I'm Not Flying

I’m not flying commercial while Mr. Obama is President.  On Friday, December 25, 2009, on a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit, Michigan, a 23-year-old Nigerian, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab tried to blow up the airliner with the explosive PETN strapped to his leg.  He was stopped, not by a federal security officer, but by a passenger who was alert enough to know something was wrong.  Terrorists are slipping through the cracks.  Not just on commercial air flights, but right into the officer’s lounge in military bases.  At Fort Hood, a Texas army base, 12 people were killed and 32 injured when Major Nidal Malik Hasan, an army psychiatrist, opened fire on the Army personnel at the processing center.  The State Department was swift in issuing a news release saying that they did not believe this was a terrorist attack.   Mr. Obama needs to get off of the glamour train and take care of his number one responsibility as Commander-In-Chief of our military -  protecting American citizens.

A great big start to securing the nation is to put someone responsible in charge of Homeland Security.  That agency at the moment is like a ship without a sail, adrift at sea.  Waiting a year to appoint someone shows an attitude of complacency toward national security.

One of Mr. Obama’s campaign pitches was that the security community was too aggressive and needed to be toned down and that he was the man to do it.  Once in office he has gone back and tried to make felons out of our intelligence officers and charge them with crimes for carrying out the wishes of past Presidents who actually took the safety of Americans seriously.

And what ever happened to personal responsibility?  “Systemic Failure” is saying, “I’m not responsible, the system did it.”  Under Mr. Obama’s watch, an airliner full of Americans was nearly blown up on Christmas by a terrorist whose own father had contacted a U.S. embassy and gave them full details of his son’s suspected terrorist activities.  Under Mr. Obama’s watchful eye another terrorist under investigation by the FBI opened fire inside a U.S. military base.  Even the military is not safe inside a guarded base.

And we have to be careful not to violate the terrorists’ civil rights which they have secured under the Obama administration.  The closing of  Guantanamo Bay, a state of the art detention facility for terrorists, signals weakness  to Al Qaeda and the rest of the wackos who want to destroy America and keep us all in fear.

We’ve seen this before.  Bill Clinton went on a mission to weaken the power of the CIA and the rest of the intelligence community.  He succeeded.  During the Clinton years, the 9-11 attack against the Twin Towers in New York was successfully planned right out in the open without any resistance from a weakened CIA or FBI.  Under Bill Clinton’s watch, the Twin Towers were bombed in 1993 and Clinton treated it as a crime, not an act of  terrorism.  President Clinton never visited the bombing site or paid it much attention, he was too busy attacking the CIA.   This past year they took some of the melted down steel from the Twin Towers and built a battle ship from it.   The special speaker at the commissioning of our new ship, The USS New York LPD-21 on November 7, 2009 was none other than Hillary Clinton.  I watched it on cable TV and I couldn’t believe the hypocrisy of what I was seeing! 

So for now, and the forseeable future, I will not be flying on commercial airline flights.  I don’t care how many gadgets we get that can sniff out a bomb.  That doesn’t protect us from a missile launcher on the ground.  I have zero confidence in our President, our Secretary of State, The State Department, and a demoralized and weakened intelligence community to keep me safe.  I pray for all of them that they will wake up and realize the seriousness of the safety of the citizens of the United States Of America.

[Via http://jlburke57.wordpress.com]

More Perspectives on Obama's Performance

There has been a bit of unrest lately over Obama’s performance, as his first year in office comes to a close. This DailyKos diary sums up my feelings about his performance. Essentially, he falls short of idealist progressive changes and of his campaign promises. But progressives constitute a minority of the American public; the rest of the country is moderate or conservative. Their voices mean we have to compromise. The Democratic majority is not completely progressive and does not give 100% support to Obama. So he is a dealbreaker, a pragmatist, that wants to work with everyone in order to move forward. This means our ideal progressive values must remain ideals for now, and only bits and pieces of progressive legislation will find themselves in his policies.  Through a conservative lens, Obama is essentially a fascist for having progressive/socialist leanings. Conservatives also have the ability to take over next term. We don’t want Obama to make progressivism look so terrible to moderates and conservatives that they take over. His job is to keep their anger and irritation at bay so that he can continue to serve as President.

A professor on the Democratic scorecard program on KPFK put it well: Our leaders are only as progressive as its people are able to mobilize and assemble to keep leaders in check.

[Via http://magikspells.wordpress.com]

Obama: Unlimited Funds For Freddie-Fannie.

While the rest of the nation stagnates and one out of five Americans is out of a job, President Obama, in the still of the night, approved UNLIMITED FUNDING for mortgage giants Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac. The two entities that are probably singularly most responsible for the crash of the sub-prime housing loan market.

Although they were successful in lining the pockets of many Democratic operatives along the way, in 2008 Fanny and Freddie exploded, taking Bear Stearns with them and leading to the failure of many other smaller entities, as we have seen. Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Christopher Dodd were all beholden to Fanny and Freddie for substantial contributions. The US government has bailed Fanny and Freddie out to the tune of ONE POINT FIVE TRILLION DOLLARS in direct and indirect aid. Those are TAXPAYER dollars, it should be noted.

What was going on was these two quasi-government backed Corporations, being major purchasers of SUB-PRIME mortgage paper, were BUNDLING these dubious assets and selling them as bonds. This precarious process worked as long as housing prices continued to rise. As early as 2003, regulators were warning of looming catastrophe “in the unlikely event that the two giants failed”.

Republican efforts to regulate Fanny and Freddie were defeated BY DEMOCRATS, IN PARTY-LINE VOTES. Since their failure in 2008, the two mortgage giants have consumed 1.1 trillion dollars in Fed backing and thus far this year have lost 124.4 billion dollars which has had to be picked up by the Federal Reserve.
Now the treasury has removed the 400 BILLION dollar cap on funding losses AT THE DIRECTION OF THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, replacing it with an UNLIMITED FUNDING CAP! That’s like handing a chronic alcoholic a half gallon of booze and telling him to knock himself out.

THIS is Obama’s much vaunted fiscal responsibility?
Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac are headed down the same road as before and we have the SAME Democrats running interference for them. Wonder who they’ll blame it on this time?

Semper Vigilans, Semper Fidelis

© Skip MacLure 2009

[Via http://skipmaclure.wordpress.com]

Clueless Napolitano Now Concedes System 'Failed Miserably'

“When all else fails, blame George Bush“

=========================================

by Mark Finkelstein

It took a tough question from Matt Lauer, but after having laughably claimed that “the system worked,” DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano has now conceded the obvious: that the security system that permitted Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to board NWA 253 with explosives “failed miserably.”

On Today and in other interviews this morning, Napolitano attempted to use her own ignorance as a shield.  Each time she was hit with a hard question, her response was to the effect “yeah, we’re wondering about that ourselves.”  She also continued to point the finger back at George Bush, repeatedly mentioning that the security procedures in place were formulated under the Bush administration.  Whatever happened to “change you can believe in“?

But back to Today, where Lauer laudably asked Napolitano the necessary question: how could she possibly have claimed, as she did yesterday, that the “system worked”?

MATT LAUER: You made a comment over the weekend and I want to call attention to that because a lot of people are disagreeing with it this morning.  You talked about this incident aboard this Northwest flight and you said “when it came right down to it, the system worked.” A lot of people don’t think the system worked at all, that the only thing that prevented outright disaster was luck.  Can you respond to that?

JANET NAPOLITANO: Sure, I think the comment is being taken out of context. What I’m saying is that once the incident occurred, moving forward, we were immediately able to notify the 128 flights in the air of protective measures to take, immediately able to notify law enforcement on the ground, airports both domestically, internationally, all carriers, all of that happening within 60 to 90 minutes, so –

LAUER: So you’re only talking about what happened after this man tried to ignite this explosive device on the plane.

NAPOLITANO: Indeed.

LAUER: You would then concede that the system prior to that, the system that’s supposed to prevent something like this from happening, failed miserably?

NAPOLITANO: It did. And that’s why we are asking a lot of the same questions I heard you asking before this interview.  How did this individual get on the plane? Why wasn’t the explosive material detected?  What do we need to do to change perhaps the rules that have been in place since 2006 for moving somebody from the generic database to more elevated status.  All of that under review right now.

LAUER: So many man-hours, so much money, Madam Secretary, has gone into securing fliers in this country and around the world, and so let’s talk about it: how does a guy who’s on this general terror list, who then buys a one-way, trans-Atlantic ticket with cash, checks no luggage, a man whose own father has written a letter to authorities both in his own country and U.S. embassy authorities, saying he’s worried that his son has become more radicalized and might attempt some kind of a suicide mission. How is this guy not the perfect candidate for a strip search or a full-body scan?

NAPOLITANO: I’ve asked the same questions.

We’ve got another question: what is Janet Napolitano, head of a department that she now admits “failed miserably,” still doing in office?

Note: As part of her “it’s Bush’s fault” defense, on Morning Joe Napolitano mentioned that young Umar had been issued his US visa “in June, 2008,” i.e., during the Bush administration. OK, but that would have been before his father was frantically trying to alert the Obama admin that his son had apparently turned into a terrorist.

via NewsBusters.org

[Via http://mountainrepublic.wordpress.com]

Jasper Schuringa: Held

 

Wouter Bos heeft hem gebeld om hem namens de Nederlandse regering te feliciteren, hij was te zien op alle belangrijke tv zenders  in de Verenigde Staten, en misschien mag hij nog wel op audientie bij Obama. En terecht.

Jasper Schuringa deed wat je moet doen, maar bijna niemand doet,  in dit soort situaties: handelen op instinct, om te overleven.

Jasper Schuringa, een held.

[Via http://t0201.wordpress.com]

It's Not Easy Being Green

The Climategate revelations and the snowstorm that swept through Europe gave the Copenhagen global warming meetings an air of unreality.  The spectacle of politicians gathering in Denmark with the goal of impoverishing their own societies provided that others do the same sets a new historical standard for idiocy.  It isn’t just Climategate and snowstorms.  Icecap reviews the evidence (HT: PowerLine):

• The most effective greenhouse gas is water vapor, comprising approximately 95 percent of the total greenhouse effect.

• Carbon dioxide concentration has been continually rising for nearly 100 years. It continues to rise, but carbon dioxide concentrations at present are near the lowest in geologic history.

• Temperature change correlation with carbon dioxide levels is not statistically significant.

• There are no data that definitively relate carbon dioxide levels to temperature changes.

• The greenhouse effect of carbon dioxide logarithmically declines with increasing concentration. At present levels, any additional carbon dioxide can have very little effect.

We also know a lot about Earth temperature changes:

• Global temperature changes naturally all of the time, in both directions and at many scales of intensity.

• The warmest year in the U.S. in the last century was 1934, not 1998. The U.S. has the best and most extensive temperature records in the world.

• Global temperature peaked in 1998 on the current 60-80 year cycle, and has been episodically declining ever since. This cooling absolutely falsifies claims that human carbon dioxide emissions are a controlling factor in Earth temperature.

• Voluminous historic records demonstrate the Medieval Climate Optimum (MCO) was real and that the “hockey stick” graphic that attempted to deny that fact was at best bad science. The MCO was considerably warmer than the end of the 20th century.

• During the last 100 years, temperature has both risen and fallen, including the present cooling. All the changes in temperature of the last 100 years are in normal historic ranges, both in absolute value and, most importantly, rate of change.

In short, there is no global warming crisis.  There is no health crisis, either.  These things are manufactured by politicians, for politicians, with utter disregard for the common good.

Reports of what happened in Copenhagen further increase the sense of unreality.  Did the talks succeed? Fail? And what was Obama’s role?  Some startling reports have emerged that help to answer the last question, even if they raise further questions.  Richard Fernandez reprints the translation of a German article that portrays Obama in an extremely unflattering light (smart diplomacy, indeed!), and reflects:

The fundamental article of faith among the lowlife is that it doesn’t matter if the world runs out of money as long as you don’t run out of it. A grifter’s optimization algorithm is to be the last man to die; the last guy to run out. Economists might argue that it is “more rational” to create an orderly society where the tide lifts all boats. But they forget that it isn’t called the Prisoner’s Dilemma for nothing.

If politicians are fundamentally controlled by the societies to which they are accountable, then they will act as rational agents of that society. Once control is lost, they’ll act like grifters. Copenhagen is a preview of what happens when a lump of money is up for grabs. Every bluebottle on the planet — dictators from Africa, professional mourners, court jesters and fast-buck artists — converged on the Copenhagen because it was, to a large extent, unaccountable. But this also limited its ill-effects. The players were too busy knifing each other to turn against the publics of the world.

The fascination of Copenhagen lies in the juxtaposition of is purported high-mindedness with the brutality in the streets, the lunacy of the public theater and the tawdriness of the proceedings. And at the conclusion everyone leaves by private jet in the middle of the night.

I think this explains a lot of what we’re seeing around us.  As Glenn Reynolds repeatedly observes, we have the worst political class in our history.  (Maybe the guys in Congress in the years immediately preceding the Civil War beat them out.  Maybe.  But I doubt it.  I think they actually believed in something other than themselves, however wrong it might have been.)  Why are our politicians so terrible?  They’re acting as grifters.  They no longer represent us.  We’ve lost control of them.  I think Rousseau foresaw this possibility when he worried that mass communication could split the will of the people as expressed in elections from the general will.  (As Homer Simpson put it, “The problem is communication.  Too much communication.”)  If the people can be massively misled, then politicians can avoid accountability, and the people have no vehicle for expressing their true preferences.  This lies behind much of the frustration that has found expression in tea parties.  Hence, as well, health care reform, cap-and-trade, Copenhagen, and a seemingly pro-Islamist, pro-Communist foreign policy.  Our politicians seek out graft instead of the common good.

Fernandez nevertheless expresses a limited optimism:

We are coming to the end a phase and should be glad of it. The sooner the charade ends the sooner things can be fixed. And since there’s a lot of real wealth and talent in the world, and because technology is powerful, I have no doubt that we have the power not only to put things right but to build an incomparably better world….

If we have a crisis in 2010 it could lead to greater democracy, a world in which we develop real energy sources and build things. The year 2015 could be the finest year on the planet. But to get there a huge almost glacially immovable mass of bureaucracy and faux aristocracy has to be moved out of the way. And I think they will largely do it to themselves. The trick is to harness the discontent which I think is inevitably coming in positive and nonviolent ways. That’s not to say unfortunate things might happen unintentionally here and there. But that’s the friction of history. The important thing is to transition to a better world in democratic and political ways rather than in dysfunctional ones.

The generation of the 1920s and 1930s failed to find an orderly way into the new world and fell prey to demagogues. In any given crisis, new demagogues will rise and many will be tempted to follow them. Let’s hope we’ve learned enough, or read enough about the last 70 years to realize that demagogues often take one from bad to worse.

I think 2010 may be both a good and a bad year. Bad in that it will be full of bad news. Good in that it will give the world a chance to truly fix things. All they really need is faith in common sense and a little bit of common decency. This, plus an extraordinary slug of uncommon daring and extraordinary luck.

I sincerely hope he’s right.  But I don’t see the mechanisms by which they’ll do it to themselves.  The people may utterly lose faith in Obama and company, the mandarins of the EU, et al.  But they have been constructing insulation between themselves and public opinion, and I expect the coming year to witness much more insulation in the form of immigration “reform,” allowing felons to vote, blatant voter fraud, legal challenges to elections (as in Minnesota), and the like.

[Via http://philoofalexandria.wordpress.com]

The real Obama....in his own words

The real Obama in his own words. Listen closely.Obama makes it very clear in these videos who he really is. This isn’t made up. This is real folks.http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=tCAffMSWSzY#t=28

Gordon Kuhn
“The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government” Thomas Jefferson
www.Cloudweavers.com

[Via http://gordonwrites.com]

Top Global Warming Causes – Natural or Human? WIH Resource Group

If you’ve followed the debate over climate change even a little, you likely know the main causes of global warming: concentrations of greenhouse gases build up in the Earth’s atmosphere, and create a “greenhouse,” or warming effect. You’re likely also aware that evidence of past warming periods has fueled the argument that natural causes are largely responsible for current global warming, and thus, our choices of ways to reduce global warming are limited. If Nature’s calling the shots, is there any reason to change human activities that increase levels of carbon dioxide, methane, and other greenhouse gases?

While arguments persist, there’s little doubt that human-produced greenhouse gas emissions play a major role in the current warming trend. Nature has a role, but it pales in the face of increasing emissions from human activity.

What are some of the natural causes of global warming?

Think back to science classes from school. You undoubtedly learned at some point that carbon dioxide is a naturally-occurring compound, that it provides food for plant life, and that animals breathe it out. You may have also learned that decaying organic material releases CO2. There’s no need to question these facts. Greenhouse gases can be emitted into the atmosphere from a variety of natural sources.

Skeptics of climate science, however, have latched onto a number of natural phenomena, and attempted to argue that they’re primary global warming causes.  Some of the natural occurrences you may have heard discussed include:

Volcanic eruptions: Yes, volcanoes emit CO2 when they erupt; as Grist’s Coby Beck showed, though, volcanic CO2 emissions do not outweigh those produced by humans.

Solar cycles and cosmic rays: If you followed discussions about the causes of global warming at all, you’ve run across this argument. A recent study released by a group of European scientists concluded that “The chance of the natural cosmic-ray or solar irradiance explanation being responsible for more than 14% of the observed warming is quite negligible.”

Water vapor: You may have heard the claim that water vapor’s the most prevelant greenhouse gas, and therefore is the main cause of global warming (not CO2). This is half true. Water vapor is the most prevalent gas; however, it’s produced as feedback of increased CO2 emissions, and is not a “forcing” of global warming.

Why human causes of global warming are a much bigger problem

Many of the activities you take for granted ultimately contribute to global warming, including

• Driving your car
• Turning on your air conditioning or heat
• Eating food that is locally out of season (or not locally grown), and shipped from other parts of the country or world

All of these activities rely on the use of fossil fuels. Burning of these fuels releases carbon dioxide… but CO2 that exists in a very different part of the carbon cycle. Fossil fuels are sequestered carbon: the elemental remains of organic entities (plants, animals) that were “stored away” by natural systems in order to maintain stability in the climate. You may find it ironic that many scientists and engineers are searching for ways to sequester carbon emissions: Nature had already done it quite well!

When you release carbon from fossil fuels by burning them, you’re essentially contributing to an “overflow” of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. This overabundance of heat-trapping gases can lead to:

• Rising sea levels
• Changes in seasonal weather and precipitation patterns
• Increased severe weather effects
• Lower rivers and lakes that are fed by snow and ice melt-off
• Habitat changes for a wide variety of plants and animals

So, can you claim a straight-line, cause-and-effect relationship between climate change and these phenomena? No… but we do know that climate change increases the probability of these effects. Consider Colorado University climate scientist Brad Udall’s analogy: the climate is like a six-sided die, with “Two faces [that] say warm, two normal, two cold. That is your normal climate… We have now changed it. Now it says three warm, two normal and one cold.” “Rolling the die” becomes much more treacherous.

Do natural events and occurrences play a role in global warming? Definitely. But if we’ve learned anything from studying the geological record, it’s that nature’s time table is very different from the one for the current warming cycle — the climate has never warmed at this quick a pace. We also know that extreme climate changes produce extreme results for life on Earth… and that you want to do your part to ensure that such results don’t occur more quickly than they might otherwise.

If you’re looking for more detailed scientific information about the evidence for human-caused climate change, check out the International Panel on Climate Change’s “Summary for Policymakers” of its Fourth Assessment Report.

Image credits: takomabibelot and flydime at Flickr under a Creative Commons license

Tagged as: Carbon dioxide, global warming, greenhouse gases, human causes, natural causes

Source: Sustainablog and WIH Resource Group

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[Via http://wihresourcegroup.wordpress.com]

Christmas Eve, 2009 and New Years wishes, 2010

 

I offer each of you personally this lovely Christmas card, now nearly 140 years after it was first created in the year 1870, as I start to write this essay on Christmas eve, year 2009.

Best holiday wishes to all my friends and visitors, you who are my brothers and sisters, who come here to Alan OldStudent’s Musings.

And Merry Christmas to my Christian friends.

Although I am an atheist, I like that Serenity Prayer by Reinhold Niebuhr:

God, grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change;
The courage to change the things that I can;
And the wisdom to know the difference.

As one who is in the seventh decade of his life, I have seen some amazing things. I saw how a mass movement in my own country, the United States, defeated and knocked down the infamous Jim Crow laws, America’s home-grown version of apartheid. And I saw how a mass movement ended an unjust war in Vietnam.

These are examples of things that we were able to change, and the American  people are better off because enough of us had the wisdom to know we could change these things, that despite our youth, we had the wisdom to know the difference.

Yes! We had the audacity to try and the gumption to carry it out.

Today, late 2009, so many of us on the American left are feeling demoralized about now, partly because so many of us had put our hopes in the very attractive and compelling Barack Obama. Now we see him pursuing a war we oppose, we see him representing the interests of the plutarchy over our interests, and now we feel let down.

Our mistake on the left has always been the tendency to tie ourselves to those twin parties of capitalism, the Democrats and the Republicans. But all real progressive change in this country has always come about through the agency of independent mass mobilization and mass action, and the politicians have always opposed these mobilizations and mass actions, at least until change became irresistible, inevitable, and irreversible.

Deep within me, I still hold that belief that I had as a youth.

I believed and I still believe, that together, we can change the world. I believed, and still believe, we can fight injustice, war, racism, exploitation, and create a world fit for decent human beings. I believed, and still believe, we can make progress towards that goal, that each of us, though our own lives be tiny in the greater scheme of things, can make a difference and influence history.

My elders said I was naive and unschooled in the ways of the world, that we just had to come to terms with injustice and violence, that understanding and accepting this inevitability was the wisdom to know the difference.

But now I’m an old man. And I still believe we can and we simply must change this world. Both human existence, even life itself, hang in the balance.

To do that, we need, each of us, to educate ourselves. Educating ourselves means so more than just learning a few facts or reading a newspaper. It requires us to develop our sensitivity, to learn to think critically, to learn to think in terms of human history, to look beyond our preconceptions and to examine the evidence, to not be afraid to examine our times, our culture, ourselves, and to be daring enough to leap beyond  our fears and reservations into the world of tomorrow.

The word “educate” comes from two Latin words, “ex” and “ducere.” “Ex” means “out of” or “away from.” “Ducere” means “to lead.” So ex-ducere becomes educere. Education literally means to lead us out of ourselves, out of convention-imposed ignorance, out of superstition, out of our  xenophobia and obscurantism, out of our comfort zone, out of what the poet William Blake calls the “mind-forged manacles, and into awareness—both self awareness and social awareness.

One of the reasons I talk so much about physical fitness on this site (other than it being one of my passions) is that physical fitness is a part of self-education. Physical fitness helps us, if we are lucky enough to be capable of developing it, to lead ourselves into a greater sense of poise, of self-confidence, of dignity and sharpness of senses, spirit, and mind.

But we must also develop our sensitivity to history, to human feeling, to human passion, to the human condition.

For truly, we are all brothers and sisters. We are, all of us, literally the children, the direct descendents, of a very small band of people who lived somewhere in Ethiopia about 160,000 years ago, wandered out of the desert, and crawled all over the face of our mother, the planet earth.

And so we owe it to ourselves and each other to develop a morality that is humanistic, that seeks good for its own sake instead of a fear-based morality. That is our duty as moral beings. That’s why the header of this site has that paraphrase of Thomas Paine, 18th century American revolutionary:

“The world is my country, humankind is my family, and to do good my religion.”

So may this coming year grant us the wisdom to see the necessity for self reliance, of building an independent, peaceful mass movement, so that we can change the things that must be changed, so that we can literally ensure the viability of our planet, for ourselves, for the future of our children and grandchildren—for the human race, indeed for all the life forms that dwell here on our watery planet!

In the words of an old anarchist and socialist hymn

Justice thunders condemnation
A better world’s in birth!

Thus, my brothers and sisters, you have my fervent wishes for a better 2010 for us all, and may your holidays be joyful.

The graphic below is of the first commercially-made Christmas card, circa 1843, by Sir Henry Cole, an Englishman.

 

Regards,

 

Alan OldStudent

[Via http://alanoldstudent.wordpress.com]

Google Suggest: I laughed. I cried.

You know what Google Suggest is.  It is that thing that happens when you start typing in Google and suggestions for possible searches appear as you type.  The way it works is that Google’s algorithms predict the search you most likely want to see using “data about the overall popularity of various searches”  (direct quote from Google).  If you think about it, there is something ethnographically important here.  Google Suggest can tell us what Americans are searching for, what they are seeking – or at least English speakers on the American version of Google.

Every once in a while something comes along that reminds you that you know nothing about what other people are thinking.  Google Suggest is just that thing.  Let’s see what I found.

Let’s start with “should I”…

…if you are asking Google, the answer is “probably not”.  “Should I worry” gives the opposite result…

…if you are asking Google, the answer is “definitely”.

The common searches for why things are the way they are…

Mail on Columbus Day.  Honestly, hadn’t crossed my mind.

What are Americans thinking of buying?  Not what I would have expected…

Same goes for a query about where is…

…the GEICO gecko – seriously?  C’mon, pull it together.

Things get interesting for searches on famous figures such as the President…

No, Obama is not literally Hitler.  I am not a big fan, but he’s not figuratively either.  If you read a book, you might know that – don’t search, books can be found by following the link here – www.amazon.com.

Other famous people with interesting results include God.

People are invoking God all the time in their searches.  In America, God has wives covered, but apparently not husbands, so we turn to the next best thing – Google…

What do American’s like?  All sorts of things.

I like turtles too.  I had a pet turtle growing up, but it probably would not have been at the top of my list.

What are Americans afraid of?

…Chinese people and pre-pubescent women.  Not my first guesses.

What do people think about ethnic groups in America?

I have to wrap it up, but I thought I would finish up with what Americans think about fat people.

Isn’t that God’s truth?

[Via http://newtome.wordpress.com]

Democrats Face Challenge in Merging Health Bills

WASHINGTON — Even as the Senate took a significant step toward passing its version of a sweeping overhaul of the health insurancesystem before Christmas, Democrats were grappling Monday with deep internal divisions over abortion, the issue that most complicates their drive to merge the Senate and House bills and send final legislation to President Obama.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/22/health/policy/22health.html?_r=1&hp

[Via http://ilovebenefits.wordpress.com]

D.C. Democrats fail us!

Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Neb, talks to the press.

Now that the Senate has passed their version of “Healthcare Reform”, it seems the House is our only hope in receiving real reform.  The Senate bill is substantially different from that which was passed by the House.  No more public option and a bunch of sweatheart concessions to the turncoat Democrats in the Senate.  For example, Sen. Bill Nelson of Nebraska managed a deal that allows his state to no longer have to share the burden of Medicaid with the federal government.  Great for Nebraska, but what about the rest of us?  This is disgusting. 

We finally get a chance to pass our agenda and Obama and the spineless Democrats in D.C. have waffled so bad that they look like fools.  58% of the country wants a public option! 

I don’t get it.  Bush had, at most, 55 Senators during his eight years, yet he was able to pass everything on his agenda with the exception of privatizing social security.  Why can’t the Democrats get anything done with 60 Senators and a super majority in the House?

At this point, this lifetime Democrat will not be voting for a single Democrat for federal office unless we get a public option.  And, I fear, neither will many other progressive Democrats.

[Via http://tanoury.wordpress.com]

Quick Thoughts On Obama

It’s been close to a year into Obama’s presidency and it has been a turbulent time.  As people who have read my blog know, I have tended to focus more on the economy and what political actions have been done to change it.  I will definitely agree that Obama has inherited an economy in very very poor shape (understatement) – though we must ask ourselves what has he and his self appointed team of economic advisers done so far to strengthen our future prospects.

It’s not easy to predict the future and what might be the outlook for the upcoming year and beyond, thus we must look at what has been done to change the corroded structure of our economy.  Sad to say but not much if anything has been done from the white house to secure a better future for our nation.  Even before Obama was elected the economic crash was under way.  After being elected one would think the first problems to tackle would be our banking system, rampant fraud, and under funded social programs.  I will say our status-quo  health care system is without a doubt not sustainable, though neither is our economy.  Both are inter-connected but one is just a subset of the other.  So why not tackle the bigger more relevant problem?  The answer to this question still eludes me and the many discouraged Americans today.

It is great to have a leader that is very well spoken and seemingly intelligent.  Also it was a relief to see someone emerge as relatively unknown in the political world and become president.  I and many others would like nothing more than our president succeed in his job on helping America prosper.  Though it is our duty as citizens to witness what is being done to us, our neighbors, and our country and then express our views either negative or positive.   It is not healthy for us to behave as giddy fans to the new ‘cool’ president – unlike a sporting event if we as a country ‘lose’ we do not have the opportunity to go home without it effecting us.  This epidemic, apathetic, fan mentality must stop immediately.

What we have seen in this past year is very disappointing to say the least.  The health care debate has proven that big Pharma and insurance companies can effectively buy our off government preventing effective reform.  Also an even bigger scene currently underway is Wall Street and big banks are now winning the ‘reform’ battle.  This is not the sign of a strong leader who ran on ‘changing’ our country.  Congress is at fault also, but that will be up for debate in the 2010 elections.  Americans left, right, and moderate voted for Obama to ‘change’ our country.  As recent polls point out (presidential approval rating has dropped the fastest in history in the first year) we have not seen any change but just endless political rhetoric with a kind face behind it.

Granted many think we should give Obama some time to prove himself.  I on the other-hand judge politicians on performance.  What I have seen is more status-quo and bailouts for the rich.  The majority of the populace has been left to soak up the failed banks and corporate losses.  We are in dire need of reformist leadership and of new voices that will speak the truth.  A national purification so to speak – hopefully Obama can prove himself to be that person but our nations time is winding down and I for one will not sit around silently hoping for this ‘change’ to come around.

[Via http://americasos.wordpress.com]

Healthcare Bill is Still a Budget Buster

The Heritage Foundation has an excellent post concerning exactly how the Senate’s healthcare bill will actually add to the federal budget deficit. The post states the following:

According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the amended Reid plan would reduce the federal budget deficit by $132 billion over the period 2010 to 2019, but that is a mirage.

For starters, as CBO notes, the bill presumes that Medicare fees for physician services will get cut by more than 20 percent in 2011, and then stay at the reduced level indefinitely. There is strong bipartisan opposition to such cuts. Fixing that problem alone will cost more than $200 billion over a decade, pushing the Reid plan from the black and into a deep red.

Then there are the numerous budget gimmicks and implausible spending reductions. The plan’s taxes and spending cuts kick in right away, while the entitlement expansion doesn’t start in earnest until 2014, and even then the real spending doesn’t begin until 2015. According to CBO, from 2010 to 2014, the bill would cut the federal budget deficit by $124 billion. From that point on, it’s essentially deficit neutral — but that’s only because of unrealistic assumptions about tax and Medicare savings provisions. By 2019, the entitlement expansions to cover more people with insurance will cost nearly $200 billion per year, and grow every year thereafter at a rate of 8 percent. CBO says that, on paper, the tax increases and Medicare cuts will more than keep up, but, in reality, they won’t. The so-called tax on high cost insurance plans applies to policies with premiums exceeding certain thresholds (for instance, $23,000 for family coverage). But those thresholds would be indexed at rates that are less than health-care inflation — forever. And so, over time, more and more plans, and their enrollees, would bump up against it until virtually the entire U.S. population is enrolled in insurance that is considered “high cost.”

Similarly, the Medicare cuts assume that hospitals, nursing homes, home health agencies and others can survive with a permanent annual cut in their payment rates for presumed productivity gains. Medicare’s chief actuary has already signaled that this reduction could push one in five hospitals into insolvency, thus forcing them out of the Medicare program.

What’s more, the benefit promises are sure to expand well beyond what CBO has assumed. There are 127 million people living in households with incomes between 100 and 400 percent of the federal poverty line, but CBO assumes that only 18 million of them will get the new subsidized insurance under the Reid plan by 2015 because of rules that make most workers ineligible for assistance. But, if enacted, employers would find ways to push more workers into subsidized arrangements, and Congress would loosen the rules to make more people eligible. Costs would grow much faster than CBO currently projects. In addition, the Reid plan continues to include a new entitlement program for long-term care that every actuary who has looked at it says is a financial disaster waiting to happen. If passed, it would only be a matter of time before another federal bailout would be necessary.

[Via http://iwilly.wordpress.com]

Obama orders US missile strike on Yemen?

I thought I would get an early start posting this morning before the global warming induced huge snowstorm knocks out our rural cable!   I came across this story at Gateway Pundit, one of my regular morning reading stops.  If you are thinking how does this involve RRW, remember that I’ve reported a couple of times lately that Saudi Arabia (with its state of the art border fence) was trying to keep the riff-raff Shia Muslims from Yemen out of their country and that Saudi Arabia had recently apprehended Somalis helping the Yemenis, here.

Holy cow!  Now Peace-prize Obama is bombing Yemen!  Here is the story Fox News is reporting:

The U.S. has launched two missile strikes against Al Qaeda targets in Yemen, two U.S. officials told Fox News, signaling an escalation of the Obama administration’s fight against the terrorist organization.

The politically sensitive strikes Thursday, first reported by ABC News, supplement efforts already under way by the government of Yemen to go after Al Qaeda in the country, the officials told Fox News, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the operation.

Such an operation is particularly sensitive in Yemen. “It’s very difficult for Yemen to ask the U.S. for help given the nature of their population and its views about the West,” one official said. “And the U.S. doesn’t want to compromise their ability to ask for help.”

Is this about protecting Yemen and the US or about protecting Obama’s friends, the Saudis?

By the way, one commenter at Gateway Pundit suggests Obama is ‘wagging the dog’ after his failure to achieve anything at Copenhagen, or on health care reform.

Endnote:  I wonder how Yemeni Jihadi sleepers, like this guy in Knoxville, TN, are going to be taking this?

[Via http://refugeeresettlementwatch.wordpress.com]

a.r.t.

Random Artworkt hat caught my eye

painter Conrad Ruiz

digital art by Cory Arcangel

[Via http://ayaba1.wordpress.com]

The Trauma of Joblessness

This is the single greatest issue facing the nation and Obama. The article below says that most folks are giving him a pass on the unemployment situation, but at some point  Obama is going to own this issue, particularly since large commitments have gone to bail out  Wall Street and to pursue the Afghan war. Neither of those initiatives promise to bear any fruit for the people, but look to extract much in the way of cost.

Perhaps it’s due to Obama, but I’ve found myself paying much closer attention generally to what’s happening in DC.  One of the main takeaways I’ve gotten is the limit of the power of the presidency.  That should not be very surprising  to anyone as there’s a consistency of policies across administrations and precedents set by prior administrations can drive succeeding ones.  The truth is that change is not possible unless the entire system of things changes; barring that all we talking about is a change in caretakers.   The system is owned by and mainly responsive  to those who have the economic prowess to make their voices heard above all others.

The entire situation we’re in was very predictable to anyone with a modicum of knowledge about the economy.  So if folks like me with limited information could predict this, there were certainly folks in a position of responsibility with more information who know where we were headed and did nothing.

Poll Reveals Trauma of Joblessness in U.S. By MICHAEL LUO and MEGAN THEE-BRENAN

More than half of the nation’s unemployed workers have borrowed money from friends or relatives since losing their jobs. An equal number have cut back on doctor visits or medical treatments because they are out of work.

Almost half have suffered from depression or anxiety. About 4 in 10 parents have noticed behavioral changes in their children that they attribute to their difficulties in finding work.

Joblessness has wreaked financial and emotional havoc on the lives of many of those out of work, according to a New York Times/CBS News poll of unemployed adults, causing major life changes, mental health issues and trouble maintaining even basic necessities.

The results of the poll, which surveyed 708 unemployed adults from Dec. 5 to Dec. 10 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus four percentage points, help to lay bare the depth of the trauma experienced by millions across the country who are out of work as the jobless rate hovers at 10 percent and, in particular, as the ranks of the long-term unemployed soar.

Roughly half of the respondents described the recession as a hardship that had caused fundamental changes in their lives. Generally, those who have been out of work longer reported experiencing more acute financial and emotional effects.

“I lost my job in March, and from there on, everything went downhill,” said Vicky Newton, 38, of Mount Pleasant, Mich., a single mother who had been a customer-service representative in an insurance agency.

“After struggling and struggling and not being able to pay my house payments or my other bills, I finally sucked up my pride,” she said in an interview after the poll was conducted. “I got food stamps just to help feed my daughter.”

Over the summer, she abandoned her home in Flint, Mich., after she started receiving foreclosure notices. She now lives 90 minutes away, in a rental house owned by her father.

With unemployment driving foreclosures nationwide, a quarter of those polled said they had either lost their home or been threatened with foreclosure or eviction for not paying their mortgage or rent. About a quarter, like Ms. Newton, have received food stamps. More than half said they had cut back on both luxuries and necessities in their spending. Seven in 10 rated their family’s financial situation as fairly bad or very bad.

But the impact on their lives was not limited to the difficulty in paying bills. Almost half said unemployment had led to more conflicts or arguments with family members and friends; 55 percent have suffered from insomnia.

“Everything gets touched,” said Colleen Klemm, 51, of North Lake, Wis., who lost her job as a manager at a landscaping company last November. “All your relationships are touched by it. You’re never your normal happy-go-lucky person. Your countenance, your self-esteem goes. You think, ‘I’m not employable.’ ”

A quarter of those who experienced anxiety or depression said they had gone to see a mental health professional. Women were significantly more likely than men to acknowledge emotional issues.

Tammy Linville, 29, of Louisville, Ky., said she lost her job as a clerical worker for the Census Bureau a year and a half ago. She began seeing a therapist for depression every week through Medicaid but recently has not been able to go because her car broke down and she cannot afford to fix it.

Her partner works at the Ford plant in the area, but his schedule has been sporadic. They have two small children and at this point, she said, they are “saving quarters for diapers.”

“Every time I think about money, I shut down because there is none,” Ms. Linville said. “I get major panic attacks. I just don’t know what we’re going to do.”

Nearly half of the adults surveyed admitted to feeling embarrassed or ashamed most of the time or sometimes as a result of being out of work. Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the traditional image of men as breadwinners, men were significantly more likely than women to report feeling ashamed most of the time.

There was a pervasive sense from the poll that the American dream had been upended for many. Nearly half of those polled said they felt in danger of falling out of their social class, with those out of work six months or more feeling especially vulnerable. Working-class respondents felt at risk in the greatest numbers.

Nearly half of respondents said they did not have health insurance, with the vast majority citing job loss as a reason, a notable finding given the tug of war in Congress over a health care overhaul. The poll offered a glimpse of the potential ripple effect of having no coverage. More than half characterized the cost of basic medical care as a hardship.

Many in the ranks of the unemployed appear to be rethinking their career and life choices. Just over 40 percent said they had moved or considered moving to another part of the state or country where there were more jobs. More than two-thirds of respondents had considered changing their career or field, and 44 percent of those surveyed had pursued job retraining or other educational opportunities.

Joe Whitlow, 31, of Nashville, worked as a mechanic until a repair shop he was running with a friend finally petered out in August. He had contemplated going back to school before, but the potential loss in income always deterred him. Now he is enrolled at a local community college, planning to study accounting.

“When everything went bad, not that I didn’t have a choice, but it made the choice easier,” Mr. Whitlow said.

The poll also shed light on the formal and informal safety nets that the jobless have relied upon. More than half said they were receiving or had received unemployment benefits. But 61 percent of those receiving benefits said the amount was not enough to cover basic necessities.

Meanwhile, a fifth said they had received food from a nonprofit organization or religious institution. Among those with a working spouse, half said their spouse had taken on additional hours or another job to help make ends meet.

Even those who have stayed employed have not escaped the recession’s bite. According to a New York Times/CBS News nationwide poll conducted at the same time as the poll of unemployed adults, about 3 in 10 people said that in the past year, as a result of bad economic conditions, their pay had been cut.

In terms of casting blame for the high unemployment rate, 26 percent of unemployed adults cited former President George W. Bush; 12 percent pointed the finger at banks; 8 percent highlighted jobs going overseas and the same number blamed politicians. Only 3 percent blamed President Obama.

Those out of work were split, however, on the president’s handling of job creation, with 47 percent expressing approval and 44 percent disapproval.

Unemployed Americans are divided over what the future holds for the job market: 39 percent anticipate improvement, 36 percent expect it will stay the same, and 22 percent say it will get worse.

Marina Stefan and Dalia Sussman contributed reporting.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/15/us/15poll.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss

[Via http://africanamericanclarioncall.wordpress.com]

Protest On Obama Statue Erected In Indonesia -- Another Wasteful Effort To Build National Pride

The controversial issue about Obama statue which is erected in Menteng Park, Jakarta, has made some portion of Indonesians angry. They were asking for the relevancy in putting a top American figure in Indonesia. “Obama has offered no contribution to Indonesia, so do we have to honour him?” and “He is not a part of Indonesia, he is a part of the USA” are two prominent arguments which supports the taking down of this statue.

First of all, I do agree that the erection of this statue is a kind of weird thing to do. If you want to inspire Indonesian kids, aren’t there more people who can be a model for this statue? How about Soekarno as the first president of Indonesia who united Indonesia and liberate the country from the invasion of three European countries: Portugal, Holland, and Japan? Or BJ. Habibie, a genius scientist from Indonesia who invented the formula for the construction of Boeing wing plane which regarded a standing applause from German governor? I think those two people will be more appropriate to be built a statue about their childhood.

However, protesting to the extent of bringing the statue down is a little bit excessive. Eventhough some of us think that Barack Obama has no contribution whatsoever in Indonesia, that doesn’t mean that there isn’t anybody who isn’t inspired by him. Please do notice that he has a Nobel Peace award which is a very prestigious award. And also do remember that Barack Obama didn’t come from a prestigious family. He started from crawling until he can be the number 1 person in the USA. If people are inspired by his spectacular effort to become what he is right now, why stopping them from honouring this man? If you want to protest, why not donating for erecting a statue for someone appropriate to be a model of instead of demanding this statue to be taken down?

It’s not about our national pride will be threaten by this statue nor this statue will be a sign of Indonesia losing its identity, but it’s about inspirational character who happens to be nobody but became one of prestigious and honorable men. Unless he is Adolf Hitler or Osama bin Laden, I think it will be alright to honour him for his good deeds.

News Source:

http://thejakartaglobe.com/city/facebook-group-calls-for-obamas-jakarta-statue-to-be-taken-down/347315

http://www.voa-islam.net/news/citizens-jurnalism/2009/12/15/2094/obama-%28memangtak-pantas-dipatungkan-di-indonesia/

http://www.republika.co.id/berita/95872/Patung_Obama_Didesak_Diturunkan

[Via http://kazasou.wordpress.com]

Obama’s Safe Schools Czar Tied to Lewd Readings for 7th Graders

FoxNews |  President Obama’s “Safe Schools Czar,” already a target of social conservatives for his past drug abuse and what they say is his promotion of homosexuality in schools, is under fresh attack after it was revealed that the pro-gay group he formerly headed recommends books his critics say are pornographic.

The group under fire is the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), which Kevin Jennings, now the assistant deputy secretary for safe and drug-free schools in the Department of Education, founded and ran from 1990 to 2008.

GLSEN says it works to create a welcoming atmosphere for homosexual students in schools, and that effort includes recommending books for students of all ages.

But critics say many of the books, particularly some that are targeted for children between Grades 7 to 12, are inappropriately explicit. A full list is available at the blog Gateway Pundit, which has published dozens of controversial passages from the books.

One recommended book is titled “Queer 13: Lesbian and Gay Writers Recall Seventh Grade.” On pages 43 through 45, writer Justin Chin tells of how as a 13-year-old, he went along with “near-rapes” by older men, but “really did enjoy those sexual encounters.” Chin also recounts each sexual action he performed with an “ugly f*** of a man” he met on a bus.

In another book, “Passages of Pride,” the author writes about a 15-year-old boy’s relationship with a much older man.

“Near the end of summer, just before starting his sophomore year in high school, Dan picked up a weekly Twin Cities newspaper. Scanning the classifieds, he came upon an ad for a “Man-2-Man” massage. Home alone one day, he called the telephone number listed in the ad and set up an appointment to meet a man named Tom…. Even though Tom was older, almost twice Dan’s age, Dan felt unthreatened by him. Dan admits Tom was a ‘troll’ in every sense of the word — an older closeted gay man seeking sex with a man much younger. But Dan says he was not intimidated by the discrepancy in their ages. ‘He kind of had me in a corner in that he knew I didn’t have access to anything I wanted.’ says Dan. ‘But everything was consensual.’”

On Page 13 of a third book, “Reflections of a Rock Lobster,” the author recounts his sexual encounters in first grade.

“By first grade I was sexually active with many friends. In fact, a small group of us regularly met in the grammar school lavatory to perform fellatio on one another. A typical week’s schedule would be Aaron and Michael on Monday during lunch; Michael and Johnny on Tuesday after school; Fred and Timmy at noon Wednesday; Aaron and Timmy after school on Thursday. None of us ever got caught, but we never worried about it anyway.”

Read the whole article

[Via http://hiddenagendanews.wordpress.com]

MS Word is Republican

Okay, it’s not really Republican, but for those who have prior-to-2007 versions of Word available, it is hilarious.

Microsoft Word suggests “Osama” for “Obama.”  Awkward!

I figured I was not the only person to find this, and the New York Times did not let me down.  Don’t worry everyone, it’s fixed.  Even funnier is if they had sent out this particular fix with all their other Windows updates.

Does anyone know any other good/bizarre suggestions?

Update:  I should have read to the bottom of the quoted article.  It IS an update you can download!!!  Why does it have a step-by-step process, by the way?  Step 1:  Click on word.  Step 2:  Add to dictionary.  Step 3:  duhhhh

[Via http://cityforward.wordpress.com]

Hypocrisy of Obama

During Mahatma Gandhi’s birth cenetary we find world leaders praising tons for Gandhi.

Gandhi is an ideal example for the anti – India forces to appreciate because that is whatthey want their adversaries to follow. They themselves would follow the anti of it i.e. violence. Obama was following the same line of tactic. He wants India to be non – violent and hence always slow to care for themselves. If Obama really cared for Gandhi , he would have stopped the war in Afghanistan and talked peace to them. But that wont work he knows and all know it too.

So keep telling others to be non violent when you can be as brutal as possible.

Dear Obama , why dont you praise Rama in the next Vijaydashmi ? he was righteous and did exactly what you are doing ..killing the demons .

[Via http://prasoondixit.wordpress.com]

Let The Purges Begin!

Fox News reports:

Most recently OPM made news when the Obama administration sought to use it as a tool upon which to consolidate power.

Under orders from the White House, it is being reported that OPM is on a mission to rid the executive branch bureaucracy of Bush-era personnel who are no longer political appointees and who have lawfully become civil servants.

…

The Obama administration has now ordered a purging of Republicans from federal government civil service.

 

The article basically details the fascist takeover of health care in America.

We are fucked.

[Via http://fascistsoup.com]

Nobels krigspris

I SvD kunde man läsa igår om hur Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrish gillade Obamas tacktal när han mottog fredspriset. Palin:

Jag gillade det han sade.

Washington Post:

Grattis, herr president!

Obamas tal till försvar för krig är absurt. Han fick fel pris. Nobels krigspris hade passat bättre till det talet. Lek med tanken att Bush hållit ett liknande tal. Det hade gett upphov till ramaskri i vänsterktretsar.

Där ligger också den stora faran med Barack Obama. I vanliga fall är det just från vänsterhåll vi kan räkna med starkast (numerärt) motstånd till krig. Men nu när krigshetsaren själv är socialist är stora delar av fredsrörelsen tystad. Detta samtidigt som hökarna på högerkanten applåderar. Obama är en politiker som förenar det sämsta från vänster och höger.

[Via http://ifrihet.wordpress.com]

Nobel Peace Prize: Martin Luther King's View of War and Peace Differs From President Obama's View

President Barack Obama attempted to synthesize peace with war (two subjects that cannot be considered equivalents). The result was eloquently disgraceful. The implied insult of Dr. King was astounding. Overall, the President’s speech was a disappointment.

In his speech, the President referred to Martin Luther King, who was awarded a Nobel Peace prize in 1964. While the President mentioned Dr. King’s actions with regard to race, Dr. King’s Nobel Lecture also addressed poverty and war.

In fact, the President glossed over King’s lecture. What is key about the quote he selected is what he chose to cut—Dr. King actually opposes the view (war is a tool of and for peace) that the President presented in his Lecture. Dr. King’s Lecture also is prophetic.

Violence is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding: it seeks to annihilate rather than convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys community and makes brotherhood impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends up defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers.

This is precisely the reason that the warcraft the President advocates will never lead to peace. War (or threat of warfare, which the President implies in his speech) never resolves problems. No matter how many troops are sent to Afghanistan, the conflict will not provide any humane resolution. Ultimately, the U.S. will leave Afghanistan without much progress, except that Afghanistan will be worse off for the experience.

At the root, soldiers train to kill, presumably in conditions where the adversarial force meets head on with the U.S. force. The last country to try (and fail) with this type of approach was Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. This is what the U.S. military is operationally setup to handle. The problem is that people have learned this and fight using guerilla tactics. The U.S. is not operationally setup to handle this with its hierarchical command structure.

Also, militaries destroy; they cannot rebuild. This is the weakness of the U.S’s approach.

Warcraft is encouraged when there are U.S. business interests tied to the rebuilding of a country after it is delivered to near ruin (that is, U.S. companies that profit from the destruction of war.

He quoted from the portion that addressed racial justice, but ignored the portions addressing poverty and war. Given what Dr. King addressed, I can see why the President did not mention these inconvenient facts.

The reader should study Dr. King’s Lecture in full and compare it with the President’s Lecture. I will offer some selections of Dr. King’s Lecture below.

Dr. King on poverty—

The time has come for an all-out world war against poverty. The rich nations must use their vast resources of wealth to develop the underdeveloped, school the unschooled, and feed the unfed. Ultimately a great nation is a compassionate nation. No individual or nation can be great if it does not have a concern for “the least of these”. Deeply etched in the fiber of our religious tradition is the conviction that men are made in the image of God and that they are souls of infinite metaphysical value, the heirs of a legacy of dignity and worth. If we feel this as a profound moral fact, we cannot be content to see men hungry, to see men victimized with starvation and ill health when we have the means to help them. The wealthy nations must go all out to bridge the gulf between the rich minority and the poor majority.

Dr. King on war—

So man’s proneness to engage in war is still a fact. But wisdom born of experience should tell us that war is obsolete. There may have been a time when war served as a negative good by preventing the spread and growth of an evil force, but the destructive power of modern weapons eliminated even the possibility that war may serve as a negative good. If we assume that life is worth living and that man has a right to survive, then we must find an alternative to war. In a day when vehicles hurtle through outer space and guided ballistic missiles carve highways of death through the stratosphere, no nation can claim victory in war. A so-called limited war will leave little more than a calamitous legacy of human suffering, political turmoil, and spiritual disillusionment. A world war – God forbid! – will leave only smoldering ashes as a mute testimony of a human race whose folly led inexorably to ultimate death. So if modern man continues to flirt unhesitatingly with war, he will transform his earthly habitat into an inferno such as even the mind of Dante could not imagine.

[Via http://alexwdc.wordpress.com]

Ignorant/liberal college students, global warming, and gov't run healthcare

Some college students from the United States crashed a global warming skeptic seminar over in Copenhagen recently. It appears that the university system is doing a fabulous job at equipping the next generation to think critically…NOT!

1. Why hasn’t higher education taught these particular kids about respecting the first amendment and letting people speak freely about ideas (even if those ideas differ from the liberal agenda)? Well, maybe it’s because radical liberals (as opposed to civil ones) don’t believe in free speech. You either side with the left or they’ll shut you down. It’s the radical left way or the highway.

2. Why hasn’t the university system taught these children to scrutinize the policies that their current government is attempting to impose upon the people. These kids are brainwashed to the point that they’ll fight for a cap on C02 emissions, but won’t take a stand against government-run healthcare. Do these kids not read the Congressional Budget Reports and see how these policies (aka Cap and Trade and the Government Healthcare Option)are putting them further and further into debt?

The answer is no. They will never do so. After all, why bother when life’s a party, where you can drink all the beer and sex you want while in the dorm? Why do so when you live in a perpetual state of entitlement, believing that certain things like healthcare, education, and material possessions belong to you by right?

Props to you, “higher” education.

[Via http://oneshotpolitics.wordpress.com]

Stimulus Package - $100,000.00 For Socially Conscious Puppet Shows

The senators also noted that researchers at Penn State University received $1.57 million to search for fossils in Argentina and that a liberal-leaning theater in Minnesota, In the Heart of the Beast, named after a famous quote by leftist leader Che Guevara, received $100,000 for socially conscious puppet shows.

[Via http://aconservativeedge.com]

the world today

firstly, it’s going straight to hell.that’s the directions it’s been for many centuries now.

then,
wtf is this shit? my blog top searches is www.shemale.com.my ????

FML time i think.

then
i realised, google really overtook microsoft and of course, google actually rules the earth cos, gmail works like this right? started out with a few people getting invites. also like wave. then they give them limited invites to invite other people.basically if you use google account as some sort of spam mail, eventually they’re going to catch up with you because it’s not a sign up email. it’s a 6 degree separation type of concept – send the invites out to friends and friends of a friends and then it just goes on….lol
best you stick to yahoo and hotmail but i think yahoo requires you to give in your address but alas, they are not foolproof. i dislike hotmail for a lot of reasons and even more i hate my domain or isp provided email. so i only ever use uni or work email these days…

alas, google actually rules the world. bwahahahah.

i’ve hold back on buying windows 7 since so many ppl complaining it’s a FML thing. i don’t need anymore FML stuff.

then the last thing i need to be reminded of is umm…i sorta forgot..crap..it was important!

i will update later when i remember. it was important!!!!! oh yeah i remember. so there is no such thing as a honest man/woman famous anymore cos i mean, the last good squeaky clean image man on earth who’s famous, ala tiger woods, has now a notorious reputation for being a philanderer, adulterer and keeps mistresses by the hoard and also, sex addict. lol hooray man….. his wife is way prettier than his mistresses…don’t fucking know what is wrong with wood’s eyes…like his dad say..career over when he gets married…….guess the dad knew he couldn’t keep his dick in his pants and eventually, that dark little secret would be outa the closet….came out to a nice bang to end 2009. but i’d stay with him if he’d give me 80million USD…heck i’ll smile and even play nice wife just as long as you keep the millions rolling. pwnage.

the last decent family man on earth’s image is shattered so there’s always a minor percentage, they’re gonna cheat…

which leaves barrack obama as the last decent men…hopefully no scandal..but i think he dare not scandal also cos i reckon michelle obama owns his ballz and if he strays, she’ll really make him regret for life….that’s the woman i want on my side in a bar brawl…she alone has the gaze to scare the crap of 236745632 guys 23645765 times my puny size.

so ladies,
i guess you gotta really train your man….and be blatantly honest to each other. no point trying to impress if you have to spend your whole life trying to impress and not be the person you are…cos once you drop your guard and relax and show your true colors, he’ll be outa that door faster than you can say hunnnnnn……

sigh
good night. : )

like they say
all the good men are either taken or gay.
i’m just talking bout some men, not all men ok?

[Via http://fightersblues.wordpress.com]

Reid Digs Deep, Achieves New Low In Class

Harry Reid

If class were cash, Harry Reid, the personification of the Peter Principle at work in the Senate, would be as deeply in debt as he and his ilk have put the United States government (i.e., the American taxpayer).

In his latest political regurgitation, he is comparing those of us who oppose this health care reform bill to supporters of slavery. Never mind that it was the Republican Party that was founded as the anti-slavery party back in the 1850s. Never mind that it was a democrat (Strom Thurman) who failed in his attempt to filibuster the Civil Rights bill of 1957  and it was actually the Republicans who led the fight in support of the bill.  Note: Thurman would later (1964) cross over the aisle to the Republican side.

Side note: Since my high school days, I’ve been criticized for writing run-on sentences. Well, folks, prepare for the crowning achievement of a life dedicated to the fine art of the run-on sentence, as I attempt to put this into some perspective:

Harry Reid, the cowardly traitor who had the audacity to stand in the hall of the United States Senate and announce “The war in Iraq is lost”  (bringing aid and comfort to the enemy) while our young men and women were winning the surge…

(let me catch my breath)

… the same Harry Reid who  is part of the Congress that has enslaved our children and grandchildren as debtors to foreign powers for the next century (if we’re lucky it will only be that long) due to the  ”tax and spend”  spree that has tripled the deficit since Obama has taken office…

(one more breath and I think we’re there)

… now points his finger at those of us who are smart enough to see what his ignorance misses (the unsustainable debt he’s imposing) and is accusing us as being the ones supporting slavery.

Wow, Harry.  You just never learn, do you? The government reforming health care is like asking the fox to reform hen house security. And I’m pretty sure the chance of success is about the same.  And if this bill becomes law, it will without doubt push the United States economy beyond the point of no return.

More on that in an upcoming rant.

Gerry Ashley

[Via http://grandrants.wordpress.com]

US Greenback Is Doomed!

By Paul Chong         Sunday 6 December 2009

(A composite report from reliable sources)

Once the pride & might

Its collapse is now in sight!

This is not just theory. It’s the real thing! Let’s hear from the experts:

US billionaire & investment guru, Jim Rogers, influential former partner of financier George Soros (The World Today Dec 3, 2009) is advising investors to desert the greenback and put their money into commodities. He says the US dollar is a flawed currency that has no future.

Nobel Prize winner Dr. Paul Samuelson, hardly an alarmist, has characterised U.S. financial imbalances as so severe and “irreversible that we must accept that at some future date there will be a run on the dollar. Probably the kind of disorderly run that precipitates a global financial crisis.” . . . while other monetary experts now warn, “We’re in the terminal stages of the world’s most gigantic pyramid scheme.”

Or as Dr. Ron Paul, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, recently noted about the rampant, unprecedented money creation going on, “If we continue doing what we are doing right now, we will literally destroy the dollar.”

The first dramatic debt growth spurt of US debt-based approach financing system occurred with the Civil War. The debt was just $65 million in 1860, but passed $1 billion in 1863 and had reached $2.7 billion following the war, slowly fluctuating for the rest of the century, finally growing steadily in the 1910s and early 1920s to roughly $22 billion as the country paid for involvement in one war after another – wars which they never did win.

When compared to hard money backed by gold or silver, this debt-based approach has the advantage of making the currency elastic, giving the government a means of expanding or contracting the money supply in response to changing economic conditions. The disadvantage of this approach is inflation. The money supply must be continually expanded in order to finance interest payments on the debt by which it is issued. This devalues the currency, causing inflation.

All signs point toward the U.S. dollar – already down one-third against other world currencies since 2002 – heading at breakneck speed for a precipitous and historic crash.

While all global currencies are falling against tangible

assets, the US Dollar is falling faster.

Unmistakable warning signs reveal here point to a monetary crisis on the verge of spinning wildly out of control, leading to massive INFLATION and quite possibly, a sudden and catastrophic dollar collapse that will forever change US nation.

Mr. Obama, in a recent cable news interview during which he tried to rationalize his multi-trillion dollar spending spree, conceded with a chuckle,“we are out of money now. We’re operating in deep deficits…” This admission came only a few months into his term, and even before he committed upwards of $50 billion more in U.S. taxpayer funds to bailing General Motors out of the hole!

Major foreign investors such as China are quickly catching on to the hard reality of US insolvency. Inescapably, they’re concluding that the “only way Washington can keep its Ponzi finance going is by running the monetary printing presses non-stop.”

Mega-investor Warren Buffett recently admitted publicly that the frantic spending and money creation underway right now will trigger a currency-destroying inflation that will be much more severe than in the 1970s.

Big-time investment gurus such as Jim Rogers dispatched a strongly worded email offering this sobering assessment:

“The world at large does seem to understand innately that governments are bankrupting themselves and destroying paper currency.”

The sheer havoc unleashed by a dollar crisis will be nationally jolting on a par with Pearl Harbour, John F. Kennedy’s assassination and 9/11. And yes, the bottom could drop out in just a single harrowing day.

The coming dollar collapse will wreak economic and social havoc far beyond skyrocketing prices. Widespread fuel and food shortages, relentless crime waves and the government’s endless socialistic machinations will devastate the American way of life like a giant tornado.

US – Greatest Debtor Nati

With US main creditors & all the global supporters pulling out,

there will be a catastrophic tsunami unimaginable.

[Via http://p21chong.wordpress.com]

Gun dealer wins!

December 04, 2009
Federal Appeals Court Rules Against D.C. in Gun Suit
A federal appeals court today revived a suit filed by the owner of a Virginia security company who was targeted, but not arrested, for prosecution in the District of Columbia on an unregistered firearms charge.

The suit, filed last year in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, alleges the police acted in bad faith in securing a warrant for the arrest of Robert Ord, the owner of Falken Industries. Ord is licensed to carry a firearm in Virginia. Since 2006, he has provided security service in the District.

Last year, District lawyers abandoned the case against Ord. But he still sued, on the grounds that the threat of prosecution has cost him hundreds of thousands of dollars in contracts. Ord said he is unwilling to work in the city out of fear he will be arrested and prosecuted on a gun charge. His suit, which seeks damages, was thrown out last year. Judge John Bates said Ord’s fears of prosecution were “mere conjecture.”

But on Dec. 4 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled in Ord’s favor, finding that the suit met certain thresholds. The court ordered additional hearings. “Obviously we are pleased the matter was reversed,” said Ord’s lawyer, Matthew LeFande, a solo practitioner in Arlington, Va. “Ultimately, we got the decision we wanted.” The court heard oral argument in September.

“Ord’s injury stems from his inability to travel to D.C. and carry on his security business here while armed without fear of prosecution,” wrote Judge David Tatel, who was joined by Judge Judith Rogers. Judge Janice Rogers Brown agreed in part. “That injury is imminent because the District of Columbia has made clear its specific intention to prosecute him.”

District lawyers, including D.C. Solicitor General Todd Kim, said Ord’s claims are meritless since he was never arrested. There was neither a search nor seizure in the case, District lawyers said. The appeals court disagreed.

“True, Ord may not have been seized in the traditional sense, but the arrest warrant effectively exiled him from the District of Columbia, thus restricting his ability to travel and causing substantial injury,” Tatel wrote. (Click here for the opinion.)

The Second Amendment Foundation, represented by Alan Gura of Alexandria, Va.’s Gura & Possessky, supported Ord as an amicus. Arthur Spitzer, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of the National Capital Area, was also on an amicus brief supporting Ord.

(culled from http://legaltimes.typepad.com/blt/2009/12/federal-appeals-court-rules-against-dc-in-gun-suit.html )

[Via http://readthisor.wordpress.com]

This is what Obama wants our health care system to look like...Socialized Medicine

Obama's Idea of Health Care Reform

Patients needs will be met despite cuts, Edmonton officials claim. This is the totally awesome socialized health care system Obama, and his progressive loons, are attempting to install right here in America. Time and time again, we hear about how great these systems are (because Obama and progressives are liars) and then we get stories like this from Canada and the U.K.

EDMONTON — Even though Albertans shouldn’t expect to see a balanced budget by the new health authority until 2011-12, pinching pennies won’t come on the backs of patients, says a top health executive with Alberta’s health superboard.

“When they need the health system, our responsibility is to make sure the system is there to meet their needs,” said Mike Conroy, executive vice-president of corporate services for Alberta Health Services. He spoke one day after The Journal detailed a presentation he made in B.C. that suggested Alberta could face a projected health deficit between $500 million and $1 billion in 2010-11, in addition to the current $1.3-billion debt.

“Our focus now is to identify every opportunity for efficiency that doesn’t compromise quality and access, and take advantage of those.”

If this doesn’t sound familiar, get use to it if ObamaCare is passed. If you don’t have the funds [taxes] to pay for services, services will be cut to control the costs. Here is something of concern that should be pointed out in the article…

“We’ve been running deficits with the health regions for some 10 years now. Typically what happens is there’s an arrangement made that cash is advanced, and in some cases in the past budget deficits have been picked up,” Liepert said, adding his department is working with Alberta Health Services to address the$1.3-billion shortfall for 2009-10.

Obama, Pelosi and Reid love socialized medicine and you should be certain that their brand of big government-run health care will follow in the same footsteps. Check out how RomneyCare worked out in Massachusetts and you will realize what will happen if we turn over our health care system to progressives. Deficits, health care rationing [look at the mammogram and PAP test recommendations that just created a firestorm] and long lines. It’s not deficit neutral when the government takes taxes away from the citizens.

[Via http://scottystarnes.wordpress.com]

The Greatest Generation Speaks....

Think Safety – Fly Safely
 
This old Salt hit a home run!  Keep it going.  

 
 
 WW II Battleship sailor tells Obama to shape up or ship out !
 
This venerable and much honored WW II vet is well known in Hawaii
for his seventy-plus years of service to patriotic organizations and causes
all over the country. A humble man without a political bone in his body,
he has never spoken out before about a government official, until now.
He dictated this letter  to a friend, signed it and mailed it to the president.
 
Dear President Obama,      
         
     My name is Harold Estes, approaching 95 on December 13 of this year.  People meeting me for the first time don’t believe my age because I remain wrinkle free and pretty much mentally alert.
 
I enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1934 and served proudly before, during and after WW II retiring as a Master Chief Bos’n Mate.  Now I live in a “rest home” located on the western end of Pearl Harbor , allowing me to keep alive the memories of 23 years of service to my country.
 
One of the benefits of my age, perhaps the only one, is to speak my mind, blunt and direct even to the head man.
 
So here goes.
 
I am amazed, angry and determined not to see my country die before I do, but you seem hell bent not to grant me that wish.
 
I can’t figure out what country you are the president of.
You fly around the world telling our friends and enemies despicable lies like:
             ” We’re no longer a Christian nation”
             ” America is arrogant” – (Your wife even
                 announced to the world,” America is mean-
                 spirited. ” Please tell her to try preaching
                 that nonsense to 23 generations of our
                 war dead buried all over the globe who
                 died for no other reason than to free a
                 whole lot of strangers from tyranny and
                 hopelessness.)
I’d say shame on the both of you, but I don’t think you like America, nor do I see an ounce of gratefulness in anything you do, for the obvious gifts this country has given you.  To be without shame or gratefulness is a dangerous thing for a man sitting in the White House.
 
After 9/11 you said,” America hasn’t lived up to her ideals.”
 
Which ones did you mean? Was it the notion of personal liberty that 11,000 farmers and shopkeepers died for to win independence from the British?  Or maybe the ideal that no man should be a slave to another man, that 500,000 men died for in the Civil War?  I hope you didn’t mean the ideal 470,000 fathers, brothers, husbands, and a lot of fellas I knew personally died for in WWII, because we felt real strongly about not letting any nation push us around, because we stand for freedom.
 
I don’t think you mean the ideal that says equality is better than discrimination.  You know the one that a whole lot of white people understood when they helped to get you elected.
 
Take a little advice from a very old geezer, young man.
 
Shape up and start acting like an American.  If you don’t, I’ll do what I can to see you get shipped out of that fancy rental on Pennsylvania Avenue .  You were elected to lead not to bow, apologize and kiss the hands of murderers and corrupt leaders who still treat their people like slaves.
 
And just who do you think you are telling the American people not to jump to conclusions and condemn that Muslim major who killed 13 of his fellow soldiers and wounded dozens more. You mean you don’t want us to do what you did when that white cop used force to subdue that black college professor in Massachusetts , who was putting up a fight?  You don’t mind offending the police calling them stupid but you don’t want us to offend Muslim fanatics by calling them what they are, terrorists.
 
One more thing.  I realize you never served in the military and never had to defend your country with your life, but you’re the Commander-in-Chief now, son.  Do your job.  When your battle-hardened field General asks you for 40,000 more troops to complete the mission, give them to him.  But if you’re not in this fight to win, then get out.  The life of one American soldier is not worth the best political strategy you’re thinking of.
 
You could be our greatest president because you face the greatest challenge ever presented to any president.  
You’re not going to restore American greatness by bringing back our bloated economy.  That’s not our greatest threat.  Losing the heart and soul of who we are as Americans is our big fight now.
And I sure as hell don’t want to think my president is the enemy in this final battle.
 
Sincerely,
Harold B. Estes
 
When a 95 year old hero of the “the Greatest Generation”
stands up and speaks out like this, I think we owe it
to him to send his words to as many Americans as
we can.

[Via http://thehick.wordpress.com]

Indian HC in Kabul turned into RAW headquarters: Pakistani Minister

ISLAMABAD: Minister of State for Shipping Nabeel Gabol said Indian High Commission in Kabul has turned into RAW headquarters.

While commenting on India’s stance about involvement in Balochistan in an exclusive interview to Geo News, Gabol said the goal of Indian High Commission in Kabul is to target Pakistan and India is not only involved in Balochistan but it is also responsible for recent blasts in Peshawar and Pakistan has evidences of Indian involvement.

Minister of State said a three-star Indian General planned the blasts occurred in Peshawar last month and RAW agents used kidnapped Afghans for suicide attacks. Indian agents supplied weapons in a attack on Sri Lankan cricket team. Pakistan will inform India and international community about this.

Replying to a question, Gabol said India is involved in Balochistan since six years. India had killed 300 to 400 people in response of Mumbai attacks. Pakistan is fully capable to reply but Pakistan wants peace in the region. The issue had been discussed with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her visit to Pakistan and we will provide evidences to India through international community, he added.

[Via http://siyasipakistan.wordpress.com]

WH Budget Director: "May be DECADES before Health Care System Works

The ONLY Government-run program that is DEFICIT NEUTRAL. That will be a real CHANGE

The longer the health care debate goes, the more information comes out. Harry Reid admits that the health care bill will cost at least $2.5 trillion. Howard Dean admits that it will cost trillions and trillions of dollars. Now Obama’s White House Budget Director, Peter Orszag, admits it will take DECADES before the health care reform will work. Does that still “bend the curve” down by not adding to the deficit? I don’t think the CBO scored the health care bill by DECADES. They scored it for a single decade on the assumption that everything goes as planned.

“It will be years to decades” before the nation has a properly working health care system that rewards quality over quantity, Peter Orszag told reporters. He said improving the quality of health care “is more like a lifelong nutrition or diet, not studying for an exam,” but he added that continuous progress is a crucial goal.

That is how a government-run plan works. It’s all a big guessing game that will cost taxpayers trillions upon trillions of dollars. Of course, it always costs exactly what is projected. Look at Medicare and Medicaid for proof.

[Via http://scottystarnes.wordpress.com]

U.S. Should Keep China Away from U.S. Space Program Technology

When President Obama visited China last week he announced that the “United States and China look forward to expanding discussions on space science cooperation and starting a dialogue on human space flight and space exploration … the two sides believed that the two countries have common interests in promoting the peaceful use of outer space and agree to take steps to enhance security in outer space.  The two sides agreed to discuss issues of strategic importance through such channels as the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue and military-to-military exchanges.”   The Chinese space program is an arm of the Chinese military.  Any cooperation with China that affords it access to sensitive U.S. technology in this area should be a non-starter.

Eric Sterner of the George C. Marshall Institute pens in Aviation Week that closer space cooperation with China will likely lead to “greater opportunities for China to acquire sensitive technology.” He argues it could contribute to Chinese military modernization and, a more than certain scenario, the proliferation of sensitive U.S. technologies to state sponsors of terrorism such as Iran and other countries that have no business acquiring cutting-edge U.S. technology.   A former Congressional and NASA staffer, Sterner reminds readers of China’s long record of illegal trafficking in sensitive U.S. technologies.

International space cooperation should come second to U.S. technological and security superiority.  If we are going to closely cooperate with foreign powers, it should be with our allies that are not out to undermine U.S. interests in a myriad of ways.  While the U.S. export control regime toward China is good, it could be better.  At this juncture, opening the door to more access to U.S. technology via outer space cooperation is not the way to go.  While it is unlikely to take this step, before the Obama Administration opens this cooperation portal, it should seriously consider a September 2008 Government Accountability Office (GAO) recommendation that “Commerce should suspend the [Verified End User] VEU program to China until an amended or new agreement is reached to conduct onsite reviews and VEU-specific procedures for conducting on-site reviews are established.”

The Bush Administration put in motion the VEU program.  The program authorizes the export of certain sensitive technologies to China without export licenses from the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS).   Barely a few years in operation, a paper by the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Controls shows that some pre-approved Chinese companies in the VEU program have been “linked to proliferators, to violators of U.S. export controls, and to China’s military production complex.”  And it is not just the VEU program that poses risks, there are problems right here in the U.S.  For a good summary of 2008 Chinese industrial espionage cases, take a look at Appendix B of the Annual Report to Congress on Foreign Economic Collection and Industrial Espionage released this summer by the National Counterintelligence Executive (NCIX).

A bottom up review of the U.S. export control regime with regards to China is long overdue.  The United States needs a better handle on what controls need updating or, in some cases scrapping, before it expands cooperation in sensitive fields such as outer space exploration.  We want to keep and strengthen our competitive and security advantage, not give it away or unwittingly weaken it.

 

[Via http://jasonpoblete.com]