Archive for July, 2008
Water Confirmed On Mars
Water’s discovery will ignite the debate among Darwinian; Intelligent Design and Divine Plans.
In 2002, the Odyssey spacecraft orbiting Mars spied what looked like a reservoir of buried ice. A few weeks ago when the Phoenix spacecraft arrived on Mars, it found what looked like ice in a hard patch underneath its landing site and changes in a trench indicated some ice had turned to gas when exposed to the sun. A soil sample was retrieved with a remote control arm, and melted it.
Until now, evidence of water on Mars’ has been largely circumstantial but now water has been confirmed. Now it will be cooked to determine if there is the presence of carbon-based compound. Those and water are considered essential building blocks for life.
NASA says it would extend the mission for an extra five weeks to see what else can be learned before the craft runs out of power this Winter. The discovery had champaign corks popped at the Jet Propulsion Lab.
The implications are staggering because discovery of water on Mars, if in sufficient supply can mean Mars could become a human base, and might even be able to be “terra farmed” or converted to a livable place for humans to use. The cost of transporting water to Mars from earth has been cited as perhaps the biggest hurdle to long range human exploration of the plant.
Whether organic compounds are discovered or not water’s discovery will ignite the debate among Darwinian; Intelligent Design and Divine Plans.
Army Doctor Charges Obama With Deserting Wounded.
“Obama seems to have been more concerned with how the visit would affect him than how it would affect the soldiers recovering from wounds received in the service of their country.”
Dr. Danny Jazarevic, who served as the Chief of Trauma, Critical Care and Vascular Surgery at Landstuhl, issued the following statement according to a report on NEWSMAX.COM on Barack Obama’s canceled visit to Ramstein and Landstuhl:
“Last week, Senator Obama skipped a visit with wounded U.S. troops at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany because the Pentagon would not allow campaign staff or media to accompany him into the hospital. I served as director of trauma surgery at that hospital for nearly four years and saw the effect that a visit from a celebrity like Senator Obama could have on morale. During that time, I do not recall a single member of Congress canceling a visit with the troops despite being just a few hours away, but Senator Obama seems to have been more concerned with how the visit would affect him than how it would affect the soldiers recovering from wounds received in the service of their country.”
Dr. Danny Jazarevic served as the Chief of Trauma, Critical Care and Vascular Surgery at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center. In 1984, Dr. Jazarevic joined the United States Army and later the Florida National Guard. He has since served in Honduras, Africa, Saudi Arabia, Bosnia, and Iraq. From December 2002 through January 2006, Dr. Jazarevic was assigned to the U.S. Army Hospital in Landstuhl, Germany, where he served as Chief of Trauma, Critical Care and Vascular Surgery. During this period, he deployed to Iraq numerous times, including with the 101st Airborne Division Forward Surgical Team and as Director of Operations for the 44th U.S. Army Medical Command. He is currently the Chief Trauma Surgeon at a civilian medical center in Florida, and also serves as a full Colonel in the U.S. Army Reserve. Dr. Jazarevic has been awarded the Bronze Star Medal.
Buying Ballots In Alabama And Related Mischief
Vote early, vote often and vote Democratic - Chicago Mayor Richard Daley
Alabama’s Attorney General has seized absentee ballots cast in three counties as part of a continuing investigation into vote buying. Allegedly some people were paid $40-$50 for their ballot or traded it for crack cocaine. Three officials have been arrested and charged with offenses related to the scheme. The AG is a white Republican and the counties are predominately black and charges of racism are flying hot and heavy there. Similar investigations have been launched in a half dozen other states. The only way to check the validity of an absentee ballot is to compare its signature with the signature on the voter’s registration affidavit itself an imprecise and often haphazard process at best.
In the early America men could cast their ballot by mail if their home was vulnerable to attacks by Native Americans. In 1857 Oregon made it possible for men to vote when they were temporarily away from home. During the American Civil War 19 of 25 Union states and 11 of 19 Confederate states OK’d absentee voting. In World War I 23 of the then 48 states approved of the practice largely to accommodate men in the armed forces. By 1924 every state had OKd some form of absentee balloting. Fraud has always been a concern.
In 1997 a Federal Court tossed out 4,740 absentee ballots and awarded the election and installed the offended candidate Miami’s Mayors job. In Tallahatcie, Georgia a Sheriff’s race was overturned when there was evidence of ballot buying. In 2005 a Benton Harbor commissioner’s recall was disqualified after the infamous Rev Edward Pinkney, an African-American community activist was caught with a supply of absentee ballots and accused of buying and intimidating voters.
In 2004 the Washington Governors race was initially decided by 42 votes. A hand recount of mail ballots found 129 errors and the election results reversed.
Regardless of the problems Voting by Mail is increasingly popular in America. If the trend continues it is possible that more people will vote by mail than at precincts. The spreading practice was hopefully to increase voter turnout but studies are mixed and in some cases where VBM is widely used shows voting percentages falling. In 1960 63.1% of those eligible to vote did but in 2004 the last Presidential election 55.3% voted.
A modern versions of vote early, vote often. Die in Chicago and stay politically active.
Obama Plays Race Card from Bottom Of Deck
“You know, he’s not patriotic enough, he’s got a funny name,’ you know, `he doesn’t look like all those other presidents on the dollar bills.’”
Barack Obama played the race card from the bottom of the deck saying Republicans would try to scare voters by pointing out “he doesn’t look like all those other presidents on the dollar bills.” The remark is being compared to his earlier characterization of rural and southern Americans as gun grabbing God nuts. Not the first time. He keeps fishing. First saw it on Huffington Post.
“They’ll say”, said Obama “You know, he’s not patriotic enough, he’s got a funny name,’ you know, `he doesn’t look like all those other presidents on the dollar bills.’” His staff made the comment even shabbier denying he was referring to race but that Obama “didn’t get here by spending decades in Washington DC.”
According to the daily Rasmussen Report tracking polls Barack Obama now attracts 45% of the vote while John McCain earns 43%. When “leaners” are included, it’s Obama 48% and McCain 46%. Obama made the comments in Missouri which is leaning toward McCain and as Ohio and its 20 electoral votes has moved from Leans Democrat to toss-up.
Fueled by a Thursday Drudge Report headline and heavy buzz inside the beltway, there is a surge in expectations that Virginia’s Tim Kaine will become Barack Obama’s running mate. Virginia and its 13 electoral votes is considered a toss-up and shifting the usually Republican state to the Democrat column would be important given the closeness of the race.
Obama’s Missouri comment may have been made because of new polling showing thirty percent (30%) of self described conservative Democrats say they’re voting for John McCain. Rasmussen Reports data also shows the Republican hopeful picking up support from 19% of White Democrats and 15% of Democrats over the age of 50.
Fourteen percent of voters are uncommitted. That figure includes 6% who say they’d vote for someone other than Obama or McCain and 8% who are undecided. Undecided voter include 6% who say they’d vote for some other candidate and 8% who are undecided.
Money Saving Plan Cost Taxpayers $500,000 More
Where hypocrisy, stupidity and incompetence intersect.
Moving Sacramento’s Development Services Department out of a leased building and into a city-owned structure was touted as a way to save money. Problem is the department, which issues permits and building information, has a lease until next year.
So, of course they would either get out of the lease or stay, right - wrong. You see City staffers ‘forgot’ to mention the lease when they went to City Council for an OK, and nobody on City Council asked the relevant questions before approving the move. The department packed up and moved and now city taxpayers are hopping mad because they were told it was a money saving move but, they are out half a million dollars for a vacant building while paying occupancy costs on it too.
City staffers look stupid, City Council more so, and the taxpayers take it in the wallet again. Where hypocrisy, stupidity and incompetence intersect.
Hypocritical Congress Ignores Will Of People
Its Unanamous Americans In Every State Support Offshore Oil Drilling - But Congress Goes On Vacation.
At the same moment oil companies announced the biggest profit in world history - exceeding the gross domestic product of Canada — Californians who have been the lone holdouts to allowing oil drilling off its shore for the first time favor it. According to a new Public Policy Institute of California a statewide survey finds 51-46% demanding it be allowed. That makes it unanimous from coast-to-coast that Americans want more offshore drilling.
But, Congress remains out of touch, and deadlocked in petty partisan bickering. A Democratic proposal to counter oil market speculation fell victim to the drilling dispute, failing 276-151 — nine votes short of the two-thirds needed for approval because the measure had been offered under expedited rules imposed by the Democrats to avoid GOP attempts to attach an offshore drilling provision.
A Senate bill, also aimed at curbing abuses in the oil markets, has been stalled for two weeks as Republicans have insisted it be opened to votes on a variety of other energy issues, principally offshore oil and gas drilling in areas long under development bans because of environmental concerns.
“This is no substitute for a real bill on drilling,” declared House GOP leader John Boehner of Ohio, who accused Democrats of using the oil market speculation measure to “divert attention” from their refusal to allow a vote on offshore oil drilling.
The House bill would have given new authorities to the Commodities Futures Trading Commission to oversee oil markets, increase the agency’s staff and set new requirements on certain trading. Market critics have argued that excessive speculation has contributed to the soaring oil prices.
At the White House, President Bush for the second time in two days called for lifting the offshore drilling bans, saying the Democratic-run Congress was letting down the American people by refusing to allow votes on the matter which the consensus is that the ban on offshore oil drilling would be lifted.
Instead of acting on oil independence Congress hypocritically voted to go on vacation leaving Americans to twist slowly in the wind and suffering from extortion at the hands of our enemies, exploited by oil companies, and ignored by their “representatives.”
Bush’s Last Chance
George Bush has a last-minute opportunity to really polish his legacy. Instead of leaving office with an approval rating slightly below taint, he has the chance to move up in the presidential rankings, perhaps as high as Millard Fillmore. All he has to do is get his head out of his past and smell the roses.
The war in Iraq as we’ve come to know it is over. It looks like we “won.”
I put “won” in quotes not out of disrespect for our military or because I secretly hoped we’d lose, like some folks did who pretended to be antiwar but were actually anti-American, but because I’m not sure what we won.
Saddam and his evil spawn are dead, and that’s a good thing for Iraq. But it doesn’t count for much with us. There are lots of dictators just as bad, thriving with our benevolent neglect, all over the world.
Iraq sure didn’t help our deterrence in the war on terror. We’ve nearly eliminated Al Qaeda from that country—once our post-invasion chaos invited them in—and if Iraq manages not to become a failed state it won’t be a haven for terrorists. But in the meantime the terrorists have taken all of Gaza, half of Lebanon, a good chunk of Pakistan and the poppy fields of Afghanistan.
We were hated in the Middle East before the war in Iraq, we’re hated in the Middle East now. If the war was about oil, then oil won, not us. If the Iraqis want to show their appreciation, they can give us Kirkuk. And by “us” I don’t mean Richard Perle.
Still, the good news is that our war there is over, if only GWB will see it. There are only two possibilities: either the insurgency is crushed, or we’re just in a lull.
If the insurgency is truly broken, then we’ve won and the Iraqis can do the mop-up on their own. If we’re just in a lull then the surge didn’t work and never will because the surge is over. Either way, our choice of action is clear.
Get out. Get out now, while the getting’s good. Don’t wait for the election and let the glory go to your successor, Georgie. Do it yourself! You have a chance that Richard Nixon would have killed for and LBJ died for—you can declare victory and get out.
There is no need to panic, withdrawal is going to take a year or more and that should be enough. Violence dropped by three-quarters in the last year, the Iraqis and our rear guard should be able to tamp down the remaining 25% before the last American soldier says good bye and good luck. Withdrawal is a process, but the kudos go to the guy who starts it.
That guy can be you, George W Bush. This is heartfelt advice from someone who would really like to see you do the right thing, the smart thing. I know you’re not used to good advice and if you’ve ever been given smart advice it doesn’t show, but that can change, right here, right now. Make just one, tiny speech:
“My fellow Americans, we won the war. I am commencing the withdrawal of our armed forces immediately at the rate of one brigade a month. Our last troops will be home in time to celebrate Christmas 2009 with their families. Mission accomplished, and this time I mean it.”
Say that, Mr. Bush, and watch your legacy shine. Hell, say that and I’ll come to Crawford and polish it myself.
Lifestyles in Turkeyville, U.S.A.
Life in the U.S.A. has begun to get a little stiffer these days, a little harder, hasn’t it? To the extent that perhaps you’ve been forced to cut back somewhat in your spending, stopped going to your favourite steak house or Starbucks, in your bid to avoid spending too much. Perhaps you’ve even had to curtail other habits, like going for a cruise in your favourite SUV StarCruiser whenever the mood takes you.
I see the grumblings in the newspapers and in blogs concerning both oil and the dollar. It seems the biggest grouse is the cost of gasoline, which is probably the very flagship of American democracy and capitalism. Some blame the government’s mishandling of domestic affairs, some blame OPEC and some blame Europe and the EU for the dollar’s volatile behaviour. It seems that life has become too comfortable, expectations too high to the extent that no accommodation has been made for a downturn in the US economy. No one believes in savings anymore, credit cards multiply and proliferate easily spreading their seed. Buy now and pay later. And boy are you paying now….
I see American’s whining, “Oh my God, gas costs over $4 a gallon now !! Soon it could be over $7 a gallon!! Eeek!!”. Give me a break, give it a rest people. This sort of bleating only convinces me that Americans live entirely cocooned in their own lifestyles, not concerned, not giving a damn about how it is outside across their waters in Europe or other parts of the world.
In UK the cost of petrol is now is £1.10 per litre. That’s about $2.20 per litre folks. That equates to $8.32 per US gallon. And that’s right NOW. The cost of petrol in UK and Europe has always been way higher than the US which has lower gas taxation as well as the wonderful advantages of the dollar being the World Reserve Currency. So when a European like me sees all the screams of US protest at the cost of gas — now at a pawltry $4 a gallon — we just tend to laugh and shake our heads.
But if gas — which is arguably at the very heart and guts of the American lifestyle — goes up to $7 a gallon, then perhaps the unthinkable will indeed happen. The American Way will be forced to change for the worse. Perhaps it will even become more like the European lifestyle. Eeeek….!!
And, let’s face it folks, we all love our lifestyles. And there is nothing on God’s earth that is worse than having to downsize your own lifestyles.
Wars and rebellions have started for lesser reasons….
FDA Finds Smoking Gun And It Ain’t A Tomato — Well Maybe.
The salmonella strain linked to a nationwide salmonella outbreak has been found in irrigation water at a serrano pepper farm in Mexico.
Well after tomato growers nationwide took it in the shorts losing tens of millions of dollars and restaurants dumped hundred of thousands of pounds of anything that even looked like one of the fruit the FDA announced today it has “found the smoking gun.” The salmonella strain linked to a nationwide food poisoning outbreak that sickened 1,300 people has been found in irrigation water on a serrano pepper from a Mexican farm, federal health officials Last week, the FDA said only jalapeno peppers grown in Mexico were implicated in the nationwide salmonella outbreak, and now it looks like they have found the source. The FDA said then it had found the same strain of salmonella responsible for the outbreak on a single Mexican-grown jalapeno in a south Texas produce warehouse.
In a gigantic CYA maneuver the FDA cautioned that some of the same contaminated water could get on tomatoes grown on Mexican farms that access the same irrigation water supplies.
Game’s Afoot After Olmert ‘Resignation’
Looming over it all is Iran’s nuclear weapons program.
Israeli’s Kadima Party primary in mid or late September pits liberal-leaning Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni against hardliner and former Army Chief of Staff Shaul Mofaz.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says he will step down as soon as that selection is made. Looming over it all is Iran’s nuclear weapons program. Livni is unlikely to attack Iran since she favors diplomatic solutions. If Mofaz wins, military action becomes much more likely. The 500 pound Gorilla is when?
The complication is that no top-level Israeli politician has confidence that Barack Obama would help. But most are confident that President Bush or John McCain would give Israel the help that it needs, and make no mistake Israel needs U. S. for a successful mission. If Obama wins, a Mofaz government would feel great pressure to attack before Bush leaves office. If McCain wins, Israel would have more time.
Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, and the Gulf states would huff and puff while being relieved that Iran’s nuclear weapons ambitions were thwarted or at least postponed. Iran, Syria, Hamas, Hezbollah and their ilk would counter strike, and Iran would make mischief in the Persian Gulf to disrupt oil supply and threaten the U. S. Navy fleet there. While that would result in a bloody defeat for Iran it would create mayhem and send oil prices into the stratosphere.
Mofaz might not wait until after the U. S. Presidential election figuring an attack and the crisis would help McCain. If the issue is foreign policy McCain wins if it’s domestic issues Obama likely wins.
A Jerusalem Post editorial welcomed Olmert’s decision saying “Olmert, in departure, has mercifully spared Israel the shameful potential ignominy of having a prime minister indicted while in office.”
The bottom-line then is the political race between Mofaz and Livni, and that is in a dead heat.
“Not Till We Have Too”: MLM writes the “undernews” for the MSM
The Huffington Post writes about why the MSM is not reporting the Edwards “story.”
Simple, THEY DON’T HAVE TOO YET.
Because, you, the blogging community, are playing the part of the Minor League Media (MLM), aka the reporters of the ‘undernews,” will flesh out these stories, so to speak. You will do much of the dirty work cleaning up the dirty National Inquirer, and “find all the links that you are better at” paraphrasing Jonathan Alter, aka MSM man, pre renaissance.
Great article at the Huffington Post right HERE.
Two things seem obvious. One, there are certainly hypocrites at work here, even though I do not know who he, she, it or they may be, and two, an overpaid consultant could not have come close to creating the MSM Motto of “Not Till We Have Too.”.
According to Sarah Lai Stirland, blogging on wired.com the great Wiki is struggling with the issue too.
Trump Blast Oil Prices and OPEC
“Oil (costs) is what is killing the world’s economy,” says Donald Trump.
“Frankly, I hear there are tankers all over the world that are loaded up to the gills with oil,” he told CNBC. “They have so much oil they don’t know what to do with it. It’s ridiculous what’s going on with OPEC and all of that.”
Trump blames major oil producing countries for the current recession and accuses large oil companies of “doing a major number” on everyone. He predicts that oil prices should drop a lot more from its $121 a barrel level after spiking near $150 a barrel in June and it should be priced around $50-60 a barrel.
“There’s a vast oversupply in the world. It’s all over the place,” Trump says.
Observers say if the U. S. would rattle its own domestic oil supply saber it would shock the market and costs would plummet. Oil experts say the U. S. could be free of Middle East imports in less than 3 years. But, progress is slowed by the November political race with Obama siding against more domestic supply to pander to radical environmentalists while McCain supports increased domestic production.
Sleaze scuppers Democrat golden boy
Gotcha: Senator John Edwards, whose wife has cancer, has been caught in a sex scandal that ends his vice-presidential hopes.
This is the entire text of the UK TIMESONLINE article published July 27, 2008
SCRATCH John Edwards off the list of potential vice-presidential candidates. The former White House contender, who had been hoping to get the nod from Barack Obama, is in the midst of a full-blown sex scandal.
Every supermarket shopper knows that the preternaturally youthful former senator for North Carolina may have fathered a love child with a film-maker while Elizabeth, his saintly wife, is dying of cancer. There are sensational new details on the National Enquirer website, although most of the media have done their best to ignore them.
The tabloid magazine cornered Edwards, 55, leaving a Los Angeles hotel where Rielle Hunter, his alleged mistress, and her baby were staying, at 2.40am last Tuesday. He ran down a hallway and dived into the men’s bathroom. A hotel security guard confirmed the encounter. “His face just went totally white,” the guard said.
The story has been bubbling away for months, but so far there has been not a word about it in the mainstream newspapers, even though Edwards was John Kerry’s running mate in 2004 and has been tipped for a prominent job in an Obama administration - if not vice-president, then attorney-general or antipoverty tsar.
Edwards volunteered recently: “I’m prepared to consider seriously anything, anything [Obama] asks me to do for our country.”
He can stop waiting by the telephone. News of the “gotcha” rapidly circulated on the internet via the Drudge Report and has been buzzing on the blogs. The Enquirer’s story appears to be well sourced.
According to the magazine, Edwards arrived at the Beverly Hilton on Monday at 9.45pm after attending a meeting on homelessness in Los Angeles and was dropped off at a side entrance. Two rooms were allegedly booked for Hunter in a friend’s name.
Edwards emerged hours later and was confronted by journalists from the Enquirer. His usual spokesmen and defenders have scurried for cover behind a wall of “no comment”, while the details of the story have gone unchallenged.
Even so, Tony Pierce, editor of the Los Angeles Times, issued an edict to the paper’s own bloggers to stay off the subject. “Because the only source has been the National Enquirer, we have decided not to cover the rumours or salacious speculations,” he wrote.
Mickey Kaus, a blogger for Slate magazine, leaked the memo. He noted: “This was a sensational scandal that the Los Angeles Times and other mainstream papers passionately did not want to uncover when Edwards was a formal candidate and now that the Enquirer seems to have done the job for them it looks like they want everyone to shut up while they fail to uncover it again.”
The New York Times has not deigned to touch the story, although it recently ran thousands of words on a relationship between McCain and a female lobbyist, which appeared to be based more on innuendo than fact.
Byron York, a conservative journalist, finally broke the silence in The Hill, a reputable, non-partisan congressional newspaper. “The media looks down on the National Enquirer but you look at the Edwards story and say, ‘Wow! There appears to be a lot of knowledge there’. It is darned fishy,” York said.
Edwards appeared at a press conference on poverty in Houston shortly after the Enquirer story broke. All he would say was: “I don’t talk about these tabloids. They’re tabloid trash and just full of lies.” There was no explicit denial.
York believes sympathy for Edwards’s wife may partly account for the media blackout. “She’s a very high-profile wife and she’s suffering from cancer. But if the story is true, this was going on when he was running for president.”
If Edwards is the father of Hunter’s child, he may also be responsible for an elaborate cover-up which would call into question his political integrity as well as his fidelity. An aide to Edwards had previously claimed via a lawyer that he (the aide) was the father.
Hunter’s existence was first mentioned by Newsweek in 2006, when the magazine claimed that the little-known film-maker had been commissioned by the millionaire candidate to make behind-the-scenes web videos of his presidential campaign after they “met in a New York bar”.
Hunter, a former aspiring actress, was paid $114,000 (£57,000) for her work. Months later, a writer on The Huffington Post website wondered what had happened to the videos, which had vanished from Edwards’s campaign site. The headline read, “Edwards mystery: innocuous videos suddenly shrouded in secrecy”.
As the battle for the Democratic presidential nomination gathered pace in October last year, the Enquirer claimed that Hunter was the candidate’s mistress. “It’s completely untrue. Ridiculous,” Edwards said. “I’ve been in love with the same woman for 30 years.” Two months later the magazine revealed that Hunter, a 43-year-old divorcee, was six months pregnant.
The story took a bizarre turn when she claimed that Andrew Young, a long-time aide to Edwards and a married family man, was the father of her child. Young’s lawyer acknowledged his paternity.
Hunter moved from New York to the same gated community in North Carolina as Young and his wife and young children, raising speculation that he was really her minder. Young has not commented on the latest allegations.
The National Enquirer may publish photographs corroborating Edwards’s presence at the hotel this weekend. A reporter for The Washington Post said yesterday: “To be quite honest, we’re waiting to see the pictures. That said, Edwards is no longer an elected official and he is not running for office now. Don’t expect wall-to-wall coverage.”
The Clinton Connection
Roger Altman, who has a controlling stake in the National Enquirer, is a former official in Bill Clinton’s administration. Some wags believe the magazine poured resources into the love child story to scupper John Edwards’s chances of beating Hillary Clinton for the presidential nomination.
Were the latest revelations timed to finish him off as a potential running mate? Despite the rumours, it is not likely. Few people think Clinton is still on Barack Obama’s shortlist.
David Perel, the Enquirer’s editor-in-chief, said the magazine’s parent company had “nothing to do with the editorial side, which I run”.
“We stayed on the story,” he said. “We did it the old-fashioned way with lots of legwork. We did what the [big] news organisations used to do. We knocked on doors, ran down leads and talked to people.”
-FINI-UK TimesOnline Article
Split Over Oil Speculators and Offshore Drilling
As far as public opinion is concerned, the best answer would be to do both.
Americans are nearly evenly divided on which is more important- cracking down on speculators or lifting the ban on offshore drilling — as the debate comes to a head in Congress this week over how to fight rising gas and oil prices. As far as public opinion is concerned, the best answer would be to do both.
A new Rasmussen Reports national survey, taken last night (Monday), finds that 45% think placing more restrictions on energy speculators is more important , while 42% take the opposite view that allowing offshore oil drilling is more important.
Most Americans still favor drilling for oil off the shore of the continental United States and believe that it will help reduce gas and oil prices. Fifty-seven percent (57%) favor offshore drilling versus 29% who are opposed. Nearly the same number (56%) believe that gas prices would be at least somewhat likely to fall if the ban is lifted.
Support for lifting the drilling ban has dropped slightly from 62% since Republican presidential candidate John McCain first proposed it as part of an overall energy strategy in mid-June. His Democratic opponent, Barack Obama, supports the ban, a position national Democrats and major environmental groups have championed for years.
Falling gasoline consumption, increasing supplies, and the threat of more domestic oil production, and the “secret agreement” with Iran have conspired to send the price of oil down. Most think the per barrel price will be pushed below $100 and maybe as low as $80 this Fall. Relieving pressure on consumers and creating a sense of relief.
Hypocritically some in Congress want to “take advantage” of lowering prices to raise federal fuel taxes.
Sierra Club doesn’t LEED by Example
Sierra Club’s hypocrisy is exposed in our nation’s capitol.
After 4 years of planning, the Sierra Club is under contract to buy 28,000 square feet of office space in Washington DC. As purveyors of “green is the new black”, one would think they would want their office building to be LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certified. One would think the Sierra Club would use this opportunity to show the world how they walk the walk. One would be wrong.
The building won’t be LEED certified, nor any of the space being bought by the Sierra Club.
The nonprofit’s build-out will have green and energy-efficient elements, but the space will not be certified under the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design program. The building itself will not be certified either.
The Sierra Club declined to comment on the decision to forgo review and certification under the LEED program.
Do as I say, not as I do?
On the one hand, the Sierra Club is in California pushing LEED and asks for donations…..“Your Secure Donation Helps Us Build Our Resistance To Soft Standards”
And on the other, their hypocrisy is exposed.
Newark Mayor and Mistress To Go to Prison As Crooks And Hyprocrites.
Hypocrites and Crooks Abound in Newark New Jersey
Adventures of the Senator Mayor. Special position for special people
Former Newark Mayor Sharpe James, 72, has been sentenced to more than two years in federal prison on Tuesday for his role in the cut-rate sales of city land to his former mistress, 39 year old Tamika Riley, who got 15 months. James apologized to his wife of 44-years “for his human frailties.”
The judge in letting James skate, reduced his sentence from the requested 20-years said James “has accomplished much in his life,” and the prosecution request for up to 20 years “disappoints me and shocks me,”
James was the second African American Mayor of Newark and served five, four-year terms before declining to run for re-election. From June 1999 until leaving his position as Mayor in July 2006, James simultaneously served as Mayor of Newark and a Democrat New Jersey State Senator.
Sounds like there is plenty of hyprocirsy to go around in Newark, New Jersey.
UK Sunday Times Blows Lid off John Edwards’ Hypocrisy
Will Mistress and Bastard Child End Edward’s Democratic
Star status?
The National Enquirer story about former presidential candidate John Edwards’ meeting at the Beverly Hilton Hotel with his alleged mistress and the child they had together, has been ignored by mainstream media. Fox News did corroborate that Edwards was there, and that the potential Democratic VP nominee was not registered as a guest at the hotel.
Now the U.K. Sunday Times has broken the overseas silence on the Edwards allegations. “Sleaze scuppers Democrat golden boy,” the newspaper’s headline reads.
“Gotcha: Senator John Edwards, whose wife has cancer, has been caught in a sex scandal that ends his vice-presidential hopes,” the subtitle hits again.
Will The New York Times, The Washington Post, alphabet networks, and other major media players report the story now? The LA Times asked bloggers not to blog about it…….
Guess jonathanturley.org did not get the memo from Tony Pierce.
As Bill Clinton jokes, it’s the coverup that get’s you in trouble.
Dangers of Charismatic Leaders
To make our point, we need not focus on the most criminal examples, like Hitler, Stalin and Mao…”
Shmuley Boteach asks in Tuesday’s Jerusalem Post “Can bores be President (of the United States)?”.
He points out “(A) rejection of charismatic leadership in favor of quiet moral purpose traces its roots all the way back to Moses. Born with a stutter, Moses inspired the people not with flair but with overwhelming righteousness.
Boteach rightly points out that “the three men widely considered to have been America’s greatest orators never became president. John C. Calhoun only made it to vice president, while Daniel Webster and William Jennings Bryan had six losing bids for the presidency between them.”
He rightly points to Abraham Lincon’s Gettysburg Address that bored listeners but had inspired generations until modern “educators” revised its importance.
“There is something to be said about the dangers of charismatic leadership. It can be easily abused, causing the public to follow blindly. It can obscure the real issues and substitute a false cult of personality. To make our point, we need not focus on the most criminal examples, like Hitler, Stalin and Mao….” Shmuley, who has authored 20 books mentions Martin Luther King Jr. whose mesmerizing speeches were central to the success of the civil rights movement. But his words would not have amounted to a hill of beans had King not been a man of towering moral purpose. His conclusion is compelling “in the final analysis, it would have been nothing more than entertainment.”
What Liberals Are Thinking
I spent some time surfing liberal websites and found two underlying themes.
First there is a lot of hatred in that group. It goes without saying that liberals hate Bush, Republicans and John McCain. Some of their groups are still trying to get Congress to start impeachment procedures against Bush. Yup, that’s just what this economy and shaky Wall Street needs right now.
I had also heard that there was division within the Democrat Party but I didn’t realize until today how deep it went. There is a YouTube video of Howard Dean in Charlotte making a stump speech for Obama. At first all you could hear was the rhythmic monotone chanting of “Yes I Can”. It actually was rather scary as it came across so militaristic*. Then off to the side were more protesters with their own signs. Although there was no organization in their protesting they were still able to interrupt Dean’s speech. If you thought they were McCain supporters you are wrong. It was a group of Hillary Clinton supporters. Wow. I have yet to see the media cover any of this.
Hillary’s supporters are beyond mad at Obama. One of their signs requested a roll call during their convention which Dean said would happen. I’ll believe it when I see it. For a roll call of how each state voted would clearly show that Obama was not the chosen one and narrowly won the primary. If they do show it then look for it around mid afternoon when no one is watching. There were also a number of blogs by Hillary supporters who write that they will never support Obama and will vote for McCain instead.
The second point is that the Democrats are doing the same thing they did in 2000 and 2004. In those elections,
along with the current one, liberals are writing that the public is stupid to vote for McCain. I didn’t get it then nor do I understand it now. Because how much sense does it take to realize that if you want people to vote for your candidate then don’t call them stupid?
The recent polls still show McCain close to Obama, and in some polls actually surpassing Obama. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the above contributes to McCain making a better show of it than expected.
* Shortly after Obama won his primary he sent out an email to say he was creating a “Fellowship”. He talked of sending people to training programs and then these “leaders” would be assigned where to work during the summer. When I first read this I was confused since not much happens in the summer. After that video I think I now understand the purpose of his “Fellowship” which in this light makes it all that much scarier.
Seven (Un)lucky Thought Provocations
- Mervyns becomes the latest merchant to become a casualty of the harsh retail environment and has filed
for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protections. It operates about 175 locations in seven states, primarily in California. - Saturday, Mick Jagger will be entitled to a basic state pension of just under 91 pounds ($180) a week. Saturday, Mick Jagger will be entitled to a basic state pension of just under 91 pounds ($180) a week.Saturday Mike Jagger will be 65-years old and can collect his $180 a week old age pension in England. Jagger is said to be worth a half billion dollars so he probably won’t need it.
- John McCain met with the Dalai Lama. It was pretty amazing. The man whose belief goes back to the seventh century standing next to the Dalai Lama. - Leno
- A 44-year old Romanian immigrant has given birth to her 18th child in British Columbia, making her the province’s most prolific mother in 20 years. The 7 pound 12 oz girl is reportedly healthy joining 9 sisters and 8 brothers ranging in age from 23 years to 23 months.
- If Obama is elected, “change” will be the only thing left in the pockets of American taxpayers — Harris Kaufman, Toronto, Canada
- The average nationwide price of a gallon of gasoline is down 12 cents to $3.96 Americans drove 40,000,000,000 miles less so far this year causing some in Congress to suggest raising federal gasoline taxes.
- Popinjay (POP-in-jay) noun: Somone who indulges in vain and empty chatter. Via French and Spanish from Arabic babbaga (parrot). The last syllable changed to jay because some thought the word referred to that bird instead of a parrot.
Longest-Serving GOP Senator Worthy Of First Class Hypocrisy H. A. A. Nomination
Senator Stevens Deserves Gold Plated Horse’s A** Award.
According to an AP article printed on NEWSMAX.com Sen. Ted Stevens, the longest-serving Republican senator and a figure in Alaska politics since before statehood, has been indicted on seven counts of falsely reporting hundreds of thousands of dollars in services he received from a company that helped renovate his home.
Stevens, 84, has been dogged by a federal investigation into whether he pushed for fishing legislation that also benefited his son, an Alaska lobbyist.
From May 1999 to August 2007, prosecutors said Stevens concealed “his continuing receipt of hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of things of value from a private corporation.” The indictment released Tuesday said the items included: home improvements to his vacation home in Alaska, including a new first floor, garage, wraparound deck, plumbing, electrical wiring; as well as car exchanges, a Viking gas grill, furniture and tools.
Prosecutors said Stevens “took multiple steps to continue” receiving things from oil services company VECO Corp., and its founder, Bill Allen. At the time, the indictment says, Allen and other VECO employees were soliciting Stevens for “multiple official actions …. knowing that Stevens could and did use his official position and his office on behalf of VECO during that same time period.”
VECO’s requests included funding and other aid for the oil services company’s projects and partnerships in Pakistan and Russia. It also included federal grants from several agencies - as well as help in building a national gas pipeline in Alaska’s North Slope Region, according to the indictment filed in U.S. District Court in Washington.
Call to Islamic prayer “one of the prettiest sounds on Earth at sunset.”
What do you think about Obama’s comments and what did he mean about Alabamans?
The resurrection and reexamination of a then largely unnoticed New York Times interview is again making ripples and raising questions about Barack Obama.
“I was a little Jakarta street kid,” Barack Obama told the New York Times a year ago, and he said he once got in trouble for making faces during Koran study classes in his elementary school. He said as president he is less likely to stereotype Muslims as fanatics - and more likely to be aware of their nationalism - since he once studied the Koran with them.
Obama recalled the opening lines of the Arabic call to prayer, reciting them with a first-rate accent according to the New York Times article by Nicholas Kristof who also reported Obama saying “It’ll give Alabama voters heart attacks.”
Obama also described the call to Islamic prayers as “one of the prettiest sounds on Earth at sunset.”
Sean Hannity discussed Kristof’s article today, Tuesday, July 29, 2008 on his afternoon radio program. What do you think?
More Jive from McCain and the Mainstream Media
It’s like an exclusive mutual admiration society between John McCain and the mainstream media. This weeks’ stream-of-unconsciousness entry comes from a McCain interview on CNN last Friday where he stated that, if elected, Osama bin Forgotten may face Nuremberg-like justice. McCain doesn’t think he’ll have a hard time gaining worldwide support for that. I think he’s drinking some kind of government-issued Kool-Aid. The Bush administration has squandered so much good will since 9-11 that I find worldwide support for anything we do as a nation difficult to believe. Does anyone even talk about bin Laden anymore?
Of course, Wolf Blitzer failed to remind Senator McCain that the United States has to find bin Laden and arrest him first. That’s something we’ve been unable to do for seven years. At this point, I think you’d have to question whether our government even wants to find bin Laden. For the record, the bin Laden topic was the headline used to grab readers, but it actually occupied only a couple of paragraphs before the subject was changed to moving the location of the American embassy in Israel to Jerusalem and McCain’s well-known position on winning (at all costs, of course) the Iraq war.
Mr. Blitzer failed to ask McCain the hard questions after the topic of bin Laden was raised. Are there really still ongoing efforts to find him? Has there been any progress in locating bin Laden? Is there any kind of strategy being employed? Does the military have any idea where he might be? What is your plan, Senator McCain, to find bin Laden? Here’s a thought: The present administration has no plan and neither does McCain. Failure to pursue this issue has again confirmed that the mainstream media is too wrapped up building McCain’s justice-crusading, straight-talk express image. Nobody wants to find bin Laden because there are too many questions surrounding and too many holes in the government’s official 9-11 story.
In another wartime sham, the Bush administration invaded Afghanistan telling the people it was being done to bring bin Laden to justice. Nobody questioned George Bush on that one (yes, not even me). There was an overflow of support for Bush’s intention to apprehend bin Laden from all political persuasions both from within the United States and from around the globe. It was a golden opportunity. Yet, a mere six months after the terrorist attacks when he was asked if any progress was being made, George W. Bush flippantly stated to the media that he doesn’t spend much time thinking about bin Laden because he’s not that important. I think putting this in perspective is critical: Within six months of the 9-11 attacks, the most deadly terrorist event in our history and the only one that has ever happened here, Osama bin Laden went from being Public Enemy No. 1 (you will recall Bush vowing to get him dead or alive) to being “not that important.” That’s when I woke up from my shock-induced patriotic trance and started seeing the Bush administration for what it is.
Nearly eight years later, many (including myself) mistrust anyone who wants to continue Bush’s ill-advised policies and McCain has put himself squarely in that camp. It is apparent that there is a mainstream media blackout on reality. The conversation about bin Laden was absurd. Even more absurd is that a supposedly seasoned journalist like Wolf Blitzer would just let it slide by. It is diffic