Wasting Time With Alex
News
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Campaign promises, fiscal responsibility, debt, ethical scandals, and hope and change
Democrats ran and won in 2006, and then again in 2008, on the bad behavior of republicans. Republicans were successfully and correctly painted as having lost their fiscal sanity for the deficit spending prior to 2006, only to have democrats gain control of congress and the spending purse after the 2006 elections, and set new spending records they then blamed Bush for. The leftwing machine’s manipulations of the facts, with big-time help from a complicit media that didn’t point out democrats were always worse at that stuff anyway when in charge, allowed them to run on the lack of fiscal responsibility of the republicans in 2008 again, using the crisis of their own making that they then blamed on Bush yet again, to win big, only to then proceed to set new deficit spending records. Here is the graph for those of you that want to dispute the deficit spending facts, so spare us the bull:
As this projection showed Obama’s deficit spending in his first year ended up being more than all 8 years of Bush. Oh sure, as I already pointed out Obama is blaming Bush for having to do so. Democrats have successfully convinced so many that the financial crisis we are in isn’t tied to those idiotic collectivist economic lending practices they forced upon the market in the last 3 decades. Even worse, they successfully have covered up the rigged games Franks and Dodd set up with Fannie and Freddie to keep those faulty economic policies afloat, and how those trading scams then led to the implosion of the housing market and then the financial sector. But that “It’s Bush’s fault” excuse is wearing thin as people are slowly seeing the truth. Almost $2 trillion of the tax payer’s dollars has been funneled to democrats and their friends, through one collectivist economic scam or another promising salvation, but delivering nothing but a drastically growing government bureaucracy, while the private sector continues to bleed jobs and contract. And the WH remains focused on tacking on trillions more in new taxes and debt so they can give government control of healthcare moneys and decisions, with a scam which purports to reign in costs and be fiscally responsible by of all things taxing us for 10 years to provide 5 or 6 years of coverage, while ignoring the economic disaster they are leaving in their wake. And the one thing they should be addressing, the lack of jobs, gets nothing but some meaningless political play. In the mean time the hole is growing deeper and the spending of money we simply don’t have continues to rise. This year is looking like it will set even higher and wasteful deficit spending records as this February’s $220.9 billion single month record is showing. This seems to be our economic future thanks to the democrats and their economics. But the fact that democrats are destroying our economy, and are trying hard to destroy healthcare, is not the thing I want to address here. I want to talk a bit about one of the other lies they told to get themselves elected.
If you have been following the whole Eric Massa fiasco, you know this stuff has turned into a soap opera writ large. Frankly I do not know if Massa is telling the truth. He is a democrat after all, and lying is second nature for them. However, I do not put it past this WH to do what Massa has accused them of doing either. Based on what I have seen them do in just this first year, I have no doubt that this bunch is probably the most corrupt crew I have ever seen. We are dealing with Chicago politics here, and this – hope & change! - is SOP for these people. My bet is that since Obama wants this monster passed, his team is going to make it happen. Even if they have to do what Massa has accused them of. In fact I do not put it past them to resort to openly committing felonies to do so considering the vested interest they have in making this the law of the lad. After all, they control the levers of power and the press, so whose gonna be able to do anything about anything bad they do? If the stuff that has been going on so far hasn’t made the case yet, I doubt anything they do will.
And that brings me to my point about this whole Massa thing. If you don’t remember Nancy promising to drain the republican swamp and end the culture of corruption back in 2006, here is just one of the instances the sympathetic press gave her words play. Unfortunately, as case after case proves – Chris Dodd, Barney Franks, Charley Rangel, and a plethora of others – Nancy lied, and the corruption and criminal behavior, like the deficit spending and the fiscal irresponsibility I talked about before, is also setting new records. Don’t take my word for it. The case with Massa is more of the same. Even more important is the fact that while Pelosi is now claiming ignorance that’s a blatant lie because Nancy knew months ago about Massa’s behavior. And while Nancy is playing dumb, just a little research would have made it all obvious from records going back to Massa’s NAVY days showing that Massa was a time bomb waiting to explode.
As is the case in all these other stories of corruption that the MSM is ignoring or down playing, we are being lied to by these democrats that want to pretend real criminal activity and serious ethics violations, stuff that makes what happens when the republicans were in charge look tame, isn’t their modus operandi. And keep in mind that it is this scandal driven congress which is ignoring the will of the people and pushing forward with an unpopular government takeover of healthcare. Why isn’t the MSM up in arms about all this corruption and the will of the people being ignored? I guess that’s more of that hope and change for you.
Blogging • Insane Stuff • All Things Government • Elections • Healthcare Reform • Economics • News • Liberal Media • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
ACORN on the record..
As the left actively but falsely tries to discredit O’Keefe’s work in exposing ACORN’s criminal activities, of all things by attacking his choice of clothing or by creating the false illusion that his video editing distorted the facts, it bears to point out that ACORN has a long history of other criminal activity. Oh sure, the left will say that it’s always about voter registration and unimportant because nobody can “definitely prove” there was any actual voter fraud, or some such, but the latest case says otherwise:
Milwaukee police officers sat on their hands for months last year instead of investigating possible voter fraud cases from the 2008 general election. It’s an incredible claim, but it’s coming from a credible source: Assistant District Attorney Bruce Landgraf, the Milwaukee County prosecutor responsible for overseeing campaign and election issues. “Honestly, the Milwaukee Police Department largely ignored your double voter (and other) referrals received in January 2009 for the first six months of 2009,” Landgraf wrote in an e-mail to a city elections official on Jan. 26.
Speaking with unguarded candor, the veteran prosecutor said in his note that MPD’s tardy response had a major impact. The cases involve voters who may have cast more than one ballot, felons who may have voted illegally and other cases of possible election fraud. “Sadly, several probable cases of genuine voter fraud were harmed by that delay,” Landgraf wrote in an e-mail obtained through an open records request. The assistant district attorney was even more pessimistic about the investigation of more than 500 individuals who registered to vote on election day but whose addresses could not be confirmed later by postcard. “I do not expect them to ever get to the Address Cards,” he said of the Milwaukee cops.
On Friday, Landgraf declined to provide specifics, referring questions to his boss, District Attorney John Chisholm. Interestingly, Chisholm wouldn’t elaborate on his assistant’s concerns. “I’ll let the e-mail speak for itself,” he said while praising Landgraf’s experience and knowledge.
That emphasis is mine. We are dealing with accusations of voter fraud here, not voter registration fraud. I use “accusations”, because obviously there never was a real investigation despite the obvious. We all know better though. This is SOP from ACORN. It’s what they exist for. And it is clear that there was a delay, on purpose, to make sure any investigation in this case didn’t pan out. You have to wonder how many of these other instances are out there.
Oh yeah, for you clever lefties that will immediately point out that the Milwaukee Journal article never mentions ACORN, that’s likely on purpose. However, you can have a look at this AG indictment which clearly shows that 2 of those co-conspirators being looked at in this case were ACORN employees.
MILWAUKEE – Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen announced today that the Milwaukee Election Fraud Task Force has brought additional electoral fraud cases against five Wisconsin residents. The Department of Justice, acting as Special Prosecutor for Milwaukee County, has filed felony charges against Maria Miles, Kevin Clancy, Michael Henderson, Herbert Gunka, and Suzanne Gunka, all alleging election fraud arising out of the November 4, 2008, Presidential Election.
“The integrity of elections is dependent upon citizens and officials insisting they be conducted lawfully. Wisconsin’s citizens should not have to wonder whether their vote has been negated or diminished by illegally cast ballots,” Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen said.
According to the criminal complaints, Miles and Clancy served as Special Registration Deputies (“SRD”) for the City of Milwaukee in advance of the 2008 Presidential Election. Each worked for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (“ACORN”). Miles and Clancy are each charged with the felony offense of Falsely Procuring Voter Registration as Party to a Crime. The complaint alleges that Miles and Clancy submitted multiple voter registration applications for the same individuals, and also were part of a scheme in which they and other SRDs registered each other to vote multiple times in order to meet voter registration quotas imposed by ACORN.
If you want the reference for that, it is here.
Clearly ACORN employees helped commit voter fraud. Sadly, the Milwaukee police dept dropped the ball, and the usual suspects are doing their best to not point out that connection. But we can continue to pretend the crook is the guy that dressed up as a pimp or not and got ACORN employees giving him advice on how to pimp children and/or foreigners that also might be under age, hide the income to avoid taxes, and then run for office as a democrat.
Blogging • Insane Stuff • All Things Government • Elections • News • Liberal Media • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Monday, March 01, 2010
Bipartisanship means do it my way!
Despite the failure of that WH PR stunt around the government takeover of healthcare last week, it looks like, at least to Pelosi, the donkeys are thinking they should move ahead and force that monstrosity on the people. According to Nancy, the problem is the republicans, not the fact that the majority of the people do not want this thing.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Sunday that Republicans have left their mark on the healthcare bill and should accept that the bill will go forward. “They’ve had plenty of opportunity to make their voices heard,” she said on CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday morning. “Bipartisanship is a two-way street. A bill can be bipartisan without bipartisan votes. Republicans have left their imprint.” The public option, for example, has been stripped from the bill because Republicans were so adamantly against it, she said. “They’ve had a field day going out and misrepresenting what the bill says,” Pelosi said. “But that’s what they do.”
I especially loved that bipartisan bit. As I have always contended, to democrats bipartisan means “you choose to do it my way”. Queen Nancy has decreed that the problem isn’t the cost or all the lies from the people pushing this disastrous proposal, and it certainly isn’t the objection by the people to it and other costly and insane collectivist policies pushed by congress and the WH, as the last 3 elections culminating with the Scott Brown victory for what once passed as a given democrat senatorial seat, but the republicans! They have had their say. Heck, the left even gave up the immediate government takeover option – the public option – and settled for a long term approach that will produce the same anyway. So there!
These collectivist have literally calculated that while this move will crush them in November, that nobody will dare roll this crap back. Thus in the end, they win, as the social expansion takes the biggest jump it has in decades and even more people become accustomed to the “free ride”. I think the idiot donkeys forget that this monster isn’t supposed to do anything but steal more of our money for the next 4 years before it delivers a single service. If they lose big enough though, that assumption might prove erroneous. But they are gambling that they are not going to lose big enough, and that even more importantly, there will be nobody with the guts to roll this back in the next 4 years, especially with Obama c*ck-blocking for them, it looks like. Lets hope they fail either way. Not because I hate this sort of colelctivist crap, but for the sake of the American people which have already beeen badly screwed over by these demcorats in but 1 year.
Blogging • Insane Stuff • All Things Government • Healthcare Reform • News • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Hollyweird under fire
It looks like the movie “Hurt Locker”, yet another anti-military Hollyweird fantasy where the soldiers are all idiots or prone to stupid behavior, while loved by the Hollyweirdos precisely because of the portrayal, doesn’t play well with the troops that have done the real thing, and I am not surprised the troops, and especially those with the ordinance disposal units, laugh at this dumb movie.
Reporting from Baghdad, Los Angeles and Washington - Many film critics—and awards voters—have praised “The Hurt Locker’s” depiction of the U.S. military in Iraq, often singling out the bomb disposal drama for its authenticity. But as the film emerges as a favorite to win the best picture Oscar, a number of active soldiers and veterans say the film is Hollywood hokum, portraying soldiers as renegades while failing to represent details about combat accurately.
Truthfully, my first reaction was to actually wonder how the news this anti-US military movie, which I again am pointing out portrayed our troops negatively to suit the image Hollyweird has of the military, was causing a controversy and getting front page time. I admit that was not the least bit surprised about the movie’s negative portrayal, because that seems to be SOP for the left, which while it claims to have respect for the troops and to support our men and women in harms way, also seem to feel the military is an evil entity used by evil America. That this is being pointed out, and in the lefty rags of all places, is surprising.
My guess is that it is attributable to the fact that the CinC now has a (D) next to his name and his WH, despite the facts to the contrary, is now claiming Iraq as their victory. I have already pointed out that I expect much historical whitewashing and fudging to go on about the Iraqi conflict now that we have literally made all the idiots that said a military victory was impossible eat their own words. I am admitting that I didn’t expect it this soon.
I suspect that over the next decade many will rewrite the facts to create the illusion that the left wasn’t just violently opposed to us winning, but actively took measures to force us to lose in Iraq, just like was done after the fall of the USSR to hide the role the mostly pro-Soviet left played there and then. Today we have the majority of these people that were calling Reagan a warmongering nut that would start WW3, all saying that they were right there with Reagan, pushing for the military arms race and the line in the sand that finally broke the evil empire and ended the 70 plus year suffering of millions at the hand of the first collectivist paradise. That is when they don’t try to tell you Reagan’s role in the whole thing was minimal, and the lion share of the credit should go to Gorbachev, or some such other nonsense.
Anyway, I should also mention that it isn’t a coincidence that a movie that inaccurately and negatively portrays our military, like the Hurt Locker does, is up for so many movie awards. Hollyweird loves
Conflicts & Wars • War on Terror • Axis-of-Evil • News • Liberal Media • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
The gravy train is gonna cost us more than they told us..
In the age of “Hope and Change” deficits no longer matter it seems. This even as a Tax Policy Center released a
detailed 40 page report of the key tax proposals in President Obama’s 2011 budget, and if you look at their numbers they are projecting a whopping $4.9 trillion shortfall, which eclipses the $1.1 trillion claimed by the Obama people. Here is the killer quote:
The budget assumes a baseline in which the 2001-2003 tax cuts are permanent (including the estate tax at its 2009 level), the exemption in the alternative minimum tax (AMT) is permanently indexed for inflation from its 2009 level, and that temporary expansions of refundability of the child tax credit and of the earned income credit are permanent. Those provisions would reduce revenues by $3.8 trillion over the 2010-2020 period. TPC’s analysis measures the impact of the tax proposals not against the administration baseline but rather against a current law baseline that assumes the 2001-2003 tax cuts expire as scheduled in 2011 and that the AMT exemption maintains its permanent level. Against that baseline, the administration’s tax proposals would cause much greater revenue losses than official budget estimates show [$4.9 trillion v. $1.1 trillion].
For those that are numerically challenged, this means that the difference between all the goodies that the collectivists want to farm out reported in this analysis and the tax intake of Uncle Sam in this business hostile environment are going to leave us with an unbelievable additional $4.9 trillion in new debt. Of course, knowing the way collectivists operate, they will simply raise taxes - and likely also spending - and then be flabbergasted when we end up with something close to a $7 trillion gap.
Blogging • Insane Stuff • All Things Government • Economics • News • Liberal Media • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
ACORN news.
There is some good news out there - other than the AGW climategate scandal finally ending the death grip the AGW cultists had on the issue, and finally allowing real science to take a look at this issue which will sooner than later kill the AGW cult - and that is that the donkey crime syndicate ACORN is going through tough times and giving up on its national structure. Now, I am not stupid enough to think this is end of these bastards, and would not be surprised that all this leads to is a rebirth under a different name with the exact same agenda and criminal behavior to push that agenda to follow, but in the short term it means a victory for the people that actually do have a problem with this kind of special interest group, masquerading as a community organization intended to help people, pushing a destructive agenda that favors the politicians that enact that agenda. If they are going to just lay low and come back again to do more of the same, there is an election this year after all, I recommend they use the name “Donkey Mafia”. Feel free to suggest your own names as well.
All Things Government • News • Liberal Media • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Monday, February 22, 2010
Doubling down..
Well, as I suspected, the Obama Administration’s plan to revive the bloated and vile government takeover of healthcare money and decision making, isn’t about fixing the differences and actually fixing healthcare at all, because the WH strategy is to double down on the same crap. If you needed more proof that these leftist elitists think we are all morons and not smart enough to make our own choices, look at this. After the Scott Brown loss in MA, and the obvious looming disasters at the polls in the elections this coming November, you would figure that the collectivist would figure out they over played their hand and that the people didn’t want any more of the destructive stuff they have given us for the last year. You would expect them to work on getting the economy going and getting people employed. Instead they are using smoke and mirrors and hoping their partners in the MSM can make the republicans out like the bad guys without any ideas of their own. Talk about projection, huh? To me it is not clear that the democrat agenda is to pass this behemoth in order to so drastically shift the balance of those that work for a living vs. those that vote for a living in their favor that they are willing to take the hit for another decade or two, if it then buys them perpetual power. Of course, at this rate, there will not be much of a country in even a decade worth ruling, but then again, marxists think they can make it better when they never, ever, have done anything but the opposite. Don’t let the freak show that is going to come out of DC distract you. These collectivists are dangerous.
Blogging • Insane Stuff • All Things Government • Healthcare Reform • Economics • News • Liberal Media • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Another drop in the bucket
While I do not want to belittle the fact that Obama is pushing for nuclear energy, I find the much touted news that he is pushing for 2 new nuke plants is just a token - one that they can easily take away later when they have gotten what they want: more massive and horribly destructive taxes on all of us - and meaningless in the grand scheme of things. It’s a joke. And insult. The Chinese are building over 120 new reactors in the next decade. That’s commitment to nuclear energy. 2 Plants are not going to add any significant power to the already desperate energy situation we face. Especially since my bet is that they will pull the plug on them anyway later, just like they did with Yucca Mountain. I hope the republicans see through this slight of hand and do not buck on their stance to kill that “Cap and Tax” bill. Remember that when government controls energy through prices they can control the peasants…
Blogging • Insane Stuff • News • Liberal Media • The Left • Science & Technology • Global Warming • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Monday, February 15, 2010
How much more humane!
Liberals were up in arms about the “evils” of the Bush administration, especially in regards to the efforts tied to GWoT. Evil American troops were ordered by Darth Vader to capture those downtrodden guys that are mad at capitalist America - explains why so many on the left empathizes with these guys, huh? – and stick them in those nasty “torture camps” like Club Gitmo. But because they were so successful at selling that idiotic meme, they painted themselves into a corner. Reversing course now brings with it the risk of looking like the idiots they actually are. Admitting that the holding facilities, while not a perfect solution, were the best option where no good one existed, simply is too painful. So instead of capturing them, since now that the leftists are in charge they can’t simply demand we “cut & run” because when the next attack happens we will all know to blame them and their idiocy for it, we are only left with the option of killing more terrorists. Case in point:
When a window of opportunity opened to strike the leader of al-Qaeda in East Africa last September, U.S. Special Operations forces prepared several options. They could obliterate his vehicle with an airstrike as he drove through southern Somalia. Or they could fire from helicopters that could land at the scene to confirm the kill. Or they could try to take him alive.
The White House authorized the second option. On the morning of Sept. 14, helicopters flying from a U.S. ship off the Somali coast blew up a car carrying Saleh Ali Nabhan. While several hovered overhead, one set down long enough for troops to scoop up enough of the remains for DNA verification. Moments later, the helicopters were headed back to the ship.
Now don’t get me wrong: most, if not all, of these bastards need a good killing. There are no compromises to be reached with them. It is us or them. They are not going to sit down with us and talk it out. Using drones to pop them when we can is a necessary step in curtailing their operations. But the largely unspoken fact is that since we aren’t willing to just wipe out everyone that lives in the swamps where these cockroaches are bred – thankfully so – we remain limited in our capability and responses. Our most important weapon, believe it or not, is intelligence. If we know what they are doing, hopefully, we can work against them. Thwart their efforts. Difficult under the best of circumstances, and even harder when you have these idiots in charge as the panty bomber proved. Sure Big Sis Napoletano will tell you the system worked, but we all know we got lucky there.
There is a big problem with this intelligence gathering strategy, as the article itself points out. No, it isn’t that we make more terrorists when we are aggressive and kill terrorists like the leftist idiots would like you to believe: it is that we are not gathering as much intel as we could because we are trying to avoid capturing terrorists. All because back when Bush was in charge, their BDS didn’t let these leftist tools see the difficult choices and options, leading them to denounce any and everything that was done by that administrations as not just bad but criminal. That stupidity has literally left them with no options of where to put prisoners now that they are in charge. Not unless they want to show how farcical and stupid their objections were in the first place. Nobody wants these bastards because they are real dangerous. They demonized Gitmo and are now looking like they were talking out of their rear ends when the promise to close it by went bye, and they are now left with no end in sight. So we are left with no options. If we are in the dark about what the enemy is doing, it makes it easier for them to do it.
So now, not only have we been forced to be more brutal – we now just kill – we are leaving a big intelligence gap that will come back to bite us in the wake of this all. But Bush was the cowboy moron….
Blogging • Insane Stuff • Conflicts & Wars • War on Terror • Axis-of-Evil • Homeland Security • News • Liberal Media • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Job creation 101..
When Obama and crew saw the all but taken for granted Kennedy seat in blue state Massachusetts go republican, for the first time in almost 5 decades, over the abysmal economic situation, the terrible unemployment situation, the out of control government spending, the ridiculous stimuluspatronage bill, the record setting debt expansions, from people that ran on the previous administration’s lack of deficit spending discipline no less, only to then tack on in 1 year more than all the previous 8 years, and not to forget the ludicrous government takeover of 1/5th of the economy masquerading as healthcare reform, which the democrats continue to try and push for despite the fact that over 60% of the public is against it, and immediately tried to make like they suddenly cared about anything other than the massive expansion of government and introducing more marxism writ large, by pretending they had shifted their focus on jobs, I pointed out that all we would get was more of the same. I bet people that there would be a costly multi billion dollar government plan that would do nothing but create more government jobs and dig the debt hole deeper. I was lambasted for being negative, even accused of the usual bull. You know, you are a racist, and so on. Looks like I am yet again being vindicated. Now, I know that the collectivists writing this are coming at it from a different angle, but the facts remain the same:
WASHINGTON – It’s a bipartisan jobs bill that would hand President Barack Obama a badly needed political victory and placate Republicans with tax cuts at the same time. But it has a problem: It won’t create many jobs. Even the Obama administration acknowledges the legislation’s centerpiece — a tax cut for businesses that hire unemployed workers — would work only on the margins.
As for the bill’s effectiveness, tax experts and business leaders said companies are unlikely to hire workers just to receive a tax break. Before businesses start hiring, they need increased demand for their products, more work for their employees and more revenue to pay those workers.
The reason this bill will do nothing is that it is just way too little, way too late. This administration is considered the most hostile one ever to the private sector for a reason. And that private sector sees this “jobs bill” for what it really is: fluff. Obama is promising them some meaningless tax cuts to take on huge risks. And that’s precisely what hiring new people is under this administration, These morons are destroying the private sector, directly and indirectly, with their reckless and ridiculous fiscal policies, and everyone, but especially small business owners, are just hunkering down and praying this stuff blows over sooner than later. How much of an incentive is a tax break of any kind, when you are looking at drastic cost increases – from the healthcare bill to other stupid anti-business regulations that seem to be the only thing these collectivists like – that dwarf that break? The answer is none at all. What Obama and the democrats are doing parallels mobsters promising to pay for your nose job, to help you look decent again, after they get done breaking every bone in your body. Nobody is going to buy that.
Rys, of the National Federation of Independent Business, said the credit could speed hiring once employers need more workers. But, he said, NFIB members aren’t seeing many signs of improvement.
And that’s the problem. We are being told things are getting better when they are not. Couple that with the private sector not trusting the crooks in DC, and you can see why whatever moneys these morons allocate for job creation will simply result in a faster growth in deficit spending and debt and yield no jobs for anyone but government bureaucrats.
All Things Government • Healthcare Reform • Economics • News • Liberal Media • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Friday, February 05, 2010
The domino effect
Yesterday I discussed the fate of Greece and the collectivist culture that took over nad has gotten them where they are today. Today I will tackle the next likely domino, Portugal. d
Portugal moved towards a political crisis on Thursday night as its finance minister appealed to opposition parties not to defeat the minority Socialist government over a regional finance bill that he said would undermine the country’s international credibility. In a televised address, Fernando Teixeira dos Santos said opposition proposals to allow the Portuguese islands of Madeira and the Azores to increase their debt would have “grave consequences for Portugal’s public accounts” and send “the worst possible message” to financial markets. Fernando Teixeira dos Santos said opposition proposals to allow the Portuguese islands of Madeira and the Azores to increase their debt would send ‘the worst possible message’ to financial markets.
His warning came as Portuguese bonds and shares came under fire for the second day running as concerns over sovereign debt spread from Greece to other high-deficit countries in the eurozone. The Lisbon stock market fell almost 5 per cent on Thursday, the biggest daily fall since November 2008, and bond yields rose to new highs amid doubts over the ability of Portugal to consolidate its public accounts. The cost of insuring Portuguese debt against default also rose to a record high.
Like the economy of Greece, that of Portugal is living on borrowed time. The same problems that are threatening to bring down Greece are doing the same in Portugal. Only unlike the current socialist Greek government that has realized the fit has hit the shan, and is doing something to try and delay the inevitable, the current socialist government of Portugal is being accused of manufacturing a crisis to prevent their parliament, which is dominated by a coalition that actually wants to make change of direction and avoid the inevitable and complete collapse of the Portuguese house of cards, from doing anything.
The world is watching and reacting to the Greek and Portuguese meltdown going on. And I am sure that what is happening here in the US is influencing the run as well.
Blogging • Insane Stuff • All Things Government • Economics • News • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Oh, damn…..
It has not been good for the cult of AGW this last couple of months. The defenders of the indefensible have been hard at work doing damage control. The usual apologists and crazies are trying hard to convince us that even if it was all fake, we should still let them do their thing - kind of like the fake but true TANG incident - because if they don’t get what we want we will be in big trouble. A step down from their previous claims we would all be living in a Waterworld, well those of us that survived the coming cataclysms would, but still much ado about nothing. Now they are being dealt another big bad blow.
The university at the centre of the climate change row over stolen e-mails broke the law by refusing to hand over its raw data for public scrutiny. The University of East Anglia breached the Freedom of Information Act by refusing to comply with requests for data concerning claims by its scientists that man-made emissions were causing global warming.
The Information Commissioner’s Office decided that UEA failed in its duties under the Act but said that it could not prosecute those involved because the complaint was made too late, The Times has learnt. The ICO is now seeking to change the law to allow prosecutions if a complaint is made more than six months after a breach. The stolen e-mails , revealed on the eve of the Copenhagen summit, showed how the university’s Climatic Research Unit attempted to thwart requests for scientific data and other information, and suggest that senior figures at the university were involved in decisions to refuse the requests. It is not known who stole the e-mails.
I mean, if the science was so clear cut and settled, why would you need to do stuff like this? Really? The AGW cult has done more damage to real scientific progress than anyone has yet understood. They are the ones that cried wolf. If the real wolf comes, most people will be too skeptical to even bother. I guess this is offset by the many and ever entertaining jokes we can tell at the expense of those that fell for this crap, and those that still continue to think there might be one once of truth to this bullshit. My fondest wish is that people can now actually do scientific research on warming. I am dying to be vindicated on the fact that the warming cycle is tied to solar activity.
News • The Left • Science & Technology • Global Warming • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Is the MSM spinning for the demcorats about what O’Keefe was up to?
WaPo has a story claiming that James O’ Keefe - the guy that exposed ACORN’s support for criminal activities despite the MSM’s attempts to pretend there was no story there - was charged in an alleged plot to bug Senator Mary Landrieu’s office. First off, this story is written by Carol D. Leonnig which already once had to apologize and offer a correction for slandering O’Keefe in this joke of a piece where she accused him of going after ACORN because he was a racist, so I immediately smelled a rat.
The conservative young filmmaker whose undercover sting damaged a liberal activist group last year faces federal criminal charges in an alleged plot to bug the New Orleans office of Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.). James O’Keefe was among four men who created a ruse to enter the lawmaker’s downtown office, saying they needed to repair her telephones, according to court records unsealed Tuesday. O’Keefe used his cellphone to take pictures of two men, Joseph Basel and Robert Flanagan, who are accused in an FBI agent’s sworn affidavit of impersonating telephone company workers. Stanley Dai is accused of aiding the Jan. 25 plot.
The piece opens with O’Keefe’s undercover activities, likely on purpose because these tools hope to use this article and this incident to discredit him, and then infers some kind of criminal intent. The details are sketchy, but the accusations being made are that O’Keefe was trying to bug the office, and as proof they discuss, in some way tangential way, that there were some listening devices and a request for the phone closet involved. Let me make a prediction: I sense another correction by the WaPo to deal with the spin of this reporter. I find it ironic that she is the one writing on O’Keefe in the first place, considering she already demonstrated her lack of journalistic credibility before, but this is the MSM we are discussing here.
Anyway, this is going to blow up in the face of the leftist twits that are all wringing their hands and all over this story. Wish they had been that diligent in pursuing the whole ACORN crime syndicate story when O’Keefe started exposing ACORN, and had done some journalistic work of their own on the story after, but again, we are talking about the MSM here, as they are about this non-story. I guess this is more of that get ahead of the story and shape it junk we can expect from the left when they want to cut off someone that is coming after them. This to me is looking like they are trying to use the power of the federal government and the MSM to slander someone that hurt them. Remember that this is Louisiana we are talking about, ACORN’s ground zero, and that they lost a ton of cash because of O’Keefe’s doings. And why would I say this?
Well here is what I think O’Keefe was up to. For weeks now the story has been that people calling Landrieu to complain about the $300 billion tax payer pay-off to buy here healthcare vote in favor of the government takeover plan have encountered busy signals. There are a lot of angry constituents and they are not getting through to her to tell her so. It would not be far fetched to guess that O’Keefe, like I definitely do (we are talking about democrats here and these people make Tony Soprano look like a saint), figured out Landrieu and her people had tampered or outright disabled their phones so they would not need to be bothered by the peasants, and that they thus had another sting to show that. They then concocted a plan to go in, film themselves calling the phone number and the unused phone(s) not ringing, and then try to take a peek at the phone closet where the phones were disabled.
From what I read in the affidavit discussed here, it looks like that’s exactly what they were doing. The fact that they had O’Keefe filming the whole thing is telling. Now these morons might be trying to use the threat of wire-tapping charges as a means to bludgeon O’Keefe and those with him into silence, but I am betting it backfires. From where I stand it looks like O’Keefe caught the Landrieu offices with their phones turned off, and the Louisiana democrat political machine is desperately trying to save face, and going all out to do so. It won’t work. They can’t let this go to trail – even one of those rigged trials Holder promised for the terrorists – because then they risk having the truth come out. My bet is O’Keefe knows it too. And he is busy getting his next master piece put together. Video soon to come. Watch the MSM drop this story like a hot potato when the facts come out. Watch the democrats end up with another black eye. Watch Landrieu, whom is going to be in trouble come the next election, scramble to save face, and make it worse.
At least O’Keefe and his stories are getting coverage, unlike the whole ACORN thing should have.
All Things Government • News • Liberal Media • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
We are in great hands!
Remember all the hubbub starting way back in 2006 and carrying on all the way into the 2008 elections about how fiscally irresponsible and bad the people in charge were? How angry the democrats were that these evil people were creating more debt? Well it seems that some debt is better than others. The leftists were furious about the federal government spending what the constitution actually gave it permission to - defense and national security - and while there was also a ton of pork, it is nothing compared to what followed after the democrats took over congress in 2006. Of course the pork and social spending went through the roof, and with help from a willing MSM, these crooks convinced everyone that it was everyone but their fault. Angered, the American people turned to a smooth talking used car salesman whose lack of experience, marxist agenda and beliefs, and complete and utter stupidity, the MSM did a bang up job of protecting. While many fell for the “Hope and Change” bull, most of us that are not wowed by marxists in sheep clothing saw that what this idiot meant was that we could only hope to be left with some loose change by the time he was done plundering our pockets at both the personal and national level.
A mere year down the road, these collectivists are setting new spending records, with no end in sight, and have raised our debt to numbers previously unimaginable, with a lot more to come, as this post pointed out. If you dig deep enough you can see how well they are taking care of the trust people gave them, and find stories like this one showing we are in great hands. Many continue to push the meme that the democrats had no choice but to engage in these massive and all out Keynesian orgy of spending because of evil Bush, but that’s all tripe. Some of us pointed out that the whole fiscal responsibility claim of the democrats was simply tripe - based on historical behavior and the actions since they took congress in 2006 - but we were mostly ignored. Even when we pointed out that Obama himself had no desire to be fiscally responsible. Most of the American people are wising up and realizing these people just can not do otherwise, as the Massachusetts election were a republican walked away with the Kennedy seat, showed last week. Many of the rank and file democrats got the message, but the WH, which wanted to claim they passed this monstrosity in Obama’s forthcoming state of the union address, seems to remain oblivious to a href="http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Unemployment-rose-in-43-apf-261347135.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=6&asset=&ccode=" target="_new">what people are worried about, and how what they are doing is fueling the problem.
Americans better get used to the current economic situation, because despite the soon to come talk about how the WH now gets that the main concern we have is the economy, and especially the massive unemployment, the solutions they will come up with will all be wrong. We are dealing with a bunch of characters that despise anything but government control of everything. They can not think outside that collectivist box, and consequently every solution come up with will involve either more borrowing and useless spending - stimulus patronage bill 2, despite the fact that most people see the first one as the waste it was – or other anti-business actions – like Obama’s attack on the financial sector – which will cause exactly the opposite of any kind of economic growth. The one good thing I see coming out of this whole mess though is that people will finally be shown that we have been lied and manipulated by those that pushed the idiotic idea that democrats were better for the economy. They are not unless your idea of a better economy is one that collapses and is replaced with one that mirrors for example Chavez’s Venezuela, Kim’s North Korea, or Castro’s Cuba.
All Things Government • Economics • News • Liberal Media • The Left • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Monday, January 25, 2010
Not going to hear this from, or see this on, the MSM
It looks like our AGW cultists have been skewered yet again. It seems that they have been caught selectively skewing the data to make their case yet again.
Call it the mystery of the missing thermometers. Two months after “climategate” cast doubt on some of the science behind global warming, new questions are being raised about the reliability of a key temperature database, used by the United Nations and climate change scientists as proof of recent planetary warming. Two American researchers allege that U.S. government scientists have skewed global temperature trends by ignoring readings from thousands of local weather stations around the world, particularly those in colder altitudes and more northerly latitudes, such as Canada. In the 1970s, nearly 600 Canadian weather stations fed surface temperature readings into a global database assembled by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Today, NOAA only collects data from 35 stations across Canada. Worse, only one station—at Eureka on Ellesmere Island—is now used by NOAA as a temperature gauge for all Canadian territory above the Arctic Circle.
How are we to trust any of this data, especially the historical patern, when they are jury rigging the measurement locations to be in warmer places? Should it really surprise anyone that when you exlude those pesky locations that are colder and shift the measurements to places that are warmer, that you end up with data that shows warming? Remember that pharma companies that get caught doing this exact kind of things during their drug trails end up in court, and people go to jail. The same would happen to people rigging security trading information in order to push the stocks they wanted. Even the Cheerios manufacturer was smacked hard because they could not conclusively make the claim their product lowered colesterol. Yet we have governments the world over, with an agenda that will cost us citizens trillions of dollars and result ins some real hurt for the non-elite that stand to profit obscenly from this scam, not just turning a blind eye to this, but actually pushing it.
Neither agency responded to a request for comment Wednesday from Canwest News Service. However Hanson did issue a public statement on the matter earlier this week. “NASA has not been involved in any manipulation of climate data used in the annual GISS global temperature analysis,” he said. “The agency is confident of the quality of this data and stands by previous scientifically-based conclusions regarding global temperatures.”
That’s good enough for me! Well not.
In addition to the allegations against NOAA and GISS, climate scientists are also dealing with the embarrassment this week of the false glacier-melt warning contained in the 2007 report of the UN Panel on Climate Change. That report said Himalayan glaciers are likely to disappear within three decades if current rates of melting continue. This week, however, the panel admitted there is no scientific evidence to support such a claim.
Their house of cards is being dimsantelled piecemeal, but it is falling apart. They continue to spin and lump this bull with real problems in the hopes of keeping the momentum, but the truth is coming out, and it looks like too many people were either just had or part of a massive conspiracy to convince us to hand over our freedoms to a world government intent on running a wealth redistribution scam that would make the seleted elite stinking rich.
Al Gore was not available for comments. He was to busy raking in as much money as he could before this thing went south and he was forced to look for a new scam to push for the same agenda.
Blogging • Insane Stuff • News • Liberal Media • The Left • Science & Technology • Global Warming • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink