. “We need a little relief on Sunday.”
Vive la big government!
Sure am glad he knows what’s best for me.
By Charles
March 14, 2008 8:27 AM | Link to this
• Hillary Clinton is of two views about Barack Obama. One is that he’s inexperienced, naive, all talk and unworthy of being president. The other is that he’s an inspired choice to be VP.
I see no contradiction in Hillary Clinton’s two views about Barack Obama. Barack Obama is inexperienced, naive, all talk and unworthy of being president. On the contrary, an American like General Colin Powell is experienced, ingenious, and worthy of being president.
Barack Obama is an inspired choice to be vice-president as was vice-president Dan Quayle.
By coverup
March 14, 2008 8:27 AM | Link to this
You gotta be kidding me. The lead story across the country is this: http://www.abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=4443788&page=1 and there is NO MENTION of it anywhere on ajc.com. What a bunch of liars this publication is.
By ron
March 14, 2008 8:28 AM | Link to this
Good morning Jim,Good topics this a.m. I believe that the president of each administraton is the largest pork spender.It’s just called something nicer.
I read the part about the transportation tax.I’m not going to reread it.Ther’s some snse of unease there on my part,but I’m not going there again.
T.Weeks,The Bish,probably deserves to be flogged,but won’t be.
You have to admire anyone that would offer the Vice-Presidency to Obama at this point,you really do.
Eliot,The soon to be ex,is lamenting about what might have been and the rest of us are debating his sanity.
Fallon couldn’t get a battleship into Baghdad so he quit.That’s simple enough.
I can halt my policy of buying a car just after my birthday and selling it just before.Pay my $10 and shut up.Next year the fee will be $100 and the following year it will be $1000,but enjoy this year.
Finally,I thought all them clarence sales them department stores is always having was named after Clarence Thomas.I know Redneck Convert told me that.
By JK
March 14, 2008 8:39 AM | Link to this
..he should cheer the state’s willingness to let the free market work.
You mean like deregulating the natural gas industry worked for the people of Georgia to give us better service and lower prices? Like that?
By jbmlaw
March 14, 2008 8:53 AM | Link to this
Good morning all. I am a fan of Coburn and DeMint, as are all right thinking souls (conservatives, not necessarily republicans.) All of the blogs have DeMint on the short list of VP nominees for McCain; he could certainly do worse. And that may send a useful message to Congress in the McCain administration.
Saw a note a week ago that President Bush met with America’s last surviving WW1 veteran, caused me to remember my paternal grandfather’s stories of his time in the army. That European adventure was the only time he ventured more than 100 miles from home.
Commissioner Oxendine may be a fine fellow personally, but I laughed out loud when I heard him crying about losing his life and death power over insurance companies. He’s just a typical bureaucrat. Probably be tougher to raise campaign contributions without the automatic industry bribes.
On the regional transportation authorities, I think the tax opt-in, opt-out ought to be at the precinct level. My idea is probably unworkable, but that is how a just world would work.
It’s a class issue. “Bishop” Weeks ought to take a lesson from ex-Gov. Horndog. To give Spitzer the minimal credit he is due, he humbly resigned. Spitzer, for all his flaws, has class at his core. Weeks does not.
From now through the end of Holy Week I will refrain from disparaging Hussein and Hildebeest. After this. Time to get right with God, and that means cleansing my heart. Eschewing the cheap jokes.
Good article on the institutional tensions between Admiral Fallon and General Petraeus in yesterday’s WSJ. No bad faith on either side. Petraeus wants to win this war. Fallon wants to be ready for the next one, and, perhaps correctly, believes we are not militarily ready to destroy Iran. We should do what we need to do, regardless.
Glad to see our dysfunctional legislature come together on a notable tax reduction. If only the national socialists were so visionary at a time of an elevating risk of recession. I would favor economic re-education for congressional democrats, since they clearly have no clue. (There’s a communism joke in there for those who remember communism.)
I am an admirer of Justice Thomas – perhaps the most intellectually organized and consistent member of the Supreme Court – but I don’t think any public-anything ought to be named after anyone whose principal service has been with government.
Special note to Glenn, I’m pro bono for your worthy project, but I cannot possible produce something before April 6, even with your close guidance. (And frankly I don’t have your vision – you’ll have to spell out your laser shot.) Do you know what is the time constraint?
By songbird
March 14, 2008 9:20 AM | Link to this
Purdue took it a step further on 11-Alive News last night and equated allowing the people of GA to vote on Sunday alcohol sales to allowing us to vote on legalizing prostitution. Just when I thought he couldn’t make himself look a bigger fool after the praying for rain thing, oops, I was wrong.
By Copyleft
March 14, 2008 9:35 AM | Link to this
Ahhh, the magical “Free Market” which we should all bow to and serve without question.
Terrible ideas just keep coming back to life on Wooten’s forum, don’t they?
By coverup
March 14, 2008 9:38 AM | Link to this
The story isn’t the big problem here. The big problem is that this has become a national news story, but our local paper refuses to acknowledge it because they have officially endorsed one of the candidates. The press getting involved in political movements is completely unethical. How can I depend on getting the truth when the people giving me my information have officially signed on as a puppet to one of the parties involved?
By GayGrayGeek
March 14, 2008 9:38 AM | Link to this
Purdue seems to have forgotten that he was elected Georgia’s Governor, not Georgia’s Pastor.
By JK
March 14, 2008 9:45 AM | Link to this
Coverup, the people who work in the press is are wh—es, the level of which makes little Kristin (their own photo-spread wh—e of the week) look like a $2, back alley h.j. professional. It’s been a long, long time since we’ve seen any prevalence of objective, substantive reporting in any of these rags or sleaze outlets. They are driven by the agenda of their dollar-hungry corporate CEO’s; the truth and their original purpose be damned.
By Abomi Nation
March 14, 2008 10:03 AM | Link to this
Yesterday state “socialists” Sonny Perdue and Casey Cagle voiced strong opposition to the House Bill that would end the car tax.
Where’s the “A birthday gift to rev up hopes of Democrats” headline?
By Redneck Convert
March 14, 2008 10:07 AM | Link to this
Well, seeing something named after Clarence Thomas is like watching your mother-in-law drive off of the cliff in your new Ford F-450 pickup. He is a godly conservative but he’s also one of Those People. He ought to be kicked off of the Supreme Court for binding a good redneck up like that.
I’m awful glad old Sonny is standing his ground on likker sales on Sunday. This is a Christian state and one of the only three in the country that don’t allow booze to be bought on Sunday. If God wanted you to have booze on Sunday you would of been borned with a likker bottle. I don’t care if more than half of the state wants booze sales on Sunday. People got to realize democracy has limits when it comes to paying respeck to my religion. When it comes down to freedom or God you got to go with God.
Glad to see that bill get going on letting the insurance cos. charge what they want without the insurance commissioner having anything to do with it. We got to have Free Innerprize that will bring all prices down. Course, I’m still waiting for natural gas prices to come down after the Public Service Commission turned it over to Free Innerprize. They’ve went thru the roof since then, but we need to wait a few decades for Free Innerprize to work. It will happen to insurance too. We will probly see lower prices after most of us is dead of old age.
And I’m against any increase in sales tax. I only pay the tax on my truck oncet a year, as kind of a birthday present, but I would be paying a sales tax on Skoal and Red Man and PBR all year round. A poor redneck won’t be able to make it if this kind of stuff keeps up.
Have a good day everybody and tell this Ron to stop mentioning me in the same breath with Clarence Thomas. I got my pride, you know.
By admirably in tune
March 14, 2008 10:08 AM | Link to this
Why dost thou thinkest they call him the gubernatorial goober?
By Matt
March 14, 2008 10:16 AM | Link to this
Free Market?! Free Market?! What about “Free For All” for the insurance companies.
By NSA
March 14, 2008 10:27 AM | Link to this
Hey Dirt Ball, Does this make U feel safer, cause it sure doesn’t do much for me!
FBI Found to Misuse Security Letters 2003-06 Audit Cites Probes of Citizens
By Dan Eggen Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, March 14, 2008; The FBI has increasingly used administrative orders to obtain the personal records of U.S. citizens rather than foreigners implicated in terrorism or counterintelligence investigations, and at least once it relied on such orders to obtain records that a special intelligence-gathering court had deemed protected by the First Amendment, according to two government audits released yesterday.
The episode was outlined in a Justice Department report that concluded the FBI had abused its intelligence-gathering privileges by issuing inadequately documented “national security letters” from 2003 to 2006, after which changes were put in place that the report called sound.
A report a year ago by the Justice Department’s inspector general disclosed that abuses involving national security letters had occurred from 2003 through 2005 and helped provoke the changes. But the report makes it clear that the abuses persisted in 2006 and disclosed that 60 percent of the nearly 50,000 security letters issued that year by the FBI targeted Americans.
Because U.S. citizens enjoy constitutional protections against unreasonable searches and seizures, judicial warrants are ordinarily required for government surveillance. But national security letters are approved only by FBI officials and are not subject to judicial approval; they routinely demand certain types of personal data, such as telephone, e-mail and financial records, while barring the recipient from disclosing that the information was requested or supplied.
According to the findings by Justice Department Inspector General Glenn A. Fine, the FBI tried to work around the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which oversees clandestine spying in the United States, after it twice rejected an FBI request in 2006 to obtain certain records. The court had concluded “the ‘facts’ were too thin” and the “request implicated the target’s First Amendment rights,” the report said.
But the FBI went ahead and got the records anyway by using a national security letter. The FBI’s general counsel, Valerie E. Caproni, told investigators it was appropriate to issue the letters in such cases because she disagreed with the court’s conclusions.
In total, Fine said, the FBI issued almost 200,000 national security letters from 2003 through 2006, and they were used in a third of all FBI national security and computer probes during that time. Fine said his investigators have identified hundreds of possible violations of laws or internal guidelines in the use of the letters, including cases in which FBI agents made improper requests, collected more data than they were allowed to, or did not have proper authorization to proceed with the case.
By WFC
March 14, 2008 10:40 AM | Link to this
Face it… Perdue is a dumb hick supporter of “the big invisible guy in the sky.” Lots of those in Georgia. I bought my JD yesterday. Sonny is a lot easier to stomach after a couple of Black-Jack-on-the-rocks. The end is near… as my Jehovah’s Witnesses friends like to say.
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 10:44 AM | Link to this
Jim Wooten has given us more than enough to consider all weekend. I’ll tackle a few but I’m kinda busy today.
Down with all pork barrel politics.
APPLAUSE for all military veterans.
Pass this one. Wives should be allowed to shoot all sorry husbands.
Obama for what?? Who?? Nawwww….
Head back to sea, Admiral Fallon.
Reduce taxes always.
Ban all phony Rednecks from blogs.
My last few minutes will be spent deciding on the “state dog”, something Jim forgot to mention. My cat says a ‘teacup Chihuahua’ is best because she,(my kitty), can beat that one in a fight anytime.
By Glenn
March 14, 2008 10:51 AM | Link to this
Good morning.
Jim,
In the center of your column is a vortex that brings me ineluctably to this Statement:
“Words of regret for all in public office who fritter away their opportunities to make a difference: ‘I look at my time as governor with a sense of what might have been,’ said Eliot Spitzer in resigning as governor of New York.”
Here is a Statement so vacuous that it ingests not only the rest of your column, but the entire Opinion Section of the DNC-AJC including the Front Page, and even whole counties including Fulton, Dekalb, and large areas of Gwinnett and Cobb. Scientists theorize that, for matter of such low ambient pressure as that of the rest of your column to exert such an extreme and seemingly centripetal force toward this Statement, the pressure gradient required would imply a Statement of such quantum catawumputude as to be capable of annihilating all matters foreign and domestic. At the Statement’s core, then, antimatter: “…for all in public office who fritter away their opportunities to make a difference…”
We find you thus in the Nave of the Church of Scientific Liberalism, Jim, reciting in full canonicals the Breviary of our liberal religion. You can make a difference. The Man didn’t make you write this, Mr. Wooten. The Man didn’t keep you on your knees, muttering these mindless incantations in supplication of remission of the sins of the Earth. Because there is no Man, Mr. Wooten. And there is no Gaia.
Spare us the vacuous libberish, thank you. It makes your whole column suck.
Jbm,
That’s great news. It was stupid of me not to realize that this is the peak season for you. I’ll get a sense of the chronology, and will pass that along. Meantime, when you get a chance, that Grade C- opinion will pop your eyes a bit. The problems with it are beyond tendentious construction or artful misrepresentation, and there is no audacity of nomenclature. It’s just crude and blunt, like a jackboot on your face. No exaggeration, man. The opinion is actually grounded in “willful concealment”. It is entirely unfaithful. It’s turpitude, actually. (Possibly even a matter for the state Judicial Council.)
You’re gonna love it!
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 10:56 AM | Link to this
admirably in tune @10:08
Have you forgotten? Jimmy Carter(D) was THE gubernatorial goober and went on to become President Potato Head. Get your facts straight.
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 11:03 AM | Link to this
Who let the air out of Glenn’s balloon @ 10:51? He is expediently and expeditiously exaggerating.
By Glenn
March 14, 2008 11:17 AM | Link to this
Dusty,
It seemed a lot more fun than saying “Hey Jim, your libberish sucks.”
By deegee
March 14, 2008 11:26 AM | Link to this
“The General Assembly should not vote out a proposed regional transportation sales tax that allows voters in one county to impose a tax on a neighboring county whose voters reject it. Too, voters should know the specific projects their money will be spent on when they go to the polls.”
What is “vote out”? I thought you could vote for or vote against. Is there some nuanced meaning to the expression “vote out” when it comes to voting for taxes? Is JW intentionally parsing words to disguise his support of a regional transportation sales tax that allows taxation without representation? Is he supporting the tax based on the assumption of an informed electorate? Are you kidding me?
By Jackie
March 14, 2008 11:30 AM | Link to this
The Federal Reserve is on the verge of bailing out Bear Sterns because of the credit/sub-prime crisis; the dollar is in the cellar; the economy is in Recession; Dubya told the EPA to allow more pollution into the air, disregarding the law; mid-level military officers are leaving the service in droves; Gen. Petraeus has stated the Iraqi government is not doing enough to meet the requirements set forth prior to the surge, i.e., the surge ain’t working; foreclosures are at a record level; the House Repubs want us to believe that their stunt about having a closed session to work out their lack of clarity about giving immunity to some telecommunications companies, when the need for immunity has not been articulated to them. What a mess the Repubs have heaped upon this country.
By Charles
March 14, 2008 11:39 AM | Link to this
• Hillary Clinton is of two views about Barack Obama. One is that he’s inexperienced, naive, all talk and unworthy of being president. The other is that he’s an inspired choice to be VP.
I see no contradiction in Hillary Clinton’s two views about Barack Obama. Barack Obama is inexperienced, naive, all talk and unworthy of being president. On the contrary, an American like General Colin Powell is experienced, ingenious, and worthy of being president.
Barack Obama is an inspired choice to be vice-president as was vice-president Dan Quayle.
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 11:45 AM | Link to this
Glenn,11:17
Watch it now. You can make a difference!
Jackie @11:30
As usual, the sky is falling.
Really? Well, that Democratic led Congress should have followed through on their promises. You can’t believe a word they say.
By ill bred
March 14, 2008 11:46 AM | Link to this
When millions of retired baby boomers get bored and try to get part time jobs to pass the time, they will find a strange country has evolved right under their noses. That’s when most Americans will realize that it’s too late to stop the annexation of north america by Mexico, which started when that comic built a ten year career with one line, “My name…. Jose Jimanez.”
Lou Dobbs knows.
By Glenn
March 14, 2008 11:56 AM | Link to this
Dig your gallows humor as usual, Charles. That woman is up one day on Mr. Obama and down the next—-and on every aspect of the man, not just his fitness for the one office or the other. The Clintons always have had the one-two tactic down cold, but she’s lost Bill to play Bad Cop, so now she has to play both Good Cop and Bad, and it’s making her really really schitzy, if you ask me.
If there ever was any question as to whether she would continue Bill’s Great Legacy of governing by day-long feeding of quick-turnaround opinion polls, behold her campaign of late. I think the larger meaning a lot of voters will draw from all this in-your-face, amoral Clintonian Opportunism is that her candidacy is not purposeful; which is to say that the more she toots, and whatever she toots, the more she trumpets the stark fact that her only purpose is to gain the Oval Office.
I’m not saying that Obama and McCain are any more purposeful, either. Why DO they want to be President, anyway? And no, I can’t find it on their website positions. Those are positions, not reasons. And I used to write that crap all day long for a living, for years. It never especially mattered to the politicians what the positions were, so long as they had them. I was just the Personal Shopper who outfitted the style-challenged and color-blind with acceptably fashionable policy fads.
Why does she want to climb Everest, Charles? Because it’s there? Because she’d be the first woman to summit? I ain’t sponsoring her multimillion-dollar expendition, thank you. That’s her bliss, not mine.
By deegee
March 14, 2008 11:57 AM | Link to this
ill bred, here’s your blog. Have a blast.
http://www.topix.net/forum/news/immigration
By getalife
March 14, 2008 11:58 AM | Link to this
After a secret session, the House is voting on FISA without corporate amnesty.
Then w spews to stay the course with a failed economy and wars.
Too bad he is too stupid and not man enough to resign in disgrace.
By Apocalypse
March 14, 2008 12:15 PM | Link to this
CLEVELAND - Barack Obama has a solid Senate record in support of Israel.
He sings the praises, too, of Jewish civil rights workers who fought for blacks’ rights in the U.S. And he says he wants to patch up “a historically powerful bond between the African-American and Jewish communities.”
Yet there is unease among some Jewish voters about the Illinois senator and Democratic presidential contender.
Why?
Part of it is a division between blacks and Jews that’s been growing for years, a split that Obama has challenged fellow blacks to confront.
Another element is the praise Obama has received from Black Muslim leader Louis Farrakhan, whose disparaging comments about Judaism are toxic to many voters. Obama’s own pastor has a history of supporting Palestinian causes.
And there are questions about Obama advisers who some U.S. Jews see as less than ardent advocates of Israel.
Finally, there are rumors and outright lies about the candidate that have gained an audience through repetition in e-mails and on Web sites.
Obama is working hard to win over this vocal, powerful and reliably Democratic voting bloc.
Jews have accounted for about 4 percent of Democratic primary voters so far this year, and Clinton has held a 52-46 percent edge over Obama among them, according to exit polls.
On the day of the Mississippi primary this week, Obama took time to call Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni to express condolences over the deadly terrorist attack on a rabbinical seminary in Jerusalem. He also reaffirmed his support for Israel’s right to defend itself and for its commitment to negotiations with Palestinians and underscored the need to stop Iran from supporting terrorism or getting nuclear weapons.
The effort by the candidate and his advisers to calm disquiet among Jewish voters began more than a year ago.
“The Jewish community cannot be taken for granted,” said Rep. Robert Wexler of Florida, one of Obama’s chief surrogates before Jewish audiences. Wexler sent an e-mail last March to supporters urging them not to be swayed by rumors, a message he repeated during a recent forum in Cleveland.
Obama used a speech in January at Martin Luther King Jr.’s church in Atlanta to chastise blacks for latent anti-Semitism. And during a recent debate, Obama alluded to James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, one black and two Jewish civil rights workers murdered in Mississippi in 1964 as they worked together on a campaign to register black voters.
“You know, I would not be sitting here were it not for a whole host of Jewish-Americans who supported the civil rights movement and helped to ensure that justice was served in the South,” Obama said. “And that coalition has frayed over time around a whole host of issues, and part of my task in this process is making sure that those lines of communication and understanding are reopened.”
Still, there remains some “nervousness over Senator Obama” among Jewish voters, said Rabbi Joshua Skoff, who attended a private meeting with Obama in Cleveland last month. “The rumors still have some legs.”
At the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, President Howard Friedman said Obama’s Senate record on Israel has given his critics no reason to doubt him.
But that record is thin. Just a little over three years ago, Obama was a state legislator in Illinois.
“Right now, Obama’s big problem with the Jewish community is similar to his problem with other communities: He’s just not clearly defined among any voter groups,” said Kenneth Wald, director of Center for Jewish Studies at the University of Florida-Gainesville. “The fact he has a name that sounds Muslim and has a Muslim father underlines questions about what we do and what we do not know about him.”
Some critics on the Internet have gone far beyond raising questions.
Contrary to some e-mails, Obama is a Christian, not a Muslim. He took his oath of office on the family Bible, not a Quran.
“There has been a concerted effort, largely out of the conservative Web sites and anonymous e-mails,” says Ira Forman, executive director of the National Jewish Democratic Council, which set up a Stop The Smears Web site to correct the rumors.
“I don’t think it moves tons and tons of votes, but at the fringes, if left unchecked, it could move a few,” he said.
By Jackie
March 14, 2008 12:16 PM | Link to this
@Dusty,
The only sky falling is the one that you walk under. There are enormous problems with the economy, government, Iraq and Dubya and you still think everything is fine and good. GROW UP!!!!
By Apocalypse
March 14, 2008 12:19 PM | Link to this
Getting closer to nomination. MAKE CALLS. CNN : With the wins in Mississippi and Texas, Obama now leads Clinton 1,611 to 1,480 in the total delegate count, CNN estimates. .. .. Barack Obama.. Pledged: 1404.. Superdelegates: 207.. Total: 1,611.. ..
Hillary Clinton.. Pledged: 1243.. Superdelegates: 237 .. Total: 1,480.. .. BLOOMBERG : Obama Cuts Into Clinton’s Delegate Lead Among Elected Officials. .. .. .. Barack Obama has pulled almost even with Hillary Clinton in endorsements from top elected officials and has cut into her lead among the other superdelegates she’s relying on to win the Democratic presidential nomination. 53 of Obama’s endorsements have come since he won the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses, compared with 12 who have aligned with Clinton since then.
MAKE CALLS. TOGETHER , YES WE CAN WIN.
2025 needed for nomination is within reach. On April 22 Pennsylvania will make its choice for the Democratic nominee. Take a moment to identify supporters and encourage them to volunteer for Barack Obama in the upcoming weeks. You don’t even have to leave your home to pick up the phone and reach out. All you need is a few minutes, a phone line, and a desire to help change the country:
http://my. barackobama. com/page/contact/splash/callpa
By Matt
March 14, 2008 12:21 PM | Link to this
Free Market?! Free Market?! How about ‘Free For All” for the insurance companies.
By ill bred
March 14, 2008 12:22 PM | Link to this
That was a joke, moron. What a clod, honestly. Duh, here’s a websight 4U cause I know what you’re all about. likeIwouldclickonyourvirus
what a total….gadz where do they comefrom?
keep it real, folks.
By Apocalypse
March 14, 2008 12:25 PM | Link to this
Wisconsin Superdelegate Endorses Barack Obama for President
Chicago, IL – Today Wisconsin superdelegate Melissa Schroeder endorsed Barack Obama for president, citing his unique ability to stand up to the special interests and unite all Americans to bring about real, meaningful change.
Melissa Schroeder said: “After much consideration, I have decided to endorse Senator Barack Obama. My decision came down to electability and who I felt would do a better job of unifying this country for a common purpose. Obama’s message of hope and change has touched millions of voters in a way that I haven’t seen since the late 1960’s. People from every walk of life, young and the not so young, Democrats, Independents and some Republicans, are all rallying around a belief that change can happen if we want it bad enough. With Obama as our nominee, I am confident that this November we will increase our majority in the House and Senate and elect a Democrat to the White House.”
Melissa Schroeder is Wisconsin’s 7th District Democratic Party Secretary.
By Jackie
March 14, 2008 12:31 PM | Link to this
@Dusty,
Here is some information that you may want to consider.
By Jackie
March 14, 2008 12:32 PM | Link to this
@Dusty,
Sorry about the previous incomplete post. Here is that data.
” $7 TRADES! Click Here!
Reuters U.S. faces severe recession: NBER’s Feldstein Friday March 14, 10:55 am ET By Ros Krasny
BOCA RATON, Florida (Reuters) - The United States is in a recession that could be “substantially more severe” than recent ones, National Bureau of Economic Research President Martin Feldstein said on Friday.
ADVERTISEMENT “The situation is very bad, the situation is getting worse, and the risks are that it could get very bad,” Feldstein said in a speech at the Futures Industry Association meeting in Boca Raton, Florida.
“There’s no doubt that this year and next year are going to be very difficult years.”
NBER is a private sector group that is considered the arbiter of U.S. business cycles. Feldstein is also a Harvard economics professor and former economic advisor to President Ronald Reagan.”
By Dusty trails
March 14, 2008 12:35 PM | Link to this
Dusty, when the men in the white coats come to your door, please just go along quietly. It is incredible to believe that you could blame the sinkhole this country is in right now on the Democratic Congress. You are seriously disturbed. The six years of GWB and a GOP Congress deserve the “credit”, not the fourteen months of Democrats in charge of Congress.
By ill bred
March 14, 2008 12:46 PM | Link to this
Trails, dont blame Dusty 4 what she hacks from Rushannity. We want her spewing that nonsense. The American people recognize the bush base when they smell it. Landslide in november. obamamania is here to stay.
Now we could be big headed and say the Obamamania will last ten years, and then we think we’ll be lucky to last six months. I think maybe we could open a chain of beauty salons if that happened, “Cup of tea, miss?” you know. I dont know where we’ll all be in ten years, but I do know that we’ll be in the business whether it’s blogging or volunteering, you know, but we’ll always be writing bits, you know. But we wont get haircuts, cause we got one yesterday, we did.
By Glenn
March 14, 2008 12:58 PM | Link to this
Dusty @ 11:45,
You wrote back to me: “Watch it now. You can make a difference!”
Do you want to know what that cliche means, and where it came from and why it’s an artifact of the otherwise conservative Jim’s liberal training, and why, like the “model ghetto” of Theresienstadt, it only sounds good when Teacher mouths that pap to pep the pups?
Or do you just want to stick with using your blithe liberal pom-poms to cheer libs in conservative jerseys playing the game according to rules you scarcely understand?
You can make a difference! Cheerleading Makes You Free.
By Charles
March 14, 2008 1:16 PM | Link to this
Let’s face it everybody. The powers that be gave the voting public lousy candidates, republicans and democrats from the beginning. In my humble opinion, the only credible candidate for president was Ron Paul.
Glenn, I understand and appreciate your comment, but I just can’t vote for Barack Obama. I’m afraid he will do for the nation what so-called educated integrationist black leaders did for the masses of African Americans. Because of the black integrationist leadership, the average black person in America is completely disconnected from reality. So-called educated integrationist and their naiveté are directly responsible for the chaos in the homes and streets.
I would much rather vote for a conscious, thoughtful, power hungry Hillary Clinton or John McCain who understands the possible results of their decisions, policies, practices, before and after they make them, than for a naïve, dreaming, Barack Obama. Just like other so-called educated integrationist, after making decisions that will affect people adversely, he will seek to convince Americans that their lives have been adversely altered because they do not know the “secret”or because of the personal decisions that Americans made. That’s just how despicable these people are.
We must have mature national leadership. Mature leadership if nothing else will give us more time to organize…
By jbmlaw
March 14, 2008 1:19 PM | Link to this
Dear Copyleft @ 9:35, no need to bow and serve, just quit throwing rocks into the machinery, and let it run.
Dear Glenn @ 10:51, I broadly agree with your assessment of the opinion, but it has a great appellate problem for us. As the thrust of the argument is to overrule the lower court for its “error of law” – essentially contradicting the lower court and finding there is no constitutional right offended - we will have to get a higher court to disagree with the appellate court interpretation of law. I have pretty good luck with misconstruction of facts, but I find courts dislike reversing on law only (except, as here, to side with the bureaucrats’s interpretation of a legislative scheme.) I can see “an ossifying effect on primary and secondary education” and one thing that might work is that the appellate interpretation is “wildly out of step with the rest of the world” (we would have to phrase it a bit more artfully.) The political junk would never be cited in an opinion, but it has a real world effect in encouraging courts to find a more rational solution.
Dear Jackie @ 11:30, you have a couple of false statements, and one that I would think you would be embarrassed to argue. (1) “Dubya told the EPA to allow more pollution into the air, disregarding the law.” Nearly a lie, by omission. The “more pollution” is CO2. The idiot leftists on the Supreme Court determined that CO2 is pollution. The obvious solution to the pollution is to forbid leftists from exhaling. Thus I assume you will support such an initiative by the President. (2) “Mid-level military officers are leaving the service in droves.” I suppose you make anything so vague true, but mid level military officers are always leaving the service in droves. You move up, or you move out. Your argument is tautological. (3) “Gen. Petraeus has stated the Iraqi government is not doing enough to meet the requirements set forth prior to the surge, i.e., the surge ain’t working.” You proffer a lunatic position. The surge is working, but the politicians are not. The surge has nothing to do with the political reconciliation, other than the latter cannot happen without the surge. Of course the purpose of the surge was to crush al Qaeda, which it has. (4) “The House Repubs want us to believe that their stunt about having a closed session to work out their lack of clarity about giving immunity to some telecommunications companies, when the need for immunity has not been articulated to them.” You err. House republicans understand why telecoms will not cooperate in good faith without immunity, and democrats choose to not understand. Similarly House republicans understand why democrats think it so necessary to preserve the tort lawyers class action suits against those telecoms who cooperated in good faith with the government, and there also democrats pretend to not understand. (5) As to your note on recession, the looming recession is almost entirely attributable to the average businessman’s correct perception that democrats are about to impose the largest tax increase in the history of the world; the moment the democrats come to their senses and renew the Bush tax cuts, the economy will spring to life.
Dear DTs @ 12:35, actually an ignorant body can destroy an economy in 18 months. I have written many times on this blog that is the jbmlaw calculation of the time it takes for macroeconomic policies to show an effect. Here only one congressional policy has had any effect, the determination to not renew the Bush tax cuts. That will translate as the largest tax increase in the history of the world; is it any wonder that businessmen are cutting back?
By George Rickey
March 14, 2008 1:37 PM | Link to this
“Or do you just want to stick with using your blithe liberal pom-poms to cheer libs in conservative jerseys playing the game according to rules you scarcely understand?”
I find it humorous and sad that you _ and others there _ understand Dusty far better than she is capable of understanding herself.
By Peter
March 14, 2008 1:42 PM | Link to this
Wow the likes of Dusty and JBMLAW can make anyone laugh on this blog…..
Dusty for one has ZERO to say, yet her head is so far in the sand she is looking for China…….
That reminds me why we are now in a deep recession……. we owe Billions to China for the made UP WAR !
Dusty fails to recognize that most Americans are currently suffering, and many Americans are in danger of loosing their homes.
Folks are having a tough time all across America because of inflation, and the fact their wages are not in line with the more expensive prices on almost everything.
But Hey Dusty, and JBMLAW don’t really care about Americans at all….they care about a guy willing to screw Americans, and of course cut taxes, as if the deficit will automatically disappear.
You see they folks come from a ME First mentality, so these folks are really not true caring Americans…..they just care about themselves !
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 1:45 PM | Link to this
Oh what fun.
Glenn, dear heart. Do you know I was teasing you about your great upset over the cliche’ of the moment?{I don’t have any pom poms. Do you?) Now, don’t forget. Viva la difference!
IllBred,
I have never read nor listened to Rush. Why do you?
Jackie,
I believe jbmlaw has answered your mindset of blame, error and depression. I could never improve on the sensibilities and knowledge of jbmlaw nor would I try (except when he get too much libertarianitis).
To our GA governor..thank you. Raindrops are falling..(but only on Republicans!)
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 1:48 PM | Link to this
George Rickey @1:37
Oh, that is so profound. I think you may make a difference!
By ill bred
March 14, 2008 1:49 PM | Link to this
mmmm cheerleaders with pompoms.
What a mess. Iraq. Wallstreet. Reactionary Feds bailout plan. Whenever wallstreet has the fed jumping through hoops then it’s a dog and pony show economy. There’s going to be no getting out of this squeeze as foreign nationals own more and more of america. Americans are going to be without America.
Americans will be without America.
Where have you gone, John Doe?
By NSA
March 14, 2008 1:51 PM | Link to this
The NeoCon Depression is beginning…Jack Vogle, founder of Vanguard group was on Bloomberg this morning, where he was asked if he thought we were in a recession. Jack said, no, it is more like a soft Depression, worse than a recession, but not yet as bad as a full blowen depression. The Bush-Republican Depression has begun, remember who to hold responsible..the necons, the chimp, the zionists, and Dusty aka jmblaw, and ALL republicans, everywhere.
By George Rickey
March 14, 2008 1:54 PM | Link to this
Just shut up.
By Peter
March 14, 2008 2:03 PM | Link to this
Gotta love this President, as he makes the BIG money for friends and family…..currently spending 16 Billion dollars a month for WAR…..
Then of course he destroys the environment, by squelching the EPA and CDC scientists, changes the data, and allows Americans to live in an unsafe country.
Why does he do it one may ask, well we have to kiss the butt of big business one knows!
Now we are living in a recession, more Americans at home will be in more danger than ever.
Heck maybe even Dusty will get car jacked by some poor idiot who needs money to pay for his rent!
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 2:06 PM | Link to this
Dear Peter,@1:42
I am so sorry that you are starving, homeless, broke and nobody loves you. It seems to be the state of many liberals here. They can’t cry enough for so many poor Americans.
I myself am going to start a fund to help Pelosi, Reid, Kennedy, Waxman, Durban, Boxer, and other Dems get a square meal. They’ve been selling pencils in Congress long enough. But that is all they know how to do.
But…..Peter..you are lucky to be living in the greatest country in the world and you can stop crying about it. Chinup, fellow. Count your blessings.
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 2:09 PM | Link to this
I support our troops. I hope they stage a coup so I can be completely controlled by them. I want to sweep the barracks and become a comfort girl.
By NSA
March 14, 2008 2:10 PM | Link to this
IF THIS IS NOT THE START OF A DEPRESSION, THEN WHY IS THE FED INVOKING A LITTLE USED LAW TO BAIL OUT A NON BANK?
Fed Invokes Little-Used Authority to Aid Bear Stearns (Update2)
By Scott Lanman and Craig Torres
March 14 (Bloomberg) — Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke invoked a law last used four decades ago to keep Bear Stearns Co. from collapsing after the securities firm approached the central bank for emergency funding.
The loan to Bear Stearns required a vote today by the Fed’s Board of Governors because the company isn’t a bank, Fed staff officials said. The central bank is taking on the credit risk from Bear Stearns collateral, lending the funds through JPMorgan Chase & Co. because it’s operationally simpler to accomplish than a direct loan, the staff said on condition of anonymity.
Bernanke took advantage of little-used parts of Fed law, added in the 1930s and last utilized in the 1960s, that allows it to loan to corporations and private partnerships with a special Board vote. The Fed chief probably sought to stave off a deeper blow to the financial system from a Bear Stearns collapse, former Fed researcher Keith Hembre said.
The Fed really doesn't have any obligation to help a non- bank aside from its role or responsibility to keep the financial markets functioning,'' said Hembre, who helps oversee $107 billion as chief economist at FAF Advisors Inc. in Minneapolis.They made a judgment, probably an accurate one, that they’re not going to function very well if you’ve got a full-blown crisis with a major Wall Street firm.”
Liquidity Pledge
The Fed said in a statement that it will “continue to provide liquidity as necessary to promote the orderly functioning of the financial system,” repeating reassurances the central bank has made often since credit strains arrived in August. The statement said the Fed Board unanimously approved the arrangement with JPMorgan and Bear Stearns.
The Fed Board typically delegates such discount-window lending authority to its regional reserve banks when it comes to loans to banks.
There's a clear realization among people both in the official sector and the financial markets that some of the institutions we have built over the last 100 years are not well adapted to the modern 21st century financial system,'' said former New York Fed research director Stephen Cecchetti.A lot of what we’ve been seeing have been creative innovations to deal with problems that the institutions were not built to handle.”
The senior staffers declined to describe how large the loan to Bear Stearns is, and whether a private-sector bailout was attempted first before the Fed extended credit through JPMorgan. The staff officials said the Fed used its authorization under the law several times in the 1960s though didn’t immediately have further details.
Market `Challenges’
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, in a separate statement, said there are challenges in our financial markets, and we continue to address them.'' Treasury isworking closely” with the Fed and the Securities and Exchange Commission.
I appreciate the leadership of the Federal Reserve in enhancing the stability and orderliness of our markets,'' Paulson said.Our financial system is flexible and resilient and I am confident that the efforts of regulators and market participants will minimize disruption to the system.”
Robert Rubin, the former Treasury secretary who is now chairman of Citigroup Inc.’s executive committee, said at a conference today that the “risks have reached a point that the right thing is to act and act in a very serious way.”
By Peter
March 14, 2008 2:19 PM | Link to this
Dusty I am sorry you are so blind to the needs of other Americans….. the poor the less fortunate than you.
The folks barely making it, now having to pay much more for food, gas, you know the less fortunate than you….as we waste Billions monthly, and don’t eve really properly care for the wounded GI’s coming home….
You know the folks we are talking about…..
The ones you NEVER think about, as you tout this President as actually being a GOOD MAN……
Hey and don’t worry about your environment at all, perhaps all the bees will stop disappearing, and we all will have pleanty of food to eat, even the fortunate ones like me.
Yes Dusty the sky is NOT falling….but hey hard to see the sky when one’s head is so far buried up some lying Republican’s cheeks.
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 2:21 PM | Link to this
Uh Oh ID THIEF @2:09 Not Dusty.
By Glenn
March 14, 2008 2:21 PM | Link to this
Jbm,
I’m hip to your preliminary analysis, and thank you for it. I especially appreciate your distinction between arguments of political valence and those of legal import. So many of these Fundamentalistsm especially have won their battles but lost their wars by failing to grasp that distinction.
But they also tend to make the touching mistake of believing that the Law is in the Justice business, rather than simply in business, in an industrial sector that operates under the rubric Justice. Were they to see the courts for what they are not, they might understand the legal uses of politics, for the Law remains the mob in robes, and mobs exist to be manipulated toward ends. Politics.
I’m being fairly oblique because of our lack of privilege. My response to your reasons for not wanting to put the constitutional foot forward: the opinion is vulnerable because it teeters on one leg, viz the Constitution in question. As it might be in federal construction, interpreting the Establishment Clause while ignoring the Free Exercise one and pretending that the latter doesn’t exist. This hypothetical is, structurally and not substantively, what the Californians are trying to pull off.
And yes, it’s retro and yes, it is susceptible of outside ridicule by court-friendly experts with no stake in the battle. It’s so retro it’s dangerously retro, like sending Japanese officers out with pop guns and Samurai swords against flame throwers and amphibious tanks and precision bombs. It’s demonstrably dangerous in its nostalgia.
And then there’s this. The Respondent counsel of record come out of that school of thought which holds that there’s a “public school monopoly”. That’s so sloppy it’s fatal. Someone pulls the Pierce trigger and bang, you’re dead. This case proves something more powerful partly because it’s more true: a “school monopoly”. The syndicalism lasted a good 75 years, and the Trust has had a good run. With this case has come the time to break up the Trust.
History converges with this jurisprudence. Distributed service delivery. Thus far, the ultimate decentralization. And the ultimate Federalism. So while NEA is whistling “Dixie” and doing that Old Time Religion, meanwhile the nation can proceed with its reconstruction, enabled, as before, by markets and by new technology.
Charles,
I understand that Obama is winning in his career by rules you are astute enough not to accept. I get to say the same thing about the historical figures to whom you alluded, but of course I lack standing to say that now, of him. What I can tell you, for me, is that I like the guy—-in fact, I think I met him when we were kids, and I think I liked him then—-but today he’s running quite deliberately as a cipher, and ironically that’s all I need to know about him. Anyone who runs as a cipher, even if he be not a cipher to me, can’t have my vote.
And when you speak of the inside-baseball element of his candidacy, I think of last month’s State of the Black Union conference. The thing actually ended in general agreement! And in my observer’s opinion, with a lucid and luscent agenda: to reject “adjusting” to American society, and instead to assume at once the vocation of leading this lost country out of the woods to a more loving and therefore higher ground—-thereby reinventing the society rather than accepting it or, worse still, asking it to accept you.
As for candidates, well damn, I just want to be able to vote for some schlub who is what he says he is, as long as what he is ain’t bad. The manager of my local supermarket would do just fine. Or the postmistress at my P.O. branch. And I am not kidding.
By getalife
March 14, 2008 2:22 PM | Link to this
When will the pundits on the radical right start writing for w to resign?
This loser is a miserable failure and you should start thinking with common sense about your country and demand his resignation.
Enough is enough.
Damn.
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 2:37 PM | Link to this
NO the ID Thief was at 2:29 I want to pull a battalion.
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 2:37 PM | Link to this
NO the ID Thief was at 2:21 I want to pull a battalion.
By Charles
March 14, 2008 2:44 PM | Link to this
…”As for candidates, well damn, I just want to be able to vote for some schlub who is what he says he is, as long as what he is ain’t bad. The manager of my local supermarket would do just fine. Or the postmistress at my P.O. branch. And I am not kidding”.
Glenn, you are either kidding or you’ve been possessed by the nebulous, confusing, and deceptive language of the so-called educated integrationist Negroes.
By jbmlaw
March 14, 2008 2:55 PM | Link to this
Dear Glenn @ 2:21, perhaps we can chat more on specifics. Today through Easter is an unusually difficult time for me this year, and I am traveling tomorrow and the following two weekends. Maybe we could meet briefly Sunday afternoon?
I imagine one other concern, one that arises from what I do not know. There is a hint in the appellate opinion that the trial court had some unpleasant things – nonfound facts? – regarding the quality of instruction for the young charges in this case. Have you enjoyed an opportunity to look over the trial court ruling, to see if there are any unexploded bombs there?
By Jackie
March 14, 2008 3:08 PM | Link to this
@Dusty,
The Dems made promises that they would clean up Washington and they failed. They are weak-kneed, lily-livered cowards because they will not impeach the Dubya and Cheyney. Other than that, you have no point.
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 3:10 PM | Link to this
Dear Jim Wooten,
It seems someone here has forgotten their own ID. They are using mine at 2:09, and twice at 2:37. Perhaps you might help with these afflicted ones. I have to leave shortly. Thank you.
Dusty
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 3:16 PM | Link to this
Help, I just got unfairly fired…My boss caught me blogging on the internet for 7.5 our of eight work hours per day….Help, will wash floors for a living, its the only real skill I have…I am now a scrub lady without internet access…I am going to lose my double wide trailer….
By in bred
March 14, 2008 3:25 PM | Link to this
What, me worry?
By Jackie
March 14, 2008 3:25 PM | Link to this
@jbmlaw,
As typical, you try to wordsmith you response to unpleasant facts.
“Dear Jackie @ 11:30, you have a couple of false statements, and one that I would think you would be embarrassed to argue. (1) “Dubya told the EPA to allow more pollution into the air, disregarding the law.” Nearly a lie, by omission. The “more pollution” is CO2. The idiot leftists on the Supreme Court determined that CO2 is pollution. The obvious solution to the pollution is to forbid leftists from exhaling. Thus I assume you will support such an initiative by the President. (2) “Mid-level military officers are leaving the service in droves.” I suppose you make anything so vague true, but mid level military officers are always leaving the service in droves. You move up, or you move out. Your argument is tautological. (3) “Gen. Petraeus has stated the Iraqi government is not doing enough to meet the requirements set forth prior to the surge, i.e., the surge ain’t working.” You proffer a lunatic position. The surge is working, but the politicians are not. The surge has nothing to do with the political reconciliation, other than the latter cannot happen without the surge. Of course the purpose of the surge was to crush al Qaeda, which it has. (4) “The House Repubs want us to believe that their stunt about having a closed session to work out their lack of clarity about giving immunity to some telecommunications companies, when the need for immunity has not been articulated to them.” You err. House republicans understand why telecoms will not cooperate in good faith without immunity, and democrats choose to not understand. Similarly House republicans understand why democrats think it so necessary to preserve the tort lawyers class action suits against those telecoms who cooperated in good faith with the government, and there also democrats pretend to not understand. (5) As to your note on recession, the looming recession is almost entirely attributable to the average businessman’s correct perception that democrats are about to impose the largest tax increase in the history of the world; the moment the democrats come to their senses and renew the Bush tax cuts, the economy will spring to life.”
1) Please read today’s Washington Post concerning Dubya and his adventures with the EPA and see if my words are not correct.
2) Mid-level military officers are leaving when they requirements are met and the all branches are having a difficult time maintaining the O-4 thru O-6. Obstensibly, they are making it “easier” for the O-1 thru O-3 move into those slots. Right or wrong?
3) Gen. Petraeus himself said those words that I posted. It appears that you know more than he when it comes to the mission he was assigned. Did not know you were a military expert. Give me a list of your military bona fides, please.
4) Apparently the House Repubs DO NOT UNDERSTAND. Some telecomms were cooperating until Dubya refused to pay the bill and they stopped the service. Secondly, the Repubs DO NOT KNOW what the telecomms will be immune from because Dubya has refused to tell them. Get your facts straight.
5) The average businessman does not have the leverage over the economy that the credit markets, sub-prime loans defaulting, borrowing Billions of dollars from China, the collapse of the dollar, the skyrocketing of oil, the loss of consumer confidence in the economy, the offshoring of manufacturing jobs, the multiplier effect that Marco Economics bring to the economy with those jobs that pay well enough to foster other jobs that are needed to supply a sector of any business.
As is typical, you blather eloquently, but, close examination of your pronouncements reveal the paucity of its content.
By Dusty
March 14, 2008 3:26 PM | Link to this
Attn: Jim Wooten
*ID Thief *@3:16 Not Dusty.
By Dusty is a tatttle tale and a cry baby
March 14, 2008 3:31 PM | Link to this
jimmy, do this, jim do that, what a cry baby…the way dusty nags jim, you would think they were married…ah, I just gave myself a nightmare….pity party for the poor jerk married to dusty….
By Glenn
March 14, 2008 3:36 PM | Link to this
Jbm, no, I haven’t, though they weren’t subtle about that parting threat, were they? I just assumed that CTA (NEA) waited for the poster family for toothless inbred serpentine Pentacostal know-nothings—-the Mencken caricature—-to come along before delivering their stroke. So procedurally this is how far I’ve gotten. I did a quick read, and then a close one, with no interruptions for case research. I wanted to study the text-as-text first, while I still had a chance before background, intent, politics, alternative interpretations and strategies come into play. Figured I could do that later.
As to their background, this is a CTA move. The counsel of record were working with NEA cutouts, and I think I know which prostitute in particular. (Let’s call him Typhoid Mary.) The political background could be very helpful going forward, but for now I’m still in the books, with only preliminary contact with the homeschooling folks and their beagles. Me, I helped form the so-called movement 25 years ago, in Boston with the late John Holt, my erstwhile employer. (He said this would happen just the way it did.) So those are my bona fides with those people. That, and lots of work on church/state jurisprudence, but I don’t yet believe that’s a strong footing here, and would defer to you on that call.
I’ll come up with a preliminary timeline targeted to run in earnest after Easter, and will run it by you during Holy Week if you’ll be available here.
Incidentally, it is such a pity that John Walton, son of Sam, crashed and died (engine trouble, they tell me); for many reasons this is so, but not least because he would have relished this fight with great cowboy-booted, deep-poocketed gusto. One handshake apiece and off we’d go.
I’ll look into the grotty details on the parents, if you want me to, and work up a memo.
By jbmlaw
March 14, 2008 3:37 PM | Link to this
Dear Jackie @ 3:25, (1) I did not challenge your words, I challenged what you - knowingly or not - concealed. (2) Your factual argument is not inconsistent with mine, but your opinion analysis is unsupported. (3) General Petraeus said “i.e, the surge ain’t working.”??? It is a false statement, and I challenge the context from which you extracted the quote. Petraeus has been quite pleased with the results of the surge, and the only congresional desire not met is the one outside the capacity of the US Military - the political reconciliation. The rest of your argument is invalid. (4) You err on what Republicans understand and what they do not. And you seemingly are unwilling to address the truth, that this is all about empowering tort attorneys, scum like Dickie Scruggs. How dare you impose penalties on shareholders of companies that complied, in good faith, with information requests from the government? You can rail all you wish about government excess, but it is immoral of you and all democrats to assess any penalty against companies for doing as the government asked. Not to mention that the information was useful in destroying al Qaeda, but we know that is outside the realm of democrat desires. (5) You err. The average businessman has total control over what happens to the economy. Government can do nothing to help, but it can certainly do something that will harm. Listennow.
By Jim Wooten
March 14, 2008 3:44 PM | Link to this
Dusty, noone believes those posts were yours. Now, go stand at the board with your nose in the chalk circle for being a tattletale.
By AmVet
March 14, 2008 3:46 PM | Link to this
Just as our fighter-pilot Hero of Alabama has completely screwed the the national GOP “conservative movement” for the foreseeable future, we can hope that “pray for rain” has done the same here in Georgia. (Alas, I fear the “faithful” will always love him!)
What a pompous tea-totaling maroon.
In a state chock full of assorted maroons.
Beer drinkers unite!
(And find Sonny a southern Ashley Dupre…)
By Jackie
March 14, 2008 3:47 PM | Link to this
@jbmlaw,
Read the Washington Post and see exactly what Gen. Petraeus says. Your trying to “scrub” his statements with the legal eloquence that you have does not make your statements true, nor does it invalidate what I have read and understood. Secondly, you try to conflate matters that are not substantive with the discussion. No one mentioned Dickie Scruggs but you, counselor. If the House Repubs understood what was going on, why DID THEY REQUEST A CLOSED SESSION on the House floor? They were doing what you are attempting to do, keep telling the same lie over and over and hoping that it begins to sound like the truth. You can not invalidate the facts with your illogical and nonsensical presentations. As for the average businessman, is he not governed by the rules and regulations of the legal entitity(city, county, state, federal government) of which he is incorporated? Does the government make the accounting rules, banking rules, tax rules? Hmmm, seems to be another hole in your arguments.
By Joe Bland
March 14, 2008 4:02 PM | Link to this
To heck with Sonny, find me an Ashley Dupre, I need a little relief on Sunday.
By Craig
March 14, 2008 4:28 PM | Link to this
Counselor, Jackie is doing fine without my help. But a couple quick comments.
You think that a company should automatically comply with any request from the government? Very un Libertarian of you - and as you know, factually incorrect. Yes, any company which automatically complies with an illegal request from the government should pay a penalty.
And as to the surge - the whole point of the surge was to reduce violence so that political reconciliation could take place. If that doesn’t happen, the surge was a failure.
By Jackie
March 14, 2008 4:43 PM | Link to this
@jbmlaw,
Try to find a thesauruses to help to find alternative meanings to the eloquence of your expansive vocabulary. It is the only argument that you have available to you, lots of words that require a few moments to validate their meaning. The same dictionary you use is available to everyone else. I await your net parry.
By Jackie
March 14, 2008 4:46 PM | Link to this
@jbmlaw,
One important concept that I did not mention. Ignorance of the law does not absolve one of the consequences of the law. If the telecommunications companies received an illegal request and they executed the request, they are culpable for that action, be it civil or criminal, or both. Do I have that correct, counselor?
By George Washington
March 14, 2008 4:52 PM | Link to this
Right you are Jackie, and if a soldier recieves an illegal order, they must refuse to execute that order…No machine gunning civilians just because Lt. JMBLAW orders it.
By Apocalypse Hussein
March 14, 2008 4:54 PM | Link to this
In the attempt to distract voters from learning about Senator Barack Obama before the next primaries, the media narrative has turned back to the provocative rhetoric of Jeremiah Wright. Rather than present us with issues, they prefer to revive a smear which is at best a “guilt by association” tactic (and if we use that logic there’s likely not a politician in the country that would be left in office.)
But not only is the old-school tactic old news, not only is the attempt to use Wright’s rhetoric old news, but Wright himself is old news - he’s been slated to retire for close to two years now. So before we worry about how gullible a Harvard Law educated U.S. Senator might have to be to fall under the influence of religion (are we really worried about a Democrat being too Christian? Didn’t Kennedy put that to rest in 1960?)
By Glenn
March 14, 2008 4:56 PM | Link to this
Charles,
I guess I was kidding in a very serious way, in the sense that I just picked two of the nearest people I think of who are known for their honesty and managerial skill. I hadn’t even considered their respective races, frankly.
I was quite serious in the rest of that post, and as for that last part, I really do think, at this point, that I’d prefer those first two neighbors I mentioned. In both cases, they are what they are, you know? That’s what I miss this election season.
If I had to name a public figure who’s black and who is what he or see says he or she is, I’d name a lot of people, of various shades of opinion, some of them radical. Barack Obama wouldn’t be one of them. But of course I’d want a conservative. Preferably a radical conservative.
Jbm,
Yes. I’ll be in Roswell Sunday for church, but can meet you anywhere around Metro Atlanta after Noon Sunday. In case I can’t connect with you between now and then to confirm, just please assume I’ll be wherever you designate, at the time you name. (Wearing a long, brightly striped English school scarf, a gift from an old friend.)
If you need to contact me in the interim, please send a FAX to me, Learned Hand, at my local Kinkos: 770-509-6666.
By Devastator
March 14, 2008 5:12 PM | Link to this
Glenn,
Please don’t respond to Charles.
I’m Afr.Amer. and I went to school with brainless idiots like him. He lives his entire life with a finger pointed at whites and any blacks who he thinks marches along side them.
You can’t win with someone who thinks life is about blaming others.
By Apocalypse Hussein
March 14, 2008 5:14 PM | Link to this
Barack Obama on His Faith and His Church Taken from HuffingtonPost
The pastor of my church, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who recently preached his last sermon and is in the process of retiring, has touched off a firestorm over the last few days. He’s drawn attention as the result of some inflammatory and appalling remarks he made about our country, our politics, and my political opponents.
Let me say at the outset that I vehemently disagree and strongly condemn the statements that have been the subject of this controversy. I categorically denounce any statement that disparages our great country or serves to divide us from our allies. I also believe that words that degrade individuals have no place in our public dialogue, whether it’s on the campaign stump or in the pulpit. In sum, I reject outright the statements by Rev. Wright that are at issue.
Because these particular statements by Rev. Wright are so contrary to my own life and beliefs, a number of people have legitimately raised questions about the nature of my relationship with Rev. Wright and my membership in the church. Let me therefore provide some context.
As I have written about in my books, I first joined Trinity United Church of Christ nearly twenty years ago. I knew Rev. Wright as someone who served this nation with honor as a United States Marine, as a respected biblical scholar, and as someone who taught or lectured at seminaries across the country, from Union Theological Seminary to the University of Chicago. He also led a diverse congregation that was and still is a pillar of the South Side and the entire city of Chicago. It’s a congregation that does not merely preach social justice but acts it out each day, through ministries ranging from housing the homeless to reaching out to those with HIV/AIDS.
Most importantly, Rev. Wright preached the gospel of Jesus, a gospel on which I base my life. In other words, he has never been my political advisor; he’s been my pastor. And the sermons I heard him preach always related to our obligation to love God and one another, to work on behalf of the poor, and to seek justice at every turn.
The statements that Rev. Wright made that are the cause of this controversy were not statements I personally heard him preach while I sat in the pews of Trinity or heard him utter in private conversation. When these statements first came to my attention, it was at the beginning of my presidential campaign. I made it clear at the time that I strongly condemned his comments. But because Rev. Wright was on the verge of retirement, and because of my strong links to the Trinity faith community, where I married my wife and where my daughters were baptized, I did not think it appropriate to leave the church.
Let me repeat what I’ve said earlier. All of the statements that have been the subject of controversy are ones that I vehemently condemn. They in no way reflect my attitudes and directly contradict my profound love for this country.
With Rev. Wright’s retirement and the ascension of my new pastor, Rev. Otis Moss, III, Michelle and I look forward to continuing a relationship with a church that has done so much good. And while Rev. Wright’s statements have pained and angered me, I believe that Americans will judge me not on the basis of what someone else said, but on the basis of who I am and what I believe in; on my values, judgment and experience to be President of the United States.
By ill bred
March 14, 2008 6:05 PM | Link to this
Betty or Veronica?
Ginger or Maryjane?