Hot Times!! Hot Times!! Hot Times!!
"It's cool to be at Hot Times!!"
Friday, August 31, 2007
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
This Psycho is a Columbus, Ohio Police Officer
Hey Folks -
Something ugly has come into the common consciousness. A "motherly" 60 year old Columbus, Ohio woman police officer and her sister have published YouTube videos that would make a psychopath blush.
Here are two of them. The third link takes you to their entire collection.
Ebonics http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1S0KB_kKW4
Jews http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqD9a6iqnJMAll their Trash http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=subiesisters&search=Search
Below my comment is the report from the local newspaper.
What I find MOST disturbing about this is the total ignorance of these two monsters regarding their naive presentation of such ugly sentiments. It's one thing to be a rabid, addled racist angrily spouting hate; it's another to calmly; with an air of kindly, helpful pedagogy, reveal the "evil" nature of Jews, Blacks, Cubans, poor people, and Liberals; and to do so with obvious certainty and the clear understanding that this sick and filthy perspective will be embraced as obvious.
These two women have a combined age of 112 years, and what have they learned? How many more of them are out there? Too many, I fear.
We read about ethnic cleansing in other countries; we don't even think about it happening here, but we'd better give some thought to stopping Bush, Gonzales, Rove, Fox, & Co. from granting dispensation and benediction for such hate-based insanity as demonstrated by this "motherly" police officer!
- Uke Man
Off-duty, online production
Police officer's videos insult Jews, blacks
Tuesday, August 28, 2007 3:32 AM
By Matthew Marx and Dean Narciso
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Disparaging remarks about blacks, Cubans and Jews are found on amateur online videos co-produced by an off-duty Columbus police officer.
The videos were created and distributed on the Internet by Officer Susan L. Purtee, 60, and her sister, Barbara Gordon-Bell, 52, who call themselves "The Patriot Dames" and the "Subie Sisters."
Together on the videos, they blame Jews, blacks, illegal immigrants and Cubans for a variety of the nation's ills.
When asked about doing the videos, Gordon-Bell said, "We've had a lot of fun with it. I don't see that we've ever harmed anybody."
Purtee was off-duty when she made the videos and in civilian clothes. The women never mention Purtee's occupation, though their Web site, www.thepatriotdames.com, notes that she is a law-enforcement officer.
"We weren't trying to strong-arm anybody or do it for the money," Gordon-Bell said last night from her home in Coral Springs, Fla.
There was no answer last night at Purtee's Grove City home. Her sister said they made the videos when Purtee visited her in Florida.
Asked if she saw anything wrong with a police officer's role in making such comments, Gordon-Bell called the opinions "reality."
"And reality and racism and bigotry run awful close together."
But the videos have the attention of attorneys for the city's Police Division.
"The legal team is reviewing the YouTube videos to see if there is any misconduct within our directives," Police Division spokeswoman Amanda Ford said last night.
Purtee is a 15-year veteran who patrols day shift on the city's Far East Side.
In a video called "Jews" that is on the sisters' Web site and that has made its way to YouTube, they say that after the 1960s, Jews monopolized the entertainment industry.
The sisters largely blame violent movies and ones that set bad examples for teens on Jewish filmmakers.
"They started to tell us -- the gentiles -- how to live, because if we did, they'd make a lot of money," says Purtee on the video.
Purtee also says that "when Hitler couldn't get rid of them (Jews), no other country wanted them."
"As long as you're a Jew, you have that thinking that everybody's beneath you," Purtee says on the tape.
At one point, Gordon-Bell holds up a sign in the video that says, "Jews Are the Problem." She also says, "Mel Gibson was right."
The sisters also complain about Cubans in a video called "Cubans ... Miami's Vice." In it, Gordon-Bell says that a recent trip to Miami was "like being in the banana republic," and says "no one spoke English."
In another video, called "Borderopoly," the sisters rail against illegal immigrants and suggest building walls of prisons along the Mexican border. In one titled "Eubonics," the sisters say that many blacks won't speak proper English, and Purtee says that blacks use "mangled English, dirty and filthy."
In the event of an administrative investigation, the Fraternal Order of Police would provide Purtee or any other member with legal representation, said President Jim Gilbert of the FOP's Capital City Lodge No. 9.
"She clearly doesn't represent herself as a police officer on the video. It appears she is speaking out, utilizing her First Amendment rights."
"I've known her as almost motherly-like in her dealings on the street," Gilbert said.
Maureen Kocot of WBNS-10TV contributed to this story.
mmarx@dispatch.com
dnarciso@dispatch.com
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Gonzo sells out his Dad
Hey Folks –
So, Gonzales is gone. Good riddance.
But he pissed me off one more time saying that he’d lived the American Dream and that even his worst day at the Justice Department was better than his father’s best day.
Well, screw him. His father, Pablo Gonzales, met Alberto’s mother when both were hard-working migrant farm workers. They raised eight children while Pablo worked construction. He died from a work-related fall in 1982.
So, what is the American Dream? Working hard but honorably and honestly to raise a family? Or is it buying power, money, and status by cozying up to rotten politicians and defending whatever despicable acts they perpetrate?
I'm sure Pablo, were he still alive, would be proud of Alberto's high status, but Alberto should be ashamed of disparaging his father's life. He should also come to understand that gaining high position by selling one's soul is NOT the American Dream.
- Uke Man
So, Gonzales is gone. Good riddance.
But he pissed me off one more time saying that he’d lived the American Dream and that even his worst day at the Justice Department was better than his father’s best day.
Well, screw him. His father, Pablo Gonzales, met Alberto’s mother when both were hard-working migrant farm workers. They raised eight children while Pablo worked construction. He died from a work-related fall in 1982.
So, what is the American Dream? Working hard but honorably and honestly to raise a family? Or is it buying power, money, and status by cozying up to rotten politicians and defending whatever despicable acts they perpetrate?
I'm sure Pablo, were he still alive, would be proud of Alberto's high status, but Alberto should be ashamed of disparaging his father's life. He should also come to understand that gaining high position by selling one's soul is NOT the American Dream.
- Uke Man
Monday, August 27, 2007
Butter Finger Girl - Bored with school - thinking of feeding her fun!!!
That should wake up the boys!!!
Give Butterfinger Crisp the Finger - Part 2
Hey Folks -
Below is a posting from last May. Yesterday I got another good comment that set me to thinking - and since I still see the ad on the tube, I thought it worth bringing up again.
Below is a posting from last May. Yesterday I got another good comment that set me to thinking - and since I still see the ad on the tube, I thought it worth bringing up again.
Anonymous said...
"Actually I think the girl in the commercial is super cute, her laugh is slightly irritating, and the commercial overall is stupid, but the girl is just too damned cute."
Well, I can't dispute that; she is cute; and she is an actor playing a role; so, I don't really want to slap HER. She - the real person - might not be as vapid, slow, lazy, self-centered, and judgmental as her character.
I'd like to slap her CHARACTER. As for the boys shown sprawling over desks in an unconscious stupor (in the longer version of the ad), a swift kick would do them (their CHARACTERS) some good. As for the hot-shot Ad-Biz boys who came up with this atrocity, they should be hanged!!
Why?
Well, let's look at the premise. The scene is a college classroom. A college education is expensive; someone is paying for it, or else building up astronomical debt via loans. Every "student" we see in the ad is either comatose or "bored" beyond listening (and perhaps so stupid or so used to tuning out as to be oblivious of any possible value being offered to them by the professor).
So, the "problem" is that the foolish university has hired a dweebish-looking prof to teach Miss Butter Finger's class (we don't know for sure, but possibly the "problem" is simply having to be in a classroom at all ). Damn!! Miss BF could be on her cell with her buds; the male slackers could be home sleeping in preparation for the evening's keg party. And whatever the professor is going on about has no relevance to anything important.
It seems pretty clear that the Ad-Biz boys are focused on the immature, infantile, lazy, selfish Id in all of us. Life should be easy and sweet - it should primarily "feed your appetite for fun," as it says in the commercial. It's not "a spoonfull of sugar helps the medicine go down." It's "Fuck the 'medicine'; feed your appetite for fun."
Now, that's a great attitude for a consumer-driven economy (check out the book Consumed by Benjamin R. Barber), but it doesn't do much for scholarship, citizenship, or committed social involvement. If selling and buying are the primary goal, fine; but, according to Barber, such a consumer oriented system results in "only one paradigm - 'Unfettered markets are deemed both the essence of human liberty, and the most expedient route to prosperity' - and hence but one value (profit), one activity (shopping), one identity (the consumer), one paradigm of behavior (market exchange), one life world (commerce) that qualify as legitimate."
Yep, the girl playing the bratty kid IS cute, but anyone who is unfortunate enough to get involved with a cute kid who actually IS a bratty Miss Butter Finger will need more than a candy bar to diminish the consequences of that involvement.
- Uke Man
(Here's the original posting and the link to the ad)
Hey Folks,
Does anyone besides me want to slap the Butterfinger Crisp girl?
Here's a short clip of the commercial if you don't know what I'm talking about:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XiquTB8tmQ
If you've seen the whole thing, and if you are old enough to be paying your own bills, don't you think Butterfinger was better off with Homer Simpson and Bart pushing their products?
- Uke Man
Sunday, August 26, 2007
Garrison Keillor on "Turd Blossom"
Hey Folks,
Here's another take on the departure of Mr. Kkkarl "Cookie" Rove.
- Uke Man
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
The Chicago Tribune
Good Riddance Turd Blossom
by Garrison Keillor
What truly cheers me up through these dog days of summer is the thought that two old friends of mine are up north on a canoe trip in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area and that I am not there with them.
I am here, reading the paper, and if I wanted to go to a movie, I could go, and if I wished to use a flush toilet, I could do that, too. But for the grace of God, I could be sitting on the ground, filthy, embittered, homeless, eating freeze-dried food and listening to the Master Woodsman tell me what a great experience I'm having and meanwhile a cloud of mosquitoes has come out to avenge the white man's colonizing of North America . I have been on canoe trips, I know what goes on.
Every canoe trip has a self-appointed Master Woodsman. In civilian life he may be a mild-mannered clerk in a cubicle but out on the trail he is transformed into the song leader, pathfinder, the great helmsman, the tier of correct knots and the authority on bears. He shows you how to do everything except the things you really need to do, such as (1) relieve yourself in some dignified manner and (2) get out of here and find a hotel. Your body aches from sleeping on the ground and you are thinking about "Lord of the Flies" and what it says about the fragility of civilization, but he is relentlessly upbeat. And then it dawns on you: Your suffering is what turns him on. The man is a sadist.
At this point, the current administration is like a very, very bad canoe trip with a week left to go, and Karl Rove is the Head Counselor who has found a path to the highway.
He left the White House with a wave and a grin and not in handcuffs as some had hoped, followed by the usual backwash of commentary on how important he was, or how not important in comparison to how important some people thought he was, and what I find eerie about the man is his inexhaustible self-confidence and optimism. He was the Master Woodsman.
According to some accounts, his positive outlook was responsible for the Current Occupant's sunny disposition in the face of bad news. No wonder Rove's nickname was "Turd Blossom." He could put fecal matter on his lapel and call it a boutonniere.
There are basically two types of Americans and the first is the type most of the world considers typical: the Americans who when the big smiley preacher stands in the pulpit and says, "How about everybody turn around and shake hands with the person behind you and give them a big howdy!" they all turn around and shake and say howdy and feel uplifted by this. And then there are the Americans who would do anything to avoid this, including staying away from church entirely.
The first type, when the preacher says he is going to show us a way we can double our net worth in the next year, thinks, "Boy, this is my lucky day." The second does not. There are more of the second type than the first.
Mr. Rove believed in himself 150 percent and believed he could make history and create the permanent Republican majority to run the country, but when people look at what he actually brought to pass - this wretched war that costs us $10 billion a month or more, a mortgaged economy, the corruption of the Department of Justice - somehow the permanent majority seems less and less interesting.
His last big assignment was to get the immigration bill passed. It failed in large part because Congress was tired of Rove and his boy-genius high-handedness.
Instead, Homeland Security announced a new crackdown on illegal immigrants, which aroused protests from farmers who said that 70 percent of farm workers today are illegal - a stunning fact, if true. Most of the people who pick our beans and tomatoes are men and women forced to sneak across the border, and why? Because they're a security threat? No. So that we can get them cheap, that's why.
Rove spoke with great confidence about beans and tomatoes and showed slides and got standing ovations in many places, but he didn't get the crops in. Goodbye and good riddance.
Here's another take on the departure of Mr. Kkkarl "Cookie" Rove.
- Uke Man
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
The Chicago Tribune
Good Riddance Turd Blossom
by Garrison Keillor
What truly cheers me up through these dog days of summer is the thought that two old friends of mine are up north on a canoe trip in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area and that I am not there with them.
I am here, reading the paper, and if I wanted to go to a movie, I could go, and if I wished to use a flush toilet, I could do that, too. But for the grace of God, I could be sitting on the ground, filthy, embittered, homeless, eating freeze-dried food and listening to the Master Woodsman tell me what a great experience I'm having and meanwhile a cloud of mosquitoes has come out to avenge the white man's colonizing of North America . I have been on canoe trips, I know what goes on.
Every canoe trip has a self-appointed Master Woodsman. In civilian life he may be a mild-mannered clerk in a cubicle but out on the trail he is transformed into the song leader, pathfinder, the great helmsman, the tier of correct knots and the authority on bears. He shows you how to do everything except the things you really need to do, such as (1) relieve yourself in some dignified manner and (2) get out of here and find a hotel. Your body aches from sleeping on the ground and you are thinking about "Lord of the Flies" and what it says about the fragility of civilization, but he is relentlessly upbeat. And then it dawns on you: Your suffering is what turns him on. The man is a sadist.
At this point, the current administration is like a very, very bad canoe trip with a week left to go, and Karl Rove is the Head Counselor who has found a path to the highway.
He left the White House with a wave and a grin and not in handcuffs as some had hoped, followed by the usual backwash of commentary on how important he was, or how not important in comparison to how important some people thought he was, and what I find eerie about the man is his inexhaustible self-confidence and optimism. He was the Master Woodsman.
According to some accounts, his positive outlook was responsible for the Current Occupant's sunny disposition in the face of bad news. No wonder Rove's nickname was "Turd Blossom." He could put fecal matter on his lapel and call it a boutonniere.
There are basically two types of Americans and the first is the type most of the world considers typical: the Americans who when the big smiley preacher stands in the pulpit and says, "How about everybody turn around and shake hands with the person behind you and give them a big howdy!" they all turn around and shake and say howdy and feel uplifted by this. And then there are the Americans who would do anything to avoid this, including staying away from church entirely.
The first type, when the preacher says he is going to show us a way we can double our net worth in the next year, thinks, "Boy, this is my lucky day." The second does not. There are more of the second type than the first.
Mr. Rove believed in himself 150 percent and believed he could make history and create the permanent Republican majority to run the country, but when people look at what he actually brought to pass - this wretched war that costs us $10 billion a month or more, a mortgaged economy, the corruption of the Department of Justice - somehow the permanent majority seems less and less interesting.
His last big assignment was to get the immigration bill passed. It failed in large part because Congress was tired of Rove and his boy-genius high-handedness.
Instead, Homeland Security announced a new crackdown on illegal immigrants, which aroused protests from farmers who said that 70 percent of farm workers today are illegal - a stunning fact, if true. Most of the people who pick our beans and tomatoes are men and women forced to sneak across the border, and why? Because they're a security threat? No. So that we can get them cheap, that's why.
Rove spoke with great confidence about beans and tomatoes and showed slides and got standing ovations in many places, but he didn't get the crops in. Goodbye and good riddance.
Friday, August 24, 2007
Which of these upstanding leaders is sending young people off to die in hopes of forcing the world to kiss his ass?
Both of them!!Imperialism's Wicked Web
Hey Folks -
A little history lesson from John Stewart. Regardless of all the spin about our Empire's altruistic motivation, the actual behavior tells a more accurate story:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8maMmj5u58
- Uke Man
A little history lesson from John Stewart. Regardless of all the spin about our Empire's altruistic motivation, the actual behavior tells a more accurate story:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8maMmj5u58
- Uke Man
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Why I hate America
Hey Folks –
The next time some Bush-freak asks me why I hate America, I’ll just hand them the August 21, 2007 Columbus Dispatch editorial “Education first.” That should make it clear.
The editorial (below) is written from the perspective of a wealthy, white, Republican businessman criticizing the school district of the city where he headquarters his business but in which he most likely does not live and to which he would never send any of his young, white relatives.
The editorial claims unions make school administrators less "efficient" and "innovative" in doing what wealthy, white, Republican businessmen think the schools should do. It never dawns on aristocrats that wealthy, white, Republican, businessman who don’t live in the district or have kids in the school might not be the ones best suited to guide the district. Perhaps the kids who go there and their parents should have a bigger say.
But isn’t the point of the editorial that parents should be listened to?
No. It is that a few parents at one school should be listened to, but ONLY because in that particular case it meshes with the publisher’s agenda. His agenda embraces the Proficiency Test / No Child Left Behind scheme which, with its emphasis on reading and math (French is never mentioned), has caused thousands of Ohio children to experience cutbacks in art, music, and physical education instruction. The paper hasn’t complained about that (additional funding [taxes] would be required).
This case involves a K-8 French-immersion school where four of the teachers don’t speak French. Three of the four will teach any given child only one period a day; the rest of the day will be in French. One 3rd grade English-only teacher will have two classrooms of students half a day each; how many students does that affect and to what extent?
It doesn’t seem like too much of an impact – not compared to the effects of reduced art, music, and phys ed; increased class size; or the effects of poverty on thousands of students – no editorial complaints on these topics (additional funding [taxes] would be required). So, it’s not about parents or kids getting what they need. It’s something else.
The reason the wealthy, white Republican businessman is jumping to defend a few irate parents is that it gives him an excuse to bash workers and the unions that try to bring them a shadow of the dignity and security long-owned by the wealthy Wolfe Publishing family.
First things first; the wealthy, white Republican businessman assures us that “Superintendent Gene Harris' . . . commitment not to exceed the district's self-imposed cap of 3 percent spending growth per year is appropriate.” Wealthy, white Republican businessmen don’t like spending any more of their money on other people’s children than they have to. Wealthy, white Republican businessmen especially don’t like taxes (ask wealthy, white Republican businesswoman Leona Helmsley).
He admits that “Living within the district's budget required teacher layoffs for the past two years” but complains that “the teachers' contract requires that any vacancies be offered first to teachers who were laid off.” Hence the terrible “problem” that results in a few students hearing a little English along with their French during the school day – a problem easily solved by pushing just four families into chaos and distress.
This sort of thinking isn’t much different from that of slave-owning plantation owners or serf-owning manor lords who saw the aristocrat’s selfish (though officially altruistic and Christian) agenda as preeminent, trumping the humanity of those they controlled. No atrocity committed against these “lower creatures” was beyond the pale if it pleased or enriched the Master or the Lord. With the Dispatch's publisher, it’s just a matter of degrees.
So, why do I hate America? Well, it’s more than what I’ve said so far. Even worse than that is this:
People responsible for such editorials, people who praise such editorials, people who see nothing wrong with such editorials run this country, run America. They own the media and control what gets said in America. They own the politicians and control what they do to America. They own the police and the criminal “justice” system and set the larger parameters of who gets imprisoned, who gets executed, and who can’t be touched in America. They constitute the aristocracy of wealth Alexis de Tocqueville cautioned against long ago. They know their place, and they know ours, and they know best.
This - in such stark contrast to the ideals we embraced as children - is why I hate America.
- Uke Man
Education first
Quality of language-immersion school is threatened by teacher-contract provisions
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Teacher contracts often are blamed for impeding the ability of school administrators to manage their districts efficiently and innovatively. A case in the Columbus City Schools illustrates the point.
Ecole Kenwood, a French-language immersion school, has been one of the district's most successful and popular programs, exactly the sort of alternative it needs to offer families who otherwise might choose private or charter schools.
Now parents are justifiably upset by the news that four teachers assigned to the school for the coming academic year don't speak French.
Two are math and science specialists and one is at the middle-school level of the K-8 school. Parents are most upset, though, about a third-grade classroom teacher, because at that level, students are supposed to receive 70 percent of their instruction in French.
Kenwood's principal will try to make do by having the new third-grade teacher split her time with another third-grade teacher who is a native of France, but that leaves neither classroom with more than half of its instruction in French.
How can parents be confident their children are immersed in the language, as the school's philosophy promises?
Superintendent Gene Harris' explanation is simple: Living within the district's budget required teacher layoffs for the past two years, and the teachers' contract requires that any vacancies be offered first to teachers who were laid off.
Her commitment not to exceed the district's self-imposed cap of 3 percent spending growth per year is appropriate, but failing to ensure that specialized programs such as language immersion are staffed by teachers with specialized expertise is a glaring flaw in the contract.
Surely, the provision requiring that openings go to laid-off teachers with appropriate certifications could further stipulate that positions in specialized programs must be filled with people who have the qualifications required by those programs.
While defining specialized might require some negotiation, language-immersion programs clearly ought to qualify.
This is an area of the contract in which school management should reclaim its rights. Administrators and teachers with students' best interests at heart should not knowingly undermine a successful program in the name of teacher seniority.
The next time some Bush-freak asks me why I hate America, I’ll just hand them the August 21, 2007 Columbus Dispatch editorial “Education first.” That should make it clear.
The editorial (below) is written from the perspective of a wealthy, white, Republican businessman criticizing the school district of the city where he headquarters his business but in which he most likely does not live and to which he would never send any of his young, white relatives.
The editorial claims unions make school administrators less "efficient" and "innovative" in doing what wealthy, white, Republican businessmen think the schools should do. It never dawns on aristocrats that wealthy, white, Republican, businessman who don’t live in the district or have kids in the school might not be the ones best suited to guide the district. Perhaps the kids who go there and their parents should have a bigger say.
But isn’t the point of the editorial that parents should be listened to?
No. It is that a few parents at one school should be listened to, but ONLY because in that particular case it meshes with the publisher’s agenda. His agenda embraces the Proficiency Test / No Child Left Behind scheme which, with its emphasis on reading and math (French is never mentioned), has caused thousands of Ohio children to experience cutbacks in art, music, and physical education instruction. The paper hasn’t complained about that (additional funding [taxes] would be required).
This case involves a K-8 French-immersion school where four of the teachers don’t speak French. Three of the four will teach any given child only one period a day; the rest of the day will be in French. One 3rd grade English-only teacher will have two classrooms of students half a day each; how many students does that affect and to what extent?
It doesn’t seem like too much of an impact – not compared to the effects of reduced art, music, and phys ed; increased class size; or the effects of poverty on thousands of students – no editorial complaints on these topics (additional funding [taxes] would be required). So, it’s not about parents or kids getting what they need. It’s something else.
The reason the wealthy, white Republican businessman is jumping to defend a few irate parents is that it gives him an excuse to bash workers and the unions that try to bring them a shadow of the dignity and security long-owned by the wealthy Wolfe Publishing family.
First things first; the wealthy, white Republican businessman assures us that “Superintendent Gene Harris' . . . commitment not to exceed the district's self-imposed cap of 3 percent spending growth per year is appropriate.” Wealthy, white Republican businessmen don’t like spending any more of their money on other people’s children than they have to. Wealthy, white Republican businessmen especially don’t like taxes (ask wealthy, white Republican businesswoman Leona Helmsley).
He admits that “Living within the district's budget required teacher layoffs for the past two years” but complains that “the teachers' contract requires that any vacancies be offered first to teachers who were laid off.” Hence the terrible “problem” that results in a few students hearing a little English along with their French during the school day – a problem easily solved by pushing just four families into chaos and distress.
This sort of thinking isn’t much different from that of slave-owning plantation owners or serf-owning manor lords who saw the aristocrat’s selfish (though officially altruistic and Christian) agenda as preeminent, trumping the humanity of those they controlled. No atrocity committed against these “lower creatures” was beyond the pale if it pleased or enriched the Master or the Lord. With the Dispatch's publisher, it’s just a matter of degrees.
So, why do I hate America? Well, it’s more than what I’ve said so far. Even worse than that is this:
People responsible for such editorials, people who praise such editorials, people who see nothing wrong with such editorials run this country, run America. They own the media and control what gets said in America. They own the politicians and control what they do to America. They own the police and the criminal “justice” system and set the larger parameters of who gets imprisoned, who gets executed, and who can’t be touched in America. They constitute the aristocracy of wealth Alexis de Tocqueville cautioned against long ago. They know their place, and they know ours, and they know best.
This - in such stark contrast to the ideals we embraced as children - is why I hate America.
- Uke Man
Education first
Quality of language-immersion school is threatened by teacher-contract provisions
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Teacher contracts often are blamed for impeding the ability of school administrators to manage their districts efficiently and innovatively. A case in the Columbus City Schools illustrates the point.
Ecole Kenwood, a French-language immersion school, has been one of the district's most successful and popular programs, exactly the sort of alternative it needs to offer families who otherwise might choose private or charter schools.
Now parents are justifiably upset by the news that four teachers assigned to the school for the coming academic year don't speak French.
Two are math and science specialists and one is at the middle-school level of the K-8 school. Parents are most upset, though, about a third-grade classroom teacher, because at that level, students are supposed to receive 70 percent of their instruction in French.
Kenwood's principal will try to make do by having the new third-grade teacher split her time with another third-grade teacher who is a native of France, but that leaves neither classroom with more than half of its instruction in French.
How can parents be confident their children are immersed in the language, as the school's philosophy promises?
Superintendent Gene Harris' explanation is simple: Living within the district's budget required teacher layoffs for the past two years, and the teachers' contract requires that any vacancies be offered first to teachers who were laid off.
Her commitment not to exceed the district's self-imposed cap of 3 percent spending growth per year is appropriate, but failing to ensure that specialized programs such as language immersion are staffed by teachers with specialized expertise is a glaring flaw in the contract.
Surely, the provision requiring that openings go to laid-off teachers with appropriate certifications could further stipulate that positions in specialized programs must be filled with people who have the qualifications required by those programs.
While defining specialized might require some negotiation, language-immersion programs clearly ought to qualify.
This is an area of the contract in which school management should reclaim its rights. Administrators and teachers with students' best interests at heart should not knowingly undermine a successful program in the name of teacher seniority.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
That face, at once contemptuous and greedy and self-righteous, is Karl Rove's face.
Hey Folks -
This says it all !!
- Uke Man
August 19, 2007
New York Times
By FRANK RICH
BACK in those heady days of late summer 2002, Andrew Card, then the president's chief of staff, told The New York Times why the much-anticipated push for war in Iraq hadn't yet arrived. "You don't introduce new products in August," he said, sounding like the mouthpiece for the Big Three automakers he once was. Sure enough, with an efficiency Detroit can only envy, the manufactured aluminum tubes and mushroom clouds rolled off the White House assembly line after Labor Day like clockwork.
Five summers later, we have the flip side of the Card corollary: You do recall defective products in August, whether you're Mattel or the Bush administration. Karl Rove's departure was both abrupt and fast. The ritualistic "for the sake of my family" rationale convinced no one, and the decision to leak the news in a friendly print interview (on The Wall Street Journal's op-ed page) rather than announce it in a White House spotlight came off as furtive. Inquiring Rove haters wanted to know: Was he one step ahead of yet another major new scandal? Was a Congressional investigation at last about to draw blood?
Perhaps, but the Republican reaction to Mr. Rove's departure is more revealing than the cries from his longtime critics. No G.O.P. presidential candidates paid tribute to Mr. Rove, and, except in the die-hard Bush bastions of Murdochland present (The Weekly Standard, Fox News) and future (The Journal), the conservative commentariat was often surprisingly harsh. It is this condemnation of Rove from his own ideological camp — not the Democrats' familiar litany about his corruption, polarizing partisanship, dirty tricks, etc. — that the White House and Mr Rove wanted to bury in the August dog days.
What the Rove critics on the right recognize is that it may be even more difficult for their political party to dig out of his wreckage than it will be for America. Their angry bill of grievances only sporadically overlaps that of the Democrats. One popular conservative blogger, Michelle Malkin, mocked Mr. Rove and his interviewer, Paul Gigot, for ignoring "the Harriet Miers debacle, the botching of the Dubai ports battle, or the undeniable stumbles in post-Iraq invasion policies," not to mention "the spectacular disaster of the illegal alien shamnesty." Ms. Malkin, an Asian-American in her 30s, comes from a far different place than the Gigot-Fred Barnes-William Kristol axis of Bush-era ideological lock step.
Those Bush dead-enders are in a serious state of denial. Just how much so could be found in the Journal interview when Mr. Rove extolled his party's health by arguing, without contradiction from Mr. Gigot, that young people are more "pro-life" and "free-market" than their elders. Maybe he was talking about 12-year-olds. Back in the real world of potential voters, the latest New York Times-CBS News poll of Americans aged 17 to 29 found that their views on abortion were almost identical to the rest of the country's. (Only 24 percent want abortion outlawed.)
That poll also found that the percentage of young people who identify as Republicans, whether free-marketers or not, is down to 25, from a high of 37 at the end of the Reagan era. Tony Fabrizio, a Republican pollster, found that self-identified G.O.P. voters are trending older rapidly, with the percentage over age 55 jumping from 28 to 41 percent in a decade.
Every poll and demographic accounting finds the Republican Party on the losing side of history, both politically and culturally. Not even a miraculous armistice in Iraq or vintage Democratic incompetence may be able to ride to the rescue. A survey conducted by The Journal itself (with NBC News) in June reported G.O.P. approval numbers lower than any in that poll's two decades of existence. Such is the political legacy for a party to which Mr. Rove sold Mr. Bush as "a new kind of Republican," an exemplar of "compassionate conservatism" and the avatar of a permanent Republican majority.
That sales pitch, as we long ago learned, was all about packaging, not substance. The hope was that No Child Left Behind and a 2000 G.O.P. convention stacked with break dancers and gospel singers would peel away some independent and black voters from the Democrats. The promise of immigration reform would spread Bush's popularity among Hispanics. Another potential add-on to the Republican base was Muslims, a growing constituency that Mr. Rove's pal Grover Norquist plotted to herd into the coalition.
The rest is history. Any prospect of a rapprochement between the G.O.P.and African-Americans died in the New Orleans Superdome. The tardy,botched immigration initiative unleashed a wave of xenophobia against Hispanics, the
fastest-growing voting bloc in the country. The Muslim outreach project disappeared into the memory hole after 9/11.
Forced to pick a single symbolic episode to encapsulate the collapse of Rovian Republicanism, however, I would not choose any of those national watersheds, or even the implosion of the Iraq war, but the George Allen "macaca" moment. Its first anniversary fell, fittingly enough, on the same day last weekend that Mitt Romney bought his victory at the desultory, poorly attended G.O.P. straw poll in Iowa.
A century seems to have passed since Mr. Allen, the Virginia Republican running for re-election to the Senate, was anointed by Washington insiders as the inevitable heir to the Bush-Rove mantle: a former governor whose jus'-folks personality, the Bushian camouflage for hard-edged conservatism, would propel him to the White House. Mr.Allen's senatorial campaign and presidential future melted down overnight after he insulted a Jim Webb campaign worker, the 20-year-old son of Indian immigrants, notjust by calling him a monkey but by sarcastically welcoming him "to America" and "the real world of Virginia."
This incident had resonance well beyond Virginia and Mr. Allen for several reasons. First, it crystallized the monochromatic whiteness at the dark heart of Rovian Republicanism. For all the minstrel antics at the 2000 convention, the record speaks for itself: there is not a single black Republican serving in either the House or Senate, and little representation of other minorities, either. Far from looking like America, the G.O.P. caucus, like the party's presidential field, could pass for a Rotary Club, circa 1954. Meanwhile, a new census analysis released this month finds that nonwhites now make up a majority in nearly a third of the nation's most populous counties, with Houston overtaking Los Angeles in black population and metropolitan Chicago surpassing Honolulu in Asian residents. Even small towns and rural America are exploding in Hispanic growth.
Second, the Allen slur was a compact distillation of the brute nastiness of the Bush-Rove years, all that ostentatious "compassion" notwithstanding. Mr. Bush and Mr. Rove are not xenophobes, but the record will show that their White House spoke up too late and said too little when some of its political allies descended into Mexican-bashing during the immigration brawl. Mr. Bush and Mr. Rove winked at anti-immigrant bigotry, much as they did at the homophobia they inflamed with their incessant election-year demagoguery about same-sex marriage.
Finally, the "macaca" incident was a media touchstone. It became a national phenomenon when the video landed on YouTube, the rollicking Web site whose reach now threatens mainstream news outlets. A year later, leading Republicans are still clueless and panicked about this new medium, which is why they, unlike their Democratic counterparts, pulled out of even a tightly controlled CNN-YouTube debate. It took smart young conservative bloggers like a former Republican National Committee operative, Patrick Ruffini, to shame them into reinstating the debate for November, lest the entire G.O.P. field look as pathetically out of touch as it is.
The rise of YouTube certifies the passing of Mr. Rove's era, a culturalchanging of the guard in the digital age. Mr. Rove made his name in direct-mail fund-raising and with fierce top-down message management. As the Internet erodes snail mail, so it upends direct mail. As YouTube threatens a politician's ability to rigidly control a message, so it threatens the Rove ethos that led Mr. Bush to campaign at "town hall"meetings attended only by hand-picked supporters.
It's no coincidence that this new culture is also threatening the Beltway journalistic establishment that celebrated Mr. Rove's invincibility well past its expiration date (much as it did James Carville's before him), extolling what Joshua Green, in his superb new Rove article in The Atlantic, calls the Cult of the Consultant. The YouTube video of Mr. Rove impersonating a rapper at one of those black-tie correspondents' dinners makes the Washington press corps look even more antediluvian than he is.
Last weekend's Iowa straw poll was a more somber but equally anachronistic spectacle. Again, it's a young conservative commentator, Ryan Sager, writing in The New York Sun, who put it best: "The face of the Republican Party in Iowa is the face of a losing party, full of hatred toward immigrants, lust for government subsidies, and the demand that any Republican seeking the office of the presidency acknowledge that he's
little more than Jesus Christ's running mate."
That face, at once contemptuous and greedy and self-righteous, is Karl Rove's face. Unless someone in his party rolls out a revolutionary new product, it is indelible enough to serve as the Republican brand for a generation.
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
The Housing Financial Crisis
Hey Folks –
Have you been following this financial / housing “Crisis”? Interesting, huh!! Interesting-er and interesting-er.
Stage 1
Remember Alan Greedspan? The chairman of the Federal Reserve back in the day? He’s the one that kept saying, “Nah!!! There’s no housing bubble!! Everything’s hunky dorey.”
Remember all those dildos on radio and TV who’ve been saying for years now how great the economy is? And did you see Kkkarl Rove on Meet the Puss, a day or two after he quit DC, saying the economy was great?
Yep! What “crisis”??
Stage 2
Regular people start losing their homes. Not much of a problem – just some stupid rednecks, immigrants, and ethnics in over their heads. Not to worry. There’s no housing bubble – the economy’s great.
Stage 3
A lot more regular people (people who had trouble with fractions and decimals in school and who think George Bush is intelligent) start losing their homes. Hey!! Don’t ask for any help you losers!! YOU made bad choices! You should have read the fine print.. If you aren’t smarter than predatory lenders, that’s your problem.
Stage 4
Now, a few "friendly" lenders start to go belly up. Well, the line is that they shouldn’t get any help either. As Compassionate Conservative George Will said, that would be “folly” – gotta punish those home owners and lenders for their folly or capitalism will be degraded. Will reminds them (and us), “caveat emptor” (literally: “buyer beware,” or as I translate it, “If I can con you into something, that’s your problem”).
Will explains that the Federal Reserve Board should not help the low-life home-owners or the few scofflaw lenders.
Stage 5
More and bigger lenders start having trouble. The federal Reserve Board throws billions of dollars into the loan availability pot to help out banks’ “liquidity.”
Stage 6
More big-deal lenders start having problems. The Federal Reserve lowers the discount rate (interest rate), the action George Will said would reward scofflaws.
An economist working for the Wall Street Urinal says they did it to help out the people who can’t get loans to save or sell their homes – it’s NOT a bailout!!!!
Ok, Folks. Here’s what I don’t get. Here’s their argument:
When the regular folks (who think God cares who wins football games and that the earth is only 7,000 years old and that “The Secret” works and that it’s Mexicans’ fault Americans are poor) lose their houses, it’s because they foolishly failed to have their legal departments check out what the friendly, smiling, Christian man from the loan company told them. They deserve what they get. AND they certainly don’t deserve our help or even our sympathy. Fuck ‘em.
And when one or two lenders get in trouble, they get pretty much the same treatment (but with less vehemence, perhaps).
When more big-time lenders start having trouble, all bets are off, and the money spigots start flowing. Here’s where it gets interesting.
Now, supposedly the "stupid" people who lost their homes are still the primary cause, and the lenders who directly loaned them the money are still a lesser cause. Bad boys, bad boys – they still need to be punished.!! They made bad choices and have to pay George Will’s price – or capitalism will suffer.
But the next level; that’s different.
Those ginks did nothing wrong; they are innocent lambs; and, beyond that, the Federal Reserve is doing what it’s doing – NOT as a bailout of the money ginks, but only to help out the good people who can’t get loans to save or sell their homes. This is NOT a bailout.
But didn’t these noodles make bad choices too? Shouldn’t they have kept more money back in case they ran into “liquidity” problems? If Joe six-pack should be punished for not thinking ahead, and the Fly By Night Loan Co. should be punished for not thinking ahead, why shouldn’t the ginks higher up the food chain be punished for not thinking ahead?
Remember Alan Greedspan and the non-existent housing bubble and all the chatter about a great economy? Well, the ginks aren’t getting punished. They are getting bailed out.
Sounds to me like another clear case of “it’s who you blow.”
- Uke man
Have you been following this financial / housing “Crisis”? Interesting, huh!! Interesting-er and interesting-er.
Stage 1
Remember Alan Greedspan? The chairman of the Federal Reserve back in the day? He’s the one that kept saying, “Nah!!! There’s no housing bubble!! Everything’s hunky dorey.”
Remember all those dildos on radio and TV who’ve been saying for years now how great the economy is? And did you see Kkkarl Rove on Meet the Puss, a day or two after he quit DC, saying the economy was great?
Yep! What “crisis”??
Stage 2
Regular people start losing their homes. Not much of a problem – just some stupid rednecks, immigrants, and ethnics in over their heads. Not to worry. There’s no housing bubble – the economy’s great.
Stage 3
A lot more regular people (people who had trouble with fractions and decimals in school and who think George Bush is intelligent) start losing their homes. Hey!! Don’t ask for any help you losers!! YOU made bad choices! You should have read the fine print.. If you aren’t smarter than predatory lenders, that’s your problem.
Stage 4
Now, a few "friendly" lenders start to go belly up. Well, the line is that they shouldn’t get any help either. As Compassionate Conservative George Will said, that would be “folly” – gotta punish those home owners and lenders for their folly or capitalism will be degraded. Will reminds them (and us), “caveat emptor” (literally: “buyer beware,” or as I translate it, “If I can con you into something, that’s your problem”).
Will explains that the Federal Reserve Board should not help the low-life home-owners or the few scofflaw lenders.
Stage 5
More and bigger lenders start having trouble. The federal Reserve Board throws billions of dollars into the loan availability pot to help out banks’ “liquidity.”
Stage 6
More big-deal lenders start having problems. The Federal Reserve lowers the discount rate (interest rate), the action George Will said would reward scofflaws.
An economist working for the Wall Street Urinal says they did it to help out the people who can’t get loans to save or sell their homes – it’s NOT a bailout!!!!
Ok, Folks. Here’s what I don’t get. Here’s their argument:
When the regular folks (who think God cares who wins football games and that the earth is only 7,000 years old and that “The Secret” works and that it’s Mexicans’ fault Americans are poor) lose their houses, it’s because they foolishly failed to have their legal departments check out what the friendly, smiling, Christian man from the loan company told them. They deserve what they get. AND they certainly don’t deserve our help or even our sympathy. Fuck ‘em.
And when one or two lenders get in trouble, they get pretty much the same treatment (but with less vehemence, perhaps).
When more big-time lenders start having trouble, all bets are off, and the money spigots start flowing. Here’s where it gets interesting.
Now, supposedly the "stupid" people who lost their homes are still the primary cause, and the lenders who directly loaned them the money are still a lesser cause. Bad boys, bad boys – they still need to be punished.!! They made bad choices and have to pay George Will’s price – or capitalism will suffer.
But the next level; that’s different.
Those ginks did nothing wrong; they are innocent lambs; and, beyond that, the Federal Reserve is doing what it’s doing – NOT as a bailout of the money ginks, but only to help out the good people who can’t get loans to save or sell their homes. This is NOT a bailout.
But didn’t these noodles make bad choices too? Shouldn’t they have kept more money back in case they ran into “liquidity” problems? If Joe six-pack should be punished for not thinking ahead, and the Fly By Night Loan Co. should be punished for not thinking ahead, why shouldn’t the ginks higher up the food chain be punished for not thinking ahead?
Remember Alan Greedspan and the non-existent housing bubble and all the chatter about a great economy? Well, the ginks aren’t getting punished. They are getting bailed out.
Sounds to me like another clear case of “it’s who you blow.”
- Uke man
Monday, August 20, 2007
Ding Dong the Witch is dead!! Which old Witch? The Mean Old Witch!!!
Only the little people pay taxes
Hey Folks –
Well, the passing of Leona Helmsley at 87 does nothing to dispute the adage: only the good die young. Leona was a mean old cur, a shining example of what one who puts acquisition of wealth above humanity becomes and how they end up.
According to Wikipedia:
Hotel career
Leona Panzirer was a real estate agent when she met and began her involvement with the then-married multi-millionaire real estate investor Harry Helmsley. Supposedly under her influence, he began a program of conversion of apartment buildings to condominiums. He later began to concentrate on the hotel industry, building the Helmsley Palace on Madison Avenue.
Leona Helmsley became infamous during the 1980s for being a tyrannical "boss from hell" whose petulance seemed ill-suited to the hospitality industry. Harry left her his entire fortune, estimated to be worth well in excess of $5 billion, upon his death in 1997.[1]
Part of her company's portfolio at one time included the Empire State Building, The Helmsley Palace (now The New York Palace), The Park Lane Hotel, The Helmsley Middletowne Hotel, The New York Helmsley Hotel (a.k.a. The New York Harley), The Helmsley Windsor Hotel, The St. Moritz (now Ritz Carlton), The Carlton House hotels, the Harley Hotels chain and The Helmsley Building.
Tax evasion conviction
She was convicted of tax-related crimes in 1992. United States Attorney Rudolph Giuliani was one of the two chief prosecutors in that case.[2] She was convicted and sentenced to prison for one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States,[3] three counts of tax evasion,[4] three counts of filing false personal tax returns,[5] sixteen counts of assisting in the filing of false corporate and partnership tax returns,[6] and ten counts of mail fraud.[7]
Harry Helmsley was initially charged as well; however, he was found to be both physically and mentally unfit to stand trial, having begun to appear enfeebled shortly after the beginning of his relationship with Leona Helmsley years before. At trial, one of the key witnesses was a former housekeeper at her Greenwich, Connecticut home, Elizabeth Baum, who recounted having the following exchange with Leona Helmsley four to six weeks after being hired in September 1983, "I said, 'You must pay a lot of taxes.' She said, 'We don't pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes.'"[8] Helmsley denied ever saying this. Most legal observers felt that Mrs. Helmsley's personality alienated the jurors. She was convicted but eventually managed to have her sentences, originally decades long, largely set aside except for 18 months, which she served. She was released in January 1994.
When the last of her appeals failed and it was clear she was going to jail, she collapsed outside of the courthouse, later diagnosed with a heart irregularity and hypertension
After prison
Helmsley's later years were apparently spent in isolation. A 2001 Chicago Sun-Times article depicted her as estranged from her grandchildren and with few friends, living alone in a lavish apartment with her dog [9] In 2002, Helmsley was sued by Charles Bell, a former employee, who sued her alleging that he was discharged solely for being homosexual. A jury agreed and ordered Mrs. Helmsley to pay Bell $11,200,000 in damages; a judge subsequently reduced this amount to $554,000.[10]
Donald Trump and Helmsley despised each other.[11]
Death
Leona Helmsley died from congestive heart failure, aged 87, on August 20, 2007, at her summer home in Greenwich, Connecticut [12][13] Cardiovascular disease ran strong in her family, claiming the lives of her father, son and a sister.
Good riddance !!!
- Uke Man
Hey Folks –
Well, the passing of Leona Helmsley at 87 does nothing to dispute the adage: only the good die young. Leona was a mean old cur, a shining example of what one who puts acquisition of wealth above humanity becomes and how they end up.
According to Wikipedia:
Hotel career
Leona Panzirer was a real estate agent when she met and began her involvement with the then-married multi-millionaire real estate investor Harry Helmsley. Supposedly under her influence, he began a program of conversion of apartment buildings to condominiums. He later began to concentrate on the hotel industry, building the Helmsley Palace on Madison Avenue.
Leona Helmsley became infamous during the 1980s for being a tyrannical "boss from hell" whose petulance seemed ill-suited to the hospitality industry. Harry left her his entire fortune, estimated to be worth well in excess of $5 billion, upon his death in 1997.[1]
Part of her company's portfolio at one time included the Empire State Building, The Helmsley Palace (now The New York Palace), The Park Lane Hotel, The Helmsley Middletowne Hotel, The New York Helmsley Hotel (a.k.a. The New York Harley), The Helmsley Windsor Hotel, The St. Moritz (now Ritz Carlton), The Carlton House hotels, the Harley Hotels chain and The Helmsley Building.
Tax evasion conviction
She was convicted of tax-related crimes in 1992. United States Attorney Rudolph Giuliani was one of the two chief prosecutors in that case.[2] She was convicted and sentenced to prison for one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States,[3] three counts of tax evasion,[4] three counts of filing false personal tax returns,[5] sixteen counts of assisting in the filing of false corporate and partnership tax returns,[6] and ten counts of mail fraud.[7]
Harry Helmsley was initially charged as well; however, he was found to be both physically and mentally unfit to stand trial, having begun to appear enfeebled shortly after the beginning of his relationship with Leona Helmsley years before. At trial, one of the key witnesses was a former housekeeper at her Greenwich, Connecticut home, Elizabeth Baum, who recounted having the following exchange with Leona Helmsley four to six weeks after being hired in September 1983, "I said, 'You must pay a lot of taxes.' She said, 'We don't pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes.'"[8] Helmsley denied ever saying this. Most legal observers felt that Mrs. Helmsley's personality alienated the jurors. She was convicted but eventually managed to have her sentences, originally decades long, largely set aside except for 18 months, which she served. She was released in January 1994.
When the last of her appeals failed and it was clear she was going to jail, she collapsed outside of the courthouse, later diagnosed with a heart irregularity and hypertension
After prison
Helmsley's later years were apparently spent in isolation. A 2001 Chicago Sun-Times article depicted her as estranged from her grandchildren and with few friends, living alone in a lavish apartment with her dog [9] In 2002, Helmsley was sued by Charles Bell, a former employee, who sued her alleging that he was discharged solely for being homosexual. A jury agreed and ordered Mrs. Helmsley to pay Bell $11,200,000 in damages; a judge subsequently reduced this amount to $554,000.[10]
Donald Trump and Helmsley despised each other.[11]
Death
Leona Helmsley died from congestive heart failure, aged 87, on August 20, 2007, at her summer home in Greenwich, Connecticut [12][13] Cardiovascular disease ran strong in her family, claiming the lives of her father, son and a sister.
Good riddance !!!
- Uke Man
Sunday, August 19, 2007
End the War!!
Hey Folks -
Here's a quicky I've been saving. The Uke Man made the paper, but big deal. There were only three politicians who showed up for the testimony (all Democrats), and one of them was a whimp. The best that one Republican could do was send a gopher to make excuses.
So, there we are. Millions protesting at the start, ignored. Millions protesting right along, ignored. We DID get coverage in the paper, but the whole movement is still getting the finger from Bush at the top of the dung heap all the way down to the little turds at the bottom.
- Uke Man
Downtown meeting
Audience eager to end Iraq war
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
By Dean Narciso
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
There was unified support -- from politicians, college instructors, physicians and regular folks -- urging a peaceful withdrawal from Iraq during a town meeting Downtown last night.
The event drew about 100 passionate voices, and one ukulele player, to First Congregation Church, 444 E. Broad St., to discuss the war's effect locally.
Columbus is spending $1.73 million a year in overtime costs to cover for firefighters who are serving in the military, said Jack Reall, president of the Columbus firefighters' union.
Reall praised Columbus leaders for supporting the extra spending and acknowledged that no jobs have gone unfilled.
Columbus police also have used overtime to fill vacancies while officers are fulfilling military duties overseas. Details were not available.
Critics of the war have produced staggering numbers showing the war's cost to the nation's
cities. The claim for Columbus' share: more than $927 million, enough to cover the city's general fund for 1½ years, said Columbus City Councilwoman Charleta Tavares, one of two council members present last night.The other, Hearcel Craig, said he came to listen. But when pressed on ways to help returning veterans, he said, "We owe them everything -- those who would give up their lives."
The front of the chapel was filled with activists, children and war opponents.
Columbus State Community College professor Rita Bova called the war an "illegal, immoral" occupation. She has urged her military-reserve students to flunk their physicals.
"Why the hell should you go?" she has told them. "Why should anyone go?"
Dennis W. Bartow II spoke for U.S. Rep. Deborah Pryce last night. Pryce, a Republican from Upper Arlington, supports President Bush's administration on the war.
He said Pryce's position is to continue to support Bush, but wait for a military summary of the conflict, expected this September. She is hoping for progress by then.
Tavares, Craig and Franklin County Commissioner Mary Jo Kilroy were the only three central Ohio politicians to attend.
"We need to make the opposition to the war visible, and I will join you in those rallies," Kilroy told the crowd.
More than half of the two-hour event was made up of audience comments.
Dr. Scott Hickey, a pediatrician, worried about the war's toll on the young.
"I was trained to look for evidence," he said. "I've yet to hear anyone talking about any evidence, any justification for the war, to be effective."
Vanetia Turner was to celebrate the July return of her son, Army Sgt. Eddie Gore. Instead, she's learned he's being redeployed Aug. 9 for 14 months.
"I believe America needs to take care of home before fighting a never-ending battle," Turner said.
Tom Harker's ukulele guided his thoughts, as he sang the satirical Sunny Day in Baghdad.
dnarciso@dispatch.com
Called up
Number of Ohio National Guardsmen and reservists mobilized as of July 18:
Army (guard and reserve): 1,597
Air National Guard: 307
Navy Reserve: 245
Marine Reserve: 0*
Total: 2,149
* Individual Marines may be attached to other units but no Ohio reserve unit has been mobilized.
Source: defenselink.com; Marine Corps
Saturday, August 18, 2007
Newsprint Helps make us Manure-Independent !!
Hey Folks -
I don't know whether Michael Hamill works for an oil company or is just one of those conservative loonies who hate government and all tax money spent on anyone but themselves; but, in any case, he is a good example of how ignorance and a narrow perspective on reality will neither keep a person from being published nor save him from sounding like a foolish know-it-all.
Directly below is his letter to the Columbus Dispatch. Below that is my response. Mine probably won't be published.
You decide which makes better sense.
- Uke Man
Ethanol shaping up to be a boondoggle Thursday, August 16, 2007
I was pleased to read The Dispatch's Aug. 10 editorial on ethanol and government subsidies, "Look before leaping." I've followed ethanol's merits, or lack thereof, for years and have written to my representatives about it. I can tell from their responses that they're under great pressure from corn growers and corporations to provide government subsidies and inducements for ethanol production.
If, in fact, the benefits of producing ethanol from corn were so compelling, then the industry could grow on its own without government support.
The rush to government-supported ethanol production in this country has the look of a costly boondoggle in the making. If people don't speak out, before long we may have additional interest groups dependent on and constantly seeking government funding for an inefficient means of energy production.
MICHAEL HAMILL Columbus
To the Editor,
Debating the benefits and liabilities of ethanol and other alternative energy sources is worthwhile, but it should be done rationally. A longstanding criticism of alternative energy is that it requires "subsidies" to compete with oil. This makes no sense.
The billions of dollars we're spending on today's war, the billions we spent on the last war, and the billions we've spent over the years maintaining an army and navy presence in the Middle East were spent solely to maintain our access to oil. Had we been energy self-sufficient via some "subsidized" alternative, none of this oil "subsidy" would have been needed.
How can any existing or proposed "subsidy" of alternative energy production even begin to come close to the number of dollars and lives expended to subsidize oil?
Yours - Tom Harker
Hey Folks -
I don't know whether Michael Hamill works for an oil company or is just one of those conservative loonies who hate government and all tax money spent on anyone but themselves; but, in any case, he is a good example of how ignorance and a narrow perspective on reality will neither keep a person from being published nor save him from sounding like a foolish know-it-all.
Directly below is his letter to the Columbus Dispatch. Below that is my response. Mine probably won't be published.
You decide which makes better sense.
- Uke Man
Ethanol shaping up to be a boondoggle
Thursday, August 16, 2007
I was pleased to read The Dispatch's Aug. 10 editorial on ethanol and government subsidies, "Look before leaping." I've followed ethanol's merits, or lack thereof, for years and have written to my representatives about it. I can tell from their responses that they're under great pressure from corn growers and corporations to provide government subsidies and inducements for ethanol production.
If, in fact, the benefits of producing ethanol from corn were so compelling, then the industry could grow on its own without government support.
The rush to government-supported ethanol production in this country has the look of a costly boondoggle in the making. If people don't speak out, before long we may have additional interest groups dependent on and constantly seeking government funding for an inefficient means of energy production.
MICHAEL HAMILL Columbus
To the Editor,
Debating the benefits and liabilities of ethanol and other alternative energy sources is worthwhile, but it should be done rationally. A longstanding criticism of alternative energy is that it requires "subsidies" to compete with oil. This makes no sense.
The billions of dollars we're spending on today's war, the billions we spent on the last war, and the billions we've spent over the years maintaining an army and navy presence in the Middle East were spent solely to maintain our access to oil. Had we been energy self-sufficient via some "subsidized" alternative, none of this oil "subsidy" would have been needed.
How can any existing or proposed "subsidy" of alternative energy production even begin to come close to the number of dollars and lives expended to subsidize oil?
Yours,
Tom Harker
Friday, August 17, 2007
It's all in who's getting fucked !!
Hey Folks -
How many times have I said that the way things are reported in our media depends on the perspective of those in control? Benedict Arnold is a traitor. Had we lost the war, it would have been George Washington (the rebel who was hanged for treason).
Here’s another example.
The man killed is described in the headline of the article below as an “Infamous bandit," but also undercuts that characterization by also describing him as Robin Hood. This disparity is somewhat decreased by placing Robin Hood in smaller type-face and within quotation marks (which usually indicates an unsubstantiated, not necessarily accurate, claim).
Infamous bandit appears in large print without quotation marks.
Read the article below and notice what is presented as a given and clearly true and what some might think, believe, or “romanticize.”
How much of the negative perspective presented is based on the following:
“There he established a reign of terror, killing those who opposed him, kidnapping rich landowners for ransom, and extorting and robbing money from businessmen in the area.
Rich landowners and businessmen didn’t like what he did to them.
On the other hand, how much did it count in his favor that:
“Kumar had a reputation for being fiercely loyal to the poor villagers in the region, particularly those from his Kurmi caste, a group on the lower rungs of India's complex social ladder and one of the most downtrodden in the area in which he operated.”
Well, Kumar killed people, and the “good” people protecting rich landowners and businessmen killed him and others. Kumar broke the law, I’m sure; but the Indian legal system outlaws discrimination on the basis of caste; and the “good” people don’t kill (or even arrest) the rich landowners and businessmen who perpetuate and benefit from the caste system.
Seems to me that who is notorious and a bandit and who should be “romanticized” by the press depends on whose side the press is on. In this case it looks like the press has sympathy for rich landowners and businessmen rather than for poor villagers “on the lower rungs of India's complex social ladder and one of the most downtrodden [groups] in the area.”
Surprise, surprise !!!
- Uke Man
INDIA'S 'ROBIN HOOD'
Infamous bandit killed by police
Monday, July 23, 2007 4:05 AM
By Gavin Rabnowitz
Associated Press
NEW DELHI -- Indian police killed one of the country's most notorious bandits yesterday -- a man who ruled the ravines and forests of central India through a mixture of fear and love for three decades, with many hailing him as a modern-day Robin Hood.
Shiv Kumar led one of the few remaining bands of outlaws that have roamed central India for centuries, their exploits romanticized in Bollywood movies.
Kumar, thought to be in his 60s, was wanted in more than 200 cases of kidnapping, extortion and murder and had a bounty on his head of more than $12,000, a small fortune in this region.
A.K. Jain, inspector general of the police special task force, said Kumar was slain after a battle between police and bandits. He was identified by villagers, Jain said.
Four of his accomplices were also killed in the battle about 400 miles southwest of New Delhi, Jain said.
Kumar had managed to evade police since escaping from custody in 1975 after being arrested for murder. Since then, he had built up a band of followers and carved out a 100-square-mile fiefdom on the border between the central Indian states of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.
There he established a reign of terror, killing those who opposed him, kidnapping rich landowners for ransom, and extorting and robbing money from businessmen in the area.
He also monopolized the tendu leaf industry. The tendu is a tobaccolike leaf used in bidis, small Indian cigars.
Kumar had a reputation for being fiercely loyal to the poor villagers in the region, particularly those from his Kurmi caste, a group on the lower rungs of India's complex social ladder and one of the most downtrodden in the area in which he operated.
He would share some of his loot with them, paying for weddings and helping with medical bills in times of need. In return, they would provide him food and shelter and tip him off when police were coming, enabling him to slip away into the safety of the forests.
How many times have I said that the way things are reported in our media depends on the perspective of those in control? Benedict Arnold is a traitor. Had we lost the war, it would have been George Washington (the rebel who was hanged for treason).
Here’s another example.
The man killed is described in the headline of the article below as an “Infamous bandit," but also undercuts that characterization by also describing him as Robin Hood. This disparity is somewhat decreased by placing Robin Hood in smaller type-face and within quotation marks (which usually indicates an unsubstantiated, not necessarily accurate, claim).
Infamous bandit appears in large print without quotation marks.
Read the article below and notice what is presented as a given and clearly true and what some might think, believe, or “romanticize.”
How much of the negative perspective presented is based on the following:
“There he established a reign of terror, killing those who opposed him, kidnapping rich landowners for ransom, and extorting and robbing money from businessmen in the area.
Rich landowners and businessmen didn’t like what he did to them.
On the other hand, how much did it count in his favor that:
“Kumar had a reputation for being fiercely loyal to the poor villagers in the region, particularly those from his Kurmi caste, a group on the lower rungs of India's complex social ladder and one of the most downtrodden in the area in which he operated.”
Well, Kumar killed people, and the “good” people protecting rich landowners and businessmen killed him and others. Kumar broke the law, I’m sure; but the Indian legal system outlaws discrimination on the basis of caste; and the “good” people don’t kill (or even arrest) the rich landowners and businessmen who perpetuate and benefit from the caste system.
Seems to me that who is notorious and a bandit and who should be “romanticized” by the press depends on whose side the press is on. In this case it looks like the press has sympathy for rich landowners and businessmen rather than for poor villagers “on the lower rungs of India's complex social ladder and one of the most downtrodden [groups] in the area.”
Surprise, surprise !!!
- Uke Man
INDIA'S 'ROBIN HOOD'
Infamous bandit killed by police
Monday, July 23, 2007 4:05 AM
By Gavin Rabnowitz
Associated Press
NEW DELHI -- Indian police killed one of the country's most notorious bandits yesterday -- a man who ruled the ravines and forests of central India through a mixture of fear and love for three decades, with many hailing him as a modern-day Robin Hood.
Shiv Kumar led one of the few remaining bands of outlaws that have roamed central India for centuries, their exploits romanticized in Bollywood movies.
Kumar, thought to be in his 60s, was wanted in more than 200 cases of kidnapping, extortion and murder and had a bounty on his head of more than $12,000, a small fortune in this region.
A.K. Jain, inspector general of the police special task force, said Kumar was slain after a battle between police and bandits. He was identified by villagers, Jain said.
Four of his accomplices were also killed in the battle about 400 miles southwest of New Delhi, Jain said.
Kumar had managed to evade police since escaping from custody in 1975 after being arrested for murder. Since then, he had built up a band of followers and carved out a 100-square-mile fiefdom on the border between the central Indian states of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.
There he established a reign of terror, killing those who opposed him, kidnapping rich landowners for ransom, and extorting and robbing money from businessmen in the area.
He also monopolized the tendu leaf industry. The tendu is a tobaccolike leaf used in bidis, small Indian cigars.
Kumar had a reputation for being fiercely loyal to the poor villagers in the region, particularly those from his Kurmi caste, a group on the lower rungs of India's complex social ladder and one of the most downtrodden in the area in which he operated.
He would share some of his loot with them, paying for weddings and helping with medical bills in times of need. In return, they would provide him food and shelter and tip him off when police were coming, enabling him to slip away into the safety of the forests.
Thursday, August 16, 2007
God-fearing? or God-awful? Dick Cheney
Hey Folks -
Here's one for any born-again Christian out there who still supports Dick Cheney. One of the Ten Commandments you zealously want to put into the schools says, "Thou shalt not lie."
Listen to Mr. Cheney then and compare it to what he says now, and then either quit supporting Cheney or quit claiming to support your Bible.
Heeeeere's Dickey:
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=2879&id=10983-1857161-HvjTdh&t=2
- Uke Man
Here's one for any born-again Christian out there who still supports Dick Cheney. One of the Ten Commandments you zealously want to put into the schools says, "Thou shalt not lie."
Listen to Mr. Cheney then and compare it to what he says now, and then either quit supporting Cheney or quit claiming to support your Bible.
Heeeeere's Dickey:
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=2879&id=10983-1857161-HvjTdh&t=2
- Uke Man
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Well, aren't we special
You know, Folks -
Some people have more dollars than sense. Religious schools are one thing, serving mainly as brainwashing centers for whatever sect is running the operation. In the Middle Ages the Jesuits said to tell them what kind of a person you wanted when you dropped off the kid, and in a few years you could come back and pick him up. The loony lady in Jesus Camp expressed a similar idea.
These schools are not as expensive as the preppie schools since their aim is maintaining and expanding the sect. Keeping the poor, working class, and middle class kids out would be counterproductive; so tuition levels are moderated.
On the other hand, establishing class differences is worth any cost to some insecure upper-crust filberts. In fact, if tuition isn't extreme, the underlying need these schools exist to address cannot be satisfied.
One can feel sorry for the "faithful" who are afraid God can't protect their darlings from the upper middle class heathens of suburban Westerville without help from the Tree of Life Christian School; but these climbers, the Nicks, are disgusting. First, they move from Upper Arlington, a suburb near the top of the status food chain, to New Albany where even richer folks (e.g. Les Wexner) live. AND, although Upper Arlington Schools always score at the top of every measure and New Albany schools are so plush they have a Kinko's store on-site making student copies for free; these Nick-ies have "never thought of attending schools there."
The Nicks aren't just anybody; they're special and willing to spend $50,700 for one year of their three kids' schooling. Supposedly that's because it's "a great investment in the future . . . Hopefully, the investment pans out when they are applying to and getting accepted to good colleges, " says Phillip, the Nick-head.
Yeah, right!! If the little Nicks have a brain and the motivation they don't need a fancy-dan, private, snooty-toot education to get into a good college. Mom and Dad Nick just need to feel special, no matter what it costs.
- Uke Man
Priceless education?
Some families in high-performing districts still opt for private schools
Tuesday, July 24, 2007 3:39 AM
By Charlie Boss
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Elizabeth Nick moved to New Albany from Upper Arlington but has never thought of attending schools there.
Public schools seem incredibly gigantic, she said.
At Columbus Academy, where she will be a senior this fall, Nick will graduate with about 90 other students. Her classes have ranged from nine to 20 students. She has weekly sessions with an adviser and has befriended most of the school's staff members, from the teachers to the lunch ladies.
Her workload is challenging, and the lessons she's learned since coming to the school three years ago have been invaluable.
"My confidence has grown," said Nick, who attended Wellington before transferring to the Gahanna-based academy. "Even though I have a big workload and it's stressful, I can handle it and handle it well."
Families like the Nicks live in expensive neighborhoods with high-performing public schools, but they still shell out big bucks to send the children to private schools.
"Why would they pay for a product that is otherwise available for free?" said Joe McTighe, executive director of the Council for American Private Education, based in Maryland. "They do that because they don't think it's the same product."
He said many parents look for schools that reflect their expectations and enhance the lessons learned at home. They are drawn to the rigorous academics, small-class sizes and family-like environments for which private or religious schools are known. Many also hope that private schools will help get their kids into a competitive college.
In Franklin County, parents can choose from 84 private and religious schools, not to mention the traditional public schools and charter schools.
Families can spend about $4,000 to $20,000 a year per child, depending on the grade and school.
Even some pre-kindergarten and kindergarten programs, such as those at Columbus Academy and Columbus School for Girls, cost more than Ohio State University's annual tuition of $8,676 this year.
"I would give up the very house we live in to keep our kids in our school," said Dena Bell, who lives in Westerville. She and her husband will spend about $13,000 to send her two kids to Tree of Life Christian School on the North Side this fall.
"It's not inexpensive," she added. "I see the value in watching my children grow up knowing the Lord. It's in their academics; it's in their sports. It's all incorporated. It's just a really unique environment. We could never go back."
Strong alumni contacts, counselors to help with the college application process, specialized tutoring centers and small classes were pluses for Karen Groeber, whose daughter will be a freshman at Columbus School for Girls this fall.
"It was worth the sacrifice to send her there when you look at the big picture," said Groeber, who lives in Clintonville. Tuition for ninth-graders this year is $17,515.
Families that choose private schools come from various income brackets, said Dan Lips, an education analyst for the Heritage Foundation, a Washington-based research organization.
John McKenzie, headmaster at Columbus Academy, conceded that tuition is expensive but said the school has aggressively increased financial aid. This year, officials hope to award about $1.4 million of need-based assistance to 20 percent of incoming students. Last year, about 15 percent received such help.
Lou Schultz, director of admissions at the school, said that as tuition rises, the school's board of trustees increases financial aid by twice that rate.
Private and religious schools say enrollment statewide has remained steady, but in Franklin County it has dipped slightly.
Last year, about 10 percent of Franklin County students were enrolled in private and religious schools, compared with about 12 percent in 2000.
Administrators say private and religious schools have everything that good public schools have: competitive athletics programs, foreign-language offerings and honors and Advanced Placement classes.
"It's a great investment in the future," said Philipp Nick, who will pay $50,700 this school year to send Elizabeth and his other two kids -- a sixth-grader and sophomore -- to Columbus Academy.
"Hopefully, the investment pans out when they are applying to and getting accepted to good colleges."
cboss@dispatch.com
Some people have more dollars than sense. Religious schools are one thing, serving mainly as brainwashing centers for whatever sect is running the operation. In the Middle Ages the Jesuits said to tell them what kind of a person you wanted when you dropped off the kid, and in a few years you could come back and pick him up. The loony lady in Jesus Camp expressed a similar idea.
These schools are not as expensive as the preppie schools since their aim is maintaining and expanding the sect. Keeping the poor, working class, and middle class kids out would be counterproductive; so tuition levels are moderated.
On the other hand, establishing class differences is worth any cost to some insecure upper-crust filberts. In fact, if tuition isn't extreme, the underlying need these schools exist to address cannot be satisfied.
One can feel sorry for the "faithful" who are afraid God can't protect their darlings from the upper middle class heathens of suburban Westerville without help from the Tree of Life Christian School; but these climbers, the Nicks, are disgusting. First, they move from Upper Arlington, a suburb near the top of the status food chain, to New Albany where even richer folks (e.g. Les Wexner) live. AND, although Upper Arlington Schools always score at the top of every measure and New Albany schools are so plush they have a Kinko's store on-site making student copies for free; these Nick-ies have "never thought of attending schools there."
The Nicks aren't just anybody; they're special and willing to spend $50,700 for one year of their three kids' schooling. Supposedly that's because it's "a great investment in the future . . . Hopefully, the investment pans out when they are applying to and getting accepted to good colleges, " says Phillip, the Nick-head.
Yeah, right!! If the little Nicks have a brain and the motivation they don't need a fancy-dan, private, snooty-toot education to get into a good college. Mom and Dad Nick just need to feel special, no matter what it costs.
- Uke Man
Priceless education?
Some families in high-performing districts still opt for private schools
Tuesday, July 24, 2007 3:39 AM
By Charlie Boss
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Elizabeth Nick moved to New Albany from Upper Arlington but has never thought of attending schools there.
Public schools seem incredibly gigantic, she said.
At Columbus Academy, where she will be a senior this fall, Nick will graduate with about 90 other students. Her classes have ranged from nine to 20 students. She has weekly sessions with an adviser and has befriended most of the school's staff members, from the teachers to the lunch ladies.
Her workload is challenging, and the lessons she's learned since coming to the school three years ago have been invaluable.
"My confidence has grown," said Nick, who attended Wellington before transferring to the Gahanna-based academy. "Even though I have a big workload and it's stressful, I can handle it and handle it well."
Families like the Nicks live in expensive neighborhoods with high-performing public schools, but they still shell out big bucks to send the children to private schools.
"Why would they pay for a product that is otherwise available for free?" said Joe McTighe, executive director of the Council for American Private Education, based in Maryland. "They do that because they don't think it's the same product."
He said many parents look for schools that reflect their expectations and enhance the lessons learned at home. They are drawn to the rigorous academics, small-class sizes and family-like environments for which private or religious schools are known. Many also hope that private schools will help get their kids into a competitive college.
In Franklin County, parents can choose from 84 private and religious schools, not to mention the traditional public schools and charter schools.
Families can spend about $4,000 to $20,000 a year per child, depending on the grade and school.
Even some pre-kindergarten and kindergarten programs, such as those at Columbus Academy and Columbus School for Girls, cost more than Ohio State University's annual tuition of $8,676 this year.
"I would give up the very house we live in to keep our kids in our school," said Dena Bell, who lives in Westerville. She and her husband will spend about $13,000 to send her two kids to Tree of Life Christian School on the North Side this fall.
"It's not inexpensive," she added. "I see the value in watching my children grow up knowing the Lord. It's in their academics; it's in their sports. It's all incorporated. It's just a really unique environment. We could never go back."
Strong alumni contacts, counselors to help with the college application process, specialized tutoring centers and small classes were pluses for Karen Groeber, whose daughter will be a freshman at Columbus School for Girls this fall.
"It was worth the sacrifice to send her there when you look at the big picture," said Groeber, who lives in Clintonville. Tuition for ninth-graders this year is $17,515.
Families that choose private schools come from various income brackets, said Dan Lips, an education analyst for the Heritage Foundation, a Washington-based research organization.
John McKenzie, headmaster at Columbus Academy, conceded that tuition is expensive but said the school has aggressively increased financial aid. This year, officials hope to award about $1.4 million of need-based assistance to 20 percent of incoming students. Last year, about 15 percent received such help.
Lou Schultz, director of admissions at the school, said that as tuition rises, the school's board of trustees increases financial aid by twice that rate.
Private and religious schools say enrollment statewide has remained steady, but in Franklin County it has dipped slightly.
Last year, about 10 percent of Franklin County students were enrolled in private and religious schools, compared with about 12 percent in 2000.
Administrators say private and religious schools have everything that good public schools have: competitive athletics programs, foreign-language offerings and honors and Advanced Placement classes.
"It's a great investment in the future," said Philipp Nick, who will pay $50,700 this school year to send Elizabeth and his other two kids -- a sixth-grader and sophomore -- to Columbus Academy.
"Hopefully, the investment pans out when they are applying to and getting accepted to good colleges."
cboss@dispatch.com
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Depends on who you are
Well, well, well, Folks -
Looks like help for the downtrodden and socialistic intrusions by the impotent, trouble-making government is okie-dokie when the "downtrodden" happen to be the well-off Ginks on top.
Hmmmm . . . not a penny for deadbeat average Americans getting kicked out of their homes, but BILLIONS are just a beginning for fatcat Ginks (it's up to half a trillion world-wide as I write).
When it comes to the middle class, working class, and the poor; well, THEY made "bad personal choices"; that's the way it goes; too bad. We can't interfere with the market when it wipes out jobs; we can't shed a tear or lift a finger when the remaining available jobs push Americans into poverty. We can't have "socialistic prescriptions" to serve those without health care. Government certainly can't be expected to intercede when Americans are losing their homes to shifty loan companies they freely chose to trust. And if Grandpa has to work until he drops, he should take pride in helping keep America competitive with other third world nations.
BUT !!!
When the Upper Crust even starts to feel threatened, all bets are off. Billions of governmental dollars are just the beginning. When Big Money Ginks make "bad personal choices," socialism isn't socialism; these Ginks MUST be protected; we all need to chip in, raise a finger, shed a tear, and pray for a good outcome. And don't mention the magical, sacrosanct, untouchable market!!! Manipulate that fucking evil-doer.
Sure, these morons made bad choices, but they are GINKS. No problem; use money made on the backs of the poor, working class, and middle class to bail 'em out; it's not socialism when handouts are given to stupid, greedy, rich people; that's called "the way God wants it."
Yep, socialism is defined as taking from the rich to help the poor - not, taking from the poor to help the rich. (news item below)
- Uke Man
BILLIONS RELEASED TO CALM MARKETS
Fed treads cautiously to not fuel credit crisis
August 11, 2007
By Jeannine Aversa
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON -- Facing a major test, the Federal Reserve pumped billions into the U.S. financial system yesterday after a global credit crunch sent Wall Street into a dive and shriveled the nest eggs of investors large and small.
Will it be enough, or will Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and his central bank colleagues have to dig deeper into their arsenal?
The Fed's action might have eased some investors' anxieties. The Dow Jones industrial average was down again yesterday, but only by 31 points at the end of a seesaw day.
The Federal Reserve has a range of tools to keep financial institutions' problems from morphing into a broader economic crisis. It can also use the power of words to try to calm investors.
So far, the Fed has chosen a little of both.
It ordered extra cash to be plowed into the system, hoping to help banks and other institutions get over the hump and carry out their business more smoothly.
The Fed also sought to send a reassuring message to Wall Street and Main Street that it is on top of an unsettling situation, pledging to provide "reserves as necessary" to help the markets safely make their way.
Bernanke and his colleagues had to walk a fine line to acknowledge a problem, discuss some relief but not say anything that might further spook investors.
"If they were to say it is a really big crisis, and they are really concerned that it could translate into an economic crisis, it would have the reverse effect on investors and send them into a bigger panic," said Victor Li, economics professor at the Villanova School of Business near Philadelphia.
The Fed can't ignore the market's pain. At the same time, it must be mindful of doing what is best for the economy in the long run.
The Fed, in a meeting Tuesday, acknowledged that Wall Street turbulence, credit problems and a nationwide housing slump pose increasing threats to the economy. But it refrained from cutting rates and stuck to a forecast that the economy will weather the financial storm and grow gradually in coming months.
"It seems like Bernanke might be more willing than (former Chairman) Alan Greenspan to let financial stress play out to ensure investors don't feel emboldened in the future and take on more risk. There is a sense that Bernanke buys into that argument more than Greenspan did," said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com.
"We'll see if that is true in the next week or so. If markets remain unstable, it will be a test to see how closely the Bernanke Fed sticks to the Greenspan cookbook."
To make sure there's money available, the Federal Reserve pushed $38 billion in temporary reserves into the system yesterday -- the biggest injection since the period after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attack. On Thursday, the Fed had put $24 billion into the system.
Banks also were told that the Fed's discount window -- to which they can turn in an emergency for short-term loans -- is available as a source of funding. After the 2001 terror attack, the Fed used the discount window to make billions in emergency loans to keep the financial system functioning.
Financial markets in the United States and around the globe have been shaken by fears about spreading credit problems that started with home mortgages. Investors are worried that these problems will infect the larger financial system and hurt the U.S. economy.
If the turmoil persists, the Fed probably will dig deeper into its toolbag.
Besides, injecting cash into the financial system, the Fed could lower the discount rate on loans to banks. That would encourage increased lending to people and businesses. The Fed has done this before in times of crisis.
The central bank's most potent weapon would be to lower the federal funds rate, now at 5.25 percent. That rate is the interest banks charge each other on overnight loans.
Cutting that rate would influence other important lending rates throughout the economy. Most notably, it would lead to a corresponding reduction in commercial banks' prime interest rate -- now at 8.25 percent -- for certain credit cards, home-equity lines of credit and other loans.
Bernanke, an economist and former academic, took the Federal Reserve helm in February 2006. He succeeded Greenspan, who in his 18 1/2 -year run seemed to have a sixth sense about Wall Street's psyche.
Some economists suggest that if credit conditions seriously worsen, the Fed might cut rates before its next scheduled meeting on Sept. 18. Others think a rate cut any time soon would be a mistake because the economy is still fundamentally in good shape. It is growing and businesses are hiring.
The White House, meanwhile, also sought to calm markets by saying it is monitoring the situation.
"I can assure you that there are many of the president's advisers who are keeping a very close eye on all the market activity and making sure that policies are put in place to keep our economy strong and growing," spokeswoman Dana Perino told reporters in Kennebunkport, Maine, where President Bush is spending the weekend.
Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., welcomed the Fed's action but said he remained "concerned by the potential of this contagion to spread more broadly."
Concern about the credit crunch swept through Europe and into the United States on Thursday. That prompted the Europeans to pump $130 billion into their financial system.
The meltdown in the housing and mortgage markets has caused home foreclosures to climb to record highs and has forced some lenders out of business. Problems first sprouted in the market for higher-risk, or "subprime," mortgages, which are held by people with poor credit or low incomes. But some problems have spilled over to more creditworthy borrowers. That has led to tighter lending standards, making credit harder to get for people and businesses.
The free flow of credit is important to the smooth functioning of the national economy. Increasingly restrictive lending conditions can put a damper on people's ability to buy big-ticket items such as homes, cars and appliances. And it can crimp businesses' capital investment and hiring.
Looks like help for the downtrodden and socialistic intrusions by the impotent, trouble-making government is okie-dokie when the "downtrodden" happen to be the well-off Ginks on top.
Hmmmm . . . not a penny for deadbeat average Americans getting kicked out of their homes, but BILLIONS are just a beginning for fatcat Ginks (it's up to half a trillion world-wide as I write).
When it comes to the middle class, working class, and the poor; well, THEY made "bad personal choices"; that's the way it goes; too bad. We can't interfere with the market when it wipes out jobs; we can't shed a tear or lift a finger when the remaining available jobs push Americans into poverty. We can't have "socialistic prescriptions" to serve those without health care. Government certainly can't be expected to intercede when Americans are losing their homes to shifty loan companies they freely chose to trust. And if Grandpa has to work until he drops, he should take pride in helping keep America competitive with other third world nations.
BUT !!!
When the Upper Crust even starts to feel threatened, all bets are off. Billions of governmental dollars are just the beginning. When Big Money Ginks make "bad personal choices," socialism isn't socialism; these Ginks MUST be protected; we all need to chip in, raise a finger, shed a tear, and pray for a good outcome. And don't mention the magical, sacrosanct, untouchable market!!! Manipulate that fucking evil-doer.
Sure, these morons made bad choices, but they are GINKS. No problem; use money made on the backs of the poor, working class, and middle class to bail 'em out; it's not socialism when handouts are given to stupid, greedy, rich people; that's called "the way God wants it."
Yep, socialism is defined as taking from the rich to help the poor - not, taking from the poor to help the rich. (news item below)
- Uke Man
BILLIONS RELEASED TO CALM MARKETS
Fed treads cautiously to not fuel credit crisis
August 11, 2007
By Jeannine Aversa
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON -- Facing a major test, the Federal Reserve pumped billions into the U.S. financial system yesterday after a global credit crunch sent Wall Street into a dive and shriveled the nest eggs of investors large and small.
Will it be enough, or will Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and his central bank colleagues have to dig deeper into their arsenal?
The Fed's action might have eased some investors' anxieties. The Dow Jones industrial average was down again yesterday, but only by 31 points at the end of a seesaw day.
The Federal Reserve has a range of tools to keep financial institutions' problems from morphing into a broader economic crisis. It can also use the power of words to try to calm investors.
So far, the Fed has chosen a little of both.
It ordered extra cash to be plowed into the system, hoping to help banks and other institutions get over the hump and carry out their business more smoothly.
The Fed also sought to send a reassuring message to Wall Street and Main Street that it is on top of an unsettling situation, pledging to provide "reserves as necessary" to help the markets safely make their way.
Bernanke and his colleagues had to walk a fine line to acknowledge a problem, discuss some relief but not say anything that might further spook investors.
"If they were to say it is a really big crisis, and they are really concerned that it could translate into an economic crisis, it would have the reverse effect on investors and send them into a bigger panic," said Victor Li, economics professor at the Villanova School of Business near Philadelphia.
The Fed can't ignore the market's pain. At the same time, it must be mindful of doing what is best for the economy in the long run.
The Fed, in a meeting Tuesday, acknowledged that Wall Street turbulence, credit problems and a nationwide housing slump pose increasing threats to the economy. But it refrained from cutting rates and stuck to a forecast that the economy will weather the financial storm and grow gradually in coming months.
"It seems like Bernanke might be more willing than (former Chairman) Alan Greenspan to let financial stress play out to ensure investors don't feel emboldened in the future and take on more risk. There is a sense that Bernanke buys into that argument more than Greenspan did," said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com.
"We'll see if that is true in the next week or so. If markets remain unstable, it will be a test to see how closely the Bernanke Fed sticks to the Greenspan cookbook."
To make sure there's money available, the Federal Reserve pushed $38 billion in temporary reserves into the system yesterday -- the biggest injection since the period after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attack. On Thursday, the Fed had put $24 billion into the system.
Banks also were told that the Fed's discount window -- to which they can turn in an emergency for short-term loans -- is available as a source of funding. After the 2001 terror attack, the Fed used the discount window to make billions in emergency loans to keep the financial system functioning.
Financial markets in the United States and around the globe have been shaken by fears about spreading credit problems that started with home mortgages. Investors are worried that these problems will infect the larger financial system and hurt the U.S. economy.
If the turmoil persists, the Fed probably will dig deeper into its toolbag.
Besides, injecting cash into the financial system, the Fed could lower the discount rate on loans to banks. That would encourage increased lending to people and businesses. The Fed has done this before in times of crisis.
The central bank's most potent weapon would be to lower the federal funds rate, now at 5.25 percent. That rate is the interest banks charge each other on overnight loans.
Cutting that rate would influence other important lending rates throughout the economy. Most notably, it would lead to a corresponding reduction in commercial banks' prime interest rate -- now at 8.25 percent -- for certain credit cards, home-equity lines of credit and other loans.
Bernanke, an economist and former academic, took the Federal Reserve helm in February 2006. He succeeded Greenspan, who in his 18 1/2 -year run seemed to have a sixth sense about Wall Street's psyche.
Some economists suggest that if credit conditions seriously worsen, the Fed might cut rates before its next scheduled meeting on Sept. 18. Others think a rate cut any time soon would be a mistake because the economy is still fundamentally in good shape. It is growing and businesses are hiring.
The White House, meanwhile, also sought to calm markets by saying it is monitoring the situation.
"I can assure you that there are many of the president's advisers who are keeping a very close eye on all the market activity and making sure that policies are put in place to keep our economy strong and growing," spokeswoman Dana Perino told reporters in Kennebunkport, Maine, where President Bush is spending the weekend.
Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., welcomed the Fed's action but said he remained "concerned by the potential of this contagion to spread more broadly."
Concern about the credit crunch swept through Europe and into the United States on Thursday. That prompted the Europeans to pump $130 billion into their financial system.
The meltdown in the housing and mortgage markets has caused home foreclosures to climb to record highs and has forced some lenders out of business. Problems first sprouted in the market for higher-risk, or "subprime," mortgages, which are held by people with poor credit or low incomes. But some problems have spilled over to more creditworthy borrowers. That has led to tighter lending standards, making credit harder to get for people and businesses.
The free flow of credit is important to the smooth functioning of the national economy. Increasingly restrictive lending conditions can put a damper on people's ability to buy big-ticket items such as homes, cars and appliances. And it can crimp businesses' capital investment and hiring.
Monday, August 13, 2007
NOW the economy isn't doing so well - Hmmmmm...
Hey Folks -
For years as regular people faced more and more difficulty, the Ginks in government and media have seen, heard, and spoken no evil about the blessed Market economy. Everything was coming up rosey!!
Lost a good job? No problem; take a bad job; lots of them around. Can't earn a living on the new job? No problem; get two new jobs - or maybe three (make George W. proud - see 1:18 into the trailer for Sicko at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joaAfBr9tAE ).
Thousands laid off at this plant and that plant; no problem; it's good for Wall Street; stocks "appreciate" that; brokers and shareholders and CEO's cheer !!! Your job is "outsourced" overseas? That's good for America; it's fast track "free trade"; the government encourages it with tax breaks and free seminars; you lose your job but adjust; get educated for a new job, and when that gets exported, get educated again.
Getting foreclosed on your home? Evicted? Well, that's the way it goes. You made the choice; you should have read the fine print (or at least have had your legal department look it over). Our President "feels sorry" for you, but he isn't going to have the government bail you out; that's socialism.
No health care since you lost your good job and started your bad job? No problem; just go to the emergency room (pay no attention to those liars in Sicko). Besides that, most health problems result from personal choices. If you don't have insurance, don't choose to get sick.
Lost your pension? No problem; you can always greet at Wal-Mart. Besides, we have every intention of continuing the shrinking of Social(ism) Security; you'd better get rich or get used to it (and in America everyone can get rich).
Well, for a long time we've been told how good the economy is, how the labor market looked good. No problem; hey!! no problem.
Until NOW.
What's the difference? The Ginks are starting to have problems. And THAT's different!!!!
Paul Krugman lays out pretty well what the situation is, the situation caused by greedy jerks who abused the American people to make ever more bucks until the center could not hold for them either.
In a future posting I'll discuss how the government and media treat these folks.
- Uke Man
August 10, 2007
Very Scary Things
By PAUL KRUGMAN
(a ukethanks to Phyll)
In September 1998, the collapse of Long Term Capital Management, a giant hedge fund, led to a meltdown in the financial markets similar, in some ways, to what’s happening now. During the crisis in ’98, I attended a closed-door briefing given by a senior Federal Reserve official, who laid out the grim state of the markets. “What can we do about it?” asked one participant. “Pray,” replied the Fed official.
Our prayers were answered. The Fed coordinated a rescue for L.T.C.M., while Robert Rubin, the Treasury secretary at the time, and Alan Greenspan, who was the Fed chairman, assured investors that everything would be all right. And the panic subsided.
Yesterday, President Bush, showing off his M.B.A. vocabulary, similarly tried to reassure the markets. But Mr. Bush is, let’s say, a bit lacking in credibility. On the other hand, it’s not clear that anyone could do the trick: right now we’re suffering from a serious shortage of saviors. And that’s too bad, because we might need one.
What’s been happening in financial markets over the past few days is something that truly scares monetary economists: liquidity has dried up. That is, markets in stuff that is normally traded all the time — in particular, financial instruments backed by home mortgages — have shut down because there are no buyers.
This could turn out to be nothing more than a brief scare. At worst, however, it could cause a chain reaction of debt defaults.
The origins of the current crunch lie in the financial follies of the last few years, which in retrospect were as irrational as the dot-com mania. The housing bubble was only part of it; across the board, people began acting as if risk had disappeared.
Everyone knows now about the explosion in subprime loans, which allowed people without the usual financial qualifications to buy houses, and the eagerness with which investors bought securities backed by these loans. But investors also snapped up high-yield corporate debt, a k a junk bonds, driving the spread between junk bond yields and U.S. Treasuries down to record lows.
Then reality hit — not all at once, but in a series of blows. First, the housing bubble popped. Then subprime melted down. Then there was a surge in investor nervousness about junk bonds: two months ago the yield on corporate bonds rated B was only 2.45 percent higher than that on government bonds; now the spread is well over 4 percent.
Investors were rattled recently when the subprime meltdown caused the collapse of two hedge funds operated by Bear Stearns, the investment bank. Since then, markets have been manic-depressive, with triple-digit gains or losses in the Dow Jones industrial average — the rule rather than the exception for the past two weeks.
But yesterday’s announcement by BNP Paribas, a large French bank, that it was suspending the operations of three of its own funds was, if anything, the most ominous news yet. The suspension was necessary, the bank said, because of “the complete evaporation of liquidity in certain market segments” — that is, there are no buyers.
When liquidity dries up, as I said, it can produce a chain reaction of defaults. Financial institution A can’t sell its mortgage-backed securities, so it can’t raise enough cash to make the payment it owes to institution B, which then doesn’t have the cash to pay institution C — and those who do have cash sit on it, because they don’t trust anyone else to repay a loan, which makes things even worse.
And here’s the truly scary thing about liquidity crises: it’s very hard for policy makers to do anything about them.
The Fed normally responds to economic problems by cutting interest rates — and as of yesterday morning the futures markets put the probability of a rate cut by the Fed before the end of next month at almost 100 percent. It can also lend money to banks that are short of cash: yesterday the European Central Bank, the Fed’s trans-Atlantic counterpart, lent banks $130 billion, saying that it would provide unlimited cash if necessary, and the Fed pumped in $24 billion.
But when liquidity dries up, the normal tools of policy lose much of their effectiveness. Reducing the cost of money doesn’t do much for borrowers if nobody is willing to make loans. Ensuring that banks have plenty of cash doesn’t do much if the cash stays in the banks’ vaults.
There are other, more exotic things the Fed and, more important, the executive branch of the U.S. government could do to contain the crisis if the standard policies don’t work. But for a variety of reasons, not least the current administration’s record of incompetence, we’d really rather not go there.
Let’s hope, then, that this crisis blows over as quickly as that of 1998. But I wouldn’t count on it
For years as regular people faced more and more difficulty, the Ginks in government and media have seen, heard, and spoken no evil about the blessed Market economy. Everything was coming up rosey!!
Lost a good job? No problem; take a bad job; lots of them around. Can't earn a living on the new job? No problem; get two new jobs - or maybe three (make George W. proud - see 1:18 into the trailer for Sicko at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joaAfBr9tAE ).
Thousands laid off at this plant and that plant; no problem; it's good for Wall Street; stocks "appreciate" that; brokers and shareholders and CEO's cheer !!! Your job is "outsourced" overseas? That's good for America; it's fast track "free trade"; the government encourages it with tax breaks and free seminars; you lose your job but adjust; get educated for a new job, and when that gets exported, get educated again.
Getting foreclosed on your home? Evicted? Well, that's the way it goes. You made the choice; you should have read the fine print (or at least have had your legal department look it over). Our President "feels sorry" for you, but he isn't going to have the government bail you out; that's socialism.
No health care since you lost your good job and started your bad job? No problem; just go to the emergency room (pay no attention to those liars in Sicko). Besides that, most health problems result from personal choices. If you don't have insurance, don't choose to get sick.
Lost your pension? No problem; you can always greet at Wal-Mart. Besides, we have every intention of continuing the shrinking of Social(ism) Security; you'd better get rich or get used to it (and in America everyone can get rich).
Well, for a long time we've been told how good the economy is, how the labor market looked good. No problem; hey!! no problem.
Until NOW.
What's the difference? The Ginks are starting to have problems. And THAT's different!!!!
Paul Krugman lays out pretty well what the situation is, the situation caused by greedy jerks who abused the American people to make ever more bucks until the center could not hold for them either.
In a future posting I'll discuss how the government and media treat these folks.
- Uke Man
August 10, 2007
Very Scary Things
By PAUL KRUGMAN
(a ukethanks to Phyll)
In September 1998, the collapse of Long Term Capital Management, a giant hedge fund, led to a meltdown in the financial markets similar, in some ways, to what’s happening now. During the crisis in ’98, I attended a closed-door briefing given by a senior Federal Reserve official, who laid out the grim state of the markets. “What can we do about it?” asked one participant. “Pray,” replied the Fed official.
Our prayers were answered. The Fed coordinated a rescue for L.T.C.M., while Robert Rubin, the Treasury secretary at the time, and Alan Greenspan, who was the Fed chairman, assured investors that everything would be all right. And the panic subsided.
Yesterday, President Bush, showing off his M.B.A. vocabulary, similarly tried to reassure the markets. But Mr. Bush is, let’s say, a bit lacking in credibility. On the other hand, it’s not clear that anyone could do the trick: right now we’re suffering from a serious shortage of saviors. And that’s too bad, because we might need one.
What’s been happening in financial markets over the past few days is something that truly scares monetary economists: liquidity has dried up. That is, markets in stuff that is normally traded all the time — in particular, financial instruments backed by home mortgages — have shut down because there are no buyers.
This could turn out to be nothing more than a brief scare. At worst, however, it could cause a chain reaction of debt defaults.
The origins of the current crunch lie in the financial follies of the last few years, which in retrospect were as irrational as the dot-com mania. The housing bubble was only part of it; across the board, people began acting as if risk had disappeared.
Everyone knows now about the explosion in subprime loans, which allowed people without the usual financial qualifications to buy houses, and the eagerness with which investors bought securities backed by these loans. But investors also snapped up high-yield corporate debt, a k a junk bonds, driving the spread between junk bond yields and U.S. Treasuries down to record lows.
Then reality hit — not all at once, but in a series of blows. First, the housing bubble popped. Then subprime melted down. Then there was a surge in investor nervousness about junk bonds: two months ago the yield on corporate bonds rated B was only 2.45 percent higher than that on government bonds; now the spread is well over 4 percent.
Investors were rattled recently when the subprime meltdown caused the collapse of two hedge funds operated by Bear Stearns, the investment bank. Since then, markets have been manic-depressive, with triple-digit gains or losses in the Dow Jones industrial average — the rule rather than the exception for the past two weeks.
But yesterday’s announcement by BNP Paribas, a large French bank, that it was suspending the operations of three of its own funds was, if anything, the most ominous news yet. The suspension was necessary, the bank said, because of “the complete evaporation of liquidity in certain market segments” — that is, there are no buyers.
When liquidity dries up, as I said, it can produce a chain reaction of defaults. Financial institution A can’t sell its mortgage-backed securities, so it can’t raise enough cash to make the payment it owes to institution B, which then doesn’t have the cash to pay institution C — and those who do have cash sit on it, because they don’t trust anyone else to repay a loan, which makes things even worse.
And here’s the truly scary thing about liquidity crises: it’s very hard for policy makers to do anything about them.
The Fed normally responds to economic problems by cutting interest rates — and as of yesterday morning the futures markets put the probability of a rate cut by the Fed before the end of next month at almost 100 percent. It can also lend money to banks that are short of cash: yesterday the European Central Bank, the Fed’s trans-Atlantic counterpart, lent banks $130 billion, saying that it would provide unlimited cash if necessary, and the Fed pumped in $24 billion.
But when liquidity dries up, the normal tools of policy lose much of their effectiveness. Reducing the cost of money doesn’t do much for borrowers if nobody is willing to make loans. Ensuring that banks have plenty of cash doesn’t do much if the cash stays in the banks’ vaults.
There are other, more exotic things the Fed and, more important, the executive branch of the U.S. government could do to contain the crisis if the standard policies don’t work. But for a variety of reasons, not least the current administration’s record of incompetence, we’d really rather not go there.
Let’s hope, then, that this crisis blows over as quickly as that of 1998. But I wouldn’t count on it
Kkkrooked Kkkarl - good riddance !!!!!
Hey Folks –
Kkkarl Rove has been called a genius. That is incorrect. Master Criminal is closer to it.
He is very good at what he does, but anyone who does what he has done is a fool – not a genius. His willing and joyfully destructive, selfish, underhanded, lying, arrogant, and corrupt behaviors are sociopathic.
Now, I make that assessment from the People’s perspective. Of course, if one looks at Kkkarl from the perspective of the ruling class – which demands destructive, selfish, underhanded, lying, arrogant, and corrupt actions in order to maintain its status – he IS a genius.
To get a look at what Kkkarl really is, check out his cool video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ln5RD9BhcCo
- Uke Man
Kkkarl Rove has been called a genius. That is incorrect. Master Criminal is closer to it.
He is very good at what he does, but anyone who does what he has done is a fool – not a genius. His willing and joyfully destructive, selfish, underhanded, lying, arrogant, and corrupt behaviors are sociopathic.
Now, I make that assessment from the People’s perspective. Of course, if one looks at Kkkarl from the perspective of the ruling class – which demands destructive, selfish, underhanded, lying, arrogant, and corrupt actions in order to maintain its status – he IS a genius.
To get a look at what Kkkarl really is, check out his cool video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ln5RD9BhcCo
- Uke Man
Sunday, August 12, 2007
The Iraq Moratorium - Stop the War !!!
Hey Folks -
The idea of the Iraq Moritorium is to allow all of us to come together in a coordinated way to stop the war – while still allowing us to do it in our own way, whatever that may be - coordinated only by the calendar, but making ONE concerted demand everywhere across the nation on the same day.
Not In Our Name, Columbus (of which I'm a member) sees promise in this approach (it is also endorsed by United For Peace and Justice). If the people are to be heard, we need to make a massive demand to stop this war. We have all worked hard to communicate that demand in the past, but as individuals or as individual groups. The Iraq Moratorium gives us a chance to unite in opposing the war, regardless of any other differences we may have.
The People united shall never be defeated. Please give the Iraq Moratorium consideration and unite to end the war.
Columbus Not in Our Name - contact Tom Harker: ukulele_man@yahoo.com
****************STOP the War * Bring the Troops Home*****************
On Friday, September 21 & the third Friday of every subsequent month, I will break my daily routine and take some action, by myself or with others, to end the War in Iraq. (sign this pledge at: http://iraqmoratorium.org/ )
The idea of the Iraq Moritorium is to allow all of us to come together in a coordinated way to stop the war – while still allowing us to do it in our own way, whatever that may be - coordinated only by the calendar, but making ONE concerted demand everywhere across the nation on the same day.
Not In Our Name, Columbus (of which I'm a member) sees promise in this approach (it is also endorsed by United For Peace and Justice). If the people are to be heard, we need to make a massive demand to stop this war. We have all worked hard to communicate that demand in the past, but as individuals or as individual groups. The Iraq Moratorium gives us a chance to unite in opposing the war, regardless of any other differences we may have.
The People united shall never be defeated. Please give the Iraq Moratorium consideration and unite to end the war.
Columbus Not in Our Name - contact Tom Harker: ukulele_man@yahoo.com
From the Iraq Moratorium website:
The Iraq Moratorium
The THIRD FRIDAY of every month beginning Friday September 21st Join with millions to:
- Wear and distribute black ribbons and armbands.
- Buy no gas on Moratorium days
- Pressure politicians and the media
- Hold vigils, pickets, rallies, and teach-ins
- Hold special religious services
- Coordinate events in music, art, and culture
- Host film showings, talks, and educational events
- Organize student actions: Teach-ins, school closings, etc.
The slow motion train wreck that is the occupation of Iraq grows more nightmarish by the day. In 2006 the American people voted to bring it to an end. But the political process is moving glacially at best. We must force the media and the politicians to recognize just how angry and how massive anti-war sentiment in this country has grown.
It's time for the Iraq Moratorium.
The Iraq Moratorium will be an escalating, monthly series of actions demanding an end to the war. Commencing Friday, September 21st and continuing the Third Friday of every month thereafter, we will make a break with business as usual.
****************STOP the War * Bring the Troops Home*****************
On Friday, September 21 & the third Friday of every subsequent month, I will break my daily routine and take some action, by myself or with others, to end the War in Iraq. (sign this pledge at: http://iraqmoratorium.org/ )
Saturday, August 11, 2007
Cindy Sheehan Quits the Democratic Party
Hey Folks -
I saved this letter on 6/27/07. Cindy Sheehan did a lot for the America that we thought it was. The America that actually is couldn't deal with that. Cindy was a problem.
She quit the Democratic party. I don't blame her. I did it myself - a long time ago.
- Uke Man
Dear Democratic Congress,
Hello, my name is Cindy Sheehan and my son Casey Sheehan was killed on April 04, 2004 in Sadr City, Baghdad, Iraq. He was killed when theRepublicans still were in control of Congress. Naively, I set off on my tireless campaign calling on Congress to rescind George's authority towage his war of terror while asking him "for what noble cause" did Casey and thousands of other have to die. Now, with Democrats in control of Congress, I have lost my optimistic naiveté and have become cynically pessimistic as I see you all caving into as one Daily Kos poster called: "Mr. 28%"
There is absolutely no sane or defensible reason for you to hand Bloody King George more money to condemn more of our brave, tired, and damagedsoldiers and the people of Iraq to more death and carnage. You think giving him more money is politically expedient, but it is a moral abomination and every second the occupation of Iraq endures, you all have more blood on your hands.
Ms. Pelosi, Speaker of the House, said after George signed the new weak as a newborn baby funding authorization bill: "Now, I think the president's policy will begin to unravel." Begin to unravel? How many more of our children will have to be killed and how much more of Iraq will have to be demolished before you all think enough unraveling has occurred? How many more crimes will BushCo be allowed to commit whiletheir poll numbers are crumbling before you all gain the political "courage" to hold them accountable. If Iraq hasn't unraveled in Ms.Pelosi's mind, what will it take? With almost 700,000 Iraqis dead and four million refugees (which the US refuses to admit) how could it get worse? Well, it is getting worse and it can get much worse thanks to your complicity.
Being cynically pessimistic, it seems to me that this new vote to extend the war until the end of September, (and let's face it, on October 1st, you will give him more money after some more theatrics, which you think are fooling the anti-war faction of your party) will feed right into the presidential primary season and you believe that if you just hang on until then, the Democrats will be able to re-take the White House. Didn't you see how "well" that worked for John Kerry in 2004 when he played the politics of careful fence sitting and pandering? The American electorate are getting disgusted with weaklings who blow where the wind takes them while frittering away our precious lifeblood and borrowing money from our new owners, the Chinese. I knew having a Democratic Congress would make no difference in grassroots action. That's why we went to DC when you all were sworn in to tell you that we wanted the troops back from Iraq and BushCo heldaccountable while you pushed for ethics reform which is quite a hoot.dn't' you think? We all know that it is affordable for you all to play this game of political mayhem because you have no children in harm's way.let me tell you what it is like:
You watch your reluctant soldier march off to a war that neither you nor he agrees with. Once your soldier leaves the country all you can do iworry. You lie awake at night staring at the moon wondering if today will be the day that you get that dreaded knock on your door. You can'tconcentrate, you can't eat, and your entire life becomes consumed with apprehension while you are waiting for the other shoe to drop. Then, when your worst fears are realized, you begin a life of constant pain, regret, and longing. Everyday is hard, but then you come up on "special" days.like upcoming Memorial Day. Memorial Day holds double pain for me because, not only are we supposed to honor our fallen troops, but Casey was born on Memorial Day in 1979. It used to be a day of celebration for us and now it is a day of despair. Our needlessly killed soldiers of this war and the past conflict in Vietnam have all left an unnecessary trail of sorrow and deep holes of absence that will never be filled.
So, Democratic Congress, with the current daily death toll of 3.72 troops per day, you have condemned 473 more to these early graves. 473 more lives wasted for your political greed: Thousands of broken hearts because of your cowardice and avarice. How can you even go to sleep at night or look at yourselves in a mirror? How do you put behind you the screaming mothers on both sides of the conflict? How does the agony you have created escape you? It will never escape me.I can't run far enough or hide well enough to get away from it.
By the end of September, we will be about 80 troops short of another bloody milestone: 4000, and MoveOn.org will hold nationwide candlelight vigils and you all will be busy passing legislation that will snuff the lights out of thousands more human beings. Congratulations Congress, you have bought yourself a few more months of an illegal and immoral bloodbath. And you know you mean to continue it indefinitely so "other presidents" can solve the horrid problem BushCo forced our world into.
It used to be George Bush's war. You could have ended it honorably. Now it is yours and you all will descend into calumnious history with BushCo.
The Camp Casey Peace Institute is calling all citizens who are as disgusted as we are with you all to join us in Philadelphia on July 4th to try and figure a way out of this "two" party system that is bought and paid for by the war machine which has a stranglehold on every aspect of our lives. As for myself, I am leaving the Democratic Party. You have completely failed those who put you in power to change the direction our country is heading. We did not elect you to help sink our ship of state but to guide it to safe harbor. We do not condone our government's violent meddling in sovereign countries and we condemn the continued murderous occupation of Iraq.
We gave you a chance, you betrayed us.
Sincerely, Cindy Sheehan
Founder and President of Gold Star Families for Peace
Founder and Director of The Camp Casey Peace Institute
Eternally grieving mother of Casey Sheehan
I saved this letter on 6/27/07. Cindy Sheehan did a lot for the America that we thought it was. The America that actually is couldn't deal with that. Cindy was a problem.
She quit the Democratic party. I don't blame her. I did it myself - a long time ago.
- Uke Man
Dear Democratic Congress,
Hello, my name is Cindy Sheehan and my son Casey Sheehan was killed on April 04, 2004 in Sadr City, Baghdad, Iraq. He was killed when theRepublicans still were in control of Congress. Naively, I set off on my tireless campaign calling on Congress to rescind George's authority towage his war of terror while asking him "for what noble cause" did Casey and thousands of other have to die. Now, with Democrats in control of Congress, I have lost my optimistic naiveté and have become cynically pessimistic as I see you all caving into as one Daily Kos poster called: "Mr. 28%"
There is absolutely no sane or defensible reason for you to hand Bloody King George more money to condemn more of our brave, tired, and damagedsoldiers and the people of Iraq to more death and carnage. You think giving him more money is politically expedient, but it is a moral abomination and every second the occupation of Iraq endures, you all have more blood on your hands.
Ms. Pelosi, Speaker of the House, said after George signed the new weak as a newborn baby funding authorization bill: "Now, I think the president's policy will begin to unravel." Begin to unravel? How many more of our children will have to be killed and how much more of Iraq will have to be demolished before you all think enough unraveling has occurred? How many more crimes will BushCo be allowed to commit whiletheir poll numbers are crumbling before you all gain the political "courage" to hold them accountable. If Iraq hasn't unraveled in Ms.Pelosi's mind, what will it take? With almost 700,000 Iraqis dead and four million refugees (which the US refuses to admit) how could it get worse? Well, it is getting worse and it can get much worse thanks to your complicity.
Being cynically pessimistic, it seems to me that this new vote to extend the war until the end of September, (and let's face it, on October 1st, you will give him more money after some more theatrics, which you think are fooling the anti-war faction of your party) will feed right into the presidential primary season and you believe that if you just hang on until then, the Democrats will be able to re-take the White House. Didn't you see how "well" that worked for John Kerry in 2004 when he played the politics of careful fence sitting and pandering? The American electorate are getting disgusted with weaklings who blow where the wind takes them while frittering away our precious lifeblood and borrowing money from our new owners, the Chinese. I knew having a Democratic Congress would make no difference in grassroots action. That's why we went to DC when you all were sworn in to tell you that we wanted the troops back from Iraq and BushCo heldaccountable while you pushed for ethics reform which is quite a hoot.dn't' you think? We all know that it is affordable for you all to play this game of political mayhem because you have no children in harm's way.let me tell you what it is like:
You watch your reluctant soldier march off to a war that neither you nor he agrees with. Once your soldier leaves the country all you can do iworry. You lie awake at night staring at the moon wondering if today will be the day that you get that dreaded knock on your door. You can'tconcentrate, you can't eat, and your entire life becomes consumed with apprehension while you are waiting for the other shoe to drop. Then, when your worst fears are realized, you begin a life of constant pain, regret, and longing. Everyday is hard, but then you come up on "special" days.like upcoming Memorial Day. Memorial Day holds double pain for me because, not only are we supposed to honor our fallen troops, but Casey was born on Memorial Day in 1979. It used to be a day of celebration for us and now it is a day of despair. Our needlessly killed soldiers of this war and the past conflict in Vietnam have all left an unnecessary trail of sorrow and deep holes of absence that will never be filled.
So, Democratic Congress, with the current daily death toll of 3.72 troops per day, you have condemned 473 more to these early graves. 473 more lives wasted for your political greed: Thousands of broken hearts because of your cowardice and avarice. How can you even go to sleep at night or look at yourselves in a mirror? How do you put behind you the screaming mothers on both sides of the conflict? How does the agony you have created escape you? It will never escape me.I can't run far enough or hide well enough to get away from it.
By the end of September, we will be about 80 troops short of another bloody milestone: 4000, and MoveOn.org will hold nationwide candlelight vigils and you all will be busy passing legislation that will snuff the lights out of thousands more human beings. Congratulations Congress, you have bought yourself a few more months of an illegal and immoral bloodbath. And you know you mean to continue it indefinitely so "other presidents" can solve the horrid problem BushCo forced our world into.
It used to be George Bush's war. You could have ended it honorably. Now it is yours and you all will descend into calumnious history with BushCo.
The Camp Casey Peace Institute is calling all citizens who are as disgusted as we are with you all to join us in Philadelphia on July 4th to try and figure a way out of this "two" party system that is bought and paid for by the war machine which has a stranglehold on every aspect of our lives. As for myself, I am leaving the Democratic Party. You have completely failed those who put you in power to change the direction our country is heading. We did not elect you to help sink our ship of state but to guide it to safe harbor. We do not condone our government's violent meddling in sovereign countries and we condemn the continued murderous occupation of Iraq.
We gave you a chance, you betrayed us.
Sincerely, Cindy Sheehan
Founder and President of Gold Star Families for Peace
Founder and Director of The Camp Casey Peace Institute
Eternally grieving mother of Casey Sheehan
Friday, August 10, 2007
Thursday, August 09, 2007
Oreo finances
Hey Folks -
Like cookies?? Well, below see a video that uses cookies to show how the US budget is laid out.
If you saw our boy-President at his pre-vacation "news" conference Thursday; you heard him, when asked whether he could do much of anything else while spending so much on the war, claim that congress just had to get its PRIORITIES figured out.
Well, this video will show you where the priorities are, and will - as well - make it clear where Georgie has his head (hint: it's where the sun don't shine):
http://www.truemajorityaction.org/oreos/contest.php
- Uke Man
Like cookies?? Well, below see a video that uses cookies to show how the US budget is laid out.
If you saw our boy-President at his pre-vacation "news" conference Thursday; you heard him, when asked whether he could do much of anything else while spending so much on the war, claim that congress just had to get its PRIORITIES figured out.
Well, this video will show you where the priorities are, and will - as well - make it clear where Georgie has his head (hint: it's where the sun don't shine):
http://www.truemajorityaction.org/oreos/contest.php
- Uke Man
"Freedom of Religion" doesn't apply to evildoers like this guy!!~
"You let 'em pray in the legislature, and next thing you know, they'll be teaching about guys like him in public schools !!"
Jesus hates all religions except whatever one I like - And to answer the famous question, He would bomb the others!!
Hey Folks -
I don't want prayer in school (I think prayer anywhere is no more than a self-deluding, magical pep-talk), but I could still accept prayer in school. The constitution doesn't outlaw prayer in school; it outlaws politically supported prayer in school.
Now Christian morons think they are getting shafted because the principal can't come on the PA praising Jesus every morning. Well, quite clearly the principal COULD praise Jesus one morning, as long as he praised Muhammad and Moses and Buddha and Vishna and Haile Sellassi and the Flying Spaghetti Monster (just to name a few) on succeeding days.
But that shit won't fly with slope-headed, knuckle dragging Jesus-freaks. It's their boy and only their boy; and once they get THAT settled, they can start on pushing the Catholics and Mormons (who open their hard-boiled eggs from the wrong end) out of the "Christianity" picture (or vice-versa).
Want prayer in school? Then, let ALL prayer (including atheist and pagan "prayer") onto the morning announcements, and there's no problem.
Think that'll happen ?????
Read the news item below.
- Uke Man
Hindu Prayer is Senate's First
Columbus Dispatch July 29, 2007
The US Senate this month [July 2007] heard its first-ever Hindu opening prayer, a development that has drawn protests from some conservative Christians. The prayer, on July 12, was disrupted by three activists who shouted, "This is an abomination," before they were arrested. The Rev. [sic.] Flip Benham of Operation Rescue / Operation Save America said the prayer placed "the false god of Hinduism on a level playing field with the One True God, Jesus Christ." The United States has an estimated 2 million Hindus.Tuesday, August 07, 2007
If your Mommy is a Commie, well you gotta turn her in . . .
Hey Folks,
Well, I guess we shouldn't be surprised. The president can't be expected single-handedly to slap down all of us who won't play ball. And with so many Americans upset, even the FBI can't guarantee the crushing of all dissent. Nope. Gotta find thousands of scumbags who will "report" on their fellows for a buck or two.
That's the America I was taught to love - the stinking landfill on the hill, to paraphrase the Gipper.
- Uke Man
FBI Proposes Building Network of U.S. Informants
July 25, 2007
Justin Rood
The FBI is taking cues from the CIA to recruit thousands of covert informants in the United States as part of a sprawling effort to boost its intelligence capabilities.
According to a recent unclassified report to Congress, the FBI expects its informants to provide secrets about possible terrorists and foreign spies, although some may also be expected to aid with criminal investigations, in the tradition of law enforcement confidential informants. The FBI did not respond to requests for comment on this story.
The FBI said the push was driven by a 2004 directive from President Bush ordering the bureau to improve its counterterrorism efforts by boosting its human intelligence capabilities.
The aggressive push for more secret informants appears to be part of a new effort to grow its intelligence and counterterrorism efforts. Other recent proposals include expanding its collection and analysis of data on U.S. persons, retaining years' worth of Americans' phone records and even increasing so-called "black bag" secret entry operations.
To handle the increase in so-called human sources, the FBI also plans to overhaul its database system, so it can manage records and verify the accuracy of information from "more than 15,000" informants, according to the document. While many of the recruited informants will apparently be U.S. residents, some informants may be overseas, recruited by FBI agents in foreign offices, the report indicates.
The total cost of the effort tops $22 million, according to the document.
The bureau has arranged to use elements of CIA training to teach FBI agents about "Source Targeting and Development," the report states. The courses will train FBI special agents on the "comprehensive tradecraft" needed to identify, recruit and manage these "confidential human sources." According to January testimony by FBI Deputy Director John S. Pistole, the CIA has been working with the bureau on the course.
The bureau apparently mulled whether to adopt entire training courses from the CIA or from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), which like the CIA recruits spies overseas. But the FBI ultimately determined "the courses offered by those agencies would not meet the needs of the FBI's unique law enforcement." The FBI report said it would also give agents "legal and policy" training, noting that its domestic intelligence efforts are "constitutionally sensitive."
"It's probably a good sign they are not adopting CIA recruitment techniques wholesale," said Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists, an expert on classified programs. U.S. intelligence officers abroad can use bribery, extortion, and other patently illegal acts to corral sources into working for them, Aftergood noted. "You're not supposed to do that in the United States," he said.
Well, I guess we shouldn't be surprised. The president can't be expected single-handedly to slap down all of us who won't play ball. And with so many Americans upset, even the FBI can't guarantee the crushing of all dissent. Nope. Gotta find thousands of scumbags who will "report" on their fellows for a buck or two.
That's the America I was taught to love - the stinking landfill on the hill, to paraphrase the Gipper.
- Uke Man
FBI Proposes Building Network of U.S. Informants
July 25, 2007
Justin Rood
The FBI is taking cues from the CIA to recruit thousands of covert informants in the United States as part of a sprawling effort to boost its intelligence capabilities.
According to a recent unclassified report to Congress, the FBI expects its informants to provide secrets about possible terrorists and foreign spies, although some may also be expected to aid with criminal investigations, in the tradition of law enforcement confidential informants. The FBI did not respond to requests for comment on this story.
The FBI said the push was driven by a 2004 directive from President Bush ordering the bureau to improve its counterterrorism efforts by boosting its human intelligence capabilities.
The aggressive push for more secret informants appears to be part of a new effort to grow its intelligence and counterterrorism efforts. Other recent proposals include expanding its collection and analysis of data on U.S. persons, retaining years' worth of Americans' phone records and even increasing so-called "black bag" secret entry operations.
To handle the increase in so-called human sources, the FBI also plans to overhaul its database system, so it can manage records and verify the accuracy of information from "more than 15,000" informants, according to the document. While many of the recruited informants will apparently be U.S. residents, some informants may be overseas, recruited by FBI agents in foreign offices, the report indicates.
The total cost of the effort tops $22 million, according to the document.
The bureau has arranged to use elements of CIA training to teach FBI agents about "Source Targeting and Development," the report states. The courses will train FBI special agents on the "comprehensive tradecraft" needed to identify, recruit and manage these "confidential human sources." According to January testimony by FBI Deputy Director John S. Pistole, the CIA has been working with the bureau on the course.
The bureau apparently mulled whether to adopt entire training courses from the CIA or from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), which like the CIA recruits spies overseas. But the FBI ultimately determined "the courses offered by those agencies would not meet the needs of the FBI's unique law enforcement." The FBI report said it would also give agents "legal and policy" training, noting that its domestic intelligence efforts are "constitutionally sensitive."
"It's probably a good sign they are not adopting CIA recruitment techniques wholesale," said Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists, an expert on classified programs. U.S. intelligence officers abroad can use bribery, extortion, and other patently illegal acts to corral sources into working for them, Aftergood noted. "You're not supposed to do that in the United States," he said.
Monday, August 06, 2007
How the Republicans fuck us and look out for the people who own them
Hey Folks -
This is what Republicans do. The people have a problem and there IS a solution to the people's problem, but the solution would present a problem to the powerful minority that benefits from the people having the problem in the first place.
To stop any effort to solve such a problem, the first tactic is usually high-powered demonization and fear-mongering aimed at convincing folks that any real solution would destroy what little they already have; aimed at getting folks to act against their own self-interest. In our Madison Ave. world it isn't too difficult for well-heeled interests to bury the solution under mega-tons of propaganda (remember the Clinton Health Plan?).
Failing that, or facing a resurgence of a formerly thwarted solution, the next tactic is to become "proactive." The idea is to propose a "solution" to the problem that, while not solving the problem - and often actually making it worse - serves other fundamental aspects of the elite agenda.
You will find a good example of just such a "solution" below. Read carefully and think. Does this "solution" actually help poor, uninsured people (how much "insurance" coverage will $5,400 per family provide [ that's a family-plan premium of a little over $400.00/month] ?).
Whatever, but it WILL get businesses out of having to provide insurance, and it WILL direct our public tax dollars into the hands of private interests, and it WILL allow Republicans to say honestly that they provided health insurance (no one needs to know that it was essentially worthless).
GOP senators offer plan for universal health insurance
Friday, July 27, 2007
By Barbara Barrett
McCLATCHY NEWSPAPERS
WASHINGTON -- A group of conservative Republican senators put forth a plan yesterday that seeks to ensure every American has health insurance -- a cause long championed by the political left.
The bill encourages families to find their own coverage and offers refundable tax credits of up to $5,400 per family.
But advocates for the uninsured say the proposal could jeopardize low-income families and chronically ill patients, as well as the employment-based health-care system, which now covers
65 percent of Americans.
"It's time for a major debate on health-care insurance," Sen. Mel Martinez, R-Fla., said. "Not enough people have access to affordable health care, and the Congress has not done enough about this crisis."
Martinez was joined in introducing the bill by fellow Republican Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina, Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and Bob Corker of Tennessee.
The bill could bring health coverage to millions of Americans now without it. But Burr said it also would begin taxing the value of health-care plans that many employers now offer workers, a controversial provision sure to face opposition. Such benefits are now tax-free, both for the employer and the worker.
"Our aim is to remove inequities in our tax laws and make tax relief for health insurance available to everyone," Martinez said.
The legislation would offer special tax credits to help cover the cost of health insurance and other health bills: $2,160 per person, up to a maximum of $5,400 per family.
The legislation, called the Every American Insured Health Act, comes amid debate this week in the House of Representatives and the Senate over the renewal of a states-run children's health insurance program. Republican leaders, including President Bush, want to keep the program as is.
Democrats, however, are trying to expand the program to cover more children.
Polls show health care as one of the top concerns of voters. Democratic presidential candidates are being pushed to unveil their health-care plans.
And several states are considering legislation to cover uninsured residents.
Kathleen Stoll, director of health policy for Families USA, an advocacy group in Washington, said the idea in the bill isn't terribly new. Republicans have long been working to dismantle the employment-based health system that most Americans now use, she said.
"When we eliminate that tax break for (the system), we should do that with extreme caution," Stoll said.
Advocates for the uninsured fear that employers could drop health benefits altogether. And for many families, $5,400 won't buy a lot of health insurance.
This is what Republicans do. The people have a problem and there IS a solution to the people's problem, but the solution would present a problem to the powerful minority that benefits from the people having the problem in the first place.
To stop any effort to solve such a problem, the first tactic is usually high-powered demonization and fear-mongering aimed at convincing folks that any real solution would destroy what little they already have; aimed at getting folks to act against their own self-interest. In our Madison Ave. world it isn't too difficult for well-heeled interests to bury the solution under mega-tons of propaganda (remember the Clinton Health Plan?).
Failing that, or facing a resurgence of a formerly thwarted solution, the next tactic is to become "proactive." The idea is to propose a "solution" to the problem that, while not solving the problem - and often actually making it worse - serves other fundamental aspects of the elite agenda.
You will find a good example of just such a "solution" below. Read carefully and think. Does this "solution" actually help poor, uninsured people (how much "insurance" coverage will $5,400 per family provide [ that's a family-plan premium of a little over $400.00/month] ?).
Whatever, but it WILL get businesses out of having to provide insurance, and it WILL direct our public tax dollars into the hands of private interests, and it WILL allow Republicans to say honestly that they provided health insurance (no one needs to know that it was essentially worthless).
Read the story below, and when you're done, if you think the vampires it mentions are truly looking out for the American people, I sincerely hope you have good health insurance and it will pay for psychiatric help.
- Uke Man
GOP senators offer plan for universal health insurance
Friday, July 27, 2007
By Barbara Barrett
McCLATCHY NEWSPAPERS
WASHINGTON -- A group of conservative Republican senators put forth a plan yesterday that seeks to ensure every American has health insurance -- a cause long championed by the political left.
The bill encourages families to find their own coverage and offers refundable tax credits of up to $5,400 per family.
But advocates for the uninsured say the proposal could jeopardize low-income families and chronically ill patients, as well as the employment-based health-care system, which now covers
65 percent of Americans.
"It's time for a major debate on health-care insurance," Sen. Mel Martinez, R-Fla., said. "Not enough people have access to affordable health care, and the Congress has not done enough about this crisis."
Martinez was joined in introducing the bill by fellow Republican Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina, Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and Bob Corker of Tennessee.
The bill could bring health coverage to millions of Americans now without it. But Burr said it also would begin taxing the value of health-care plans that many employers now offer workers, a controversial provision sure to face opposition. Such benefits are now tax-free, both for the employer and the worker.
"Our aim is to remove inequities in our tax laws and make tax relief for health insurance available to everyone," Martinez said.
The legislation would offer special tax credits to help cover the cost of health insurance and other health bills: $2,160 per person, up to a maximum of $5,400 per family.
The legislation, called the Every American Insured Health Act, comes amid debate this week in the House of Representatives and the Senate over the renewal of a states-run children's health insurance program. Republican leaders, including President Bush, want to keep the program as is.
Democrats, however, are trying to expand the program to cover more children.
Polls show health care as one of the top concerns of voters. Democratic presidential candidates are being pushed to unveil their health-care plans.
And several states are considering legislation to cover uninsured residents.
Kathleen Stoll, director of health policy for Families USA, an advocacy group in Washington, said the idea in the bill isn't terribly new. Republicans have long been working to dismantle the employment-based health system that most Americans now use, she said.
"When we eliminate that tax break for (the system), we should do that with extreme caution," Stoll said.
Advocates for the uninsured fear that employers could drop health benefits altogether. And for many families, $5,400 won't buy a lot of health insurance.
Sunday, August 05, 2007
We're too stupid to vote? Well, they're too stupid to run things!!
Hey Folks –
Right-wing patrician pundit Jonah Goldberg recently wrote:
Voters should have to pass test on basics
Thursday, August 2, 2007
Can you name all three branches of government? Can you name even one? Do you know who your congressman is? Your senators? Do you know how many senators each state gets? If you know the answers (you probably do because you're a newspaper reader), you're in the minority.
He goes on to suggest making voting more difficult. Why? Well, he says the people just aren’t interested in politics; so, they don’t need to vote. He suggests that in order to vote we should first have to pass a test. Hmmm . . . a poll test.
Well, folks, if the test asks “To which branch of government does the Vice President belong,” there won’t be anyone voting in the next election.
But, then too, if politicians are required to pass a “basic humanity” test before running for office, there won’t be anyone to vote for anyway.
- Uke Man
Right-wing patrician pundit Jonah Goldberg recently wrote:
Voters should have to pass test on basics
Thursday, August 2, 2007
Can you name all three branches of government? Can you name even one? Do you know who your congressman is? Your senators? Do you know how many senators each state gets? If you know the answers (you probably do because you're a newspaper reader), you're in the minority.
He goes on to suggest making voting more difficult. Why? Well, he says the people just aren’t interested in politics; so, they don’t need to vote. He suggests that in order to vote we should first have to pass a test. Hmmm . . . a poll test.
Well, folks, if the test asks “To which branch of government does the Vice President belong,” there won’t be anyone voting in the next election.
But, then too, if politicians are required to pass a “basic humanity” test before running for office, there won’t be anyone to vote for anyway.
- Uke Man
Saturday, August 04, 2007
Uke Man solo Videos
Hey Folks -
Time for a little shameless promotion!!
Check out my musical outrages at:
http://ukuleledisco.com/moonsong
Once there, click on "show all" to see all 39 different videos. Pick and choose; see a few; come back for more; write me at ukulele_man@yahoo.com
This is the work of Jason & Ted, "Sonic Uke." Check out their whole unbelievable site!!!
- Uke Man
Time for a little shameless promotion!!
Check out my musical outrages at:
http://ukuleledisco.com/moonsong
Once there, click on "show all" to see all 39 different videos. Pick and choose; see a few; come back for more; write me at ukulele_man@yahoo.com
This is the work of Jason & Ted, "Sonic Uke." Check out their whole unbelievable site!!!
- Uke Man
Friday, August 03, 2007
E Pluribus Unum ??
Check out the video for an historical review of our ideals in action. Are they worth a plug nickel?The Committee to Keep All the Others Out
Hey Folks -
America is too great to allow low skilled workers to flood over our borders and change the face of this country - Always has been. Check out the video: http://www.markfiore.com/animation/amnesty.html
- Uke Man
p.s. Send Ahnold back to Austria and Mel Gibson back to the Middle Ages !!
Thursday, August 02, 2007
Spreading Manure - not Democracy
Hey Folks,
Ain’t it just ducky what passes for “democracy” in this god-forsaken stinking city on the hill !!!
Our Idiot Boy President and his mental midget retainers don’t give a damn about the Constitution (“Just a damned piece of paper” – G.W. Bush) or their oath to uphold it. Nor do they feel any need to respect the legislative branch of government, ignoring subpoenas. They have the “Supremes” pretty well sewed up with zombie reactionaries in the majority, and they are working to eliminate even Republican federal prosecutors who have a conscience or an understanding of ethics. Yep, Dickey and Dopey are pretty much along the Yellow-Bellied Road to a regal presidency.
And what about the Democrats? They are busy trying to look busy but being careful to initiate only actions that can be sandbagged by Duh-bya. Everything they come up with is analyzed, by even the moronic TV pundits, either as impossible to implement or as too lengthy a process to reach resolution before the Monkey Boy is out of office.
This is no accident. It is part of the plan , the road to electoral success; fuck the people by letting Bush continue his ways, yes; but the Democrats will look so good by comparison come 2008, that we’ll overwhelmingly bring their wimpy asses into the White House and a larger congressional majority. Whereupon the Democrats can ignore the needs of the people just as the Republicans did - just not as blatantly, and with a slightly adjusted list of winners and losers..
Bush is and has been destroying much of what was best about this country in regards to freedom, liberty, rights, citizenship, and community. At the same time he has been ever increasing the ranks of the poor, decreasing the ranks of the middle class, and increasing the income of the rich. And what are the “leading” Democrats talking about? What is the media focusing on? Which candidates are addressing the issues important to the vast numbers of people Bush and his Republican vampires have been screwing to death?
According to the media, Clinton and Obama are “it” for the Dems. One seldom hears about Edwards, and the rest are presented as either hopeless or jokes. So, what are Clinton and Obama talking about? Bullshit !! Obama says that as President he’ll talk to people like Chavez and Castro; Clinton tries to make it sound like Obama said something stupid – something other than he actually said. They take shots back and forth. The media love it and feed it to us endlessly, as if it means something.
To hell with concentrating on the war or health care or the loss of decent-paying jobs or poverty and hunger or the needs of children and the aged or saving pensions or the problem of global warming or the neglect of New Orleans or the broken criminal “justice” system or the need for public transportation or ANY of a MILLION things that directly affect the regular people in this country.
What crap!!! But it IS part of the PLAN, a plan to which both parties pay obeisance and to which the media also bows down. That is, maintaining the essential status quo; that is, the maintenance of the rich on top and everyone else on the bottom.
The world is changing, and the USA no longer has the monopoly it’s enjoyed since W W II. The rest of the world is catching up, and for the fat cats on top to stay fat and get fatter is becoming more of a challenge. Guess who is going to get squeezed in the process?
This is why the political process concentrates on a cat fight over something not really even said, why it goes “off” over Hillary’s inch of middle aged cleavage, why in recent times “crucial” issues like homosexuality, abortion, and evolution have been so strenuously pressed to the fore and covered ad nauseum by the media.
The process is NOT about making a better America or a better Iraq or a better world. It is about keeping the fat cats fat and making them fatter – at everyone else’s expense.
This is the reason for the war. This is the reason for the seeming contradiction of naturally xenophobic and scapegoating Republicans encouraging “illegal" Mexicans to come here and work – to do the jobs that can’t be sent to India and won’t support American families.
This is the reason for the totally bogus attacks on Social Security and the demolition of pensions. This is the reason for school voucher schemes and subsidizing corporations who send their jobs overseas. It’s the reason for ignoring the Kyoto Protocol and threatening Russia with missiles in Europe. It is the priority that keeps us from taking real steps to protect our harbors, the priority that short circuits all the things regular Americans need our government to move on, the priority that overrides OUR issues.
This narrowly defined priority – i.e. keeping the fat cats fat and helping them get fatter – is often paraded as “American interests.” We must do this, or we can’t do that because of “American interests.”
Well, in a way that might be construed as true since the American ruling class are Americans, and everything that gets done IS in their interest; but they are a tiny minority. The vast majority of Americans, and THEIR interests – can (as our snarling Vice President said) go fuck themselves.
That’s our “democracy,” and that’s the shit our children are asked to spread around the world at the cost of their lives.
- Uke Man
Ain’t it just ducky what passes for “democracy” in this god-forsaken stinking city on the hill !!!
Our Idiot Boy President and his mental midget retainers don’t give a damn about the Constitution (“Just a damned piece of paper” – G.W. Bush) or their oath to uphold it. Nor do they feel any need to respect the legislative branch of government, ignoring subpoenas. They have the “Supremes” pretty well sewed up with zombie reactionaries in the majority, and they are working to eliminate even Republican federal prosecutors who have a conscience or an understanding of ethics. Yep, Dickey and Dopey are pretty much along the Yellow-Bellied Road to a regal presidency.
And what about the Democrats? They are busy trying to look busy but being careful to initiate only actions that can be sandbagged by Duh-bya. Everything they come up with is analyzed, by even the moronic TV pundits, either as impossible to implement or as too lengthy a process to reach resolution before the Monkey Boy is out of office.
This is no accident. It is part of the plan , the road to electoral success; fuck the people by letting Bush continue his ways, yes; but the Democrats will look so good by comparison come 2008, that we’ll overwhelmingly bring their wimpy asses into the White House and a larger congressional majority. Whereupon the Democrats can ignore the needs of the people just as the Republicans did - just not as blatantly, and with a slightly adjusted list of winners and losers..
Bush is and has been destroying much of what was best about this country in regards to freedom, liberty, rights, citizenship, and community. At the same time he has been ever increasing the ranks of the poor, decreasing the ranks of the middle class, and increasing the income of the rich. And what are the “leading” Democrats talking about? What is the media focusing on? Which candidates are addressing the issues important to the vast numbers of people Bush and his Republican vampires have been screwing to death?
According to the media, Clinton and Obama are “it” for the Dems. One seldom hears about Edwards, and the rest are presented as either hopeless or jokes. So, what are Clinton and Obama talking about? Bullshit !! Obama says that as President he’ll talk to people like Chavez and Castro; Clinton tries to make it sound like Obama said something stupid – something other than he actually said. They take shots back and forth. The media love it and feed it to us endlessly, as if it means something.
To hell with concentrating on the war or health care or the loss of decent-paying jobs or poverty and hunger or the needs of children and the aged or saving pensions or the problem of global warming or the neglect of New Orleans or the broken criminal “justice” system or the need for public transportation or ANY of a MILLION things that directly affect the regular people in this country.
What crap!!! But it IS part of the PLAN, a plan to which both parties pay obeisance and to which the media also bows down. That is, maintaining the essential status quo; that is, the maintenance of the rich on top and everyone else on the bottom.
The world is changing, and the USA no longer has the monopoly it’s enjoyed since W W II. The rest of the world is catching up, and for the fat cats on top to stay fat and get fatter is becoming more of a challenge. Guess who is going to get squeezed in the process?
This is why the political process concentrates on a cat fight over something not really even said, why it goes “off” over Hillary’s inch of middle aged cleavage, why in recent times “crucial” issues like homosexuality, abortion, and evolution have been so strenuously pressed to the fore and covered ad nauseum by the media.
The process is NOT about making a better America or a better Iraq or a better world. It is about keeping the fat cats fat and making them fatter – at everyone else’s expense.
This is the reason for the war. This is the reason for the seeming contradiction of naturally xenophobic and scapegoating Republicans encouraging “illegal" Mexicans to come here and work – to do the jobs that can’t be sent to India and won’t support American families.
This is the reason for the totally bogus attacks on Social Security and the demolition of pensions. This is the reason for school voucher schemes and subsidizing corporations who send their jobs overseas. It’s the reason for ignoring the Kyoto Protocol and threatening Russia with missiles in Europe. It is the priority that keeps us from taking real steps to protect our harbors, the priority that short circuits all the things regular Americans need our government to move on, the priority that overrides OUR issues.
This narrowly defined priority – i.e. keeping the fat cats fat and helping them get fatter – is often paraded as “American interests.” We must do this, or we can’t do that because of “American interests.”
Well, in a way that might be construed as true since the American ruling class are Americans, and everything that gets done IS in their interest; but they are a tiny minority. The vast majority of Americans, and THEIR interests – can (as our snarling Vice President said) go fuck themselves.
That’s our “democracy,” and that’s the shit our children are asked to spread around the world at the cost of their lives.
- Uke Man
Wednesday, August 01, 2007
Crybaby Highhats
Hey Folks -
Below is a recent Columbus Dispatch editorial. The editorial page is supposed to consist of opinion. This editorial is propaganda.
I've responded below the editorial.
- Uke Man
Union dues
Governor seeks to reward labor supporters at expense of taxpayers
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Gov. Ted Strickland's unfortunate inclination to dispense favors to organized labor entered a new and innovative chapter with an out-of-the-blue executive order that amounts to a gift of 7,000 new members to the Service Employees International Union.
It was the latest in a series of actions by Strickland that threaten to drive up costs and put the interests of labor ahead of those of the state and taxpayers.
With a pen stroke, Strickland declared that all the home-health-care workers who work as independent contractors and are paid through state Medicaid-waiver programs have the right to organize for collective bargaining.
The governor's July 17 order doesn't include the word union and doesn't specify what type of entity can be recognized by the workers as their bargaining agent, but established labor unions clearly are the likeliest to take up the opportunity. The SEIU, which seeks to unionize the entire health-care industry, already has announced its intent to do so.
The home-health-care industry helps keep older Ohioans in their homes and reduces nursing-home costs for Medicaid, and the people who do the work might deserve a bump in pay or a change in working terms and conditions.
But those pay rates and other terms are set by the state. Strickland easily can change them through the agencies that administer the programs.
His claim that he prefers a collective-bargaining process to reach the best possible agreement is hard to swallow. More likely, he and the rest of the Democratic Party prefer the prospect of a grateful SEIU, which already donates heavily to Democratic candidates, contributing even more.
Strickland has given ample evidence of his devotion to organized labor. His two-year budget would have placed a moratorium on new charter schools and restrictions on private-school vouchers, two beneficial programs that are despised by teachers unions. Fortunately, lawmakers preserved both programs.
In another move to hamper charter schools, he used a line-item veto to strike from the state's transportation bill a provision that would have allowed charter schools to establish their own bus services, taking the per-student transportation funding that normally goes to traditional school districts. This was a two-fer, benefiting anti-charter teachers unions as well as school-bus drivers unions.
The Ohio School Facilities Commission, with Strickland appointees, reversed previous policy and, henceforth, will allow companies that are building schools with commission-approved funds to pay prevailing wage and use project-labor agreements, both of which drive up the cost of projects by introducing union-influenced wages and other requirements.
Strickland is a longtime supporter of organized labor, and many of his decisions favoring labor probably stem from sincerely held beliefs.
But that doesn't mean they are good policy or good for the state. The excesses of past labor contracts threaten to drive American automakers and other industries to collapse. The state should avoid moving in the same direction.
To the Editor,
In writing the “Union dues / Governor seeks to reward labor supporters at expense of taxpayers” editorial, Sunday, July 29, 2007; did you forget that workers are taxpayers too?
Did you forget that Gov. Taft is responsible for the low level of home health care workers’ income – folks who, even you say, “might deserve a bump in pay or a change in working terms and conditions”?
You say “Strickland easily can change them through the agencies that administer the programs.” Did you forget to ask why Gov. Taft hadn’t already done that, thus making the issue moot?
Did you notice the contradiction in suggesting that the governor administratively give an actual, immediate raise to these workers (a certain cost to the taxpayers) as opposed to allowing the workers to unionize, an act that guarantees self-respect, but no guaranteed raise.
It seems you would rather spend taxpayers’ dollars on an administratively granted raise than allow American workers the right to organize and maybe get a raise later. Hmmmmm . . .
When you said the governor has an “unfortunate inclination to dispense favors to organized labor,” were you cognizant that Gov. Taft and Republican legislators, for their part, show an inclination to dispense favors to management (who donate heavily to Republicans)? And is it your view that helping management squeeze those who labor (the majority of Ohio’s taxpayers) is benevolent while helping them hurts Ohio?
As for your comments about teachers unions, did you ever consider that teachers might have good, altruistic, rationally-based reasons for supporting their union’s position; or are only those on the other side (many of whom are profit-seeking businessmen) the only honorable part of that argument?
Finally, did it bother you at all to compare very low-paid health workers to very well-paid auto workers? Apparently, if those workers who care for our aged relatives are allowed simply to attempt to bargain a living wage, you think that is a bad thing.
Maybe we should send our Grandparents to India or East Timor and save a few bucks - at least, that is, those of us who work for a living and who, otherwise, might stimulate “excesses” and cause “industries to collapse.”
After all, the workers in this state and their aged kin don’t really count as citizens or taxpayers. Worse, if they get unionized, they make a lot of noise claiming otherwise.
- Uke Man
Below is a recent Columbus Dispatch editorial. The editorial page is supposed to consist of opinion. This editorial is propaganda.
I've responded below the editorial.
- Uke Man
Union dues
Governor seeks to reward labor supporters at expense of taxpayers
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Gov. Ted Strickland's unfortunate inclination to dispense favors to organized labor entered a new and innovative chapter with an out-of-the-blue executive order that amounts to a gift of 7,000 new members to the Service Employees International Union.
It was the latest in a series of actions by Strickland that threaten to drive up costs and put the interests of labor ahead of those of the state and taxpayers.
With a pen stroke, Strickland declared that all the home-health-care workers who work as independent contractors and are paid through state Medicaid-waiver programs have the right to organize for collective bargaining.
The governor's July 17 order doesn't include the word union and doesn't specify what type of entity can be recognized by the workers as their bargaining agent, but established labor unions clearly are the likeliest to take up the opportunity. The SEIU, which seeks to unionize the entire health-care industry, already has announced its intent to do so.
The home-health-care industry helps keep older Ohioans in their homes and reduces nursing-home costs for Medicaid, and the people who do the work might deserve a bump in pay or a change in working terms and conditions.
But those pay rates and other terms are set by the state. Strickland easily can change them through the agencies that administer the programs.
His claim that he prefers a collective-bargaining process to reach the best possible agreement is hard to swallow. More likely, he and the rest of the Democratic Party prefer the prospect of a grateful SEIU, which already donates heavily to Democratic candidates, contributing even more.
Strickland has given ample evidence of his devotion to organized labor. His two-year budget would have placed a moratorium on new charter schools and restrictions on private-school vouchers, two beneficial programs that are despised by teachers unions. Fortunately, lawmakers preserved both programs.
In another move to hamper charter schools, he used a line-item veto to strike from the state's transportation bill a provision that would have allowed charter schools to establish their own bus services, taking the per-student transportation funding that normally goes to traditional school districts. This was a two-fer, benefiting anti-charter teachers unions as well as school-bus drivers unions.
The Ohio School Facilities Commission, with Strickland appointees, reversed previous policy and, henceforth, will allow companies that are building schools with commission-approved funds to pay prevailing wage and use project-labor agreements, both of which drive up the cost of projects by introducing union-influenced wages and other requirements.
Strickland is a longtime supporter of organized labor, and many of his decisions favoring labor probably stem from sincerely held beliefs.
But that doesn't mean they are good policy or good for the state. The excesses of past labor contracts threaten to drive American automakers and other industries to collapse. The state should avoid moving in the same direction.
To the Editor,
In writing the “Union dues / Governor seeks to reward labor supporters at expense of taxpayers” editorial, Sunday, July 29, 2007; did you forget that workers are taxpayers too?
Did you forget that Gov. Taft is responsible for the low level of home health care workers’ income – folks who, even you say, “might deserve a bump in pay or a change in working terms and conditions”?
You say “Strickland easily can change them through the agencies that administer the programs.” Did you forget to ask why Gov. Taft hadn’t already done that, thus making the issue moot?
Did you notice the contradiction in suggesting that the governor administratively give an actual, immediate raise to these workers (a certain cost to the taxpayers) as opposed to allowing the workers to unionize, an act that guarantees self-respect, but no guaranteed raise.
It seems you would rather spend taxpayers’ dollars on an administratively granted raise than allow American workers the right to organize and maybe get a raise later. Hmmmmm . . .
When you said the governor has an “unfortunate inclination to dispense favors to organized labor,” were you cognizant that Gov. Taft and Republican legislators, for their part, show an inclination to dispense favors to management (who donate heavily to Republicans)? And is it your view that helping management squeeze those who labor (the majority of Ohio’s taxpayers) is benevolent while helping them hurts Ohio?
As for your comments about teachers unions, did you ever consider that teachers might have good, altruistic, rationally-based reasons for supporting their union’s position; or are only those on the other side (many of whom are profit-seeking businessmen) the only honorable part of that argument?
Finally, did it bother you at all to compare very low-paid health workers to very well-paid auto workers? Apparently, if those workers who care for our aged relatives are allowed simply to attempt to bargain a living wage, you think that is a bad thing.
Maybe we should send our Grandparents to India or East Timor and save a few bucks - at least, that is, those of us who work for a living and who, otherwise, might stimulate “excesses” and cause “industries to collapse.”
After all, the workers in this state and their aged kin don’t really count as citizens or taxpayers. Worse, if they get unionized, they make a lot of noise claiming otherwise.
- Uke Man
About Me
- Name: Tom Harker
- Location: Circleville, Ohio, United States
Music and Politics, Politics and Music!!! * * * Everything is political. We’re admonished, “Never discuss religion or politics.” Follow that advice, and we’ll have to quit talking altogether. * * * Well, the Uke Man speaks! * * * Keep track here of my musical shenanigans, my political ruminations, and - from time to time - some other interesting eruptions.
Previous Posts
- Uke Man & Hot Times - Friday, Sept.7
- William Howard Taft, "Mr. Republican" says:
- People are sick of being scapegoated by rich fucks...
- Sorry
- Hot Times!! Hot Times!! Hot Times!!
- Do you know?
- Do You Know ??
- Doesn't look like a Nazi cop
- This Psycho is a Columbus, Ohio Police Officer
- You and me,Dubya; you and me!!
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