Thinking Right

By Mid-South Philosopher

November 25, 2008 8:05 AM | Link to this

Judge Sears appears to be a good public servant unlike the suspected former cocaine user (remember…when questioned about it in the 2000 campaign, he never denied it) and reformed drunk, George W. Bush, who used the presidential pardoning power yesterday to liberate a number of drug offenders, corporatist criminals (i.e., embezzlers, bank fraud propagators, and income tax evaders), and other thugs.

His pardon of 14 convicted felons, yesterday, was conspicuous by the absence of the two former Border Patrol agents, Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean, who were convicted of shooting a drug dealer and attempting to cover it up. Ramos and Compean shot Osvaldo Aldrete Davila in the posterior as the coward was fleeing a marijuana load on 2005. Davila was later granted immunity by U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton, who, in my judgment, is a living boil on the butt of justice, and used to help convict the two agents.

Incidentally, Davila continued to commit drug related crimes and is now in prison!

Likely, George W. Bush will not help Ramos and Compean before he leaves office. I don’t know whether or not Barry Obama will have the courage to do what is right.

I will tell you this…the sooner that, that Crawford, Texas excuse for a human being is out of office and lost in ignominy the better.

How in the hll did we ever elect such an a* as President!?!

By Ragnar Danneskjöld

November 25, 2008 8:07 AM | Link to this

Good morning all. I attended the “summit” last week – I hate pretentious labels – but I admit it was one of the best seminars I’ve attended. The two ladies who opened the first two sessions – Robin Fretwell Wilson of Washington & Lee, and Katherine Shaw Spaht of LSU - were extraordinary thinkers, and were provocatively interesting. Suspect Ms. Wilson could write one heckuva polemic; she took no prisoners.

I arrived around two hours before the show started – hard to break the morning routine – and the second person in the building was the Chief Justice. I was impressed - she was not merely lending her name to a “worthwhile” cause, she was really an active participant in setting up the show. I enjoyed a breakfast conversation with a wonderfully bright juvenile court judge, who had some great stories of his earlier practice in criminal law. Guv. Sonny stopped by to work the room, and he had some well-considered arguments to offer the crowd. Don’t know what I expected from the governor, but his talk was more impressive live, bordering on “intellectual” (if I can use that term without the pejorative connotation,) than he normally projects in television sound-bites.

The “summit” tied together the differing legislative and judicial trends, the pressures arising therefrom, and the effects on the average family. Funny, I came away with most of my prejudices reinforced – that government is the cause of most of our social problems, and only rarely seems capable of ameliorating even the worst situations. The seminar had a hard-conservative slant, but perhaps that is the nature of the topic. I believe they recorded the show, and in a perfect world they would find some way to make the presentations available cost-effective to the general public. GA Values, get your friends at WABE to do their job for a change, put this on television. I don’t know, though, maybe nobody really cares, nobody would watch.

But back to topic, “I don’t know Sears and I agree on specifics…” I think you may be surprised, Jim. While the Chief Justice often seems to be the embodiment of the “living, breathing Constitution” we detest, she may be more conservative than the two of us combined on the “nuclear family.” I’ll second Jim’s core observation, that Justice Sears could be a change-artist – not Obama-like illusory-change, but something real and meaningful - for the institution, for “the family.” I perceive that is where her heart is. She needs an appropriate platform; I’m not a marketing guy, so I cannot contribute to that discussion.

By SOUTHERN ATL

November 25, 2008 8:13 AM | Link to this

YOUR COMMENTS or MRS.SEARS COMMENTS? She’s not intimidated into silence, as many upper- and middle-class black people are because of an imagined imperfection — a divorce, for example — in their own lives.

If these are your comments, you can not speak about the experiences of BLACK PEOPLE unless you are black and have actually experienced this firsthand!!! I think that you are completely out of line!!!

By cc

November 25, 2008 8:13 AM | Link to this

to me she sounds like one of those ‘activist’ judges that conservatives are always crying about, oh, but that’s right, it’s ok to be an activist judge if you’re limiting freedom but it’s not ok if you’re protecting freedom. no matter how weird or wrong it may seem, someone’s personal freedom is very important and is the foundation of what this country is supposed to be about. i think the points made in the article have merit, i think it’s a problem, but i also think that the girl made a choice and allowed a male to get her into that situation. more importantly, parents today seem to take extra credit for just being a parent without putting in all the extra work. not saying most parents don’t work hard, but extra on top of all the hard work that is already done is what’s need to prevent this problem. but to give extra, you have to first step down off of the pedestal and take off the crown you put on yourself. the child worship i see today has made younger people, rude selfish and apathetic to taking the time to think something through.

By Tom Perdue

November 25, 2008 8:25 AM | Link to this

The Chambliss campaign has raised about $4 million since the runoff campaign began, and the Republican National Committee has loaned $2 million to the National Republican Senatorial Committee to help fund the runoff. The NRSC has already aired two ads attacking Martin for being a tax-and-spend liberal and soft on crime.

But what keeps Chambliss operatives up at night is that the runoff — with its emphasis on turnout — has little to do with either candidate’s performance and more to do with their own efforts to rally the base. “My dog could have been on the ballot and would be in exactly the same position Jim Martin is today,” said Tom Perdue, Chambliss’ longtime political consultant. “Martin was the beneficiary of an Obama wave that swept the country. As a person, as a candidate, he’s the most insignificant opponent in all my 30 years of politics. Nobody knows who he is.”

By Saxby's the man

November 25, 2008 8:28 AM | Link to this

It’s a shame Giuliani’s presidential campaign never got very far.

I still do not think that any of the GOP candidates could have beaten Obama…but Giuliani is a good republican. Pro-choice pro-gay rights pro-gun control (reasonable) = limited government .

I miss the republicans that believe in liberty.

By Around the Coast

November 25, 2008 8:32 AM | Link to this

This weekend I started seeing signs around Savannah that say “Saxby Won’t Tax Me.” Let’s address a few of the errors in logic presented here:

If the “me” in the signs is a business with a lobbyist (esp. Bo), then the sign is accurate.

By JACK

November 25, 2008 8:34 AM | Link to this

there is no positive message out there in support of saxby despite the many groups spending buckoo bucks here in ga. all they have is ‘vote for saxby’ or else liberals will have a filibuster proof senate.

saxby as the last line of defense for the gop is a joke.

By Ragnar Danneskjöld

November 25, 2008 8:41 AM | Link to this

The simple way to identify the paid anti-Saxbe bloggers and the closely-related (but much smaller in number) Saxbe Derangement Syndrome sufferers is that their first post of the day ignores the topic of the day – they don’t waste any time with thought before posting their program materials. As the off-topic anti-Saxbe postings already begin, here, as a public service, are the responses to the whinings of today’s paid democrat bloggers and for the other Saxbe Derangement Syndrome sufferers:

(1) No, he didn’t smear Max Cleland and he did not question Cleland’s patriotism; here is the ad, see for yourself. He did challenge Cleland’s judgment, legitimately. Mr. Cleland richly deserved to be fired for insisting on unionizing Homeland Security, then in formation; as rotten as that agency is, can you imagine how bad it would be if it had been unionized? Two weeks ago, in this space albeit in another context, we discussed the inherent economic problem that arises with unionized bureaucrats. Democrats always claim that their judgment on policy matters should not be questioned, that same is “smearing.” This was a valid economic challenge – Saxbe was not merely a screaming monkey jumping on Cleland’s shoulders – and there is no doubt in retrospect that the voters made a good decision. (Note that Mr. Cleland is never mentioned prospectively for statewide office in Georgia. Isn’t that the real difference between a smear and a valid criticism?) We all agree that Saxbe destroyed Max’s political career, we simply disagree over the merits of that destruction. I think the destruction was a fundamental good for society.

(2) The reasons to vote for Saxbe are

(a) Mr. Chambliss’s unflinching support of the military missions in Afghanistan and Iraq. He gets to share the credit for the victories - (a) the extinguishment of al Qaeda all over the world and (b) the formation of a true representative democracy in the heart of the Arabian Middle East - because he never demanded unilateral withdrawal, when the screaming monkeys were baselessly demanding surrender. Mr. Martin lacks Mr. Lieberman’s character (that’s not particularly a criticism of Martin, few people do), and would have knuckled under to party pressure.

(b) Mr. Chambliss’s unqualified endorsements of Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito, in the confirmation process. I think a majority of democrats opposed both, and the conservative bloc has been correct on every issue, even when in the minority. Mr. Martin does not appreciate the virtues of conservative justices, and he fails to appreciate the danger in the “living, breathing Constitution.”

(c) Mr. Chambliss is “open” to Fair Tax, even if, as friend Ga Values argues, Chambliss does not understand it. Mr. Martin is not open to the Fair Tax, and willfully misrepresents the nature of the plan. Before Boortz and Linder, I advocated elimination of the income tax and substitution of a national sales tax, both on grounds of “fairness” and simplicity. Amusingly, Mr. Martin’s total argument against the Fair Tax seems to be that democrats cannot be trusted to really abolish the income tax; perhaps he is correct in his character analysis there.

(3) We don’t care about lobbyists. If you have any suggestion of “bribery,” take it to the Obama justice department. Otherwise the activities of Chambliss and family are indistinguishable from those of the prospective vice president. Saxbe’s earmarks are a drop in the ocean of democrat earmarks under the current Congress, so that is hardly an argument for strengthening the political power of the democrats. I acknowledge my weasel-words in this argument, as I have a profound contempt for the democrat spending standards that lured formerly-honest conservatives to the dark side.

(4) The headline of the November 12 WSJ read, “Democrats Plot Detroit Rescue.” While there may be some argument in favor of government intervention to preserve confidence in the financial system, as that meaningfully implicates every other business in the country, that same argument does not validate corporate welfare to the failing automobile giants. Mr. Martin does not distance himself from the “democrats” in the headline, and thus cannot possibly claim a favorable distinction from Mr. Chambliss.

By Jen

November 25, 2008 8:41 AM | Link to this

Mr Wooten, I vehemently protest your use of the word “abuse” in regards to the children of single mothers.

Who is the abuser? The mother? The father? Abuse should be punished, should it not? Who should be punished? The mother? The father? The child?

I am married to a man who was raised by his mother, who was a teenager when she gave birth to him. His father took off before he was born. Our social system on the one hand let my mother-in-law know that if she chose abortion she was a killer. On the other hand they refused her a high school education by removing her from the public school system, thereby making it difficult to get a job. The social system of our country also did not enforce any support by his biological father, also a teenager, not even after he went on to graduate and entered the military. It appears that we ALREADY punish the mother, and therefore the child. Does any of this sound like a good start of a child’s life? Do you expect or care if this child succeeds in life or do you simply say that child is a casualty of your war against single motherhood and that by continued punishment you think you can prevent it? Forget the child…it seems that the only thing our social system was willing to do was punish my mother-in-law. She deserved it for being a 14 year old slut, I guess.

Luckily, she was special. Very intelligent and made of stern stuff. She thumbed her nose at our country’s social system. She found a very few welfare programs that would allow her to have child care while she worked multiple minimum wage jobs. She got her GED. She spent 18 years making less than 15K a year.

Somehow, she managed to raise a son who is now a professor at one of Georgia’s fine universities, and in the process she went to college and became an accountant. Of course, because of his very poor upbringing he is now one of those despised “liberal elite professors”. He understandably has very strong support for social programs. He does not believe in God (most of the church people in his hometown shunned his “slutty” mother, and him, as well). He has a strong belief in education. And he has a great deal of distrust towards anything not geared towards directly helping or serving the people.

He is, in a word, a success. He is not in prison. He does not use drugs. He is highly educated at 34 years old. He is a taxpayer. He votes. He is a white male of superior physical condition (truly). And he is a father of a white male, raising our son with his beliefs. He has his “traditionally” raised wife and 49 year old mother to help him, too.

So, while I protest your use of the word abuse perhaps, after witnessing the power of my husband, I understand why you fear those who would undermind your beliefs by propetuating their own.

But, truly, if you want to help the millions of kids already born to unwed mothers, which is the best way to prevent future single-parent childhoods, then you need to stop using language that implies crime and punishment.

By Who do you think you are?

November 25, 2008 8:49 AM | Link to this

Your comments were disrespectful, and completely out of line:

“She’s not intimidated into silence, as many upper- and middle-class black people are because of an imagined imperfection — a divorce, for example — in their own lives.” What is this comment supposed to mean? And why single out one race when at the beginning of your comment your statistics identified that this is a problem with all races, not just blacks. You don’t live in the black community, nor do you probably socialize with very many blacks. So how do you know what many upper and middle class blacks think on the topic. And you wonder why blacks don’t support your party. Because of ignorant, ill-informed comments such as these. You should be censured by your employer for this one.

By Ga Values

November 25, 2008 8:54 AM | Link to this

Who is looking out for the Taxpayer in Washington, we have been SHAFTED in the CITI Bail Out part II. The taxpayer is paying the price to own the company but we may end up with 5%. This bunch of crooks need to go, by the way 1 of them is Obama’s new Sec. of Treasury, not a good start. Cut & Paste from the Washington Post:

The government is guaranteeing a total of $306 billion of Citigroup’s assets against losses greater than $29 billion. In exchange, it is requiring the firm to hand over $7 billion worth of preferred stock, essentially paying the government an insurance premium.

The government is not firing Citi’s executives, but it is requiring that their compensation be approved by federal authorities under terms that are not yet finalized. And it is requiring that the bank help people at risk of losing their homes avoid foreclosure by using the same aggressive approach that the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. has required of IndyMac, a California-based bank it took over in July.

Regulators also prohibited Citigroup from paying dividends to common shareholders of more than a penny a share in the coming three years and required a dividend payment of 8 percent on the government’s preferred stock — higher than the 5 percent dividends that it required of institutions that took rescue money from the Treasury Department over the past few weeks.

The Treasury also has the option of buying warrants in Citigroup if the firm’s shares recover. If that happens, the government would end up owning slightly less than 8 percent of the bank’s shares.

“It strikes me as unbelievably generous,” said a former Fed official who has been in touch with Citigroup. “I’m sure it will be controversial… . They are purifying the balance sheet with two intentions, so Citi’s creditors and shareholders are reassured. And because the creditors are reassured, presumably their lines of credit won’t be cut off. Citi, with that kind of confidence, can do what banks are supposed to do.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/24/AR20081124011182.html?hpid=topnews&sid=ST2008112403290&spos=

By Simple Answers

November 25, 2008 8:57 AM | Link to this

From Ragwit @ 8:07: Funny, I came away with most of my prejudices reinforced…

Well, there’s a big surprise.

Look for a post soon suggesting that lowering capital gains taxes will reduce out-of-wedlock births.

By I'll tell you who he thinks he is

November 25, 2008 9:01 AM | Link to this

Wooten out of line? Two words: Bill Cosby. Look how they tried to slander him for speaking the truth. Wooten doesn’t need to socialize with many blacks to see what they did to Cosby, he just needs to read his own newspaper.

And your diatribe against Wooten is exactly why we need voices like Cosby and Sears to lead the way.

By spankmonkey

November 25, 2008 9:02 AM | Link to this

jim, you ignore a pretty important statistic in your analysis. The divorce rate amongst “our people” (whites). So maybe we’re making fewer babies out of wedlock, but a huge percentage of “white” children end up in a single parent house as well.

Because while the “conservatives” are out there making it illegal for two committed gay people to marry, they make it stupid simple to end a marriage, (sign this… you’re done…)

And even though statistics show that children without thier dads in their lives have higher instances of drug abuse and delinquency, the “conservative” system gives dads no rights in the lives of their children, just financial obligations.

Truthfully, in conservative Cobb county, you would be better protected if, as a man, you DIDN’T marry your sweetheart, and just shacked up and made babies. At least when you become part of that 60% that will divorce (in this case break up) you will have the SAME rights to have the child in your life (next to none)without the hassles of dealing with community property issues and the possibiity of alimony and such.

By Ga Values

November 25, 2008 9:03 AM | Link to this

How can this bunch call themselves conservatives?? The taxpayer is getting ready to bail out American Express and the other credit card companies, why?? We are being RIPPED OFF.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122758048504155625.html

By ron

November 25, 2008 9:12 AM | Link to this

Good morning,I don’t know if Jim’s being humorous this morning or if I’m just extra cynical,But I doubt that lack of marriage is the underlying cause of big and rapacious government.I see lack of matrimonial ties as a result rather than a cause.

When younger people have a lot of spare time on their hands because of utter lack of opportunity in the job market they have very little else to do except go at the two backed beast in a big and rapacious way.It costs them nothing,it doesn’t take special equipment,and it’s fun—for the moment.

It’s a lot easier to get married and stay married if you’re earning a decent wage than it is if you’re living in poverty.This is one thing that conservatives are dead set against,that living wage for the lower portions of society where a large proportion of the problem springs.Until they get that hangup behind them there will be problems.

By Ga Values

November 25, 2008 9:15 AM | Link to this

The WSJ has been taken over by the socialist.. the world as we know it is over.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122757114267354637.html

By spankmonkey

November 25, 2008 9:21 AM | Link to this

No no no… I nominate this one as Rag’s spew of the day:

“a) the extinguishment of al Qaeda all over the world and (b) the formation of a true representative democracy in the heart of the Arabian Middle East “

I see rag is cut from the same cloth as W… Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it…

Rag also wants me to become an IRS agent. Because I don’t have enough to do everyday trying to keep a small business afloat in W’s economy… That reminds me where’s Andy? He was crowing about the Dow Jones tanking because that damn liberul got elected… where’s his eating crow about yesterday’s stock gains??? If it went down because of Obama, it went up because of _____???

But I digress. Back to Rag.

Anyway, Rag wants me to become an IRS agent, and collect taxes all day long to send to the government. Yeah that’s what I need to do, collect and pass on tax revenues for the goverbment, not work on increasing sales and reducing my bottom lines… The national sales tax sounds interesting, until you look at it in action, it will make millions of small business owners become tax collectors, so Rag won’t have to fire up TurbTax in Febuary and spend 15 mins doing his yearly duty to our country.

Of course we can forgive Rag, for there is an obsession there with Robert Bork, and that speaks volumes. just do a google search for Bork and look and see what an accomplished jurist and towering legal mind he WAS. Now he’s just a befuddled old man who’s legal arguments as a friend of the court in the Scooter Libby case were a joke, deemed to be on the level of a first year legal intern.

By Nicol Gelinas

November 25, 2008 9:27 AM | Link to this

SUNDAY’s Citigroup bailout marks the end of an era. Citi was the global emblem of American financial capitalism. But now the world sees Citigroup and its New York home base as emblems of failure.

Yet markets are working to get us through this crisis. The government will continue to cushion the full impact of market forces - but it must continue to let markets work.

Citigroup was in acute trouble until the bailout saved it. The deal will let Citi stay Citi, with its current management. The government (acting through the Fed, the Treasury and the FDIC) will take responsibility for up to $250 billion in future losses on Citi’s mortgage- and other asset-related loan and bond portfolios. In exchange, the feds get a bigger stake in the bank, plus ongoing management and compensation oversight.

What the world doesn’t see is that what failed wasn’t capitalism but the firms that naively adopted the financial model in vogue for the last decade: the idea that any loan, bond or other bank asset could be sliced up and turned into an instantly liquid, priceable and tradeable security, with all its risks engineered away.

Citigroup and the rest of the financial-industry giants embraced that business model. Its abject failure now leaves much of the rest of the industry dependent on the government’s explicit willingness to prop them up.

Yet Citi’s fate is a testament to the power of markets.

Starting 13 months ago, Citigroup and other banks, in concert with the government, began an effort to hide the very real losses that were starting to seep through the industry’s balance sheets and toward the government’s books. Their efforts started with the October 2007 idea to sequester what was thought to be the industry’s $100 billion or so in bad assets in an “off-balance-sheet vehicle” jointly owned by three big banks.

It didn’t, and couldn’t, work. Despite the soothing words, the markets (themselves recovering from years of irrationality) knew that something was very rotten at companies like Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch - and, finally, Citi.

As financial and government executives kept insisting that all was under control, the markets became more and more insistent - forcing firm after firm to capitulate to reality.

The government was the last such entity to capitulate. Even last month, it still thought that, by handing out capital to a big group of banks and guaranteeing some bank debt - it could hide which of the biggest surviving firms were actually desperate for the money.

It couldn’t.

By spankmonkey

November 25, 2008 9:28 AM | Link to this

“If these are your comments, you can not speak about the experiences of BLACK PEOPLE unless you are black and have actually experienced this firsthand!!! I think that you are completely out of line!!!”

What a crock…

You can’t comment on what you see in my house because you aint black!!!

B******!

You need to explain to us what’s going on in your house, cause it looks pretty bad from the outside. And It’s not because the “man” is keeping you down anymore. You do it to yourselves.

This kind of s** attitude is waht makes me lean to right from time to time. I’m all for helping people out when they need it, but they gotta help themselves too…

By Single Mom

November 25, 2008 9:28 AM | Link to this

Once again, Mr. Wooten, you bring up the scourge of single mothers without mentioning the DIVORCE RATE among your own kind (uppity Cobb County CRACKERS) and all the once-married parents — both men and women — who bail on their responsibility to actively raise their own children. (It takes more than keeping up with health insurance premiums, by the way.) Look in the phone book, Mr. Wooten, and tell us how many divorce attorneys are in your oh-so-special, privileged little corner of the world. Hint: They’re the ones with the biggest houses, nicest cars, EX-wives, and bratty, spoiled entitlement-minded kids who expect everything to be handed to them (and usually get it).

And what’s this about Conservatives failing in their endeavor to solve the problems of public education, health care, retirement, or crime? You say that AS IF your heroes ever even tried!

YOUR HYPOCRISY NEVER CEASES TO ASTOUND ME. Go Cheney yourself. Seriously.

By Ragnar Danneskjöld

November 25, 2008 9:30 AM | Link to this

Good morning GA Values @ 9:15, don’t panic. The editorial is a guest column, by Bill Clinton’s Comptroller of the Currency. It does not reflect the views of the WSJ, which has been pretty consistently conservative.

By Churchill's Mom

November 25, 2008 9:33 AM | Link to this

Jim get your head out of the sand She’s Coming..I’m still voting for Martin, why would my hero be associated with a crook like Chambliss is beyond me, must be their connection throughTed Stevens.

JIM THARPE

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin will come to Georgia next week to campaign for incumbent U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss on the eve of the runoff election.

Palin, who drew large crowds while running for vice president with Republican presidential candidate U.S. Sen. John McCain, will appear at Chambliss rallies in Augusta, Savannah, Perry and Atlanta on Monday, the day before the Dec. 2 senate runooff between Chambliss and Democrat Jim Martin.

The Atlanta rally has been tentatively scheduled for 4 p.m., but the location wasn’t yet set.

The Georgia senate runoff has drawn a parade of political a-listers for both candidates.

McCain and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee have appeared for Chambliss. Former president Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore have appeared for Martin.

By Ragnar Danneskjöld

November 25, 2008 9:37 AM | Link to this

Dear Spanky @ 9:21, clearly you lack sufficient intellectual stimulation today. Let’s give you some fodder:

Amend the Constitution – the best potential candidate for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination is Vaclav Klaus.

A word of praise for Obama’s incoming head of the National Economic Council. The notorious Larry Summers – yesterday’s WSJ had a funny snarky line, that he could “condescend to Albert Einstein” – has a pithy quotation in today’s WSJ, that brilliantly captures the leftist political forces that allowed FNMA and FHLMC to destroy the taxpayers:

“The illusion that the companies were doing virtuous work made it impossible to build a political case for serious regulation. When there were social failures the companies always blamed their need to perform for the shareholders. When there were business failures it was always the result of their social obligations. Government budget discipline was not appropriate because it was always emphasized that they were ‘private companies.’ But market discipline was nearly nonexistent given the general perception — now validated — that their debt was government backed. Little wonder with gains privatized and losses socialized that the enterprises have gambled their way into financial catastrophe.”

By ron

November 25, 2008 9:49 AM | Link to this

Dear Ragnar,——We have very effectively privatized the gains and socialized the losses for a lot of U.S. companies.The latest is Citigroup.We have taught corporate America a valuable lesson.Take all the risk you want to maximise profits because in the end there is no risk to the risk taker.

By Peter

November 25, 2008 9:52 AM | Link to this

Jim,

You are correct………..”Until one cultural trend is reversed, conservatives have no hope of slowing the march toward big and rapacious government.

We can’t win elections.

We can’t solve the problems of public education.”

But your lies are not correct…..

REPUBLICAN’S have already created the biggest government, the biggest lies, the worst economy, the worst housing market, the Biggest MADE UP WAR, and created the worst ECONOMY since the Great Depression.

I am truly glad all the REPUBLICAN Greed, can not make thing worse than they already have……well now I think about it they can….

Bush will allow for the RAPING of the American Ecology if he has his way !

Speaking of Education…Republican’s are a Joke when it comes to spending on Education, and their policies are worse !

Speaking of children Jim, why did REPUBLICAN’S Stop the funding for the Boy’s and Girl’s Clubs of America……… or the after school programs, young children so desperately need ?

Because they are Greedy and want to KILL folks instead with America’s Cash !

Republican’s will give Billions to Corporate America, but will CONTINUE to SCREW the American Public !

Gee Jim that is why we have elections…….. and REPUBLICAN’S have been trounced !

Thank GOD !

Hopefully they will have Little to say about the governing of America for Years to come !

By DB, Gwinnettian

November 25, 2008 9:56 AM | Link to this

Pretty good column this time, Mr. Wooten.

Although your headline writer had me reading “Sears Charge” and thinking it was going to be about the credit crunch.

By Cindy

November 25, 2008 9:58 AM | Link to this

I weep at the abuses of America’s children. I will never forget the faces of those 5 children that Texas mother drowned.

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 25, 2008 10:07 AM | Link to this

Saxby Economics, bail out the EXECUTIVES

Wachovia, which lost $33 billion in the last two quarters, said 10 top executives may be entitled to $98.1 million in severance pay after the bank is acquired by Wells Fargo.

By Redneck Convert

November 25, 2008 10:08 AM | Link to this

Well, there’s only a couple little things to do about all these kids without two parents in the home.

First, we got to round up and snip all Those People that are having these kids in Sin. It wouldn’t hurt them much. And make the fathers go out and work for free on a road gang or something.

Second, we got to get back to shunning unmarried people that live together in Sin. It has got to the point that even death notices mention a person’s “lifelong partner,” instead of a husband or wife. We got to get the church back into our life and make sure people like this are looked down on and shamed.

Third, we got to cut out public relief for every mom that has a kid out of wedlock. We should not be in the business of rewarding people for Sin.

Next, we need to make sure to call the kids of single moms what they are, b*rds. We just accept too much of this Sin.

Next, we need to shame every man or woman that gets divorced and remarried. There’s probly lots of them on this blog and they need to be kicked off. The Bible says you can have one spouse, not two or three or four. Lots of so-called respeckable people are walking around today after three or four or five divorces. We can’t have that and stay a godly society. If you married her, you’re stuck with her.

So I say get God back into our life. Get the church back in too. If they are going to do You Know What outside of marriage, they need to pay for it and pay big-time.

Just don’t raise my taxes to pay for all this Sin. It was alot better back in the 1940s and 1950s when we thought people that had babys out of wedlock didn’t exist and we shipped them away from home or drove them out of state.

That’s my opinion and it’s very true. I know Wooten and Raghead and all the other godly conservatives agree with me. And we can do all this, Raghead, with or without a capital gains tax. I know you’re just waiting for a chance to jump in with a argument against the capital gains tax again, but this has nothing to do with that. So stop acting like a crazy man that says the same thing all the time. Have a good day everybody.

By dan

November 25, 2008 10:09 AM | Link to this

Heil Obama

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 25, 2008 10:09 AM | Link to this

NOT SAXBY ECONOMICS, Taxpayer First, Lobbyist Last

Several members of Congress are working to overturn a quiet change in Treasury Department policy that was aimed at encouraging banking mergers.

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 25, 2008 10:12 AM | Link to this

SAXBY ECONOMICS, ANYTHING GOES

Monday’s article in The Wall Street Journal about Morgan Stanley’s stock decline sparked plenty of discussion about default swaps and their potential to be manipulated.

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 25, 2008 10:15 AM | Link to this

SAXBY ECONOMICS

Global securities regulators launched three task forces to study abusive short selling, unregulated financial products and unregulated financial entities such as hedge funds, the Securities and Exchange Commission said on Monday.

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 25, 2008 10:16 AM | Link to this

SAXBY ECONOMICS

The big asset management company BlackRock has laid off four investment managers and six analysts and researchers as the toll from the economic crisis spreads through the financial industry,

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 25, 2008 10:17 AM | Link to this

SAXBY ECONOMICS

Goldman Sachs plans to sell at least $2 billion of new debt that will be guaranteed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, with pricing expected Tuesday, Reuters reported.

By Peter

November 25, 2008 10:18 AM | Link to this

Gotta Love the Republican’s and George Bush……. look at his 14 pardon’s today…..

Good to be a drug dealer, a polluter, and a thief stealing from the government…..

But hey that is what Bush is really all about !

Typical Republican……..Speaks with Forked Tongue !

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 25, 2008 10:19 AM | Link to this

SAXBY ECONOMICS

How much money is the United States willing to lend and spend to bail out the American financial system? The number crunchers at Bloomberg News estimated that the bill could possibly reach more than $7.4 trillion, or roughly half of the nation’s annual gross domestic product.

By deegee

November 25, 2008 10:21 AM | Link to this

Until men start birthing babies you will always question what ever happened to the father when child rearing goes bad. Men can walk away from an unplanned pregnancy. They can walk away from their responsibilities after the child is born. Women have to live with the consequences and that is the undeniable, biological fact of the matter. We might be better off creating a revolution that starts with the message, “girls use sex to get love, boys use love to get sex. Girls, don’t get played.” I think it would help if we had all male, and all female middle schools and high schools, with uniforms.

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 25, 2008 10:21 AM | Link to this

Saxby Economics, Maybe bad for the Lawyers

Cravath, Swaine & Moore said it would reduce bonuses for its associates, while Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom will pay associates the same base bonuses as 2007.

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 10:23 AM | Link to this

Do some of you totally miss the point that Jim Wooten is making in his strong and forceful editorial? He cares about children. He cares about them no matter the color of their skin. HE CARES.

Children that grow up with only one parent have a tough time making a successful life. Wooten did not say it was impossible. He said it was difficult.

Jim Wooten admires those who try to do something to help the lives of children. He admires the tenacity of Judge Sears.

If the statistics anger you, Jim Wooten did not make the statistics. He wants you to know why he is concerned.

Save your “fire’ for those who care less about children than their “good times”.

If you want examples of good parents, look at Obama. Look at George W. Bush. These are the busiest men (and women) in the world who never betrayed their children by desertation. But it does not take prestige to care for children. It only takes love and devotion no matter your income. LOVE AND DEVOTION FOR YOUR CHILDREN. That is what is needed for all children. With two parents, they get it DOUBLE.

By Chad Harris

November 25, 2008 10:30 AM | Link to this

Georgia Senate Runoff Voting Divided Along Racist Bigot Lines

An Obama Appearance is Definitely Needed to beat Saxbuy Chumpass

AFIK it is not difficult for your chartered jet to get from Chicago to Atlanta and Back. Private pilots who plot a trip from the ATL to Midway find it an easy trip.

From Politico today borrowing from Matt Towery’s Insider Advantage Georgia:

Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss holds a narrow lead over Democrat Jim Martin in the Dec. 2 Georgia Senate runoff, according to a new Politico/InsiderAdvantage poll.

The poll shows Chambliss leading Martin by three points, 50 to 47 percent, with three percent of respondents undecided. The first-term GOP senator’s lead is within the poll’s four-point margin of error. The Politico/InsiderAdvantage poll surveyed 523 likely voters on November 23.

The poll numbers are almost identical to the general election results, when Chambliss fell just short of the 50 percent necessary to win the seat outright on Election Night. He led Martin 49.8 to 46.8 percent, with a Libertarian candidate taking three percent of the vote.

“This thing’s going to be a nailbiter. We don’t know who’s going to turn out and we don’t know how it’s going to turn out, but it’s going to be a close race,” said InsiderAdvantage CEO Matt Towery.

With a recount underway in the too-close-to-call Minnesota Senate race, Georgia is the last election battleground in determining whether Democrats will be able to capture a 60-seat filibuster-proof Senate majority.

According to the Politico/InsiderAdvantage poll, each side is doing a convincing job of persuading its base. Chambliss wins over 96 percent of Republicans, while 91 percent of Democrats support Martin. Among independents, it’s a dead heat: Chambliss narrowly leads Martin, 45.5 to 45.2 percent.

The poll found evidence of a gender gap among the electorate: men preferred Chambliss, 52 to 41 percent while women favored Martin, 52 to 48 percent.

Georgians are also dividing their support along racial lines, according to the poll: Martin holds a commanding lead over Chambliss among African-American voters, 89 to 8 percent. Among whites, Chambliss leads Martin 67 to 31 percent.

The poll is weighted for 25 percent African-American turnout, which would be a bit higher than expected. So far, African-Americans have comprised just under 23 percent of voters who have already cast their ballots.

In the presidential race, though, African-Americans comprised a record 30 percent of the vote – a performance fueled by Obama’s historic candidacy.

Towery said the race was close enough that if Obama appeared at a rally just before the election and urged his supporters to vote for Martin, it might be enough to put the Democrat over the top.

“This whole race is on Barack Obama’s shoulders,” said Towery. “If he wants Georgia to vote Democratic, he could come down here the day of the election, hold a rally in Atlanta and get prepared to send people to the polls.”

So far, however, Democratic operatives believe that Obama will remain in Chicago to handle the presidential transition. But several other A-list Democrats have appeared in Georgia to campaign for Martin: Former President Clinton came to Atlanta last Wednesday, while former Vice President Al Gore spoke at a fundraiser Sunday night.

By ron

November 25, 2008 10:38 AM | Link to this

Dear Redneck, I looked in the Atlas for this place called Sin that you say people are living in and I can’t locate it.What State’s it in?

By Kids need help

November 25, 2008 10:41 AM | Link to this

If people would really listen to these “lost” children, they would know that they make choices based on influence. And when society shows a hatred toward them for coming from a single family home or living on the bad end of town, they will look for acceptance elsewhere, which is too often in gangs. Things won’t change until people quit condemning these kids for their choices and turning a blind eye to the situations these choices are made in. It never ceases to amaze me that many middle class folks expect kids from lower income neighborhoods to make the same kind of choices as kids of priveleged backgrounds, not realizing how much the environment impacts the perceptions. Until this ignorance is stopped, there will be no help.

Soccer Moms can make a big difference by finding young people who cannot participate in school events because of lack of transportation.

I have, when I’ve been been made aware, taken children to school who have missed the bus and would otherwise miss the school day. These absences eventually lead to failing grades which leads to demotivation and drop outs when the child is in fact smart enough to graduate. Some answers are simple if adults would just get involved instead of slinging mud. There is more to having a child left behind than improper education and it has a lot to do with “rules” that are in some cases impossible to follow.

By Chad Harris

November 25, 2008 10:43 AM | Link to this

If this takes place, this is one of the dumbest ideas Obama and his transition team have had and will cause considerable harm to this country—and I’m a huge Obama supporter and I canvassed door to door and made calls for him during his campaign. The FISA stance was another. His backing away from closing GITMO and doing away with their absurd trials with no meaningful discovery available to the defense bar, crucial info available to only the prosecution, and hearsay evidence admissable is right out of KafKa

From Christopher Hitchens @ Slate yesterday:

Serving the Clintonian Interest The last thing we need is a Clinton in charge of foreign policy. By Christopher Hitchens Posted Monday, Nov. 24, 2008, at 12:27 PM ET

It was apt in a small way that the first endorser of Hillary Rodham Clinton for secretary of state should have been Henry Kissinger. The last time he was nominated for any position of responsibility—the chairmanship of the 9/11 commission—he accepted with many florid words about the great honor and responsibility, and then he withdrew when it became clear that he would have to disclose the client list of Kissinger Associates. (See, for the article that began this embarrassing process for him, my Slate column “The Latest Kissinger Outrage.”)

It is possible that the Senate will be as much of a club as the undistinguished fraternity/sorority of our ex-secretaries of state, but even so, it’s difficult to see Sen. Clinton achieving confirmation unless our elected representatives are ready to ask a few questions about conflict of interest along similar lines. And how can they not? The last time that Clinton foreign-policy associations came up for congressional review, the investigations ended in a cloud of murk that still has not been dispelled. Former President Bill Clinton has recently and rather disingenuously offered to submit his own foundation to scrutiny (see the work of my Vanity Fair colleague Todd Purdum on the delightful friends and associates that Clinton has acquired since he left office), but the real problem is otherwise. Both President and Sen. Clinton, while in office, made it obvious to foreign powers that they and their relatives were wide open to suggestions from lobbyists and middlemen.

Just to give the most salient examples from the Clinton fundraising scandals of the late 1990s: The House Committee on Government Reform and Oversight published a list of witnesses called before it who had either “fled or pled”—in other words, who had left the country to avoid testifying or invoked the Fifth Amendment to avoid self-incrimination. Some Democratic members of the committee said that this was unfair to, say, the Buddhist nuns who raised the unlawful California temple dough for then-Vice President Al Gore, but however fair you want to be, the number of those who found it highly inconvenient to testify fluctuates between 94 and 120. If you recall the names John Huang, James Riady, Johnny Chung, Charlie Trie, and others, you will remember the pattern of acquired amnesia syndrome and stubborn reluctance to testify, followed by sudden willingness on the part of the Democratic National Committee to return quite large sums of money from foreign sources. Much of this cash had been raised at political events held in the public rooms of the White House, the sort of events that featured the adorable Roger Tamraz, for another example.

Related was the result of a House select committee on Chinese espionage in the United States and the illegal transfer to China of advanced military technology. Chaired by Christopher Cox, R-Calif., the committee issued a report in 1999 with no dissenting or “minority” signature. It found that the Clinton administration’s attitude toward Chinese penetration had been abysmally lax (as lax, I would say, as its attitude toward easy money from businessmen with Chinese military-industrial associations).

Many quids and many quos were mooted by these investigations (still incomplete at the time of writing) though perhaps not enough unambivalent pros. You can’t say that about the Marc Rich and other pardons—the vulgar bonanza with which the last Clinton era came to an end. Rich’s ex-wife, Denise Rich, gave large sums to Hillary Clinton’s re-election campaign and to Bill Clinton’s library, and Marc Rich got a pardon. Edgar and Vonna Jo Gregory, convicted of bank fraud, hired Hillary Clinton’s brother Tony and paid him $250,000, and they got a pardon. Carlos Vignali Jr. and Almon Glenn Braswell paid $400,000 to Hillary Clinton’s other brother, Hugh, and, hey, they, respectively, got a presidential commutation and a presidential pardon, too. In the Hugh case, the money was returned as being too embarrassing for words (and as though following the hallowed custom, when busted or flustered, of the Clinton-era DNC). But I would say that it was more embarrassing to realize that a former first lady, and a candidate for secretary of state, was a full partner in years of seedy overseas money-grubbing and has two greedy brothers to whom she cannot say no.

Does this sibling and fraternal squalor have foreign-policy implications, too? Yes. Until late 1999, the fabulous Rodham boys were toiling on another scheme to get the hazelnut concession from the newly independent republic of Georgia. There was something quixotically awful about this scheme—something simultaneously too small-time and too big-time—but it also involved a partnership with the main political foe of the then-Georgian president (who may conceivably have had political aspirations), so once again the United States was made to look as if its extended first family were operating like a banana republic.

China, Indonesia, Georgia—these are not exactly negligible countries on our defense and financial and ideological peripheries. In each country, there are important special interests that equate the name Clinton with the word pushover. And did I forget to add what President Clinton pleaded when the revulsion at the Rich pardons became too acute? He claimed that he had concerted the deal with the government of Israel in the intervals of the Camp David “agreement”! So anyone who criticized the pardons had better have been careful if they didn’t want to hear from the Anti-Defamation League. Another splendid way of showing that all is aboveboard and of convincing the Muslim world of our evenhandedness.

In matters of foreign policy, it has been proved time and again, the Clintons are devoted to no interest other than their own. A president absolutely has to know of his chief foreign-policy executive that he or she has no other agenda than the one he has set. Who can say with a straight face that this is true of a woman whose personal ambition is without limit; whose second loyalty is to an impeached and disbarred and discredited former president; and who is ready at any moment, and on government time, to take a wheedling call from either of her bulbous brothers? This is also the unscrupulous female who until recently was willing to play the race card on President-elect Obama and (in spite of her own complete want of any foreign-policy qualifications) to ridicule him for lacking what she only knew about by way of sordid backstairs dealing. What may look like wound-healing and magnanimity to some looks like foolhardiness and masochism to me.

Christopher Hitchens is a columnist for Vanity Fair and the Roger S. Mertz media fellow at the Hoover Institution in Stanford, Calif.

By Ragnar Danneskjöld

November 25, 2008 10:45 AM | Link to this

Dear ron @ 9:49, great observation; I cannot challenge.

Dear redneck @ 10:08, “So stop acting like a crazy man that says the same thing all the time.” I resent that – I’m never acting.

Dear Dusty @ 10:23, how dare you post something both cogent and relevant to the daily topic – you just don’t fit in with the character of the blog sometimes.

By Peter

November 25, 2008 10:45 AM | Link to this

HA HA HA……….By Dusty

November 25, 2008 10:23 AM | Link to this

Do some of you totally miss the point that Jim Wooten is making in his strong and forceful editorial? He cares about children. He cares about them no matter the color of their skin. HE CARES.

OK Dusty……. tell us why REPUBLICAN’S stopped the Funding for the Boys and Girls Clubs of America……..if Republican’s actually CARE about Children ?

How about the after school programs for kids with single parents, so they continue to get help, and can grow, instead of putting them on the streets to become the future DRUG Dealer’s that President’s like George Bush will Pardon ?

What a bunch of Lies !

By GaLiberal

November 25, 2008 10:48 AM | Link to this

Moron Jim said: The plain reality is that a society that creates human life as trophies of sexual conquest, as fond remembrances of past relationships, as a way to avoid the question “why did you get out of bed this morning?” or as a lifestyle-support claim, is in danger of social destruction.

What Moron Jim doesn’t tell you is there are a myriad of other factors that determine the outcome. Things like social status (white vs. non-white), economic status (poor vs. rich), and family support. I know someone who raised three children as a single unmarried mother and she had no problems. She was white, upper class, and her family supported her decision. She had no need for a husband. Similarly, I know of married couples and their children are a complete loss. Drugs, gangs, violent behavior, one is serving time at a youth detention camp. So MJ’s premise that children born to unmarried women are “child abuse” is specious at best and most likely an outright lie.

Another thing that MJ doesn’t tell you is that he’s a racist. Or at best a bigot. If you read his diatribe, you very quickly see he is singling out African Americans as the sole cause of the “problem.” Take for example MJ’s statistics that he throws out there:

At the core, the show-stopper is this: In 2007, 28 percent of white, 50 percent of Hispanic and 71 percent of black babies were born to single women.

So? Does that mean all these children grew up being “abused” as MJ claims? How many of these “abused” children when on graduate from college, or became doctors, engineers, or lawyers? None? No, but he doesn’t provide that statistic does he. That’s because to prove the balance would give lie to his arguments. Again, all MJ and his neocon Rethuglicon boot licking buddies can do is lie to make their point.

The Rethuglicon religoNazi lie that you need to have a man and a woman to have a family. You don’t. A single woman, a single man, two women, or two men and be just as good as a man and woman at raising children. The facts are there, but MJ and the religoNazis want to ignore them and spin other lies to support their position.

When you vote Rethuglicon, you vote against your own best interests. And MJs ‘abused children’ lie is living proof.

By Gator Joe

November 25, 2008 10:50 AM | Link to this

Wooten: Much of the strain on marraiges, families, and most importantly on children is caused by the depressed and worsening economy. Another factor would be ignorance, the result of sub-standard educational systems. I would be willing to bet the rate of children born to single women is highest in poor communities and in states with low ranking educational systems. Georgia has both.

By GaLiberal

November 25, 2008 10:51 AM | Link to this

Moron Jim said: The plain reality is that a society that creates human life as trophies of sexual conquest, as fond remembrances of past relationships, as a way to avoid the question “why did you get out of bed this morning?” or as a lifestyle-support claim, is in danger of social destruction.

What Moron Jim doesn’t tell you is there are a myriad of other factors that determine the outcome. Things like social status (white vs. non-white), economic status (poor vs. rich), and family support. I know someone who raised three children as a single unmarried mother and she had no problems. She was white, upper class, and her family supported her decision. She had no need for a husband. Similarly, I know of married couples and their children are a complete loss. Drugs, gangs, violent behavior, one is serving time at a youth detention camp. So MJ’s premise that children born to unmarried women are “child abuse” is specious at best and most likely an outright lie.

Another thing that MJ doesn’t tell you is that he’s a racist. Or at best a bigot. If you read his diatribe, you very quickly see he is singling out African Americans as the sole cause of the “problem.” Take for example MJ’s statistics that he throws out there:

At the core, the show-stopper is this: In 2007, 28 percent of white, 50 percent of Hispanic and 71 percent of black babies were born to single women.

So? Does that mean all these children grew up being “abused” as MJ claims? How many of these “abused” children when on graduate from college, or became doctors, engineers, or lawyers? None? No, but he doesn’t provide that statistic does he. That’s because to prove the balance would give lie to his arguments. Again, all MJ and his neocon Rethuglicon boot licking buddies can do is lie to make their point.

The Rethuglicon religoNazi lie that you need to have a man and a woman to have a family. You don’t. A single woman, a single man, two women, or two men and be just as good as a man and woman at raising children. The facts are there, but MJ and the religoNazis want to ignore them and spin other lies to support their position.

When you vote Rethuglicon, you vote against your own best interests. And MJs ‘abused children’ lie is living proof.

By Gator Joe

November 25, 2008 11:02 AM | Link to this

It isn’t surprising white males by a large margin support Saxby Chambliss. In Chambliss they see someone much like themselves, white, conservative, narrow-minded, racist, draft/combat avoiding, and a chicken-hawk.

By hotlanta

November 25, 2008 11:04 AM | Link to this

Why are the women who are on their 2nd marriage always think that they can tell other people what to do. Sarah Palin’s daughter proved her marriage theory wrong about children behavior if daddy is at home. How is 50% of black babies born to single women when 19 girls in Gloucester ?Maine were pregnant at the same time. Who are doing these numbers.

By Support of Children

November 25, 2008 11:05 AM | Link to this

Need more Fatherly participation:

(GA’s most wanted list)

John Larry Baker, Jr. As of 7/30/2008, owes $118,725.00 for 5 children. Last seen in Laredo, TX 78045.

Aaron W. Ayers As of 7/30/2008, owes $44,874.00 for 1 child. Last seen in Toccoa, GA 30577.

Randy Carver As of 9/31/2008 owes $15,000.00 for 1 child. Last seen in Atlanta, GA 30315

By JB

November 25, 2008 11:34 AM | Link to this

Let,s see which group is it that dosen’t believe in birth control, or sex education. We should round all of these people up in one spot and have a preacher, preach abstenice to them. There problem solved.

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 11:35 AM | Link to this

Dear Ragnar @10:45

Sorry, Ragnar. I’ll try not to let it happen again!!

Peter@10:45

Jim Wooten is suggesting that couples “tie the knot” or at least stick around BEFORE children are brought into one parent homes. YOU KNOW. STOP the problem before it happens.

GA LIBERAL@10:51

Join a dance club and do the TWIST. Or work in a pretzel factory. You couldn’t present a post without insults or fabrications if you tried. Does it really bother you to tell the truth once and a while? Try it. You’ll like it.

And last but not least…SAXBY THE SURE THING….PUT HIM BACK IN CONGRESS TO MAKE THEIR DAY! Vote for SAXBY CHAMBLISS

By Wooten's hits and misses

November 25, 2008 11:44 AM | Link to this

If Wooten discounts the divorced families, then call him on it. If he discount that a gay couple can indeed be a nuclear family, call him on it.

But being wrong on what he’s wrong on doesn’t make him wrong on what he’s right on. Your mistake is that you think he is d@mning you individually, when he in fact is d@mning a societal problem.

By Peter

November 25, 2008 12:00 PM | Link to this

Funny stuff Dusty…………..Peter@10:45

Jim Wooten is suggesting that couples “tie the knot” or at least stick around BEFORE children are brought into one parent homes. YOU KNOW. STOP the problem before it happens.

Is that why Republican’s don’t want sex education taught in schools ?

Duhhhhhhhhhh………..Education what a concept…….not something Republican’s care much about !

Back to the Boys and Girl’s Club’s of America Dusty….

If Republican’s care about children……why did they stop funding them?

By Soothsayer

November 25, 2008 12:00 PM | Link to this

“The Fed was really adamantly opposed to any form of regulation whatsoever. I guess if I had to do it over again, I certainly would have pushed for some way to give greater transparency to products which turned out to be injurious to our markets.”

This is a great read (although somewhat long) about how we got to this point If you take time to read it all you will have a lot better understanding of the problems we face.

By Peter

November 25, 2008 12:13 PM | Link to this

Here is just another example of Jim’s Lies, and the Republican’s lies……….

As corporate America get’s bailed out families are falling apart, and becoming desolate……… and who is hurting the most ?

Children !!!!!!!!!!!

Left Out of the Bailout: The Poor

As the roster of corporations and financial institutions on line for government bailouts seems to grow, some public policy advocates in Washington D.C. are calling on policymakers to focus more efforts on the nation’s poorest. The ranks of the destitute are growing quietly but alarmingly as much of the world focuses on troubles surrounding Wall Street. “Recent data show poverty is already rising quite substantially,” says Robert Greenstein, the executive director of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. “There is a strong potential for more hardship and destitution than we have seen in this country in a number of decades.”

Greenstein’s center released a new study on Monday projecting a sharp rise in the number of people living below the poverty line, which is roughly $21,200 annually for a family of four according to Department of Health and Human Services. An estimated 36.5 million Americans currently live below the poverty line, but those numbers will likely increase by as many as 10.3 million if current projections for the depth and duration of the recession hold true. According to the center’s analysis, the number of poor children will grow by as many as 3.3 million. And the number of children in deep poverty, those in families living on less than half the wages of the official poverty line, will climb by as many as 2 million.

Republican’s speak with Forked tongues !

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 12:19 PM | Link to this

Peter,

THINK, MAN!!

Funding will not take the place of a father in a family.

Sex education will not take the place of a father in a family.

Boys Clubs will not take the place of a father in a family.

STOP the problem before it happens and there is NO father around. THINK AHEAD!!!

By Republicans R Crooks

November 25, 2008 12:21 PM | Link to this

If we would just legalize prostitution, we could zero out divorce at its source—mariage. As for ba st ard children, we could zero them out with a couple quick snips of a certain ductus…again eliminating the problem at its source…and the former reproductive system could once and for all be converted to its highest and best purpose, a pure recreation area. As for saxby, the Chimp-in-Chief, Woodenhead, and Dirty ball, just send all four to gitmo for the next eight years, they have earned the right over the last almost eight long disasterous years of lies….Now I gotta go reprogram my new fancy talking microwave oven, which seems to have become self aware this morning and now tells me it is now vegan, and refuses to cook meat of any kind! I gotta stop buying electronics made in India…dam ned Hindu’s….

By ncgreybr

November 25, 2008 12:26 PM | Link to this

Sarah Palin’s coming to Georgia to help Chambliss out? Do you think she’ll congratulate him on getting the Russians out of Georgia?

By citizen

November 25, 2008 12:31 PM | Link to this

Soothsayer, 12 Noon You might want to Google The Commodity Futures Trading Commission Meeting November 13, 1998 where Ms. Born is trying to convince the Commission that there needs to be stronger regulations in the derivatives (credit default swaps) market. They shut her down then, also. What a shame!

By Jen

November 25, 2008 12:34 PM | Link to this

Dusty,

How do you suggest we get fathers to stick around?

There was nothing that was going to make my husband’s father stick around. He even refused to put his name on the birth certificate because he thought he could get out of child support.

And he did get out of his $100/mo child support.

What we need is to educate young people about sex so they don’t end up 14 years old and pregnant.

By Sweet P

November 25, 2008 12:40 PM | Link to this

Wooten wants to legislate sex. He wants to plan for families without family planning. He wants street smart child-bearers without the school of hard knocks degree. he wants assertive, discrete, and wiley young ladies without the sex-ed.

It’s an age old problem. How to stop sex without ever mentioning it. Like talking about it is worse than doing it.

It’s all because Wooten thinks that he is a Christian. He thinks that sex is from the devil unless sanctioned and chaperoned by a nuns wearing plastic gloves to place the appropriate dingie in the appropriate harbor all under the umbrella of holy matrimony or who knows what he wants, we only know that any christian forays into the bedroom usually end up with gay pride parades.

Sex Education would solve all the single mom theories.

By Peter

November 25, 2008 12:40 PM | Link to this

More Baloney from Dusty………….

“By Dusty

November 25, 2008 12:19 PM | Link to this

Peter,

THINK, MAN!!

Funding will not take the place of a father in a family.

Sex education will not take the place of a father in a family.

Boys Clubs will not take the place of a father in a family.

STOP the problem before it happens and there is NO father around. THINK AHEAD!!!”

Tell me Dusty what percentage of American’s end up with a divorce ? Had you thought of that Dusty ?

Stopping the Problem comes with EDUCATION……SEX EDUCATION….had you thought of that Dusty ?

Gee where are kids suppose to get SEX EDUCATION DUSTY ?

Plus we already have a huge PROBLEM in America………Had you thought of that Dusty ?

Maybe all the father’s are in Jail Dusty…….had you thought of that ?

Get real for a change……..

Maybe Bombing another country and killing the father’s is another issue Dusty……..Had you thought of that ?

Make some common sense Please !

All starts with education at a young age …….. But hey we understand Republican’s don’t really think education is all that necessary, at least not as much as raping the land, and blowing up foreign countries !

Or bailing out the RICH !

By Father in the Family

November 25, 2008 12:40 PM | Link to this

I had 4 kids and couldn’t get rid of the drunken father. When I was finally able to get the kids free I spent the rest of rest of their childhood taking them to therapy. And that is a white middle class success story with a father around. The father is not always the solution.

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 12:46 PM | Link to this

Republcan R Crooks 12:21

I am so glad you have a talking microwave. I hope you got a BookieBrand that talks “liberal” or your short circuits will blow the thing. At least, you have SOMETHING that will speak to you. Probably the ONLY thing. But it will not lie like you.

As to Guantanamo, I have already been to the beach this year, thank you. You would fit in better there. I don’t like terrorists! While you….well….just a wild guess…but….you’d enjoy the company which might be more in line with your “philosophy”.

Well, have a nice veggie lunch. I will do the same. And….Oh yes….VOTE FOR SAXBY CHAMBLISS..tell Congress: THERE AINT NO FREE LUNCH.

By Single Mom

November 25, 2008 12:46 PM | Link to this

Yes, I eagerly await Dusty’s insightful, compassionate response to the father question. I know plenty of MARRIED men who abandoned their parental responsibilities. (Women too.) What of them? GPS chip in the nads, maybe? Forced labor camps? Electro-shock therapy? Or will she come back around to the “conservative” staple: The fault lies entirely with women’s knees, and men are just being men?

By Redneck Convert

November 25, 2008 12:50 PM | Link to this

No educating people about You Know What in schools! It should be a big suprize on the wedding night.

By Chad Harris

November 25, 2008 12:55 PM | Link to this

Leah Sears wrote an opinion and of all people Harold Melton wrote another re-emphasizing it stressing that the US S Ct requires the individual arraignment of each and every/any defendant for any accusation. Each defendant separately is to be informed at the arriagnment of their express right to counsel and that counsel can be provided for them if there is any chance they could receive probation or jail if convicted.

Sears has been informed her opinion is being ignored in every state court in Georgia and has not lifted a finger to compell it’s enforcement. This raises the question as to why trees were cut down to provide the paper on which the opinion was crafted.

It also raises the question of Justice Sears’ fundamental integrity and the stability of her convictions. Why have your law clerks write an opinion you sign (when they had no choice since it was already the law of the land) if you’re going to ignore that it is never enforced?

**The opinion is BARNES v. THE STATE, 275 Ga. 499. S01G1568, Sears, Justice, Decided September 23, 2002 and the Georgia Supreme Court’s opinion in Deren V. State 237 Ga. 387 (515 SE2d 191) (1999). Barnes upholds Deren v. State 237Ga. 387 (515 S.E. 2d 191 (1999).

This opinion was based on Justice Ginsberg’s opinion in Alabama v. Shelton, 535 US 654, US122 S.Ct.1764 152 LE2d 888, (2002), Ginsberg, J. Sonny Perdue’s former counsel, Harold Melton, now an Associate Justice of the Georgia Supreme Court adopted this opinion and emphasized it forcefully **

Georgia aka JawJaw is one of about 3 statues in the US that criminalizes traffic misdemeanors. If you are stopped and accused of going 10 mph over the speed limit (no one does that do they? no one drives their gas hog SUV 75 mph speeding down 10th and crossing Piedmont at 75 mph do they?) or accused of an improper lane switch your sentence could be $1000 fine and a year in the slam if convictedc.

This occurs because greedy county managers want the revenue and the JawJaw Rethugs in the legislature support this stupidity.

The Court clerks and solicitors violate the law and Leah Ward Sears’ opinion each and every minute of each and every day throughout JawJaw because they claim when pinned down they don’t have time to do this.

When the US Supreme Court mandated they do this, that was an order. Anything short of this is a violation of US law, and Georgia law.

Leah Sears ahs been made aware that the law is violated only a stone’s throw from where she sits in her office as has the JawJaw AG and they haven’t lifted a finger to enforce the law.

By getalife comrades

November 25, 2008 1:18 PM | Link to this

Hail mary throwing trillions at the problem is not working.

Russia knows about collapsing and they see us collapsing.

Be a good time for wingnuts to secede to Alaska as palin their queen.

Of course, Russia may want Alaska back.

Happy Holidays comrades!

By GaLiberal

November 25, 2008 1:31 PM | Link to this

**Dusty@11:35 said: GA LIBERAL@10:51

Join a dance club and do the TWIST. Or work in a pretzel factory. You couldn’t present a post without insults or fabrications if you tried. Does it really bother you to tell the truth once and a while? Try it. You’ll like it.**

I did tell the truth, but since it conflicts with your narrow bigoted religoNazi views, you discount it completely. I find it telling that you offered no rebuttal information other than to hurl insults. You are typical of the lowest common denominator the Rethuglicon party continually suckers. No facts. Just lies, spin, and insults.

When you vote Rethuglicon, you vote against your own best interests. And Dusty is living proof.

By ron

November 25, 2008 1:39 PM | Link to this

Dear hotlanta——17 high school girls in Glouchester, Mass. wound up pregnant after some of them admitted to entering into a “pregnancy pact”.Their idea was to raise their babies together. I have never heard anymore about it.If my friend G.L.,the Glouchester fisherman ever sobers up long enough to answer a question,I’ll call him someday and see if he knows anything.

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 1:47 PM | Link to this

Dear Jen,

Do you think sex education is going to stop a drunken man from having sex with a fourtenn year old? I don’t think so.

Do you think that a girl having safe sex since fourteen is going to be a good wife and mother? I don’t think so.

Peter,

You can think of all the exceptions to the rule, but the majority still stands. Childre of single mothers have a lesser chance at succeeding than those with both parents watching out for them. All the programs in the world cannot replace the absence of good PARENTS.

To answer your question: Parents should teach their children sex “education”, honesty and self values. And…parents should be the good example.

Jim Wooten tries to make that point. Society would do well to listen instead of making excuses.

By Jen

November 25, 2008 1:59 PM | Link to this

Dusty, you didn’t answer the question.

How to make the father be in a child’s life?

How?

Answer it.

FYI, my mother-in-law didn’t have sex with a drunken man when she was 14. She had sex with her 14-year-old next door neighbor.

By Cindy

November 25, 2008 2:07 PM | Link to this

Dusty, I don’t think these folks are making excuses; they are looking at reality. Many “single” mothers have a “significant other” with them who is very capable of being a father. Marriage does not a father make. And I definitely resent the insinuation that 14 year olds who practice safe sex don’t turn out to be good wives and mothers.
It appears that your silver spoon or at least lack of knowledge and experience in other lifestyles is blurring your vision. When trying to fix a broken car by using tools and methods to fix a broken bicycle, you just can’t fix it right.

By Republicans R Crooks

November 25, 2008 2:15 PM | Link to this

Well, if ah gotta support these single moms and their bas tard brats, ah at least should git my pick of the moms fer a little recreation between and amoung the sheets.. not those sheets woodenhead, the ones on the bed, not your head….Whad do ya say, if you are a single welfare mom, and a hard working tax paying man taps ya on the shoulder in the grocery store, ya gotta go with him….

By Republicans R Crooks

November 25, 2008 2:19 PM | Link to this

Men can enter into a “No Preggers” pact too, just by gitting those pesky ducts cut or clipped….but do not tell the little ladies, let em think the lack of children is their fault….and the gold diggers can just keep trying to git preggers at your expense, while you enjoy their efforts…

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 2:28 PM | Link to this

Dear Single Mom,

I know many married men who are living happily and responsibly, each with their wife and children. They will do almost anything in the world to protect their families. Some work two jobs to be sure they can take care of their love ones. They will fight anyone who would harm them. There are still men who act like “men”.

I am afraid that you present no facts.

It takes two people to start a baby and both are responsible. The idea is to THINK before the fun starts, not when you’ve got a baby coming into the world that neither of you may want. The child had nothing to do with the outcome. Don’t punish the little one for one moment of good times and lack of restraint on the part of two adults.

GA Liberal,

Jim Wooten presented you with facts and statistics which you immediately ignored.

He did not say that EVERY situation is the same. But the statistics show a trend without bias. He mentioned what the statistics show but you want to deny the results.

If you call statistics “religion” you need a bit more education. It shows the trends not religious obligations NOR ideals.

I am a Christian and believe that the love of two people enhance the better development of children in all ways. But you can ignore that.

Just look at the statistics. Jim Wooten and Leah Sears wish you to think about and figure out the problem. You are not doing that. Hollering and accusing others is not a solution.

By Jen

November 25, 2008 2:32 PM | Link to this

Dusty,

Still not answering the question. How are you going to achieve this illustrious goal?

How will you make fathers live up to that description you just put up?

Since fathers are, apparently, the most important parent, or that mothers aren’t good enough by themselves….how will you make it so that each child has a father?

Answer it.

By Just Logic

November 25, 2008 2:33 PM | Link to this

As long as the gubmit continues to promote having children out of wedlock by giving checks per baby it will NOT stop. Should be simple, if you are currently receiving assistance and get pregnant, you WILL NOT get any more money, period! Too many youngsters have the mind set of more babies = more money. We know that the additional money does not go to the benefit of the child in most cases. I am tired of seeing the single moms with 4 or 5 kids and pregnant on the news crying about what they are gonna do after an apartment fire or such. Why in the hell do you have that many kids and preganant when you couldn’t support the first one or two on your own! At the very least make ANYONE who is to receive gubmit checks go to the office and pick up the check, before you get the check you must submit to and PASS a drug test. If you fail, no check this month! Working people must pass a drug test to work so they can pay for your irresponsibility, you should have to pass them as well!

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 2:44 PM | Link to this

Dear Jen,

You can’t make a “father” do anything. That is the point. Don’t get in a situation or “relaxation” where you have to make anybody do anything.

A 14 YEAR OLD girl should know NOT to have sex with a fourteen year old neighbor or anybody else indiscriminately. Her parents should have stressed that obvious fact. The neighbor’s parents should have taught him something about restraint.

Sure you can do something with the “man”. Match up his DNA. Haul him off to court. Garnish his wages, etc.etc,etc. But the better way is to teach both parties the value of life and the resistance to starting a new one for FUN!! Now we are seeing the results of those that DO NOT CARE. THEY DO WHAT THEY WANT TO DO AND NOBODY IS GOING TO TELL THEM ABOUT IT. THEN THE CHILDREN SUFFER.

By Single Mom

November 25, 2008 2:52 PM | Link to this

Jen, Dusty did answer the question. She explained that I “present no facts.” Therefore, my assumption that there are married men who abandon their parental responsibilities are a figment of our imagination. They simply do not exist. The courts are simply NOT jammed with women trying in vain to get child support, and file repeated contempt charges when men do not pay, or move out of state, or remarry and plead broke…. It’s all a liberal lie made up by people who want to have sex without consequences. Also, I’m guessing married people never cheat on their spouses. See, if it didn’t happen to DUSTY, then it simply has never happened. Get it?

By Jen

November 25, 2008 2:52 PM | Link to this

OK, Dusty, let’s hold the woman 100% responsible.

How will you make a 14 year old girl understand not to have sex with you 14 year old neighbor?

How will you get other women, with their women’s weakness for slutty behavior, to understand that they should not “get in a situation” where they have to make the fathers of their children stick around?

How will me make people care?

By Children Thriving with "Single" parents

November 25, 2008 2:54 PM | Link to this

They’re a good family,” she continued. “They’re a family in every way except in the eyes of the law. These children have a right to permanancy,” she added, “The only real permanancy is adoption in the home where they are thriving.”

“There is no rational basis to preclude homosexuals from adopting,” said the judge.

The boys, now four and eight years old, were taken from their crack-smoking, abusive birth parents by the Department of Children and Family Services.

By REPUBLICANS EVIL TIME IS UP

November 25, 2008 3:16 PM | Link to this

NOTICE HOW YOU REDNECK HICKS LIKE TO POINT OUT ITS JUST THE YOUNG BLACK GIRLS OR THE OLDER BLACK WOMEN ON WELFARE, OUT OF MARRIAGE BABIES HAVING, THIS IS TRUE BUT REMEMBER BLACKS ARE ONLY 15% OF THE POPULATION SO THAT MEANS IT HAS TO BE MORE WHITES ON WELFARE SINCE THE WHITES ARE 60% OF THE AMERICAN POPULATION,IF IT IS NOT MANY BLACKS IN WYOMING UTAH MONTANA NORTH AND SOUTH DAKOTA IDAHO MAINE NEW HAMPSHURE NEW MEXICO COLORADO NEBRASKA IOWA AND SO ON THESE STATES HAVE 1% BLACK POPULATION SO THAT MEANS IT IS MORE WHITE PEOPLE ON WELFARE THAN BLACKS SO WHO DONT LIKE TO WORK OR LIKES TO HAVE BABIES OUT OF WEDLOCK, IT LOOKS LIKE WHITE WOMEN HAVE THE BIGGEST WELFARE PROBLEM THAT YOU HICKS LIKE TO BLAME ON THE BLACKS IN THE INNER CITY REMEMBER EVIL WHITE PEOPLE YOU ALL OUT NUMBER BLACK PEOPLE SO HOW CAN IT BE THAT YOU DONT LIKE TO POINT THE FINGER AT YOURSELVES BUT AT THE MEXICANS ARABS JEWS INDIANS ASIANS AND BLACKS,US JEWS AINT GOING FOR YOUR NEO-NAZI PROPAGANDA ANY MORE. P.S.BLACK SELL CRACK STEAL CARS AND ROB,BUT THE EVIL SOUTHERN WHITE MAN MOLEST THEIR KIDS,BOMBS CHURCHES AND DAYCARE CENTERS DRAGS PEOPLE FROM BEHIND THEIR TRUCKS, EATS OTHER HUMANS LIKE ERIC DAHMER, LOOK AT ERIC RUDOLPH TIMOTHY MCVEIGH, GEORGE BUSH LYING ABOUT IRAQ KILLING INNOCENT 1,000,000 PEOPLE, DEVIL IN THE FLESH.

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 3:16 PM | Link to this

Jen,

what is your problem? Women are not slutty.

Do you not know that fourteen year old girls who have been taught that they are not sex chattels for fun will know NOT to start what they cannot stop? They certainly will know to stop. BUT NOT IF THEY ARE NOT TAUGHT MORALS OR THE FACTS OF LIFE. They don’t know any better. NOBODY TOLD THEM. Where are their parents??

You never understand that morals are taught for good reason, to save a person from the results of irresponsibility. Get over your aversion to responsible behavior. It is not commendable.

By jim is a caveman

November 25, 2008 3:29 PM | Link to this

Okay, then explain Bristol Palin, Dusty? Did the Queen of the Yukon neglect to teach her daughter morals? Or can bad things happen to good people? You can teach a kid and teach a kid and teach a kid and the kid can still make a mistake, a rash judgment, or get caught up in the heat of the moment. How do you then make that kid stick around and do the right thing? Or an adult for that matter? Just saying they should do this or that doesn’t do it. How do we make them do it?

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 3:33 PM | Link to this

single Mom

Sorry you have had a very bad experience. Even if the courts are jammed, they do not represent a large portion of the population.

Most people are quite familiar with good families because they know so many. All families have problems but not necessarily from failed marriages. Anyway, hope things will work out for you.

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 3:46 PM | Link to this

Caveman,3:29

Bristol Palin was taught right from wrong I am almost certain. At seventeen, she made her own decisions. I believe she realizes now that she should have listened. I do not think she will be a single mother very long.

But you have answered your own question. An old response: You can take a horse to water but you cannot make him drink.

YOur children have a better chance of staying out of trouble, sexual and otherwise, if you teach them right from wrong. But it is not infallible. Nobody said it was. Just a better chance for them.

How to make older children do what you want? You can’t. Just keep on loving them is all I can tell you. There’s always hope but sometimes heartbreak. Don’t we wish things could be a little more perfect?

See ya later!!!

By Single Mom

November 25, 2008 3:50 PM | Link to this

Dusty, I have no such problem with child support or paternal involvement, but thanks. I DO have friends who married in good faith and wind up doing and paying for everything themselves. Why don’t you stop generalizing? There are 350 million or so Americans, and judging people based on sterotypes just makes you look stupid.

That being said, HALF of the marriages in this country end in divorce. That means we ALL know couples who make it work, and ones who couldn’t. What’s your point? MY point is that married people leave too. I make it here every time Wooten prints some pejorative “single moms are the problem” hateful crap that singles out single parents with no thought for all the other, many, complex factors involved in raising decent children. I’m sick of the prejudice, and cannot for the life of me see the benefit to anyone of perpetuating it.

By Tomhere

November 25, 2008 4:01 PM | Link to this

Sounds like judicial activism to me. Judges are supposed to ajudicate and that’s it. We don’t need lectures.

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 4:03 PM | Link to this

Single Mom,3:50

Read the statistics again. Even if you do not like to hear about it, the problem mentioned here today is still there. Ignoring it will not make it go away.

Jim Wooten and Judge Sears are facing up to the questions about fatherless families to get some answers. They did not MAKE the problem.

Glad you got your legal procedures worked out. But you sound very bitter. I hope your children are happier.

By Dusty for Martin

November 25, 2008 4:05 PM | Link to this

Vote Martin, Saxby is a CROOK

By Marriage creates Happy Homes

November 25, 2008 4:10 PM | Link to this

DENVER — A jury on Monday found a Colorado Springs woman guilty of three counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of her three children.

The jury returned the verdict after three hours of deliberation. Deborah Nicholls was found guilty of burning her three children in a fire at her home in March 2003.

Prosecutors argued she and her husband planned the fire to collect insurance money. Timothy Nicholls was convicted of three counts of murder in a separate trial and is serving life without parole, prosecutors said.

By Dusty

November 25, 2008 4:13 PM | Link to this

Martin is the minus miniman. Saxby Chambliss is the savy strongman. Gooooo Saxby!! Get Congress in the Groove!! GEORGIA FOR CHAMBLISS!!

By Algonquin J. Calhoun

November 25, 2008 4:15 PM | Link to this

Single Mom, Jim is the mouthpiece for what’s left of the Republinazi Party. As such, it is his job to scapegoat someone for the mess we’re in and today it’s all your fault. You are divorced and what the Taliban, that is the Republinazi Party, would tell you is that you must stay in love, you must make it work, once married you must make it work. Now cheating or committing fraud, being a homosexual while pretending to be hetero, is alright with them. It must be since so many of them do it. Actually, if you re-read the scribblings Jim left, you’ll see that there’s a racism inherent in his point of view. What his statistics don’t tell us is a success story of a racially mixed boy whose mother was twice married and left the raising of her son, largely, to her own mother and father. That boy grew up getting a good education and he’s made something of his life. He’ll be sworn in as the 44th Presidnt of the United States on January 20th, 2009!

By Single Mom

November 25, 2008 4:18 PM | Link to this

Thanks, Dusty! My children ARE happy, healthy, successful in school, and well-adjusted. Probably because they do know their dad, and because their mom is NOT a judgmental, condescending, narrow-minded B—-H who thinks everyone else’s personal behavior should be thrown out there to be judged, mocked, and criticized by strangers who think they know what’s best for everybody else. Go figure.

By Dusty for Martin

November 25, 2008 4:20 PM | Link to this

Vote Martin, Saxby is a CROOK

By Republicans for Obama

November 25, 2008 4:29 PM | Link to this

Why did Saxby not do this….

President-elect Barack Obama vowed on Tuesday to cut waste in a federal budget that “bleeds billions,” to help offset the costs of the huge stimulus package his team is planning.

“If we are going to make the investments we need, we also have to be willing to shed the spending that we don’t need,” he said.

The president-elect, speaking to reporters in Chicago to introduce another key member of his economic team, also offered insight into the way he interpreted the election results that carried him to power. He said his victory was “decisive,” but brought with it a sense of humility that underscored the need for bipartisanship.

As expected, Mr. Obama said that he would nominate Peter R. Orszag to be director of the Office of Management and Budget. Mr. Orszag has been director of the Congressional Budget Office for nearly two years; he has worked in both the Bush and Clinton administrations.

By Algonquin J. Calhoun

November 25, 2008 4:29 PM | Link to this

Apparently, Palin didn’t educate her daughter very well. Trollop is sincerely knocked up and they have a shotgun to the back of her intended. They may marry but it won’t last long. Within a year’s time Trollop will be hittin’ the tundra in her mini-dress, lookin’ for some strange!

By Saxby Chambliss

November 25, 2008 4:32 PM | Link to this

We have to stop this LIBERAL Obama from ending my PORK in the FARM BILL, The LOBBYIST have paid for it & need to get it..

Mr. Obama cited, as an example of the sort of cuts he expects Mr. Orszag and Mr. Nabors to find, a recent government report showing that farmers whose incomes exceeded $2.5 million had probably wrongly been paid some $49 million in government subsidies over a three-year period.

By Crazy chick from commercial

November 25, 2008 4:49 PM | Link to this

Let’s talk about something fun. How about magic?

By catlady

November 25, 2008 4:58 PM | Link to this

My daughter (the one who used the Republican party-sent postcard to get an absentee ballot) got another 4 mailings today from the Ga Republican party urging her to vote for Saxby and telling us what would befall us if Jim Martin is elected. That is 8 in a week! How did they get her name and address??The crap these folks print is incredible! People, don’t be simpleminded as they think you are—check out the claims Saxby is putting out. (For example, if the state sales tax goes from 5 cents on the dollar to six cents on the dollar, you can claim the tax rate went up 20%~ ) Check out the lies, check out what Saxby has done for you (unless you are a “farmer” making millions,you won’t like what you find out) and then vote the rascal out of office! Let him work to pay for his golf excursions and his health care! Maybe his son can be saved if he sees his dad held accountable for the mess he has made, the Georgians he HASN’T represented, over the last 6 years.

On the Fair Tax. You want to keep “your” money? Then pay for everything you use (the roads, each time; the clean air, each breath; the untainted food, each bite; the sewer, each flush; the military, each minute they protect you, etc). One thing I cannot understand: Many of the folks who claim to support it also claim to be Christians. Yet, they overlook some pretty important New Testament stories—the widow’s mite, for example. I can think of a half dozen places that Jesus talks about the “well off” taking care of the less well off. Square that with the “Fair Tax” where the rich reap the benefits and the poor give all they have. And if you think there will be a savings without the IRS, I have some land to sell you in South Georgia. It isn’t as easy as “just using the state tax collectors you already have”, not by a long shot!

As to the original thread: As a 35 year teacher, I certainly agree that kids need functioning PARENTS. It goes for married parents as well. Far too few kids have parents who parent. And I suspect if the percentages were reversed (if 70% of the white babies were born out of marriage) Mr. Wooten would be trumpeting the figures. All children should be born into homes where they are wanted, where they will be the priority, where the adults are willing to forego their own wants to give the children what they need, where adults have the education and tools they need to take care of their families.

By Dusty for MARTIN

November 25, 2008 5:10 PM | Link to this

“Saxby Chambliss spent 6 years stockpiling $13 million from special interests only to waste nearly every dime of it during the general election. I’m sure Tom Perdue’s dog could have also done a better job managing Saxby Chambliss’ campaign. In fact, Perdue’s dog is probably better qualified to fix this economy than Saxby Chambliss.”

By ron

November 25, 2008 5:12 PM | Link to this

Algonquin J.——-You are so narrow minded that you can look through a keyhole with both eyes.

By Tick

November 25, 2008 5:13 PM | Link to this

The truth hurts.

I am a lifelong Republican, and there is no logical reason that Saxby should not have won this race handily except for 1) the Obama wave that Perdue talks about, and 2) the fact that the RNC has lost the plot over the last few years and let the conservative base fracture. That is not the Dems fault — the is the Republican’s fault.

It’s almost like they have forgotten how to mount a proper grassroots political campaign.

By Mick

November 25, 2008 5:14 PM | Link to this

Just when you think Chambliss and his minions couldn’t get any more despicable they sink lower and lower. If Sax is re-elected he will be relegated to the role of an insignificant ignorant redneck with no clout to bring Georgia any benefits. We have got to get out of the slump and back on the right track. Sax is the problem, not the solution.

By Glenn

November 25, 2008 5:15 PM | Link to this

catlady, as a teacher of 35 years, first, you are The Best; and second, what do you think of respectable progressives entering the reproductive privacy of a high-ranking public official, and visiting those perceived sins all the way up the Fallopian tubes of the official’s politically unprepossessing daughter. Personally I thought I’d see Alaska melt first, for highwater beachfront vantages.

By Chad Harris

November 25, 2008 5:15 PM | Link to this

March to 60 Removing the Thug Scum from the Senate

Minnesota has discovered more voter fraud. This is the only real fraud that exists. It occurs when Rethugs steal ballots. An increasing number of missing ballots that were Franken votes are being recovered by the hour in Minnesota.

Franken will win ultimately, as I’ve stated many times because the law in Minnesota is that after the recount, and after the subsequent litigation brought by Coleman, the US Senate has the final say. And at 58-42 that ain’t math for Coleman. Buh Buh Norm. Clean out your office.

In some good news, (way over Jimmy the Woo Woo’s head as well as the thugs who don’t read) the Bush torture maven John Brennan, President-elect Barack Obama’s top adviser on intelligence, has taken his name out of the running for any intelligence position in the new administration. Brennan wrote a letter to Obama that he did not want to be a distraction. His potential appointment has raised a firestorm in liberal blogs who associate him with the Bush administration’s interrogation, detention and rendition policies. Good going liberal bloggers—you backed Brennan out of an Obama administration. Nice work.

In the can they get any dumber category, A California-based PAC that ran scurrilous attack ads against Obama has produced a new pro-Palin ad, just in time for Thanksgiving.

“Thank you for your passionate, hopeful and articulate advocacy of common sense conservative values.”

Keep on keepin’ on Wingnuts. Well be happy to hand your butts to you every time there is an election. You ride that moron’s horsie into every election. It’s the gift that will always give.

The thing to most thankful for this Thanksgiving is that there are still a sizable group of Republicans out there who are stupid enough to think Sarah Palin would be awesome in 2012. And are wasting their money to make it happen—like Jimmy the Woo Woo and Dusty the Wusty.

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 25, 2008 5:17 PM | Link to this

President George Bush is to consider pardoning Saxby Chambliss for misrepresenting the citizens of Georgia.

By Chad Harris

November 25, 2008 5:18 PM | Link to this

March to 60 Removing the Thug Scum from the Senate

Minnesota has discovered more voter fraud. This is the only real fraud that exists. It occurs when Rethugs steal ballots. An increasing number of missing ballots that were Franken votes are being recovered by the hour in Minnesota.

Franken will win ultimately, as I’ve stated many times because the law in Minnesota is that after the recount, and after the subsequent litigation brought by Coleman, the US Senate has the final say. And at 58-42 that ain’t math for Coleman. Buh Buh Norm. Clean out your office.

In some good news, (way over Jimmy the Woo Woo’s head as well as the thugs who don’t read) the Bush torture maven John Brennan, President-elect Barack Obama’s top adviser on intelligence, has taken his name out of the running for any intelligence position in the new administration. Brennan wrote a letter to Obama that he did not want to be a distraction. His potential appointment has raised a firestorm in liberal blogs who associate him with the Bush administration’s interrogation, detention and rendition policies. Good going liberal bloggers—you backed Brennan out of an Obama administration. Nice work.

In the can they get any dumber category, A California-based PAC that ran scurrilous attack ads against Obama has produced a new pro-Palin ad, just in time for Thanksgiving.

“Thank you for your passionate, hopeful and articulate advocacy of common sense conservative values.”

Keep on keepin’ on Wingnuts. Well be happy to hand your butts to you every time there is an election. You ride that moron’s horsie into every election. It’s the gift that will always give.

**The thing to most thankful for this Thanksgiving is that there are still a sizable group of Republicans out there who are stupid enough to think Sarah Palin would be awesome in 2012. And are wasting their money to make it happen—like Jimmy the Woo Woo and Dusty the Wusty.

Barack Obama might have as much power to shape a new court as Reagan. Like Reagan, Obama could appoint as many as three justices before Inauguration Day 2013. John Paul Stevens, 88, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 75, are of retirement age, and Ginsburg is a colon cancer survivor. David Souter, 69, has reportedly expressed an interest in returning to his home in New Hampshire. (Kennedy, who has twice had minor heart procedures, is 72, as is Scalia.)**

“The real question is: Is Obama going to appoint significantly more liberal judges than President Clinton did? Or appoint justices that are center-left like Ginsburg and Breyer?” said Thomas Goldstein, head of the Supreme Court practice for the law firm Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld.

By Cornbread Fred

November 25, 2008 5:19 PM | Link to this

Dusty, THANK YOU for praising both Obama and Bush for being good fathers! Is there hope for turning you into an anti-two-party-system fanatic like me? The rest of you get off her case! She’s being good today.

By Algonquin J. Calhoun

November 25, 2008 5:22 PM | Link to this

Ron, I feel so vindicated! It makes me feel great that an individual with the intelligence quotient of a peanut would assault me in this manner. You like Trollop do you? She’ll be available soon as she drops this little load of backseat love.

By Glenn

November 25, 2008 6:05 PM | Link to this

And then again there’s that paragraph of Mr. Wooten’s that begins, “The simple reality is that a society that creates human beings as trophies of…conquest.”. Now, that’s not even the opening of a proper paragraph. In fact it starts a mere, compound sentence.

But what a sentence. What a society. And what a socially-built government.

The Psalmist wrote: “Like as arrows in the hand of the giant, even so are the little children.”

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 26, 2008 8:36 AM | Link to this

The great Number Crunching game The bailout numbers keeps getting better and better… (especially with the news announced today).

The bailout has cost more than all of these big budget government expenditures – combined:

Marshall Plan: Cost: $12.7 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $115.3 billion Louisiana Purchase: Cost: $15 million, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $217 billion Race to the Moon: Cost: $36.4 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $237 billion S&L Crisis: Cost: $153 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $256 billion Korean War: Cost: $54 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $454 billion The New Deal: Cost: $32 billion (Est), Inflation Adjusted Cost: $500 billion (Est) Invasion of Iraq: Cost: $551b, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $597 billion Vietnam War: Cost: $111 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $698 billion NASA: Cost: $416.7 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $851.2 billion TOTAL: $3.92 trillion

The bailout cost with the latest Citigroup addition is about $5 trillion. Posted by Sunil at 11/25/2008 0 comments
Labels: bail baby bail Monday, November 24, 2008 Taxing the rich - forgotten promises? I hope that Obama has not conveniently forgotten his campaign rhetoric of increasing taxes on the rich. I waited for some mention of this hyped up promise in the economic team rollout event this afternoon, but did not see even a passing reference. Even if the current economic climate is not the most conducive for a statement on taxing the rich, one hopes sincerely that he has not forgotten this plank that he ran on…

As mentioned previously on this blog, only 2% of all households in the US make more than $250,000 a year. That leaves 98% of all households below the $250,000 limit. The median income of US households is about $50,000. A sensible tax on the elite 2% will help pay for the stimulus/infrastructure plan that the President elect unveiled over the weekend. We cannot go on deficit financing all of our expenditures and lay the repayment responsibilities on future generations.

From here: But there were no plans to balance the tax cuts with an immediate tax increase on the wealthy. During the campaign, Obama said he would pay for increased tax relief by raising taxes on people making more than $250,000. “There won’t be any tax increases in the January package,” said one Obama aide, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the details of the Obama package have not been fleshed out. The last eight years of ‘trickle down from the rich to the not so rich’ just has not worked. It is clear from the staggering disparities between the upper crust and the rest.

Meanwhile on the bailout front, the current administration is not even trying to act coy about raising the possibility that the bailout mania will end with Citigroup. The pledges made by the US government to ease the credit crisis now totals $7.7 trillion. It is indeed strange how the bailout czars trip over themselves to rescue the world of the virtual (a service economy that deals in cooked up financial instruments) even as it lets the nuts and bolts economy (an automotive industry employing real people and producing tangible goods) by the wayside. I do agree that the automotive industry led itself into the current mess by lobbying for policies that was more in its short term self interest than strategic, but the last great manufacturing lynchpin in this country will crumble in the blink of an eye if we ignore the $25 billion bailout requested by the automotive industry. Why is Detroit not included in the elite ‘too big to fail’ category when it is responsible for directly or indirectly employing nearly 3 million US residents? Posted by Sunil at 11/24/2008 0 comments
Labels: bailout, Barack Obama, Section 382 tax code Expatriate diaries An interesting column on the reverse migration of Indian Americans to India (includes a reference to S & M conferences that take place in India - no, it is not what you think).

Exact data on émigrés working in India or spending more time here are scarce. But this is one indicator: India unveiled an Overseas Citizen of India card in 2006, offering foreign citizens of Indian origin visa-free entry for life and making it easier to work in the country. By this July, more than 280,000 émigrés had signed up, according to The Economic Times, a business daily, including 120,000 from the United States.

At first we felt confused by India’s formalities and hierarchies, by British phraseology even the British had jettisoned, by the ubiquity of acronyms. We wondered what newspapers meant when they said, “INSAT-4CR in orbit, DTH to get a boost.” (Apparently, it meant a satellite would soon beam direct-to-home television signals.)

Working in offices, some of us were perplexed to be invited to “S&M conferences,” only to discover that this denoted sales and marketing. Several found to their chagrin that it is acceptable for another man to touch your inner thigh when you crack a joke in a meeting.

We learned new expressions: “He is on tour” (Means: He is traveling. Doesn’t mean: He has joined U2.); “What is your native place?” (Means: Where did your ancestors live? Doesn’t mean: What hospital delivered you?); “Two minutes” (Means: An hour. Doesn’t mean: Two minutes.).

Images from a recent visit to Mary Boone Gallery. They have a exhibition of Eric Fischl’s glass/resin and bronze sculptures. The show runs till 20th Dec. From the gallery handout: The largest figural group, “Ten Breaths: Congress of Wits”, is based on photographs taken by Fischl of a Brazilian dance troupe. The exuberance conveyed by these five dancers is countered by the palpable physical and emotional weight of the figures in “Ten Breaths: Damage” and “Ten Breaths: Samaritan”. “Ten Breaths: Tumbling Woman”, a variation on the bronze sculpture Fischl created in response to 11 September 2001, is here given new context in the presence of another solitary figure – the striking translucent “Ten Breaths: Falling Angel” mounted high above the floor of the Gallery. Posted by Sunil at 11/24/2008 0 comments
Labels: Indian American Sunday, November 23, 2008 Prescience Even if I do not have a magic mirror to look back across the decades, I am sure it does not take great erudition to declare the following:

Forbes magazine President and CEO Steve Forbes called Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson “the worst treasury secretary we’ve had in modern times”, citing, among other things, the government’s handling of the housing crisis. And they are planning on bailing out Citi tomorrow. If prescience is anything, Peter Schiff had it right quite some time back. The scary scenario is that he does not project a very reassuring future ahead… (via The Dish). Posted by Sunil at 11/23/2008 0 comments
Labels: bail baby bail, Henry Paulson Saturday, November 22, 2008 Infrastructural changes ahead If Obama can manage to deliver on the rhetoric mentioned at a weekly address earlier today, we are indeed in for some major change.

I have already directed my economic team to come up with an Economic Recovery Plan that will mean 2.5 million more jobs by January of 2011 – a plan big enough to meet the challenges we face that I intend to sign soon after taking office. We’ll be working out the details in the weeks ahead, but it will be a two-year, nationwide effort to jumpstart job creation in America and lay the foundation for a strong and growing economy. We’ll put people back to work rebuilding our crumbling roads and bridges, modernizing schools that are failing our children, and building wind farms and solar panels; fuel-efficient cars and the alternative energy technologies that can free us from our dependence on foreign oil and keep our economy competitive in the years ahead.

I liked the fact that he mentioned crumbling roads and bridges, modernizing schools and alternative energy technologies. The only way to get us out of our current morass is infrastructural improvements. Similar to what was enacted after the Great Depression in the 30’s. One must always bear in mind that these are tall promises, very tall. Not easy at all. My fingers are crossed. Posted by Sunil at 11/22/2008 0 comments
Labels: Barack Obama Photos

Posted by Sunil at 11/22/2008 0 comments
Labels: At home, Chelsea, Staten Island’s St. George Ferry terminal Friday, November 21, 2008 Rhythmic review From Michiko Kakutani’s review of a book about the 2008 presidential race written in rhyme by Calvin Trillin. The review itself was written in rhyme by the Japanese American Times reviewer Michiko Kakutani. Her rhyme is a keeper.

There once was a poet named Bud Trillin, Who cast George Bush as his villain. He sounded like a new Ogden Nash, Writing doggerel with real panache, Chronicling the reign of Bush Two, And Rove’s quest to wipe out the blue. The prez was famous for gaffes, Which Trillin played for some laughs. He painted Bush as a shrub, With a strong impulse to flub, While taking on the Pentagon And Cheney and the neo-cons. In our nation’s hard times, Trillin sought funny lines. Some said he made mere frivolity Out of real issues of polity. But others toasted his wicked wit, And gave him lots of Amazon hits.

From Katrina to Enron to the war in Iraq, Bush’s missteps weren’t hard to attack. W.M.D.’s that didn’t exist led to a desert fiasco, While greed and a hurricane created domestic disasters. In the Gulf, we were caught in a quagmire, While at home, things looked increasingly dire. This mess helped spawn two earlier books By providing some embarrassing hooks. Now the poet’s turned to the ’08 election, Skewering the candidates for our delectation. There was Rudy, McCain, Huckabee and Romney, Obama, Edwards, Dodd and, of course, Hillary. All of them tracked from Iowa to New Hampshire, In caucuses and primaries from Des Moines to Manchester.

The former first lady versus Senator Obama Made for lots of gripping political drama. Bud noted Barack’s “eloquence at his command” And how he got Dems to eat from his hand. As for McCain, Bud saw flip-flops at a cost From the straight-talking man who in 2000 lost, He’d become someone fond of the tactics of Rove, Especially as all his poll ratings dove. While critics said the poet was partisan, Fans hailed him as a talented artisan.

McCain’s pick of Palin was more grist for the mill, Caribou Barbie saw herself as a tool of God’s will, At least that’s how Trillin saw the lass from Alaska, Whom Republicans hoped would play in Nebraska. Both McCain and Palin tried to act mavericky, But many thought of her selection as gimmicky. The right was glad she was instantly famous, But foes just saw a complete ignoramus.

Everything changed when the Dow took a dive. Bankers on Wall Street questioned how they’d survive, And folks turned from talk about lipstick and pigs To worrying how they’d stay in their digs. More bad fallout from the reign of 43, Which hit the poor, the rich and the bourgeoisie. Republicans suffered from this new twist of fate, And McCainiacs wondered if it was too late. Mac touted a guy known as Joe the Plumber, But his populist gambit became a bummer. Trillin recounted this all with verve and élan, Charting the candidates’ every slogan and plan.

Trillin followed the race to the end, Seeing what message the voters would send. This deadline poet began his last lines As anxious Democrats looked for a sign. The networks announced that Obama had won, A momentous end to a historic run. Obama’s mantra of change helped win the election, And promised America a brand-new direction. Trillin praised the country’s choice to reboot In verse that was witty, quick and acute. What had begun two books back as a wry chronicle of woe Became a tribute to the nation’s ability to grow. Posted by Sunil at 11/21/2008 0 comments
Labels: 2008 presidential election, Barack Obama, Calvin Trillin, John McCain Quick comment… As mentioned here before, Geithner is a good pick for Treasury. Looks like the markets liked it. Seemed to close 500 points up. But then, who believes the markets these days… Posted by Sunil at 11/21/2008 0 comments
Labels: Federal Reserve, Timothy Geithner Advice to Sec. Paulson (IMHO) Out the 700 billion dollars authorized by Congress last month to rescue the economy (read: bailout financial institutions), 290 billion dollars has now been spent by Sec Paulson in doling out taxpayer cash to companies of his choice. Rightly or wrongly, Sec. Paulson made a little publicized comment that he is reluctant in approaching Congress for approval on spending the rest knowing full well that it might be an uphill battle with the public suffering from an extended bout of ‘fat cat only’ bailout fatigue. He has rightly called that the next President-elect have the reins on the money to do what is best fit to get us out of this hole.

Meanwhile, what does the market do - it holds us hostage. Every day we see the DOW slipping by about 400 points. Yesterday evening it closed at 7552. We see prominent banks calling for the rest of the $410 billion to be disbursed as soon as possible. Many are warning of dire forecasts if the stated plan is to wait until the next administration takes office. Yesterday, Citigroup’s stock fell by historic amounts to less than 5 dollars a share. Some people are hinting at a Citigroup based bailout, others are mentioning Citi’s merger with another firm. From a macro view of events, large financial institutions know that now might be the best time to wring the rest of the bailout funds - kind of like looting banks as the banks premises are engulfed in flames.

At this point in time, it might be prudent for Sec. Paulson to just sit back - take a deep breath and let the markets settle down. Let the much talked about ‘bottoming of the markets’ run through its course. It is clear that all of the policies (however loftily planned) introduced by Sec. Paulson have failed miserably - whether it be buying troubled assets or investing in banks directly or shoring up credit card and loan companies - nothing seems to have affected the downward slide. With a lame duck (looks more crippled than lame) administration and a Congress awaiting a change of hands, now might be a good time to relax and tell the market “Just shut the ** up - do what you have to do – we are not moved by your daily swings”.

Yes, this is a classic case of the tail wildly wagging the dog. Instead of prudent policies guiding investments and market conditions, we live in an age where fiscal and monetary policies are determined by the direction of the DOW or the spiraling stock values of ‘select’ companies. Yes and remember, it only ‘select’ companies like prominent Wall Street firms that get the preferential treatment. Sec. Paulson: Now, more than ever, is time for a much needed respite, some introspection and enact of policy of ‘wait patiently’. People will respect this policy of yours more than the failed policies associated with the TARP bailout. I suspect the moment Sec. Paulson starts to project an image of this nature, the market which has been behaving more like a spoilt brat on painkillers will also settle down. Of course, before the ‘settling down’ can actually happen, the spoilt brat might throw just one more hissy fit taking the DOW to maybe 5000 and swallow a couple of companies with it, but what the hell, we have endured so much so far and used up billions of dollars of taxpayer money and nothing much has happened, let the hissy fit run its course. As soon as the market and (by translation the big financial institutions) understand that they cannot wag the dog any longer, they will also resort to prudent methods of buying and selling.

Irrationally exuberant behavior started this whole thing. Inflated housing prices, unbelievably cheap credit and overleveraged companies all acted in collusion to hype the markets to soaring levels. Rational approaches like the one outlined above will help end it.

Talking about irrational behavior, it is indeed interesting to end with the cover of a book published some years back that predicted a DOW of 36,000. The book said that it will offer the reader “Rock solid investment advice. Long term investors can place it next to the works of Benjamin Graham and Peter Lynch, as well as Warren Buffett’s annual homilies to his Berkshire Hathaway’s investors”.

Posted by Sunil at 11/21/2008 0 comments
Labels: DOW, Hank Paulson, Irrationally exuberant behavior, TARP Thursday, November 20, 2008 Questions Today is World Philosophy Day.

From Elisabeth Roudinesco’s new book Philosophy in Turbulent Times (via LRB):

Jean-Paul Sartre – for or against? Raymond Aron – for or against? … Should we take a blowtorch to May 1968 and its ideas … seen now as incomprehensible, elitist, dangerous and anti-democratic? Have the protagonists of that revolution … all become little bourgeois capitalist pleasure seekers without faith or principles, or haven’t they? …

The father has vanished, but why not the mother? Isn’t the mother really just a father, in the end, and the father a mother? Why do young people not think anything? Why are children so unbearable? Is it because of television, or pornography, or comic books? …

And women: are they capable of supervising male workers on the same basis as men are? Of thinking like men, of being philosophers? Do they have the same brain, the same neurons, the same emotions, the same criminal instincts? Was Christ the lover of Mary Magdalene, and if so, does that mean that the Christian religion is sexually split between a hidden feminine pole and a dominant masculine one?

Has France become decadent? Are you for Spinoza, Darwin, Galileo, or against? Are you partial to the United States? Wasn’t Heidegger a Nazi? Was Michel Foucault the precursor of Bin Laden, [and] Gilles Deleuze a drug addict … ? Was Napoleon really so different from Hitler? Posted by Sunil at 11/20/2008 0 comments
Labels: Philosophy Day Science watch Will we be walking around with fellow Neanderthals soon? New research hints at the exciting or horrific possibility. Depends on how one views this… This research will again re-ignite the cloning debate and the resultant religious viewpoints to genome replication.

From the Times : If the genome of an extinct species can be reconstructed, biologists can work out the exact DNA differences with the genome of its nearest living relative. There are talks on how to modify the DNA in an elephant’s egg so that after each round of changes it would progressively resemble the DNA in a mammoth egg. The final-stage egg could then be brought to term in an elephant mother, and mammoths might once again roam the Siberian steppes. The same would be technically possible with Neanderthals, whose full genome is expected to be recovered shortly, but there would be several ethical issues in modifying modern human DNA to that of another human species.

Image ripped from here. Reconstructed Neanderthal skeleton, right, and a Homo sapiens skeleton. Some research suggests that it is the human, not the Neanderthal, that strays in the human family tree. Posted by Sunil at 11/20/2008 0 comments
Labels: cloning, gene splicing, genetic engineering, genome sequencing, Neanderthal Wednesday, November 19, 2008 Poetry Female genital mutilation - man’s controlling hand, again… by Patrick Jones

eyelids down drenched in righteousness spitting venom upon innocent skin

sworn to secrecy steeped in indignity parading as, cultural identity,

stapled sexuality an egotist’s litany controlling lives with rusted knives

stitched virginity with thorns of masculinity

the mouth clings to memory as blood in dirt an indelible history drowned in theocracy

even diamonds slip to insignificance as the price of purity rises as does the perpetual misery

be it religion or cultural that shape the fear of the clitoral all are evil and genocidal

eyelids open drenched in morality spit reason upon decrepid ritual

Note: Patrick Jones was recently forced to launch his new collection of poems in the street after a bookstore cancelled the event because of a campaign by Christian activists. Christian Voice said the book was “obscene and blasphemous” and called on the chain to remove copies from stores.(via Bookslut )

Posted by Sunil at 11/19/2008 0 comments
Labels: cultural misalignments, Culture watch, Female Genital Mutilation, mores, Poetry Google made thousands of photographs from the LIFE photo archive dating from 1750s to today freely accessible here. Long live opensourcing!

Children of plantation sharecropper Lonnie Fair preparing food on wood stove in sparsely furnished shack. Location: MS, US Date taken: 1936 Photographer: Alfred Eisenstaedt

Posted by Sunil at 11/19/2008 0 comments
Labels: LIFE photo archive, opensourcing, Photography The remixed skies yesterday evening

Posted by Sunil at 11/19/2008 0 comments
Labels: Hudson River, Photography, Staten Island’s St. George Ferry terminal, Statue of Liberty Tuesday, November 18, 2008 Appropriation in the Arts As I continue to understand appropriation in the arts, I ran into a great write-up on poet Lewis Hyde and his philosophy on copyrights and copylefts. It is a great read for those exploring the realms of creative commons and believe in the virtues of sharing their creative output…

Despite Ben Franklin’s notorious talents of self-promotion, he was explicit that his inventions were not and should not be his to claim as property. Offered an exclusive patent on the Franklin stove, he refused on the grounds that the invention was based on previous innovations — specifically, on theories of heat and matter articulated by Isaac Newton and the Dutch physician Hermann Boerhaave. “That as we enjoy great advantages from the inventions of others,” Franklin wrote in his “Autobiography,” “we should be glad of an opportunity to serve others by any invention of ours, and this we should do freely and generously.”

Of course, you might say, this was an easy position for Franklin to take: he was rich. People need their copyrights to live. But that’s exactly Hyde’s point: copyrights are utilitarian things. They generate money to pay a mortgage and buy groceries and continue working. Extended too far beyond their practical usefulness, copyrights not only contradict their original intent; they also wall creators off from the sources of their inventiveness. Genius, Hyde believes, needs to “tinker in a collective shop.” Posted by Sunil at 11/18/2008 0 comments
Labels: appropriation, Creative Commons, Gift economies, Lewis Hyde The $4,284,500,000,000.00 bailout It is common to hear about the bailout costs and the $700 billion number associated with the exercise. However, there are many elements of the taxpayer sponsored bailout quietly gobbling huge sums of money behind the scenes. Fortunately, I managed to stumble upon a website that is keeping a running tab on the total bailout allocations. CNBC estimates that the total amount allocated so far in this taxpayer financed orgy to be $4,284,500,000,000.00. Yes, that is right - we are putting over 4 trillion dollars into this.

Here is a graphical breakdown.

I see very little money allocated to the tasks involved in the government working with homeowners in helping them change their lending terms or mortgage conditions. Helping hurting homeowners (albeit a difficult and arduous task) will help us identify the quantum of wrongful mortgages, their hidden clauses and their knock on effects on the bundled securities that they back up. Of course, such an effort will involve not just the government, but a concerted attempt by the mortgage industry and banks in sitting down at the table with the aggrieved mortgage holders and working this thing though – but then that is hard work and it benefits only the common folks.

Instead, Sec. Paulson writing in an op-ed piece here tells us that the best way to address housing and mortgages which are at the root of our economic difficulties is “more access to lower-cost mortgage lending to slow the decline in the housing market and reduce the number of foreclosures”.

What he is telling us is that as soon as lenders (i.e. institutions like banks and mortgage lenders) are bailed out, the economic situation should stabilize. Again he is brandishing the principles behind the failed, trickle down Reaganomics that have led to naught over the last eight years… His idea seems overtly flawed because the solution completely bypasses the segment that is hurting (homeowners) and rewards the segment that caused the hurt in the first place (banks/mortgage lenders who with obfuscated terms and conditions bilked fledging homeowners)… I see a long hard slog ahead…

Posted by Sunil at 11/18/2008 0 comments
Labels: bail baby bail, bailout, Hank Paulson, trickle down Reaganomics, Trillion dollar bailout No more Gitmo Day before yesterday on the television program 60 minutes, the President elect Barack Hussein Obama came forward and made a fairly bold statement in public:

I have said repeatedly that I intend to close Guantanamo, and I will follow through on that. I have said repeatedly that America doesn’t torture, and I’m going to make sure that we don’t torture. After being a helpless observer for the last eight years and in particular, after watching the systematic excision of liberties as depicted in the movie ‘Torturing Democracy’, I must say that it is a sign of change when the only person who has the power to close Guantanamo actually makes a statement that he is going to do so.

Depiction of Strappado by Bessonov Nicolay titled ‘Interrogation’, Oil on canvas, 1992.

Strappado is a form of torture that began with the Medieval Inquisition. In one version, the hands of the accused were tied behind his back and the rope looped over a brace in the ceiling of the chamber or attached to a pulley. Then the subject was raised until he was hanging from his arms. This might cause the shoulders to pull out of their sockets. Sometimes, the torturers added a series of drops, jerking the subject up and down. Weights could be added to the ankles and feet to make the hanging even more painful. It is alleged that this form of torture was also routinely used at Gitmo. Posted by Sunil at 11/18/2008 0 comments
Labels: Barack Obama, burning at the stakes, Spanish Inquisition, Strappado, tar and feathers, torture, Veto Gitmo Monday, November 17, 2008 The bonus of parsing the fine print A lot of people are agog over the fact that Goldman Sachs is not giving out bonuses this year. I urge such people to look deeper than just the attention grabbing headlines. The truth is that only 7 employees in Goldman are not getting bonuses. The rest of the employees are collectively pocketing 7 billion dollars in bonuses.

Now it looks like other banks are following the same strategy. Produce eye popping headlines and hide the dirty laundry in the fine print. Today’s headline splashed across the online Times read the following: Top Executives at UBS Will Not Get Bonuses.

Until I got to the fine print:

UBS said that its chairman, its chief executive, and other members of the executive board would receive only fixed salaries this year and that all other UBS employees would get lower 2008 bonuses. Posted by Sunil at 11/17/2008 1 comments
Labels: bonus culture, Goldman Sachs, UBS Monday Quotable “I have learned a long time ago. When they come up and say this has to be done and has to be done immediately, there is no other way of doing it, you have to sit back and take a deep breath and nine times out of 10 they are not telling the truth” - Republican Senator Jim Inhofe asserting that Henry Paulson might have decided who to dole out the $700,000,000,000.00 taxpayer financed bailout money based on his Wall Street friendships.

It is funny, while Inhofe was referring to the extreme haste with which Sec. Paulson rushed the TARP legislation through Congress by invoking that ‘all will be lost’ if we do not pass it, one could almost apply Inhofe’s comments verbatim to the case made for the Iraq war. If we do not learn from history, we are condemned to repeat it again, again and again…

The Poker Game, Cassius Marcellus Coolidge (1844-1934), oil on canvas, 41” X 50”. (Image from Sotheby’s) Posted by Sunil at 11/17/2008 0 comments
Labels: Iraq war, Liar’s Poker, Wall Street Poker Is Goldman Sachs pulling the wool over our eyes? Today, Goldman Sachs, the bank that vacuumed in 10 billion dollars of taxpayer bailout money made a pathetic announcement: They said that they were trimming the bonuses of 7 employees. Here is what they said:

Our senior executive officers made this decision because they believe it is the right thing to do. We cannot ignore the fact that we are part of an industry that is directly associated with the ongoing economic problems. I guess they could not have made it sound more condescending. Of course, other than the seven people singled out as ‘top management’, the rest of the firm is set to receive 7 billion dollars in bonuses (per last week’s news). Each of the firm’s 443 partners is set to pocket an average of more than 5 million dollars as part of the annual Christmas windfall this year.

It might be better if the people at Goldman try not to pull the wool over the public eye with contrite sounding statements like ‘the top management at the firm are getting no bonuses’ – when it amounts to just 7 individuals. Individuals who might more than likely have some left over change from last years bonus packages that totaled more than 17 billion dollars.

Bonus pools of Wall Street firms up until 2006. In 2007, the total bonus pool was a whooping 36 billion dollars. 36 billion dollars would not have fit into the vertcal axis of the above graph. Source: The Washington Post - December 20, 2006 Posted by Sunil at 11/17/2008 0 comments
Labels: bail baby bail, bailout, bonus culture, condescending, Goldman Sachs, Henry Paulson Weekend pictures

Posted by Sunil at 11/17/2008 0 comments
Labels: Brooklyn apartments, Brooklyn Bridge, manhattan, Photography Friday, November 14, 2008 Friday Quotable “Who are we as men to say that we are called by God to the ministry of priesthood, but women are not? That our call is valid, but theirs is not? We profess as Catholics that the invitation to the priesthood comes from God, and it seems to me that we are tampering with the sacred.” - Rev. Roy Bourgeois. Rev. Roy Bourgeois, 69 is a Roman Catholic priest whom the Vatican is considering excommunicating next week for participating in a ceremony it considers illicit and invalid: the ordination of a woman as a priest.

Andres Serrano, ‘Heaven and Hell’, 1984, Cibachrome Photograph, 27.5” X 40” (ripped from the Artnet site) Posted by Sunil at 11/14/2008 0 comments
Labels: Roy Bourgeois, subjugation of women, vatican, Womens equality Thursday, November 13, 2008

Choose life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a f*** big television, Choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players, and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol and dental insurance. Choose fixed- interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisure wear and matching luggage. Choose a three piece suite on hire purchase in a range of f*** fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who you are on a Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing sprit- crushing game shows, stuffing f*** junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pishing you last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, f***-up brats you have spawned to replace yourself. Choose your future. Choose life… But why would I want to do a thing like that?

—- From the movie Trainspotting, whose director recently released Slumdog Millionaire.

Posted by Sunil at 11/13/2008 0 comments
Labels: Slumdog Millionaire, Trainspotting Skies

I didn’t say what a good painting must be, or have, or do. I described some of the features of paintings which in my judgment are good paintings, and how these features work to the advantage of these paintings. It’s as simple as that. I make mistakes but not rules. Anyone who makes rules for painting is a fool, and anyone who reads description as prescription is also a fool - Walter Darby Bannard Posted by Sunil at 11/13/2008 0 comments
Labels: nj skies Asian psyche Chinese reactions to the US election…

“I think the main reason Chinese have liked Obama so much is he’s a black person and we Chinese have sympathy for the weak side,” said Li Bingxin, an official with the China Journalists Association “They have fought so many years for equality. If the black side can win it will be a breakthrough.”

One good Chinese friend had asked me days earlier if Mr. Obama would be the first black president and was surprised by the answer. “Wasn’t Abraham Lincoln black?” he asked. Um, no. “But he did something really good for the black people, right?”

Another friend asked to know more about Mr. Obama. I played her a video clip of a speech and she was shocked when he expressed a litany of economic problems, including people struggling to pay for health care and send their children to school.

“Is this all true?” she asked, and was shocked by my affirmative answer. “We thought everyone in America was rich.”

Posted by Sunil at 11/13/2008 0 comments
Labels: Barack Obama, black white divide, China The great monthly flip flopping ritual Former Goldman Sachs CEO and current Treasury Secretary Henry ‘FlipFlop’ Paulson is caught in a curious case of shape shifting. We are now able to soundly predict with a large degree of confidence the frequency with which the Treasury Secretary performs the flips and flops on the bailout package. Yes, the predictable recurrence pattern on plans to use bailout funds now happens monthly. See below.

In September: The $700,000,000,000.00 bailout bill was called TARP (or Troubled Assets Relief Program). It was sold to lawmakers as a mechanism to buy off troubled and toxic securitized assets off banks and lending institutions and thus ease the credit crisis sparked by the mortgage meltdown.

In October: Buying troubled assets was cast by the wayside and the Treasury decided to flip and put out a plan to buy equity stakes in American banks of their choice. Hank’s alma mater Goldman Sachs saw a cash injection of $10 billion. Morgan Stanley got another $10 billion. Is it a matter of coincidence that both of them announced bonus pools of 7 billion dollars. No, I would not dare suggest that they used taxpayer money to pay their bonuses.

In November: Treasury flopped and now announces that they have decided that buying up equity stakes in banks are not working (or maybe worked just well enough for those banks to declare bonuses). The wizards yesterday announced that they are planning on using the remaining bailout funds to help companies that issue credit cards, make student loans and finance car purchases.

In December: Plans to unveil disbursement of as yet unknown cash injections to as yet unknown set of companies as Christmas gifts. Consumer retail stores, bodegas and kiosks might need to behave properly in line as they queue up to get a part of the largesse.

Curiously missing from the whole bailout equation was help for troubled and distressed homeowners.

United States Senator from the state of NJ Robert Menendez summed it up best:

In the month of August, over 9,800 homes entered foreclosure every day, if this statistic was that there were over 9,800 Wall Street executives that lost their jobs every day in August, we would have ended this a long time ago. Sad but true… Posted by Sunil at 11/13/2008 0 comments
Labels: bail baby bail, bailout, bonus culture, Henry Paulson, mortgage crisis, subprime mortgage crisis, TARP, Term Securities Lending Facility, Treasury Secretary Wednesday, November 12, 2008 Thus Spake Sarahthustra - IV The pitbull’s punditry gets better as we go on. Continuing the series that started here… Gov Sarah Palin, seems to be a gift that keeps on giving (especially to purveyors of linguistic gymnastics). She is in her element here in a couple of performances over the past week.

On her plans to get to run for the 2012 presidency.

“I’m like, O.K., God, if there is an open door for me somewhere - this is what I always pray - don’t let me miss the open door, show me where the open door is, even if it’s cracked open a little bit, maybe I’ll plow right on through that and maybe prematurely plow through it.”

Recently the media was agog over the fact that she considered that the continent of Africa was one country. Here she is correcting her record:

“My concern has been the atrocities there in Darfur and the relevance to me with that issue as we spoke about Africa and some of the countries there that were kind of the people succumbing to the dictators and the corruption of some collapsed governments on the continent, the relevance was Alaska’s investment in Darfur with some of our permanent fund dollars.”

Whatever Gov. Palin says about Africa, she still cannot beat what the current President had to say about that great continent…

“We spent a lot of time talking about Africa, as we should. Africa is a nation that suffers from incredible disease.” —Gothenburg, Sweden, June 14, 2001 Posted by Sunil at 11/12/2008 0 comments
Labels: Alaska, Baskin in Alaska, Sarah Palin, Village crier, Wassila Killa Sign of the times I read this quote today from a young lady from Colorado who quit her job voluntarily to nurse her husband full time. The situation is sad but commendable. It turns out that the husband was an Iraq war veteran who was shot in battle and is now rendered a quadriplegic.

“I am here and I take wonderful care of Matt and I enjoy it, but he would be institutionalized without me. He is my full-time job now. I just feel like I should be compensated for that. They should value what I do.” From when did spouses who take voluntary decisions to look after their families have to be compensated by the Federal government for the work done?

Of course, one might say that my statements are not in good taste considering that her spouse gave up his freedoms for our country and is entitled to adequate compensation. I might have gone with a ‘not in good taste’ mode until I found that the family in question already has access to the following amenities:

This war veteran gets a full disability pension of $6,800 a month. This family was given a well landscaped split level home with two car garages - donated to them free of cost. The family also has the ability to hire a person of ones choice to look after the affairs at home - a service that is paid for by the government in cases such as these. At this rate, we need to start keeping tabs and asking the Feds compensation for looking after our children. That is also a full time job over and above ones regular job. Maybe we are all getting too caught up in the free money for everyone bailout scheme in vogue. Of course in the endgame, going to Iraq in the first place was the biggest mistake. Posted by Sunil at 11/12/2008 0 comments
Labels: Culture watch Profiles in profligacy: The Bailout Lobbyist We have talked abut the bailout multiple times here, here and here. It is undoubtedly the greatest giveaway of taxpayer money since one can’t remember when, but in an interesting piece in the Times today, I noticed profiles of a couple of lobbyists who are making sure that the constituents they represent get a fair share of this socialist largess doled out by the Treasury.

A Hispanic business group is representing plumbing and home-heating specialists. This group wants the Treasury to hire its members as contractors to take care of houses that the government may end up owning through buying distressed mortgages. The National Marine Manufacturers Association is asking whether boat financing companies might be eligible for aid to ensure that dealers have access to credit to stock their showrooms with boats. While the plumbing lobbyist is making sure that the Joes it represents obtain a fair bite of the bailout chunk, it is painfully clear that almost none of the aforementioned bailout money has explicitly been allocated for distressed homeowner mortgage protection.

On the other hand, if the boat based lobbyist group actually succeeded in convincing the Sec. Paulson, then it will be a historic time when we start using taxpayer money to help boat dealers stock up their showrooms with new boats at a time when consumer confidence is at a historic low!

More than lobbying for boat dealers, it looks like someone needs to lobby to repair the money rushing out of gaping holes in the rickety Treasury Department steamer. Posted by Sunil at 11/12/2008 0 comments
Labels: bailout, Treasury Department, Treasury Secretary Monday, November 10, 2008 On what we could learn from the Chinese regarding bailouts Today was yet another great day for bailouts. Firstly, there was yet another bailout of the beleaguered insurance giant AIG, then there was news that the Treasury Department on the sly decided to give American banks a tax windfall of $140 billion and thirdly, there was news of a half a trillion dollar Chinese bailout. OK, now why am I mixing the Chinese bailout with similar measures taking place here? Well, it is indeed interesting to see how these monies are being put to use. To get a quick idea on the differences between the plans hatched by the Treasury as opposed to the Chinese in bailing out, it is instructive to see the details. Or, maybe it is even time to learn from the Chinese.

On what the Chinese would do with their bailout:

At a time when major infrastructure projects are being put off around the world, China said it would spend an estimated $586 billion over the next two years — roughly 7 percent of its gross domestic product each year — to construct new railways, subways and airports and to rebuild communities devastated by an earthquake in the southwest in May. On the sly tax windfall to US banks:

Late September, the Treasury Department issued a five-sentence notice that attracted almost no public attention. Administration officials had just given American banks a windfall of as much as $140 billion. The change to Section 382 of the tax code came after a two-decade effort by the Republican administration to eliminate or overhaul the law. Section 382 of the tax code was created by Congress in 1986 to end what it considered an abuse of the tax system: companies sheltering their profits from taxation by acquiring shell companies whose only real value was the losses on their books. The firms would then use the acquired company’s losses to offset their gains and avoid paying taxes. On bailing out AIG again and yet again:

The government created an $85 billion emergency credit line in September to keep A.I.G. from toppling and added $38 billion more in early October when it became clear that the original amount was not enough. As part of the new revision announced today, the Federal Reserve said it would reduce that credit line to $60 billion. When the reorganized deal is complete, taxpayers will have invested and lent a total of $150 billion to A.I.G., the most the government has ever directed to a single private enterprise. So just to get this clear:

China spends its bailout money on actual projects like infrastructure additions that benefit its citizens and in turn keep the economy humming and productive. In the United States, the Treasury decides to award tax write-offs to banks that shelter their profits from taxation by acquiring shell companies whose real value indicates losses on their books, but then manage to offset imaginary losses with actual capital gains to avoid any payment of taxes. Posted by Sunil at 11/10/2008 2 comments
Labels: AIG, bail baby bail, bailout, China, Goldman Sachs, Henry Paulson, Neel Kashkari, Section 382 tax code, Treasury Secretary, US treasury Sunday, November 09, 2008 Weekend Pictures

Posted by Sunil at 11/09/2008 0 comments
Labels: Photography Friday, November 07, 2008 Ways to go… Meanwhile the rest of the world (esp. the Middle East) have quite some catching up to do in matters of race. As this Lebanese daily reports:

Racism against black people has been alive and well in Arab countries for a long time, with Saudi Arabia ending its own private brand of slavery only at the beginning of the sixties and Mauritania still maintaining a very active slave trade until this day. Even in countries in which the practice of slavery never existed, the view of blacks as inferior has been prevalent for many years, and carries its own brand of prejudice culturally and politically. One of the highest selling type of cosmetics in Egypt, Sudan and the Gulf today are skin-whitening creams that carry names such as “Fair and Lovely,” “Ultra Fair” and “B-White,” and whose advertisements send the message that girls will get the job/ men/look of their dreams if only they were whiter. “Most westerners do not have an idea of how racist a place the Middle East can be,” said Anthony Badran, a Lebanese Fellow for the DC-based Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. “They are completely unaware, for example, that in many Arab countries, the word still used to refer to a black person is ‘abed’ or ‘slave.’”

Dianne Blell combines fashion advertising, mythology and art history in the production of her photo tableaus. Here she seems to use classic elements of Hindu folklore using the vehicle of Radha and Krishna’s love story. The inherent stereotypes latent in many societies are reinforced subliminally using their mythologies and histories. This might be one reason why it is easier for people to transcend race here in the United States (the United States is relatively a new union without too much mythological baggage) but will be a much tougher act to follow in many other parts of our world. Posted by Sunil at 11/07/2008 0 comments
Labels: Abraham Lincoln, black or white, black white divide, John Stuart Mill, Race Echoes of 2000?? Something smells in Alaska and it is definitely not the cod (via The Daily Dish). Four years ago, 313,592 out of 474,740 registered voters in Alaska participated in the election-a 66% turnout. Taking into account 49,000 outstanding ballots, on Tuesday 272,633 out of 495,731 registered Alaskans showed up at the polls; a turnout of 54.9%. That’s a decrease of more than 11% in voter turnout even though passions ran high for and against Barack Obama, as well as for and against Sarah Palin! This year, early voters set a new record. As of last Thursday, with 4 days left to vote early, 15,000 Alaskans showed up-shattering the old record set in 2004 by 28%! Consider the most popular governor in history-and now the most polarizing-was on the Republican ticket. Consider the historic nature of this race; the first African American presidential candidate EVER! The second woman to ever make a presidential ticket; and she’s one of our own. Despite that, we’re supposed to believe that overall participation DECREASED by 11%. Not only that, but this historic election both nationally and for Alaska HAD THE LOWEST ALASKA TURNOUT FOR A PRESIDENTIAL RACE EVER!!! That makes sense. REALLY??? Something stinks.

William T. Wiley, ‘Dr. Faustow and Diablo’, 2006, acrylic and charcoal on canvas, 59” x 73” image. From an exhibition of his works at The Charles Cowles Gallery

Posted by Sunil at 11/07/2008 0 comments
Labels: election shenanigans, Sarah Palin Comment on Obama considering Summers for Treasury The Times is agog with the news that Mr. Lawrence Summers is in the short list to be the next Treasury Secretary. It is commendable that President elect Obama is looking to allay jittery markets and appoint someone as quickly as possible at the Treasury who can project an image of stability, values and infuse continuity at the Treasury.

The only problem is that Mr. Lawrence Summers is not that man.

From his speech to the National Bureau of Economic Research:

Women often don’t want to work the hours needed to get to the top and that girls are socialized toward nursing while boys are socialized toward building bridges. In the special case of science and engineering, there are issues of intrinsic aptitude, and particularly of the variability of aptitude, and that those considerations are reinforced by what are, in fact, lesser factors involving socialization and continuing iscrimination. In other words, this man was telling us that women were intrinsically inferior to men when it came to math and sciences.

That he was the President of Harvard University when he made that comment was another thing… Now he is being considered by President elect Obama to be the Treasury Secretary. No way. Now how. Not ever.

Obama can do better than that. Geithner is the right individual for this job. Posted by Sunil at 11/07/2008 1 comments
Labels: Barack Obama, Lawrence Summers, National Bureau of Economic Research, reinforcing misconceptions, stereotypes, Subjugation, subjugation of women, Timothy Geithner, Treasury Secretary, US treasury Thursday, November 06, 2008 Comment on Palin trashing in vogue The Republican party and its wingnut appendage Fox News are busy tripping over each other in their enthusiasm to throw Gov. Palin under the Straight Talk express bus. In my humble opinion, the blame should not be directed at Gov. Palin who did a great job arousing the hateful, right wing crowds using the one thing she knows best – using hateful, rabble rousing, preachy speeches. Instead, the blame should lie squarely with Sen. McCain who made the disastrous, unvetted decision to anoint a hitherto unknown lady who was barely equipped to be the Governor of Alaska. Posted by Sunil at 11/06/2008 0 comments
Labels: Sarah Palin Bonus reductions Projected bonus cuts on Wall Street here. About time those millions were cut (in my view) and redistributed. Of course, some of this might be companies posturing to the market in the hope of driving up stock prices. The same strategy employed when companies announce layoffs… Has anyone gone back a year later to some of these companies that garner headlines when they project layoffs and asked them exactly how much they laid off or exactly how much they cut bonuses? No. I am sure not. Yes, posturing for the markets is an important aspect of this exercise… Posted by Sunil at 11/06/2008 0 comments
Labels: income inequality, Wall Street chicanery, wall street shenanigans, wall street supervision Growing up in Bangalore, India I used to catch glimpses of the covers of the local newspaper ‘The Deccan Herald’ as my father sat on his chair drinking his morning cup. The effects of the Obama win echo and reverberate far and wide and this is what the Deccan Herald from Bangalore had to say this morning:

History often produces the man it requires for its need and purpose and Obama perhaps knew it was his moment and seized it. But opportunity is responsibility too. That casts on the 44th President the task of creating a new, more humane America, responsive to the myriad problems it confronts within and creatively engaging with the world of which it is still the leader. There is much cleaning up and reconstruction that awaits him in the economy, society and elsewhere, and Obama has indicated that he is seized of the enormity of the challenge. It would be the hope of the world that America’s howl for change does not go waste.

Update: Other reports from around the world here. A great photograph compilation of people’s reactions from around the world. Some of them are indeed touching. Posted by Sunil at 11/06/2008 0 comments
Labels: Barack Obama Wednesday, November 05, 2008 On turnouts and community organizing On the turnout yesterday:

Via Kos: Provided the number stands, the turnout rate for yesterday’s election was the highest in 100 years, according to the estimate from turnout guru Dr. Michael McDonald at George Mason University. Almost 137 million (136,631,825) went to the polls… There is a chance that American turnout will match or surpass the 1960 turnout, and if it does, that will mean approximately 136 million people voted. That raw number will be the most people who have ever voted in an American election. Also a quick recap of community organizing (the kind of organizing that Gov. Palin said was a job that shouldered no real responsibilities)…

Community organizing is a process by which people living in proximity to each other are brought together by an organization to act in their common self-interest. Community organizers may act as area-wide coordinators of programs for different agencies in an attempt to meet community needs for various services. Community organizers may work actively, as do other types of social workers, in community councils of social agencies and in community-action groups. At times the role of community organizers overlaps that of the social planner. Barack Obama started as a community organizer. Maybe it was the ethos of community organizing that people saw as a reason to go to the hustings in such large numbers… I do not know and maybe we will never know. All said and done, it was a victory for America and our people in the large scheme of things - the country, the concept, this glorious experiment in progress. Posted by Sunil at 11/05/2008 0 comments
Labels: Barack Obama, community organizing “Can you teach me to fly like that?” Jonathan Seagull trembled to conquer another unknown. “Of course if you wish to learn.” “I wish. When can we start?”. “We could start now if you’d like.” “I want to learn to fly like that,” Jonathan said and a strange light glowed in his eyes. “Tell me what to do,” Chiang spoke slowly and watched the younger gull ever so carefully. “To fly as fast as thought, to anywhere that is,” he said, “you must begin by knowing that you have already arrived …” The trick, according to Chiang, was for Jonathan to stop seeing himself as trapped inside a limited body that had a forty-two inch wingspan and performance that could be plotted on a chart. The trick was to know that his true nature lived, as perfect as an unwritten number, everywhere at once across space and time.

— From Richard Bach’s Jonathan Livingston Seagull Posted by Sunil at 11/05/2008 0 comments
Labels: Photography Tuesday, November 04, 2008 Barack Obama - The President of the United States of America

Posted by Sunil at 11/04/2008 0 comments
Labels: Barack Obama On Barack Obama being President… Occasionally, I read Markos’ blog. Dailykos has a reputation for being a super-opinionated liberal blog, and I try not to get caught up in the marching rhetoric. Every once in a while I find myself getting sucked up. Markos got me early in October with this piece where he speaks in a fiercely quiet way about the change we are witnessing. So with conservatives bracing for the worst, they won’t experience the kind of pain we did in 2004. Not unless we deliver a defeat even worse than their worst nightmares. And I’ll be honest with you — I want them to hurt as much as we did. I want their spirits crushed, their backs broken. The day after the election, I want to see an electoral battlefield littered with defeated Republicans, their ranks demoralized, their treasury in heavy debt, and no real leadership to take the helm. I want a vacuum so complete, that a bloody leadership battle between the neocons, theocons, and corporate cons shakes the GOP to its core, and leaves it fractured and ill-equipped to stymie the progressive agenda, much less ramp up for an even bleaker (for them) 2010. We’re not out to win this thing. We’re out to crush them. And that’s going to require a level of engagement beyond anything you’ve ever done before. It’ll mean more phone banking, more canvassing, more donating. Work on this site keeps me from working the phones or walking precincts (my wife has helped out on those fronts), but I’ve surrendered a significant portion of my income, way more than my family can really afford, on behalf of the cause. We’ve all got something to offer, whether it’s time or money, and now’s the time to offer what we can… I am proud to say that I did my little bit in convincing people the need for a positive change – through blogging and otherwise. I am happy that I did - however small it might be. I hope for a better future, not just for our country, not just for our people, but for the world at large. The new President has a host of problems that he will have to shoulder and hit the ground running. On top of the agenda is the economy and distressed homeowners. Add to that the dangers posed by creeping inflation and rising unemployment and one has the recipe for disaster. Outside of the country, it is a fact that Afghanistan is hurting badly and Iraq is still in a quagmire. With global recession and a bellicose Russia he will have a lot to deal with internally and externally. A lot will be expected of him over the next four years and my hope is that he delivers. Time will tell. For now I am happy.

In light of the fact that President Obama faces a Great Depression like scenario in front of him, a historical parallel drawn by George Packer in the New Yorker today is handy: On the night of his landslide victory over Hoover, in 1932, in the depths of the Great Depression, Roosevelt had an intimate conversation with his son James: “You know, Jimmy,” Franklin said, “all my life I have been afraid of only one thing—fire. Tonight I think I’m afraid of something else.” “Afraid of what, Pa?” “I’m just afraid that I may not have the strength to do this job.” He paused reflectively. “After you leave me tonight, Jimmy, I am going to pray. I am going to pray that God will help me, that he will give me the strength and the guidance to do this job and to do it right. I hope that you will pray for me, too, Jimmy.”

Posted by Sunil at 11/04/2008 0 comments
Labels: 2008 presidential election, Barack Obama Jonathan Curley, a banker who voted for Bush Sr. once and Bush Jr. twice writes in the Christian Science Monitor on what he learnt while campaigning for Sen. Obama.

I’ve learned that this election is about the heart of America. It’s about the young people who are losing hope and the old people who have been forgotten. It’s about those who have worked all their lives and never fully realized the promise of America, but see that promise for their grandchildren in Barack Obama. The poor see a chance, when they often have few. I saw hope in the eyes and faces in those doorways. Read on here. Posted by Sunil at 11/04/2008 0 comments
Labels: 2008 presidential election, Barack Obama, compassion, poor huddled masses Voting Day Stories - III The lines at the firehouse where my wife and our four year old stopped to vote was relatively small. It was a quick affair and she called me and said that all went through smoothly. The workflow built into the voting machine in New Jersey follow a two step process. First you get to pick all of the candidates for the state, senate and the Presidential races of your choice. Once selected, you then press a button to ‘vote’ for the selected choices. My wife said that she had no problems selecting the various choices on the ballot. My wife then told me that when the time came to press the button to cast the ‘vote’, she did not do it. I asked her what happened. Did she not feel up to the great task of actually participating in this final rite of passage after being battered with promises and ads over the last two years? She then told me over the phone that she made our four year old son do it. I think she did that in the belief that what she did today at the polls was more for our children than for ourselves. Yes, to a large extent we do these things for ourselves, but in the end run, we are here to pass the baton and we better pass a cleaner baton than a ruined old, dirty one to our children. Posted by Sunil at 11/04/2008 0 comments
Labels: 2008 presidential election Voting day stories - II Watching this video of over a 1000 students at my alma mater lined up at 6am this morning to vote is indeed heartening… Posted by Sunil at 11/04/2008 0 comments
Labels: 2008 presidential election, student council, student voting bodies, youth for Obama Making it easier to refuse emergency contraception even for rape victims A Times editorial on the damage that the current administration can do before we see a new one in the White House.

Existing law allows doctors and nurses to refuse to participate in an abortion. Michael Leavitt, the secretary of health and human services, is expected to issue new regulations after these elections that would extend the so-called right to refuse to a wide range of health care workers and activities including abortion referrals, unbiased counseling and provision of birth control pills or emergency contraception, even for rape victims. OK, let’s repeat the last part: As a result of the changes to be instituted in a couple of days, a whole range of health care workers (those of whom that make healthcare decisions solely on their religious/moral beliefs) will have the legal right to refuse emergency contraception even for rape victims. Simplistic had highlighted the issue when it had first surfaced in Sept.

Selection from the art of Octavio Ocampo.

Posted by Sunil at 11/04/2008 1 comments
Labels: birth control pills, emergency contraception, protection for rapists, rape Faces Displaced people fleeing the fighting between Laurent Nkunda’s ‘rebel’ army and the Congolese government forces in Goma, Congo. Full set of pictures here. Looting, rape and murder reigns. Posted by Sunil at 11/04/2008 0 comments
Labels: Congo, Goma, Laurent Nkunda Tuesday Quotable The will of God prevails. In great contests each party claims to act in accordance with the will of God. Both may be, and one must be, wrong. God cannot be for and against the same thing at the same time. In the present civil war it is quite possible that God’s purpose is something different from the purpose of either party - and yet the human instrumentalities, working just as they do, are of the best adaptation to effect His purpose - Abraham Lincoln

From Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln: edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume V, “Meditation on the Divine Will” (September 2, 1862?), pp. 403-404.

Posted by Sunil at 11/04/2008 0 comments
Labels: Abraham Lincoln Voting day stories My friend just returned from voting at PS 149 in New York City. She told me that she got on line at 7:00 am in the morning. There were hundreds in front of her in the line to vote and in about an hour, hundreds had gathered up behind her. She got to vote at 9:15 am and by then three voting machines had broken down. This added to the state of confusion at the voting booth and she told me that election officials were seen walking around distributing pamphlets to the people lined up instructing them to call the appropriate 1-800 numbers complaining that voting machines that were supposed to reliably work broke down just a couple of hours into the process. She said that she was glad to actually cast her vote and added that even if New York is not a swing state, she wanted to tell her grandchildren that she participated in a historic election. My wife plans to vote in the afternoon today. Posted by Sunil at 11/04/2008 0 comments
Labels: 2008 presidential election, Voting day 2008 Monday, November 03, 2008 Palin might invoke ‘Pallin’ around with Kali’ surprise Heidi Klum (the model) was dressed for Halloween as the fearsome Indian goddess Kali (the celestial consort of Lord Shiva). Just a couple of days back, Ms. Klum made news by endorsing Barack Obama for President. Here is why I am little scared with these two otherwise inane developments…

I am concerned that this Halloween costume gag might be used by the spinmeisters at the McCain / Palin camp to now state conclusively that Sen. Obama is now pallin’ around with mythological Hindu goddesses who brandish fearsome weapons of mass destruction emanating from multiple upper limb like extremities thus invoking and fortifying all the negative images, ideas and thoughts that the McCain camp has put into middle America about Sen. Obama.

Of course, I am only kidding. Nevertheless, this does highlight the puerile nature of the campaign that the McCain/Palin camp have conducted thus far. As easy as it has been for Heidi to transform herself into this blue skinned goddesses holding a severed head, the McSame camp had tried their best to cast Sen. Obama variously as a closet terrorist, foreign policy newbie, baby killer, gay activist, supporter for introducing porn to preteens, Iran pal, embryo extinguisher, firebrand Muslim, fire breathing preacher’s best friend and finally when nothing else seemed to stick, a naive socialist.

It is only in our best interests to go out and vote for whoever you think is going to build this country going forward. My choice is clear. Make yours tomorrow. We must, as a nation, make sure that we just go out and vote tomorrow - even if that is the only one thing that you accomplish tomorrow - even if it means h

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 26, 2008 8:43 AM | Link to this

The great Number Crunching game The bailout numbers keeps getting better and better… (especially with the news announced today).

The bailout has cost more than all of these big budget government expenditures – combined:

Marshall Plan: Cost: $12.7 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $115.3 billion Louisiana Purchase: Cost: $15 million, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $217 billion Race to the Moon: Cost: $36.4 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $237 billion S&L Crisis: Cost: $153 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $256 billion Korean War: Cost: $54 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $454 billion The New Deal: Cost: $32 billion (Est), Inflation Adjusted Cost: $500 billion (Est) Invasion of Iraq: Cost: $551b, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $597 billion Vietnam War: Cost: $111 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $698 billion NASA: Cost: $416.7 billion, Inflation Adjusted Cost: $851.2 billion TOTAL: $3.92 trillion

The bailout cost with the latest Citigroup addition is about $5 trillion.

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 26, 2008 8:58 AM | Link to this

November 26, 2008 Posted: 2:47 am November 26, 2008

Uncle Sam’s $351 billion rescue of Citigroup isn’t stopping the bank’s top brass and board members from indulging in office renovations, first-class flights and pricey cuisine.

Insiders tell The Post that Citi is undertaking expensive remodeling of top officials’ offices at the bank’s tony headquarters at 399 Park Ave. even as the sprawling financial institution was on the brink of collapse over the weekend.

Those same executives also are making frequent use of a high-end executive dining area used by senior officials and managing directors to entertain high-profile clients at Citi’s Manhattan digs.

One source notes that “executives of the bank enjoy an elaborate breakfast buffet every morning,” and seafood and steak meals for lunch.

Citi’s board of directors and senior executives also are allowed to take first-class flights - despite a company-wide ban on luxury airfare, one source notes.

“Our exemptions granted to senior executive first-class flights are granted on a case-by-case basis,” said Citi spokeswoman Christina Pretto, who would not name which executives have been given an exemption.

Pretto added that executives are required to pay for their own meals when not being accompanied by a client in its high-end dining area.

As for the renovations, she says they are part of a larger plan to consolidate offices at Citi’s various Manhattan locations.

The consolidation includes vacating pricey leased space Citi holds at Bloomberg Holdings headquarters on Lexington Avenue and its namesake Citigroup Center on East 53rd Street in order to bring senior management closer together at 399 Park Ave.

“[Our renovations] are part of an overall plan to put more people in less space, Pretto said.

To be sure, Citi’s use of money wouldn’t come into question during normal times. But the troubled bank’s balance sheet is receiving intense scrutiny after the Federal Reserve, the Treasury and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. helped craft a hurried plan over the weekend to cover Citi’s losses.

The government agreed three days ago to guarantee a mind-boggling $306 billion in residential and real-estate mortgages and hand out $20 billion in funds to Citi. That’s on top of the $25 billion already provided to the giant bank as part of a broader government move to grease the skids for lenders stricken during the growing credit crisis.

American International Group, which was taken over by the government in mid-September in a rescue now costing taxpayers $150 billion, also has been chastised for extravagant spending after it received a government lifeline.

By Bo Chambliss LOBBYIST

November 26, 2008 9:04 AM | Link to this

So much for too big to fail.

Citigroup, the financial services behemoth that once embodied the term, showed it was too big to prevail, running to the government during the weekend to get a bailout of $20 billion in cash and $300 billion in loan guarantees. That’s in addition to the $25 billion in already got under the first phase of the Troubled Asset Relief Program.

Citi’s second bailout was as inevitable as its first. No other institution peddled as much toxic swill.

As part of the deal, three federal agencies — the Treasury, the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. — will share in a massive cesspool of bad mortgages, credit card debt and commercial real estate loans.

Citi is working on the ultimate special purpose entity, just like those vehicles it helped create at Enron and just like those that it used to hide debt during the mortgage crisis. In the government, it has found the perfect patsy investor for its off-balance-sheet deals.

Three hundred billion is a lot of money, but it’s a pittance against Citi’s $2 trillion in assets, which doesn’t include another $1.2 trillion of junk so rancid Citi already moved it off-book.

About $306 billion has been earmarked for this Citi sewer so far. The company would eat the first $29 billion, and 10 percent of any losses after that.

Meanwhile, the Treasury would take the hit for the next $5  billion, under the cover of the TARP. In exchange, Treasury gets $4 billion of preferred stock paying 8 percent interest.

That part of the deal tells us just how putrid these assets are. The terms show the government is expecting to pay the full $5 billion, bringing the total losses to $34 billion.

But wait, there’s more. After the TARP money is drawn down, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. steps in with another $10 billion guarantee and after that the Federal Reserve gets stuck with another $100 billion for which it gets nothing in return.

Oh, and Citi keeps all of the ownership interest in the sludge investments, so if they should increase in value, it gets the upside.

If the government really wanted to protect taxpayers, it would have demanded some sort of a sliding scale for returns that would have increased the government’s equity stake in the company as the value of the assets declined.

As it is, Citi has every incentive to zero out the value of the cesspool as quickly as possible.

Meanwhile, the government is left with warrants to buy Citi stock. Those shares have plunged to a 16-year low, which could be a good deal for the government. Or not, given that Citi’s stock is now trading for less than the change found under the average couch cushion. Besides, the warrants are already underwater. They were priced at more than $10 a share. Even with Monday’s bailout boost, Citi’s shares were selling at less than $6.

The deal is great for Citi’s failed executives, all of whom get to keep their jobs. Such is the good life for execs in the Citi.

The bank’s beleaguered shareholders, though, will see their investment diluted as the warrants convert, and see their dividend cut, as stipulated in the government’s terms, to no more than a penny a share from 16 cents. A year ago it was 54 cents.

While Citi’s shares rose by $2.31 a share since the news of the deal, the stock remains catfish bait, a sign that investors aren’t impressed. After all, the preferred stock amounts to more debt.

As bad as all that may sound, it gets worse. The money probably won’t be enough. Even after the government programs, Citi still has almost $3 trillion in on- and off-books assets, and there’s a good chance at least some of them as every bit as rotten as the stuff the government is guaranteeing.

In other words, the government’s plan will halt Citi’s decline about as well as a wall of Kleenex will stop a runaway locomotive. It might as well change its name to Boomerang Bank, because once it burns through this latest bailout, it will be coming back for more.

Citi obviously wasn’t too big to fail. Unfortunately for taxpayers, it wasn’t too failed to bail, either.

By jack

November 26, 2008 9:54 AM | Link to this

**Jim, When do you apologize for your unwavering support of George W. Bush for 8 years?

You once said you liked print because you could not hide from what you had said. Considering that you were overwhelming for Bush and supported Bush for the past 8 years, how is that we should believe ANYTHING you say for the next 8?

Bush has become an international figure of ridicule. He is so incompetent, only the blindest of partisans still support him.

And yet ALL of you conservatives worshiped him for years. Why would your opinion mean anything now?

By southern

November 26, 2008 10:44 AM | Link to this

remember when bush took office, the liberials said he may sit in the white house but we’ll never let him govern, i have a feeling that payback’s gonna be hell,

By david wayne osedach, san diego/ U.S.A.

November 26, 2008 11:51 AM | Link to this

This dire situation didn’t happen overnite. And if we’re going to change it we have to start somewhere. Choosing President Obama to represent us to the world is a good start.

By bobs

November 26, 2008 12:28 PM | Link to this

Cheers for abandoning her public office mid term and neglecting her duty to the people of Georgia. Cheers for evidently being bored with being one of the privileged few to ever be asked to serve on a State’s Supreme Court. She makes me puke.

By mike the plumber

November 26, 2008 1:53 PM | Link to this

David from SD, are you serious? I can’t wait to watch the next 4 years as this clown makes sissified Jimmy Carter look like a lion to the rest of the world. Maybe he wants to go have a sit down with Hugo & Putin right now. They along with the rest of the terrorist helping nations out there are licking thier chops right now. At least after we endure the next 4, the dumpocrap party should be in the trash can by then. Huckabee 2012

By P-Low

November 26, 2008 2:30 PM | Link to this

Dear Southern ATL,

I’m black so I have the experience. Upper and middle class blacks are uppitty cowards who will not speak unless they are given permission by some white person no matter who they are - even the lady who cleans the toilets. Bunch of cowards afraid to loose their imagined position in society. I think I’m going to hurl.

By Demi

November 26, 2008 4:47 PM | Link to this

P-Low you are wrong for that bruh!!! LOL

By Demi

November 26, 2008 4:49 PM | Link to this

mike the plumber No, I have a feeling God is going to bless America again…

By REPUBLICANS EVIL TIME IS UP

November 27, 2008 4:36 PM | Link to this

YOU WICKED EVIL NEO NAZI RETHUGLICANS 1.MARTIN SERVED COUNTRY. 2.MARTIN HELPS KIDS COUNTRY AND FAMILY 3.MARTIN HELPS THE POOR 4.MARTIN CUTS TAXES 5.MARTIN STRONG NOT A COWARD AMERICAN

1.SUXBY DODGE THE VIETNAM WAR,BUT CALLS FOR WAR 2.SUXBY HURTS KIDS COUNTRY AND FAMILY 3.SUXBYHURTS THE POOR 4.SUXBY WEAK AND A COWARD 5.SUXBY LIES STEALS AND CHEAT 6.SUXBY SOLD GEORGIA OUT WITH THEIR JOBS

P.S. I SEE ALL THE RACIST SNAKES COMING OUT OF THE WOODWORK HELL MILLER, ADOLF JULLIANI SONNY PERDONT AND THE REST OF THE RETHUGLICAN PARTY WHO REPRESENTS EVIL TO THE UPMOST, ALL OF RURAL NORTH AND SOUTH GEORGIA WILL SUFFER BECAUSE THEY WILL HAVE A EVIL MINORITY WITH THEIR NEO-CONS THAT THEY ARE WILLING TO RE-ELECT,HOPE SUXBY CONTINUES TO F******* OVER YOU JOHNNY REBS IN YOUR TRAILER OR HUTS YOU IMBRED REBEL FLAG LOSING LOSERS.