Morning Open Thread
Good morning.
President Barack Obama, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, left and Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT), right are briefed in the Red Room of the White House prior to the signing ceremony for the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010. Photo by Pete Souza.
Comments (153) «
Good morning all you fine patriotic Democrats fighting for health care reform. America needs you now more than ever.
There may be another solution for "tort reform"...
One that does not increase prices due to damages in the form of large fines...
(CNN) -- Two people were executed Tuesday in China for their part in a tainted milk scandal that killed at least six babies and sickened about 300,000 others, state-run media reported.
Zhang Yujun was executed for endangering public safety and Geng Jinping was executed for producing and selling toxic food, the Xinhua news agency said.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/11/24/china.milk.execution/index.html
(CNN) - Can Lou Dobbs make the leap from the anchor desk to the Oval Office?
A radio interviewer on WTOP joked Monday about the "crazy" idea that the former CNN host could mount a White House bid in 2012 - but Dobbs wasn't laughing. "What's so crazy about that?" he responded in the interview broadcast on the Washington, D.C. station.
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/
Palin/Dobbs 2012
Dobbs/Palin 2012
Run, Lou RUN!
Black Friday turnout to jump 16%
Survey says number of people 'definitely' heading to stores increasing to 57 million from 49 million in 2008.
http://money.cnn.com/2009/11/24/news/economy/Black_Friday_forecast_NRF/index.htm
OH, the repelicans surely are not gonna like this. They want the economy to suffer. They don't want things to get better during the Obama administration. That will prove what a lame POS the LAST president was...
Good morning, all.
I don't understand the lack of interest much less urgency in Washington....
An American Catastrophe
By BOB HERBERT
Published: November 20, 2009
In many ways, it’s like a ghost town. It’s eerily quiet. Driving around in the middle of the afternoon, in a city that once was among the most productive on the planet, you see very little traffic, minimal commercial activity, hardly any pedestrians.
What you’ll see are endless acres of urban ruin, block after block and mile after mile of empty and rotting office buildings, storefronts, hotels, apartment buildings and private homes. It’s a scene of devastation and disintegration that stuns the mind, a major American city that still is home to 900,0000 people but which looks at times like a cross between postwar Berlin and the ruin of an ancient civilization.
Detroit was the arsenal of democracy in World War II and the incubator of the American middle class. It was the city that taught mass production to the rest of the world. It was a place that made cars, trucks and other tangible products, not derivatives. And it was the architect of the quintessentially American idea of putting people to work and paying them a decent wage. It’s frightening to think seriously about what we’ve allowed to happen to this city and what is now happening to the middle class and the American economy as a whole...
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/21/opinion/21herbert.html?_r=2&ref=opinion
It's worse than the reaction to what happened after Katrina. Where is the outrage among our public officials? Can't they face up to the problem or are they afraid to stand up to the multinationals.
Perhaps the young men and women coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan who cannot find decent jobs can stand up to these bastards? Let's help them run for office. The major problem in this country is the complacency among our leadership.
Fired up and ready to go? Where? When? Why isn't it happening?
If you are not going to be an agent of change, who needs you? Let's seek out the less timid and start running candidates who understand the urgency of change.
Sadly to say, I worked hard for a Senate candidate just four years ago who now only sits on her ass and Tweets. That's not good enough.
Gotta run. later.
Sarah, Don't Go Rogue; Go Home
With the release of her new book, "Going Rogue: An American Life," former Alaskan Gov. and Republican Party vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin is once again being given a spotlight she does not deserve. Under normal circumstances, Palin would have drifted into obscurity by now; a political has-been, who never was. Instead, a sub-par politician with no substantial constituency, no command of relevant issues and no solutions to substantive problems is being given air and face time as though she really matters. The simple reality that few are willing to articulate is, if she were not relatively attractive, of European ancestry and a woman, Sarah Palin would be day-old bread
http://messenger.truthout.org/ss/link.php?M=181559&N=380&C=e5cedf15aa0be2c656f9aa698a4a3404&L=3356
I always wonder, if Palin looked like Virginia Fox if these Repugs would be so mesmerized. I doubt it !!
OH, the repelicans surely are not gonna like this. They want the economy to suffer. They don't want things to get better during the Obama administration. That will prove what a lame POS the LAST president was...
Chicago---Have you noticed the latest frustration and viciousness in the Repugs, as the economy slowly but surely turns around? As jobs are forecast to start growing in March 2010. As House sales rise, etc?
They cannot stand for success of America. It is only failure they can build their own party on.
Sarah Palin writing her next book.....
THE AUDACITY OF THE DOPE !
Chicago on November 24, 2009 at 09:30 AM
Hi, Chicago.
What else do unemployed people have to do but window shop what they used to buy?
The underemployed will be working their second jobs staffing these retail outlets. The rest of us will be scurrying around trying find a few crumbs of a bargain like scavengers descending on the corpse of what was once a strong economy.
Let's be real. Until we start demanding that developing our own economy again is more important than the globalization of the wealth of the top 2%, we will be nothing more than a cog in somebody else's wheel.
Are we willing to fight our own party to insure that our kids will have a future?
It's time to challenge the leadership on this. I want Schumer to take the lead and oust Reid and his band of nervous Nellies. Let the voters see that there will be no change in this country if we water down this healthcare bill. Let the bill die instead of "centralizing" it to the point it won't change a damned thing.
The electorate needs to see clearly what the consequences of fiddling around with our future means. Nothing ventured; nothing gained.
Do the want to settle for less than nothing or do they want to actually solve some problems? We need to get rid of the obstacles in our way. The only way to do that is to let this bill die if it doesn't have a strong public option.
Obama is not showing leadership either. We can do better. He needs to see opposition within the party (real opposition that includes leaders that publicly challenge his decisions and threaten to challenge him as a candidate) or he's going to keep this useless War on Terror neocon farce going.
It's time to light a fire under all of them. Obama needs to know that he is no more secure than Bush was. It's time for Dr. Dean to seriously consider a run for the White House. The Blue Dogs must act like statesmen on healthcare or they are just bogus ex-Republicans doing nothing for their constituents.
bbl.
funny how ratzmunchkin gets such different results than other pollsters...makes you wonder if they have any political bias.....hahahahahahaha
yeah, Gregg,
You put together a list of all pollsters side by side , and the ONLY one in the negative is Rasmussen ! Now I wonder why that is?
LIKELY VOTERS VS AMERICAN PUBLIC ON HEALTH CARE? WHAT DIFFERENCE WOULD IT MAKE? OBAMA APPROVAL MID TERM , WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE???
NONE, NADA, ZERO.
YET , that is all our little furry girlie have to cling to. (Dufus did not even KNOW about Rasmussen until Stevieboy said something about it. Boy, Dufus ever learned a lot from our blog. He did not even know the difference between Medicaid, and Medicare till he learned it here. :)
We DON'T want the dopey health care plan.
OF COURSE, YOU don't, dumb old man!!!
YOU HAVE FREE MEDICARE, PROPOSED FOR BY DEMOCRATS
PART B, MEDICARE, TO COVER YOUR DOCTORS, LABS, ETC, FOR ONLY $95 PER MONTH
LIBERALS THROW IN YOUR SS CHECK EACH MONTH.
LIBERALS THROW IN YOUR VETERAN BENEFITS
How much else do you pick up from your State and local government, in the way of food stamps, free Rxs, your free turkey for Thanksgiving??
And of course ole Thomasss, gets unemployment benefits, and a COBRA subsidy of 65% paid for by those Liberals. Probably some local and state help.
stevieboy gets aid from his State in the way of some Homestead credit, AS WELL AS STATE ASSISTANCE towards his property tax. I am sure that way put in by Liberals!!! Who knows what else Stevieboy gets, besides his Free Thanksgiving dinner at the local Church.
And then of course, the ever mouthy German----pretending he knows something about our country, while he sits there in Germany enjoying all those wonderful Socialist benefits! Bet he wouldn't trade them for all the money in the world! Taken care of from Birth to Death!
So naturally you could care less, you Greedy, racist, bigoted old man!!!
Who will speak for American Jews and other friends of Israel in Washington in 2010 and beyond?
Will it be Sarah Palin, who recently said West Bank settlements "should be allowed to be expanded upon" because Jews would be "flocking to Israel" in the days to come? [1]
Will it be prominent Jewish leader Abe Foxman, who called Palin's recent pro-settlement comments "clear and well-intentioned" and said it was the "height of chutzpah" for anyone to say Palin's positions endanger a Jewish, democratic Israel? [2]
Or will it be us - JStreetPAC and the pro-Israel, pro-peace candidates we support?
Let's answer this question right now with a major statement of our movement's power -- before Foxman and Palin answer it for us.
We're setting an ambitious goal of raising $25,000 in the next two days for JStreetPAC. We'll distribute the money we raise by the end of the year to JStreetPAC endorsed candidates that really need our support in next year's election. If each of us chips in $25 right now, we'll show Palin and Foxman who really should be listened to in Washington.
Click here to make a gift of $25 to JStreetPAC and help pro-Israel, pro-peace candidates win their races.
Congress is where key American political battles over the United States' approach to Israel and the Middle East are waged.
It's also where hawkish pro-Israel voices wield the most power at the moment - and if they want to slow down or stop President Obama's attempts to achieve a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, that's where they'll make their stand.
Changing this balance of power in Congress is JStreetPAC's mission. By funding candidates for Congress who share our values, we can make old school politics on Israel yesterday's news.
Please consider a gift of $25 today.
We're building a political movement to reclaim the voice of reason and sanity in American politics on the Middle East. Thank you for your generous support,
- Isaac
Isaac Luria
Campaigns Director
JStreetPAC
November 23, 2009
ABOUT JSTREETPAC
JStreetPAC is the first and only Political Action Committee established to explicitly promote meaningful American leadership to end the Arab-Israeli and Palestinian-Israel conflicts peacefully and diplomatically. JStreetPAC was founded to give voice to the majority of Americans who favor a new direction for American policy in the Middle East and to reward American political candidates for their courage and leadership on our issues. Learn more at our website - just follow the links above.
Paid for by JStreetPAC, http://jstreetpac.org/. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.
NOT JUST MCCAIN AIDES THAT SAY PALIN IS A LIAR AND CREEP !
Palin's former aide annoyed by portrayal in 'Going Rogue'
Former Gov. Sarah Palin's book, "Going Rogue," blames her first legislative director for moves early in her term that helped poison her relationship with state lawmakers. But the ex-aide, John Bitney, calls Palin's account a fabrication and said he wishes his former boss would leave him alone.
"I'm just pilloried right and left and turned into the big bad wolf here for stuff I didn't do," said Bitney, who is now an aide to Valdez Republican Rep. John Harris. "It's like I'm this fictional character that she's decided to make me out to be this sort of incompetent slob."
Palin's writing about Bitney is her most detailed description yet of incidents that helped shape her relationship with legislators. Her bad blood with top legislators of both parties began not long after she took office. By last spring, relationships with many lawmakers from both parties had soured to the point that feuds with the governor overshadowed much of the other legislative business.
Bitney joins a list of people slammed in the book who are calling it fiction, including McCain's former campaign manager, Steve Schmidt. Bitney, though, has a far deeper relationship with Palin than the others. He was a high school classmate of Palin's from Wasilla who played a key role as an adviser in her successful 2006 campaign for governor.
Palin told to keep her big mouth shut at Fort Bragg, too. Gee, I could swear that the trolls were bragging that tens of thousands of people were going to be lining up at all these stops. Seems she can garner only up to about 1500 per city. Small percentage for someone who wants to be President. Maybe this trip will finally convince her the only base she has is Stevie times about 50,000 other Americans.
No speeches as Sarah Palin makes her Fort Bragg stop
An estimated 1,500 people lined up at a PX store at Fort Bragg this morning to see former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and have her sign copies of her new memoir.
Palin greeted people at a table just inside the door of the North Post Exchange, a Wal-Mart-size department store on the base. The line waiting to see her spilled out the front door and wrapped around the building.
Many people went into the PX to buy Palin’s book, “Going Rogue: An American Life,” then emerged to take their places in line. People took shelter from the rain under umbrellas and shielded their books in plastic bags.
Geesh, I voted for obama, and he STILL represents the Change I wanted, from Republian Destruction to Democratic Repair ! It took Bush 8 years to do this mess-----I will give Obama 8 years to fix it ! Smart people will!
in case you did not go stalking the Hartford Courant website today, hoping to see my obituary, just want to make sure you saw my LTE printed today:
"I read the Courant article about "Loyal to Dodd, But With Doubts" with some skepticism.
I have not seen Senator Dodd found guilty in a court of law for any of his actions. I have seen the Senate Ethics committee find him innocent of any ethical wrongdoings.
I have seen the many things that Senator Dodd (unlike Lieberman) has done for this State over the last 20 years, and I see nothing in his qualifications to say he will not continue to be a good Senator for this State.
Even the poll on Doubter's votes for "Leadership Qualities" find that 61% know that he is and has been a good leader.
When you weigh the alternative, I don't think there can be any doubt at all. I cannot think of anything more destructive to this State than a Republican Senator would be.
PamB
Global warming's impacts on the rise
http://www.azdailysun.com/articles/2009/11/23/news/20091123_front_207987.txt
WASHINGTON -- Since the 1997 international accord to fight global warming, climate change has worsened and accelerated -- beyond some of the grimmest of warnings made back then.
As the world has talked for a dozen years about what to do next, new ship passages opened through the once frozen summer sea ice of the Arctic. In Greenland and Antarctica, ice sheets have lost trillions of tons of ice. Mountain glaciers in Europe, South America, Asia and Africa are shrinking faster than before. And it's not just the frozen parts of the world that have felt the heat in the dozen years leading up to next month's climate summit in Copenhagen:
-- The world's oceans have risen by about an inch and a half.
-- Droughts and wildfires have turned more severe worldwide, from the U.S. West to Australia to the Sahel desert of North Africa.
-- Species now in trouble because of changing climate include, not just the lumbering polar bear which has become a symbol of global warming, but also fragile butterflies, colorful frogs and entire stands of North American pine forests.
-- Temperatures over the past 12 years are 0.4 of a degree warmer than the dozen years leading up to 1997.
Even the gloomiest climate models back in the 1990s didn't forecast results quite this bad so fast.
"The latest science is telling us we are in more trouble than we thought," said Janos Pasztor, climate adviser to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.
And here's why: Since an agreement to reduce greenhouse gas pollution was signed in Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997, the level of carbon dioxide in the air has increased 6.5 percent. Officials from across the world will convene in Copenhagen next month to seek a follow-up pact, one that President Barack Obama says "has immediate operational effect ... an important step forward in the effort to rally the world around a solution."
The last effort didn't quite get the anticipated results.
From 1997 to 2008, world carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels have increased 31 percent; U.S. emissions of this greenhouse gas rose 3.7 percent. Emissions from China, now the biggest producer of this pollution, have more than doubled in that time period. When the U.S. Senate balked at the accord and President George W. Bush withdrew from it, that meant that the top three carbon polluters -- the U.S., China and India -- were not part of the pact's emission reductions. Developing countries were not covered by the Kyoto Protocol and that is a major issue in Copenhagen.
And the effects of greenhouse gases are more powerful and happening sooner than predicted, scientists said.
"Back in 1997, the impacts (of climate change) were underestimated; the rate of change has been faster," said Virginia Burkett, chief scientist for global change research at the U.S. Geological Survey.
That last part alarms former Vice President Al Gore, who helped broker a last-minute deal in Kyoto.
"By far the most serious differences that we've had is an acceleration of the crisis itself," Gore said in an interview this month with The Associated Press.
In 1997, global warming was an issue for climate scientists, environmentalists and policy wonks. Now biologists, lawyers, economists, engineers, insurance analysts, risk managers, disaster professionals, commodity traders, nutritionists, ethicists and even psychologists are working on global warming.
"We've come from a time in 1997 where this was some abstract problem working its way around scientific circles to now when the problem is in everyone's face," said Andrew Weaver, a University of Victoria climate scientist.
The changes in the last 12 years that have the scientists most alarmed are happening in the Arctic with melting summer sea ice and around the world with the loss of key land-based ice masses. It's all happening far faster than predicted.
Back in 1997 "nobody in their wildest expectations," would have forecast the dramatic sudden loss of summer sea ice in the Arctic that started about five years ago, Weaver said. From 1993 to 1997, sea ice would shrink on average in the summer to about 2.7 million square miles. The average for the last five years is less than 2 million square miles. What's been lost is the size of Alaska.
Antarctica had a slight increase in sea ice, mostly because of the cooling effect of the ozone hole, according to the British Antarctic Survey. At the same time, large chunks of ice shelves -- adding up to the size of Delaware -- came off the Antarctic peninsula.
While melting Arctic ocean ice doesn't raise sea levels, the melting of giant land-based ice sheets and glaciers that drain into the seas do. Those are shrinking dramatically at both poles.
Measurements show that since 2000, Greenland has lost more than 1.5 trillion tons of ice, while Antarctica has lost about 1 trillion tons since 2002, according to two scientific studies published this fall. In multiple reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports, scientists didn't anticipate ice sheet loss in Antarctica, Weaver said. And the rate of those losses is accelerating, so that Greenland's ice sheets are melting twice as fast now as they were just seven years ago, increasing sea level rise.
Worldwide glaciers are shrinking three times faster than in the 1970s and the average glacier has lost 25 feet of ice since 1997, said Michael Zemp, a researcher at World Glacier Monitoring Service at the University of Zurich.
"Glaciers are a good climate indicator," Zemp said. "What we see is an accelerated loss of ice."
Also, permafrost -- the frozen northern ground that oil pipelines are built upon and which traps the potent greenhouse gas methane -- is thawing at an alarming rate, Burkett said.
Another new post-1997 impact of global warming has scientists very concerned. The oceans are getting more acidic because more of the carbon dioxide in the air is being absorbed into the water. That causes acidification, an issue that didn't even merit a name until the past few years.
More acidic water harms coral, oysters and plankton and ultimately threatens the ocean food chain, biologists say.
In 1997, "there was no interest in plants and animals" and how they are hampered by climate change, said Stanford University biologist Terry Root. Now scientists are talking about which species can be saved from extinction and which are goners. The polar bear became the first species put on the federal list of threatened species and the small rabbit-like American pika may be joining it.
More than 37 million acres of Canadian and U.S. pine forests have been damaged by beetles that don't die in warmer winters. And in the U.S. West, the average number of acres burned per fire has more than doubled.
The Colorado River reservoirs, major water suppliers for the U.S. West, were nearly full in 1999, but by 2007 half the water was gone after the region endured the worst multiyear drought in 100 years of record-keeping.
Insurance losses and blackouts have soared and experts say global warming is partly to blame. The number of major U.S. weather-related blackouts from 2004-2008 were more than seven times higher than from 1993-1997, said Evan Mills, a staff scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab.
"The message on the science is that we know a lot more than we did in 1997 and it's all negative," said Eileen Claussen, president of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. "Things are much worse than the models predicted."
On the Net:
U.S. government's 2009 report on climate change impacts: http://tinyurl.com/usimpacts
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 2007 report on changes already observed:
Sarah, Don't Go Rogue; Go Home
With the release of her new book, "Going Rogue: An American Life," former Alaskan Gov. and Republican Party vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin is once again being given a spotlight she does not deserve
PamB,
I think it is in the best interest of the country that Sarah stays in the spotlight and continues to draw support from the repelican base. This country needs that rogue politician out there rumaging for 2010 and 2012. She knows she can't run. She wouldn't even be able to win Alaska. She wants to make money selling books. It's the greed thing again (typical repelican). But the republican dupes follow her like moths to a flame. She's cute, got good teeth, can spell y-o-u...
She scares the independents to our side and divides the right-wing-nut base. Keep up the good work Sarah. You are doing a FINE job.
Dufus and Harporrhoid,
I read the article. I did not see where it determined it was a hoax. Looks like you idiots dreamed that up.
The article clearly states,
"Federal and state investigators who have been working the case since September haven't yet announced whether Bill Sparkman's death was a homicide, suicide or accident."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091124/ap_on_re_us/us_census_worker_hanged_2
Hey this is cool. The idiot troll droppings from Dufus and Harporrhoid are being deleted as they "drop" them.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHA
COOL ! ! !
Wow, look. Harporrhoid actually provided a link.
What(?) are you trying to pretend you have some credibility now? It won't work. Not as long as you continue to make stupid comments like this:
----------------------------------------------
Face facts Paaaaaamela Daaaaaarling, Hillary's going to get her wide ass kicked to the curb by the fine democrats at the polls and at the convention and the great Mohammad Obama is going to get his ticket torn by the majority of the American public in the general elections.
Your bitter dreams of regaining America in your lifetime will never come to fruition, not at all.
Posted by Harpos_got_your_back_Pam_its_heavy_as_hell on January 10, 2008 at 08:31 PM
Howd that work out for ya' there Harporrhoid? Huh?
Jonah,
Thanks for cleaning up the troll droppings. If only they could be potty-trained...
Reagan Would Fail "Purity Test" Proposed for GOP
The most rigidly conservatives members of the Republican National Committee are circulating a proposal to establish a purity test for the party's candidates.
If adopted, the party would withhold money from any contender who disagreed with conservative principles on more than two of 10 essential issues identified by the right-wingers.
With Orwellian irony, Bopp and his buddies have labeled their proposal: "Reagan's Unity Principle for Support of Candidates."
The relevant portion of the resolution reads:
WHEREAS, the Republican National Committee shares President Ronald Reagan's belief that the Republican Party should espouse conservative principles and public policies and welcome persons of diverse views; and
WHEREAS, the Republican National Committee desires to implement President Reagan's Unity Principle for Support of Candidates; and
WHEREAS, in addition to supporting candidates, the Republican National Committee provides financial support for Republican state and local parties for party building and federal election activities, which benefits all candidates and is not affected by this resolution; and
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the Republican National Committee identifies ten (10) key public policy positions for the 2010 election cycle, which the Republican National Committee expects its public officials and candidates to support:
(1) We support smaller government, smaller national debt, lower deficits and lower taxes by opposing bills like Obama's "stimulus" bill;
(2) We support market-based health care reform and oppose Obama-style government run healthcare;
(3) We support market-based energy reforms by opposing cap and trade legislation;
(4) We support workers' right to secret ballot by opposing card check;
(5) We support legal immigration and assimilation into American society by opposing amnesty for illegal immigrants;
(6) We support victory in Iraq and Afghanistan by supporting military-recommended troop surges;
(7) We support containment of Iran and North Korea, particularly effective action to eliminate their nuclear weapons threat;
(8) We support retention of the Defense of Marriage Act;
(9) We support protecting the lives of vulnerable persons by opposing health care rationing, denial of health care and government funding of abortion; and
(10) We support the right to keep and bear arms by opposing government restrictions on gun ownership; and be further
RESOLVED, that a candidate who disagrees with three or more of the above stated public policy positions of the Republican National Committee, as identified by the voting record, public statements and/or signed questionnaire of the candidate, shall not be eligible for financial support and endorsement by the Republican National Committee; and be further
RESOLVED, that upon the approval of this resolution the Republican National Committee shall deliver a copy of this resolution to each of Republican members of Congress, all Republican candidates for Congress, as they become known, and to each Republican state and territorial party office.
Fair enough.
So here's a question: Applying the standard established in the resolution – review of the candidate's official record, public statements and answers to questions – would Ronald Reagan pass the purity test?
Let's see:
(1) Deficit spending soared during Reagan's presidency. Strike one.
(2) As governor of California, Reagan oversaw the development of Medi-Cal, the nation's largest Medicaid program – expanding it to cover long-term care and developed massive new managed care systems. Strike two.
(3) As governor of California, Reagan Reagan established the Air Resources Board to battle California's smog problems and supported aggressive government intervention where the market had failed to protect the environment. As president, Reagan signed more wilderness protections laws – which restrict private-sector exploitation of natural resources – than any president in history. Strike three.
(4) Reagan was a former union president who campaigned against the Taft-Hartley Act and other restrictions of the right of unions to organize. Strike four.
(5) Reagan signed the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, which granted amnesty to most undocumented workers who could prove they had been in the country continuously for the previous five years. After he finished his presidency, Reagan continues to speak out forcefully for immigration rights. Strike five.
(6) After the 1983 bombing of a Marine barracks in Beirut, Reagan was urged by some to surge more troops into the region. Instead, he ordered the Marines to begin withdrawal from Lebanon. Strike six.
(7) Reagan acknowledged that during his presidency the U.S. sold weapons to Iran. Strike seven.
(8) Reagan was the first president to invite an openly gay couple to spend the night in the White House and he famously argued that gays and lesbians should not be discriminated against in a 1978 television advertising campaign. Strike eight.
(9) Shortly after his inauguration as governor of California, Reagan signed into law the most liberal abortion statute of its day". Strike nine.
(10) Here's Reagan, in 1991, on gun control: "I support the Brady Bill, and I urge the Congress to enact it without further delay." Strike ten.
Of course it is true that Reagan, like John Kerry, was for some ideas before he was against them.
Reasonable people might debate the proper point at which to try and pin Reagan down.
But no reasonable person can suggest that Ronald Reagan would have met the eight out ten test the RNC right-wingers seek to apply – especially on hot-button issues such as gun control, gay rights and immigration
Indeed, one of the favorites of the RNC's extreme conservatives, Florida U.S. Senate candidate Marco Rubio, recently declared that Reagan was wrong to support amnesty for undocumented immigrants.
And it is probably worth noting that, when Reagan was seeking the Republican nomination in 1980, conservatives Phil Crane and John Connolly suggested that "the Gipper" was an amiable fellow but just not pure enough. Crane positioned himself that year as as a pure conservative alternative to Reagan.
Crane, the purist, won 1.8 percent of the vote in the New Hampshire Republican primary and exited stage right.
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat/500305/reagan_would_fail_purity_test_proposed_for_gop
Hi Chicago, Just another day when ole man Dufus Hog has his wife out working his beautiful '
ranch' and Thomnass has his unemployment check in hand, so no need to look for work. HIS wife is out there at some cash register, and will bring home the bacon !
Dufus did not even know what all this global warming stuff was---until he came in here and the Repugs were saying it was BAD !
Per Dufus:
We DON'T want the dopey health care plan.
OF COURSE, YOU don't, dumb old man!!!
YOU HAVE FREE MEDICARE, PUT IN LIBERAL DEMOCRATS
PART B, MEDICARE, TO COVER YOUR DOCTORS, LABS, ETC, FOR ONLY $95 PER MONTH
LIBERALS THROW IN YOUR SS CHECK EACH MONTH.
LIBERALS THROW IN YOUR VETERAN BENEFITS
How much else do you pick up from your State and local government, in the way of food stamps, free Rxs, your free turkey for Thanksgiving??
And of course ole Thomasss, gets unemployment benefits, and a COBRA subsidy of 65% paid for by those Liberals. Probably some local and state help.
stevieboy gets aid from his State in the way of some Homestead credit, AS WELL AS STATE ASSISTANCE towards his property tax. I am sure that way put in by Liberals!!! Who knows what else Stevieboy gets, besides his Free Thanksgiving dinner at the local Church.
And then of course, the ever mouthy German----pretending he knows something about our country, while he sits there in Germany enjoying all those wonderful Socialist benefits! Bet he wouldn't trade them for all the money in the world! Taken care of from Birth to Death!
So naturally you could care less, you Greedy, racist, bigoted old man!!!
Never attacked a DNC blogger in my 6 years on here !!! Never will! I love Democratic bloggers. It is Repug trolls I hate. Little men.......
the definition of an internet troll is:
"In Internet slang, a troll is someone who posts controversial, inflammatory, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community, such as an online discussion forum, chat room or blog, with the primary intent of provoking other users into an emotional response[1] or of otherwise disrupting normal on-topic discussion."
Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth was one of the high points not only of the environmental movement but also of the documentary tradition in America. He figured out how to use a new medium, PowerPoint, to take the unavoidably wonkish story of global warming and make it scary, credible and manageable. It was, perhaps, as important as anything he could have done as president, and he deserved not only the Oscar but also the Nobel.
As almost everyone noted at the time, however, there was one problem with the film: the section on what to actually do about the biggest problem we've ever faced was remarkably short, both in duration and on plausible ideas. If the world is coming to an end, changing your light bulb doesn't seem like the obvious response. Or rather, it seems highly obvious but highly insufficient--a gesture, not a solution.
Gore heard those criticisms and spent the next few years convening a series of more than thirty "Solutions Summits" in Nashville and elsewhere, where he picked the brains of virtually everyone who ever thought professionally about climate and energy. He's taken all those data and all those ideas, and with the help of a capable team of researchers he's turned them into a book, Our Choice, an ambitious and entirely successful attempt to lay out all that we know about mainstream answers to global warming. (When I say "virtually everyone," I mean it; the acknowledgments take up four pages of agate type and include even me.) He's got chapters on solar electricity, on wind energy, on biofuels, on nuclear power and even on more recondite topics: geothermal energy, carbon sequestration.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20091207/mckibben
43**IveStillGotTheNews** on November 24, 2009 at 03:55 PM
I'm not sure which one of our local idiot trolls posted this. It must be one of the smarter ones. Probably not Dufus. They were smart enough to post this tripe under a new name. I'll still save it to the archives as one of the stupidest things posted. Especially this part:
"You thought you had a big win last year but all it really did was expose a guy that you knew had some massive baggage. Obama will ultimately be responsible for the growth of the GOP in numbers you can't imagine. You can kiss your lefty commie asses goodbye for many years to come."
HAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHA
THis from the group of fools that supported George Bush.
AHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH
If you were wondering who is duping the dupes...
Fox Nation Falsely Characterized Reportedly Stolen CRU Emails As "Global Warming's Waterloo"
Limbaugh Distorts Apparently Stolen Emails To Falsely Claim Global Warming Is "Made Up"
http://mediamatters.org/research/200911200051
Is anyone surprised? Fox was set up to spew right-wing propaganda and Rush, well, you all know about Limpballs.
Sad that the dupes are so stupid that they believe this crap.
By DICK MORRIS & EILEEN MCGANN
Dick Morris? Really? Dick Morris?
YOu can't be for real. That idiot is almost as stupid as you guys.
Did you get this off Faux "news"?
Good afternoon, all.
Dobbs mulls White House bid
Politico
Alexander Burns
Nov 24
Former CNN host Lou Dobbs fueled already rampant speculation about his political future Monday, sending the clearest signals yet that he's mulling a bid for president — and leaving third-party political operatives salivating over the possibility of a celebrity recruit for the 2012 campaign...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20091124/pl_politico/29861
So. We're going to have Dobbs running against Beck on the third-party front and the winner of that wrestling match running against Palin in 2012?
What happened to Ron Paul? He's not libertarian enough for Birther Dobbs?
This Dick Morris?
Morris again uses Fox News to raise funds
On Fox News' Hannity, Fox News contributor Dick Morris touted "the work we're trying to do through DickMorris.com" to oppose health care reform and instructed viewers to "go there and help us." Morris has repeatedly used his frequent appearances on Fox News to raise money for conservative political organizations, including those in which he has a financial interest, a practice that also has been followed by Fox News' Mike Huckabee.
http://mediamatters.org/research/200911240023
THAT Dick Morris?
ZERO credibility.
Why would the young be against healthcare reform when they are the ones without any coverage? You conservative dummies don't even know who the uninsured are.
"It puts in jeopardy the whole theory of the new Democratic majority, because young people are essential to that base."
WHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAAHHA
Yeah, and the minorities are gonna vote repelican too!
BWAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAHAHH
LOL!
You stupid trolls crack me up.
hi chicago, it is hilarious that anyone would give any credibility to dickie moron....i can't even count all the times he made super duper solid election predictions that were miles and miles off...
dickie on 10/28/09;
"...If the financial markets stop hogging the headlines and McCain exploits the tax and spending issue he developed (with the considerable aid of Joe the Plumber) it is very possible that he could close the race further, perhaps bringing it to a tie in the next ten days.
This race is far, far from over!..."
hahahahahahahahahaha
change those panty hose dickie and take ann coltface out for some methadone shooters...
if i had the time and interest chicago we could dredge up all the great sally predictions of the past few years but i lack both. sally is already counting her chickens and she doesn't even have any eggs!
bbl.
Perhaps President Obama is a secret member of the teabaggers and is as easily led as the rest of the Birthers....
The Phantom Menace
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: November 22, 2009
A funny thing happened on the way to a new New Deal. A year ago, the only thing we had to fear was fear itself; today, the reigning doctrine in Washington appears to be “Be afraid. Be very afraid.”
What happened? To be sure, “centrists” in the Senate have hobbled efforts to rescue the economy. But the evidence suggests that in addition to facing political opposition, President Obama and his inner circle have been intimidated by scare stories from Wall Street...
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/23/opinion/23krugman.html
I think he's been scared by the neocons, too. Is there anybody in the White House besides the the kids who cares enough about the future to fight for it?
Is that THIS DICK Morris...
Truth Squad: Spotlight on Dick Morris
http://www.healthbeatblog.com/2009/05/truth-squad-spotlight-on-dick-morris-remember-him.html?cid=6a00d8341d843653ef01156fb91ead970c
Dick Morris is a joke. Only real idiots believe the propaganda that comes out of his mouth. Oh yeah, that would Frosty.
-15%
You've got to be kidding. Are you counting all the dead conservatives along with all the Dead Ender Republicans in that poll? Your numbers don't only add up they are imaginary numbers.
If Obama is minus 15, where is Bush? Someplace between anti-matter and Palin territory?
it is Zogby who did the poll...
Then post it and a link instead of Dick Morris' version of the bible.
67SandyH on November 24, 2009 at 04:55 PM
Sandy,
That's why the idiots don't post links. They play "fast and loose" with the facts.
Obama and liberal healthcare have gone down in ALL polls.
Another bogus assessment.
Since we got the 2010 info and rates on our health plan (we used to get a choice of four or five; it's now down to two, expensive and more expensive), I'd sign on for any sort of healthcare reform bill that would stop the bleeding of our standard of living even a little.
You guys on Medicare are living the life of kings compared to the rest of us working people.
Chicago on November 24, 2009 at 05:01 PM
Chicago,
It's more like they make it up as they go along.
I want to know what health care plans our trolls have and who pays for them. Apparently, they have no idea what the middle class worker is paying for minimal coverage.
Most of those young voters that Morris is so confident hate the very idea of reform have no health coverage at all...and a lot of them are working and going to school or working two jobs. The rest of them are in the armed forces getting the least amount of care that a conservatives filibuster can manage to give them.
Depending, of course, on which recent set of numbers you peruse...
List just one besides Rasmussen and a link. You are working off a Republican press release or some bogus Far Right blog. Why can't you argue your point by yourself? Are you that unsure of your own position?
China State Construction nets $100m US subway deal
By Liu Yiyu (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-11-24 08:11
China State Construction Engineering Corp, the largest contractor in China, has bagged a subway ventilation project worth about $100 million in New York's Manhattan area, marking the construction giant's third order in the United States' infrastructure space this year.The contract was given to China Construction American Co, a subsidiary, the Wall Street Journal quoted a source as saying.
"The new project, along with the $410-million Hamilton Bridge project and a $1.7-billion entertainment project it won earlier this year, signals China State Construction's ambition to tap the American construction market," said Li Zhirui, an industry analyst at First Capital Securities.
Li, however, said the order came as no surprise as the US government is spending massively on infrastructure projects.
The three orders only account for about 4 percent of the value of its total orders this year, Li added.
In the first three quarters of this year, the Chinese construction giant signed more than $2 billion worth of contracts in the US market. China State Construction was also the contractor for a high school, a railway station and the Chinese embassy in the US...
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2009-11/24/content_9028469.htm
Whose stupid ass idea was it to allow the Red Chinese to bid on American jobs? Mayor Bloomberg ought to be run out on a rail for this. I wonder how many Chinese illegals will be snuck in for the cheap labor?
Sandy,
Dufus-Dan was the "boss" at McDonalds before he retired. Not McDonalds Corp.; just a store. You know, the job they often give to the teenagers?
So Dufus is kind of sensative about letting people know he has McDonalds-Care. It makes him feel small...
Sandy,
Dufus-Dan was the "boss" at McDonalds before he retired. Not McDonalds Corp.; just a store. You know, the job they often give to the teenagers?
So Dufus is kind of sensitive about letting people know he has McDonalds-Care. It makes him feel small...
Zogby Interactive: Obama Job Approval Holds Steady at 49%
http://www.zogby.com/news/ReadNews.cfm?ID=1767
FRANKFORT, KY (AP) - A Kentucky census worker found naked, bound with duct tape and hanging from a tree with "fed" scrawled on his chest killed himself but staged his death to make it look like a homicide, authorities said Tuesday.
Bill Sparkman, 51, was found Sept. 12 near a cemetery in a heavily wooded area of southeastern Kentucky. A man who found the body in the Daniel Boone National Forest has said Sparkman also was gagged and had an identification badge taped to his neck.Authorities said Sparkman alone manipulated the scene to conceal a suicide. Police said he had talked with others about ending his life, though authorities did not say specifically who in a news release.
Sparkman had recently taken out two life insurance policies that would not pay out for suicide, authorities said. If Sparkman had been killed on the job, his family also would have been be eligible for up to $10,000 in death gratuity payments from the government.
He was not eligible for a separate life insurance policy through the government because his census work was intermittent, Census Bureau spokesman Stephen Buckner has previously said.
The Census Bureau suspended door-to-door interviews in the rural county after Sparkman's body was found...
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9C631A81&show_article=1
The KY State Police is covering for a right wing militia group or some other nefarious person or group in regards to this. The FBI needs to go in to do a proper investigation. This finding is preposterous without further evidence!
Chicago on November 24, 2009 at 05:28 PM
So the German was the HamBurdler?
BobVADemocratHawk on November 24, 2009 at 05:28 PM
Bob,
The Republicans no longer even try to hide the fact that they are selling the country out, do they?
Did you see the story the other day ago about how Kenya is selling the rights to their farmland to other countries? The locals can farm the land, but the crops go straight to the foreign country. The farmer never gets paid for the product he produces. He's just the mule that pulls the plow for token room and board.
Sounds a hell of a lot like colonialism to me.
Bitter harvest
by Joanne Bladd
Friday, 04 September 2009
Gulf nations are gobbling up vast tracts of foreign farmland from developing nations that can ill afford to sell them. Is this much-needed investment, or a thinly-disguised land-grab?...
Land deals are nothing new. But, says Hallam, the buying pattern behind the latest trend is. Traditionally, foreign farmland deals were between private investors and private owners. Now, sales are commonly between government and government, or state-backed buyers.
“What’s different this time is that these [deals] are part of government-led policies. This is very much investing to produce food to ship home, rather than as a general investment policy,” he says...
http://www.arabianbusiness.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=566685&Itemid=1
I guess the multinationals have pretty much done the same in this country. All those "agri-business" conglomerates pretty much ran the American family farmer off their land a generation ago.
Now Bloomberg has us paying China to build the transportation systems necesary to transfer our resources overseas?
Where is all this going to end? With us paying taxes directly to these foreign governments?
The Bush crime family pretty much made sure that foreigners own our "company store" by borrowing all that money from China while they cut taxes on their domestic collaborators in our top 2%. We became a banana republic the moment Reagan stepped into the White House.
Supporting a Communist regime is tantamount to being a Communist sympathizer.
66BobVADemocratHawk on November 24, 2009 at 06:00 PM
Remember when Bush approved the deal contracting port security to Dubai?
That was different. There are federal contracts, state contracts and local government contracts. Maybe we should learn a little bit about what we are talking about before we start blaming Obama.
**IveStillGotTheNews** on November 24, 2009 at 06:07 PM
If you have something you want to debate then do such. Until then, you're just like the rest of the GOP; mouth running all the time to say nothing.
70**IveStillGotTheNews** on November 24, 2009 at 06:07 PM
Just another stupid troll (or one of the regular four under a new name) trying to pretend he is not an idiot... and not doing it well.
BobVADemocratHawk on November 24, 2009 at 05:54 PM
There is something fishy about this whole affair. Why did this guy plan such an elaborate, high-profile political suicide when it would have been easier and less suspect to die in a house explosion from a gas line break or car accident?
**IveStillGotTheNews** on November 24, 2009 at 06:07 PM
We are the tip of the iceberg. You lost in a landslide, remember? Go ahead and try to forget the last eight years of conservative Republican lying, cheating, and incompetence. No one else has.
Chicago on November 24, 2009 at 06:11 PM
I'm not blaming the POTUS for the NY subway contract, I'm blaming Mayor Bloomberg and\or Gov. Patterson (D-NY). The bid was either for the city of NY or the State of NY. And whomever approved the bid, along with the NY law that allows such, is doing nothing more than appeasing and supporting the Red Chinese.
SandyH on November 24, 2009 at 06:19 PM
Furthermore, the report says all he had to do was to stand up to prevent from being choked to death. For all intents and purposes, the KY State Police are saying that he stuck his head underwater and drowned himself or some other impossible act. He would've stood up unless he was unconscious. This is a coverup.
No one does...
You'd be surprised how many remember Bush trying to sell our ports to the Arabs. Even Dobbs was all over it. Do you think he won't remind people when he runs for President?
How about those who are having financial problems...or those who are afraid they are the next ones to be brought down by the Bush Great Depression/TARP/Outsourcing Economy?
Bush is the standard by which all conservatives are now judged by the Silent Majority. You can't wish it away. It sticks out like a sore thumb.
Obama is seen as the "lucky" guy who inherited the mess and must somehow find a way to turn it around by 2012. The Democrats are the ones having to push the Republicans to fix the things they borke.
You stand for the status quo which stinks for the working man and woman. They know it's your fault and your shame. And you are making it abundantly clear that you don't care.
"Screw you" is not a great campaign slogan for the Midterms with the middle class, but that's what your guys in Congress are pushing.
The peckerhead republicans need to grow up. Do these people call themselves adults. They are childish pieces of shit who need to be thrown out of office.
dobbs is not qualified to be president. Who the hell does he think he is? What an ahole.
republicans hate America and Americans.
republicans hate muslims and want to kill them all.
hannity, bush, cheney, rove, cunningham, drudge, sanford, kyl, mcconnell, graham, gramm, demint, cantor, boner, limpballs, coldsore, savage, hatch, delay, frist and sessions are chicken hawks.
most of our other ports are ran by companies located elsewhere...
Run but not owned.
The President has no right to be selling American public lands to foreign governments. I guess the Bush crime family bought up that free water aqueduct in Paraguay, so Bush thought he could sell off our ports like they belong to him personally?
That's the problem with Republicans. They think they personally have the right to make decisions for the rest of us without the votes or any authority.
If these people aren't chicken hawks, I want to see their military discharge. I proudly have mine. I demand that they show theirs or resign. If they can't produce it then they are not qualified to represent the good people of America. I don't give a shit about the assholes they represent.
Is cheney in his bunker at an undisclosed location in dubai with all our money?
johhne on November 24, 2009 at 06:47 PM
And built by Haliburton...
Good night fellow Americans. Keep the Faith and keep the faith. Yes we can, yes we will, and yes we did!
...For all those whose cares have been our concern; the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.
Mammogram cutbacks: Make no mistake, rationing for women has begun
By Elizabeth Lee Vliet
11/24/2009
I am shocked and appalled at the cataclysmic shift in the guidelines to later and less frequent mammograms. This is diametrically opposite from the American Cancer Society guidelines and from what most oncologists and practicing physicians think is needed.
Fundamentally, I do not agree with delaying mammograms to age 50, reducing screening to every two years or stopping mammograms at age 74. I think these new guidelines are detrimental to our goals of getting early detection and prompt treatment for women with breast cancer.
Even more ominous, the recommendation to start mammograms at age 50 instead of age 40 comes at a time when physicians are seeing younger women developing breast cancer. It makes no sense to suddenly decide to wait until an older age to screen for breast cancer when we know that survival is improved the earlier the diagnosis is made and treatment is begun.
It makes no sense, that is, unless you realize that this change is designed primarily to cut costs, not improve women's health. This may be the start of government-mandated guideline-based rationing of health care. Women are the first group to suffer when cost-cutting takes precedence over sound medical care....
You get the feeling that this was just another concession made to the insurance companies before the health care reform vote. Why are we allowing them to gamble over the health of American women to keep profits high?
I can't believe that the timing on this is not calculated for political expediency.
77BobVADemocratHawk on November 24, 2009 at 06:22 PM
BobVA,
We're good.
Hi, Johne.
Have you heard the latest about Obama's decision on Afghanistan? I'm willing to listen to what he has to say, but he's got to come up with a really good explanation for wanting to send more troops into harm's way. While I can understand having to multitask handling all of Bush's mistakes, I don't understand why one needs to make them worse.
The President better have a new threat to explain why he wants to risk the lives of our troops than the old failed one Bush used. We don't have to "finish" anything that was a mistake.
You just hit the abort button and get the hell out of the cockpit of a plane which is going down in flames. There isn't even an enemy on the ground in Afghanistan that would hold us prisoner if we bailed out. They just want ALL foreigners to leave.
If the Taliban were stupid enough to invited Al Queada back in, we just pay the other war lords a bounty for every scalp they produce. That's the way things are done in that part of the world. Why must we always fight other cultures instead of acknowledging them?
Goodnight Bob,
Sandy,
ronnie reegan started this. The American people own millions of acres in the west and reegan suddenly had the idea that he could make money for his real estate friends so he proposed to sell it all. Thank God that reason prevailed and it did not get sold by this pissaant.
We own millions of acres of land managed by the Bureau of Land Management. We also own millions of acres managed by the U.S. Forest Service and the National Park Service. It's a wonder that chimp didn't try to sell it all off to his buddies. Who needs government?
HEY, you who has more Faux news !
Before you go peddling lies on here, you might not want to post shit that can be checked.
GOP blog has ZERO comments. Redstate 4-5. THIS is why Repugs lost the last 2 elections. No unity, no exchange of ideas, not a brain between them.
Your Daddy might be a millionaire (huh), but I bet big bucks he shakes his head when he looks at you, and wonders 'how did THIS loser beat out a million other sperms"! What a disappointment you must be
johhne on November 24, 2009 at 07:31 PM
Reagan started it all.
I figured as much. These Republicans think they are royalty...or at least some sort of privileged celebrities or movie stars. Palin comes from a long line of these egotists.
Look at how the K and C Street crooks were buying and selling influence all over the place while they imagined themselves as biblical figures like King David. Cheating on your wife and bribery is O.K. if you "think" you might have God's favor?
Conservatives have family values alright...crime family values.
I see ole Dougie Hoffman in NY conceded again!!!
How humiliating !!! Palin's radical right wing buddy just couldn't take NO for an answer!!!
Hi.
In all the years of reading this site, here is the most intelligent comment ever made by the backwards backwoods MN sockpuppet clown:
l
94
**Frosted Flake** on November 24, 2009 at 07:40 PM
Bye.
Palin not Prepared for ANYTHING having to do with our National government !!
top adviser to John McCain's presidential campaign revealed that a joint interview with McCain and Sarah Palin planned for Univision last fall had to be canceled because Palin wasn't prepared.
"She did not feel comfortable speaking about issues regarding Hispanics and Latin America," GOP consultant Ana Navarro said. "Those are not topics that come up frequently in Alaska. So she asked to cancel the interview and, unfortunately, you were already there."
Jason Recher, a senior campaign adviser to Palin now working on her book tour, dismissed the story and took a shot at Navarro for dwelling on last year's news. According to Recher, Palin was ready to talk about Hispanic issues. But McCain's advisers canceled the interview because she was not familiar with McCain's complicated record in the area.
"Nobody's sitting around talking about the 2008 campaign except for the people who lost it," he said.
But Navarro isn't the only person who worked with Palin speaking out this week. Ex-aide John Bitney said Palin turned him into a "fictional character" in her book and compared his former boss to a "sociopath."
OH, AND DON'T MISS THIS ONE FOR SURE! Palin supporters cannot express WHY they support Palin. I think they just don't want to use the expressions---I AM A RACIST. I AM A RADICAL RELIGIOUS FREAK WHO LIKE WITCH DOCTORS TOO.
Chase Whitestead and Erick Stroll of "New Left Media" set out to determine just what was it about Sarah Palin that impelled her supporters to stand in massive lines for hours for the chance to meet her at book signings.
They interviewed several of her supporters who were waiting in line at a Borders bookstore in Columbus, Ohio. These fans expressed very strong support for Palin, but it was mostly couched in vague generalities about her being "real" and "strong" and "fair."
When pressed to cite specific policies that they favored or thought qualified her for the presidency, most of her fans struggled to come up with anything other than generic lines about cutting taxes and spending and the Palin staple: "drill, baby, drill."
On the other hand, they were all worried that President Obama has been doing enormous damage to the country. However, again, specifics eluded them.
WATCH THE VIDEO---SEE IT WITH YOUR OWN EYES:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/23/palin-supporters-struggle_n_367800.html
This BS sending in 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan, is insane. All were going to do is get more of are young killed.
It took about 500,000 troops to liberate the tiny country of Kuwait.
If were going to liberate, Afghanistan, it will take more then that, in that rugged Country. Probably at least a million.
Sending in only 40,000 troops, is a joke, and will only provide more targets for the Taliban.
And we won't accomplish a damn thing.
PamB on November 24, 2009 at 07:43 PM
Hi, Pam.
Now these losers fancy themselves millionaires? That's why healthcare costs don't bother them?
I guess there are enough stupid conservatives that are millionaires. But most of them wouldn't lower themselves to look at the DNC site much less talk to the little people on the blog.
We're stuck with the grifters of the Birther movement.
PALIN FOOLING NOBODY ANY OF THE TIME
"Last fall it seemed as if Sarah Palin would light a fuse and cause a social explosion. Behind her beauty-pageant smile lurked the shadow, the dark side of human nature. Her tactic of appealing to the worst impulses of the electorate had a long history in the Republican Party. Indeed, Palin inherited the selfish, mean-spirited values of another politician with a gleaming smile, Ronald Reagan.
When it first dawned in American politics, the shadow was shocking. Values were turned upside down. The AIDS crisis? Ignore it. They deserve what they got. The deficit? Doesn't matter as long as the rich get what they want. Huge unemployment and falling incomes among the working class? Feed them crank social issues so they have someone to hate. Palin breathes this noxious atmosphere like the clear air of Alaska and thrives on it.
Now, however, Palin brings a smile. When she quit her job as governor, it was obvious that someone had whispered in her ear, "You're fading. Soon you'll be a nobody. Grab the money while you can." And so she did, earning a hefty advance, much of which, fittingly, goes to paying off lawsuits related to her ethical violations while in office. The shadow that seemed so dangerous a year ago has been defanged, reduced to spiteful backbiting against the McCain campaign, the very people who gave Palin her spot in the limelight to begin with.
I hope the left will take a deep breath and stop treating Palin like a diabolical force. The American character has always had a large dose of orneriness in it, and the more ornery you were, the farther west you moved. Alaska has a reputation for being an icebox for malcontents. Palin came straight from the source, and countless Americans root for her. In hard times, being the bellyacher-in-chief is a valid role. Hence the rise of Glenn Beck.
But nobody is being fooled. A recent Gallup poll showed that 67% of responders don't want Palin to run for president. Fear of Palin is ill-advised on two counts. First, fear is what the shadow wants. Without it, the shadow has no power. Second, the left needs to learn how to win graciously. The current upheaval in American society, which has been an enormous threat on many fronts, called forth a president and a constituency that knows how to handle crisis. The voices of sanity are prevailing. The solutions that have emerged on all fronts -- economic, social, and international -- represent the best in the American character.
But you can't expect everyone to join the party. As long as we know that Palin is fooling nobody all of the time, the darker side can be tolerated. The shadow is always with us. Today it's on a book tour.
Published in the San Francisco Chronicle
Sandy, It is like I have said many times---REAL Conservatives, those who joined the GOP Party because they thought we needed smaller government, and fewer taxes, Are not stooping to coming into the DNC blog, to attack, post racist and vile comments.
Have you ever seen ONE SINGLE positive remark made by these trolls, that boosted up their party or their leaders? NONE ! NADA. ZERO.
So these are not your true Conservative members of the GOP. these are those Angry, unreasonable, uninformed, Tea baggers and birthers. Not a brain in their heads, only hate in their hearts.
Things must be slow on the RNC newswire today. Dick Morris is the best you can post...over and over again?
I'm going to see if Tom DeLay wins "Dancing with the Stars" tonight. The closest he'll ever get is a guest spot at a Teabagger event waltzing around with Dick Armey or a bit part on an alumni show tap dancing with Larry Craig.
Good night, everyone. Catch you later.
President Bush says he will veto any legislative effort to delay the takeover,
The reason this deal is attracting so much attention is that Dubai Ports is owned by an Arab government that has links to terrorism. The United Arab Emirates was home to two of the Sept. 11 hijackers and was a financial base for the operation. UAE has also been implicated in a nuclear smuggling ring: It was identified as a transfer point for nuclear components from Pakistani scientists to Iran, Libya and North Korea.
But some Republicans aren't siding with the administration, either. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said the deal raised "serious questions regarding the safety and security of our homeland
WHAT PART OF THIS, YOU OLD FAT HOG, DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND. HE FOUGHT TOOTH AND NAIL TO KEEP HIS TERRORIST FRIENDLY BUDDIES IN THIS DEAL!LOOK UP THE WORD VETO!
TRY THIS ONE ON FOR SIZE, YOU FREAK!
"WASHINGTON - The Bush administration secretly required a company in the United Arab Emirates to cooperate with future U.S. investigations before approving its takeover of operations at six American ports, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press. It chose not to impose other, routine restrictions.
As part of the $6.8 billion purchase, state-owned Dubai Ports World agreed to reveal records on demand about “foreign operational direction” of its business at U.S. ports, the documents said. Those records broadly include details about the design, maintenance or operation of ports and equipment.
The administration did not require Dubai Ports to keep copies of business records on U.S. soil, where they would be subject to court orders. It also did not require the company to designate an American citizen to accommodate U.S. government requests. Outside legal experts said such obligations are routinely attached to U.S. approvals of foreign sales in other industries.
The conditions involving the sale of London-based Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co., also known as P&O, were detailed in U.S. documents marked “confidential.” Such records are regularly guarded as trade secrets, and it is highly unusual for them to be made public.
The concessions — described previously by the Homeland Security Department as unprecedented among maritime companies — reflect the close relationship between the United States and the United Arab Emirates.
For Bush, an emerging headache
President Bush’s marquee issue, the war on terrorism, is being used against him by Democrats and rebelling members of his own party in a donnybrook that may prove to be a major headache in an election year.
In a sign of the growing bipartisan opposition to the pending sale of shipping operations at six major U.S. seaports to a state-owned business in the United Arab Emirates, lawmakers on Wednesday ratcheted up their displeasure with President Bush, some saying that they could override a threatened presidential veto.
On the heels of debacles over government eavesdropping, Katrina recovery and Vice President Cheney’s hunting accident, people in both parties are suggesting the port security issue is another case of Bush appearing to be tone deaf to controversy
Bush brushed aside objections by leaders in the Senate and House that the $6.8 billion sale could raise risks of terrorism at American ports. In a forceful defense of his administration’s earlier approval of the deal, he pledged Tuesday to veto any bill from Congress that would block the sale of a British company to the Arab firm.
The deal would put Dubai Ports World in charge of major shipping operations in New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami and Philadelphia.
(IF YOU BELIEVE BUSH KNEW NOTHING ABOUT THIS, I HAVE SOME LAND IN THE EVERGLADES I AM LOOKING TO SELL. CALL ME)
Heading out Dems......
Time to spend some time with the family!
blog ya tomorrow.
Commodity Futures Trading Commission Chairman Gary Gensler seems like a Washington rarity: He apologizes for his mistakes.
Gensler, during his stint in the Clinton administration, pushed for the deregulation that helped to set in motion the financial crisis of the past couple of years. But he’s since seen the error of his ways.
“Looking back now,” Gensler said, reiterating a similar statement he made in Monday’s USA Today, “we should have done more to help protect the American public.”
Now the CFTC chairman is pushing for transparency in the over-the-counter derivatives market, home to the now infamous credit-default swaps that ruined so many banks.
Given that these OTC derivatives played a big part in the worst meltdown since the Great Depression, Gensler said, “We need to do this.”
Cramer’s been using his Mad Money pulpit to push for similar changes, which is why he invited Gensler onto the show. Watch the video for the full interview and for a complete outline of the CFTC chair’s proposal.
PamB on November 24, 2009 at 08:17 PM
Pam,
They're teabaggers. None of the angry old geezers or young smart alecks who come in here as trolls has any allegiance to the Republican Party.
Most Republicans don't even have any allegiance to their party these days.
It's always been about looking out for their own personal financial interests with these people rather than any conservative ideology. The Republican Party is based on superiority complexes, greed, and racism in the 21st century.
Abortion, guns control, and tax cuts (which only benefit the wealthy) are just wedge issues to manipulate the brain-challenged.
bye
The controversy pertained to management contracts of six major United States ports. The purchaser was DP World (DPW), a state-owned company in the UAE. The contracts had already been foreign-owned, by Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O), a British firm taken over by DPW (completed in March 2006). Although the sale was approved by the executive branch of the United States Government, various United States political figures argued that the takeover would compromise U.S. port security.
U.S. President George W. Bush argued vigorously for the approval of the deal, claiming that the delay sends the wrong message to U.S. allies. Legislation was introduced to the United States Congress to delay the sale.
...
On February 22, 2006, President Bush threatened to veto any legislation passed by Congress to block the deal, a veto that would be his first. In a statement to reporters, Bush claimed, "It would send a terrible signal to friends and allies not to let this transaction go through.
...
On February 24, 2006, it was reported[8] that there are 22 U.S. ports in the deal, not just the six major ports mentioned in initial news stories and reports. According to the website of P&O Ports, the port-operations subsidiary of P&O, DPW would take over stevedore services at 12 East Coast ports including Portland, Maine; Boston, Massachusetts; Davisville, Rhode Island; New York City; Newark, New Jersey; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Camden, New Jersey; Wilmington, Delaware; Baltimore, Maryland; and Virginia locations at Newport News, Norfolk, and Portsmouth.
Additionally, DPW will take over P&O stevedoring operations at nine ports along the Gulf of Mexico including the Texas ports of Beaumont, Port Arthur, Galveston, Houston, Freeport, and Corpus Christi, plus the Louisiana ports of Lake Charles and New Orleans.
Former Senate Majority Leader and 1996 Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole hired by Dubai Ports World to lobby Congress on its behalf against bipartisan criticism of the deal. Mr. Dole is a special counsel in the Washington office of the law firm of Alston & Bird. DP World hired the firm in 2005 to help shepherd its purchase of the British-based firm Peninsular and Oriental.
On March 8, 2006 the House Panel voted 62–2 to block the deal, and senator Charles Schumer added amendments to a senate bill to block the deal, causing an uproar in the senate.
On March 9, 2006, Dubai Ports World released a statement saying they would turn over operation of U.S. ports to a U.S. "Entity". Later that same day, American Enterprise Institute scholar Norm Ornstein reported on PBS's "News Hour" that DP World was considering selling its U.S. operations to Halliburton.
Dubai Ports World eventually sold P&O's American operations to American International Group's asset management division, Global Investment Group for an undisclosed sum.
Although the sale was approved by the executive branch of the United States Government...
The executive branch of the United States government consists of the president, the vice president and 15 Cabinet-level executive departments.
The indicted felon is on dancing with the drug addicts tonight. They are treating him like royalty. What is wrong with this picture. I guess there is a large part of our population who doesn't give a shit what kind of character a person has so long as they are on television and applauded by the half wits who adore half wits.
Stephanie Miller was saying this morning that texas passed a law banning gay marriage. It turns out that they f**ked themselves because it seems that it bans all marriage in texas. Talk about stupid. Go figure.
Asshole limpballs must have spent his entire show today bitching about global warming. Why is this
"guy" such an asshole?
It is getting bad with getting a hotspot and posting things. I had to keep shutting down programs in order to do anything. After I shut down some programs the sites start working.
I think we need to add troops to Afghanistan with a strategy to shore up the Afghan government with them making positive changes in taking over the fight right away. If they do not, then we need to reverse ourselves and withdraw.
Here is a true American company. They could just as easily sent their manufacturing to Mexico of south carolina like other fascist companies.
Tesla to open electric car factory in SoCal
By DAISY NGUYEN
Associated Press Writer
DOWNEY, Calif. (AP) -- The mayor of Downey says the city is close to making a deal with Tesla Motors to build an electric car plant in a former NASA manufacturing complex.
Mayor Mario Guerra says Tuesday that he has called an emergency City Council meeting to approve a memorandum of understanding with the private owners the 80-acre complex. If approved, the memorandum could facilitate a lease agreement with Tesla.
The San Carlos-based carmaker is looking for a factory to build its electric sedan, the Model S.
Calls to a Tesla spokeswoman were not immediately returned.
Downey is about 20 miles southeast of Los Angeles.
The cheap bastards who own boeing aircraft are sending going to open another plant to build the 787 in south assholina. It seems that the workers in south assholina voted to leave eliminate the machinists union and enticed boeing to move there to save money.
boeing has been in Washington State since 1916 and I think it is criminal to move so the ceo can make more money. Their asshole governor also threw in $400 million probably using stimulus funds illegally to entice them there.
http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSTRE5896ZJ20090910
Before WWII, the federal government built the Bonneville Power Administration Coolidge Dam. They built it partially to provide electricity to produce Aluminum for war planes. I wonder when they are going to be lured away from Washington State by the Tennessee Valley Authority (which was also built by the taxpayer) f**king Washington State once again.
Walton OKs bed tax bump for Southwest promotion
DeFUNIAK SPRINGS —Walton County will use 90 percent of all of the funds it raises through a bed-tax hike that went into effect last month to help promote Walton and Bay counties to travelers who fly to the Emerald Coast on Southwest Airlines.
The board of county commissioners voted at Tuesday’s meeting to approve an agreement with Southwest that essentially mirrors one signed last week between the airline and the Bay County Tourist Development Council.
http://www.newsherald.com/news/southwest-79377-bed-springs.html
How is it that Florida counties can help only one company Southwest with its bed tax? Is this not the city government using its power to support a corporation?
Younpoet,
That doesn't sound fair at all. Just like sanford in south carolina using $400 million in tax money to bribe boeing aircraft to move there.
walmart pulls a lot of this crap. Years ago (1980's) when walmart was moving into small towns destroying small mom and pop businesses, my city paid them $1 million to come to town. They used my tax money to destroy home town businesses. A lot of that goes on and it certainly doesn't seem fair to me to use our tax money to bribe companies to move to a city or state.
David,
Try clearing your temp internet files and your cookies. (Maybe even reboot after.)
Do not shut down running programs unless you know exactly what they do.
Plumbing products firm builds energy-efficient molding plant
PANAMA CITY BEACH, FLA. (Nov. 20, 9:30 a.m. ET) -- Plumbing and water products manufacturer Coast Water Efficient Technology LLC is retrofitting a 90,000-square-foot facility in Panama City Beach that will serve as the company’s new corporate and manufacturing headquarters.
The company is relocating from Pomona, Calif. to Panama City, and expects the new facility to be a model for energy-efficient injection molding plants. It will open by the middle of 2010.
http://www.wjhg.com/news/headlines/73079437.html
Kady questions legality of Coast WET package
PANAMA CITY — With only one item, the agenda for Tuesday’s Community Redevelopment Agency meeting looked light. Looks, however, can be deceiving.
By the end of the night, there was a board member calling for an attorney general’s opinion regarding the legality of a $1.6 million incentive package the taxpayer-funded CRA has proposed offering Coast WET, a company that announced last week it was relocating to Panama City, and a special commission meeting scheduled for today.
http://www.newsherald.com/news/panama-79376-city-questions.html
It is amazing that Panama City can afford to give a private company an incentive this large, I wonder what else the city is giving away?
I want to support a program to recruit and fund candidates to oppose the turncoat Democrats opposing healthcare reform.
I would rather have Republicans holding these seats than have people that side with the enemies of everyday Americans posing as their friends.
It is time for all Americans to get involved and quit letting fat cats run their lives while they rob them blind. It is obviously hard enough to get the word out without having the deception of these double agents adding to the confusion.
If blue-collar working class people can be talked into voting against their own and their children's economic future as they have for the last thirty years, we do not need "Democrats" carrying water for health insurance companies or anyone else that sides with those who've sucked trillions out of our econonomy so a few can make billions. The vast amount of money that disappeared over the last thirty years came from the pockets of American workers and went into the pockets of Chinese workers, their robber baron overlords and their communist government.
Democrats are for working people. It is that simple, and to succeed we need to keep the message that simple. And when elected Democrats say that to our face and take money from our enemies in exchange for screwing us, we need to get rid of them immediately. Only then can we get the everyday Americans who've been tricked into supporting their economic enemies to understand how impportant it is to vote for their pocketbook and not be tricked by side issues and the double-dealing double-talk we get wtih people like Lincoln, Landrieu, Nelson, and Lieberman.
johhne on November 24, 2009 at 10:31 PM
I agree, why is it that our cities and states offering incentives to large corporations and large and small family businesses are denied the same deal. It is like our politicians are segregating who can get their help, so they can reap in the benefits in campaign contributions.
I am surprised a small board in a county can make these huge deals without much oversight.
133
pwg432 on November 24, 2009 at 10:46 PM
You are so right. It's about time we removed lobbyists from Washington, ban all campaign funds from donors, fund all election campaigns using public funds and set term limits for Congress and maybe even the Supreme Court. Maybe this would set us on the right track again.
pwg432,
Thom Hartman is really into this train of thought. As you may know, he is a very intelligent individual and has written several books about this subject. I am not sure it was him or someone else who is favoring going back to local banks rather than huge banks like B of A, or Wells Fargo who don't always have our best interests at heart
nerdish/libertarian/wing nut takes the pipe un-un-conceding....he was the first political spawn of the palin/beck/rush team who attracted various weak kneed hangers on such as pawltry as he rushed to his destiny...hahahahahahahaha
"Doug Hoffman will not contest the results of New York's 23rd District special election, the state Conservative Party candidate announced in a release Tuesday afternoon.
After "un-conceding" the race last week and stirring talk of an election challenge, Hoffman acknowledged that the final count of absentee ballots, completed Monday, "re-affirm the fact that Bill Owens won.""
136johhne on November 24, 2009 at 11:11 PM
Johnne,
One thing the health care debate is proving for the American voter is that a large part of our government is owned and operated by the Insurance industry. The repelican party is owned in its entirety by the health insurance companies. The health insurance industry has managed to purchase just enough of the Democratic party as to hamper the interests of the American people. When you have a representative such as Lierman who is supposed to represent the PEOPLE of his state siding with the insurance companies which have a lot of clout in his state it makes it very clear that the people who elected him are not being represented.
WE are no longer a government of, by, or for the people.
WE need to take our country back.
It would be unheard of if Democrats supported a repelican filibuster. If Lierman supports the filibuster he should be stripped of his chairman seat. The three democrats that are threatening to join the filibuster should be stripped of any seats on any committee. They should be roundly boo'ed any time they come to the floor to speak. They should be outcasts. They should be challenged in primaries and the Democratic party should fund their primary challengers. If they want to vote nay on the bill, that is their right. But to vote to support a repelican filibuster is unheard of and completely unacceptable.
Technology News: Green Tech: Leaked Emails Fuel Climate-Change Firestorm
'Taken Out of Context'
Scientists charge that their comments are being distorted and taken out of context.
A post on the RealClimate blog, for example, disputes many of the accusations being thrown about as a result of the hack.
Kevin Trenberth, head of the climate analysis section at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, is one of the climate scientists affected by the hack.
Some 102 emails included in the stolen materials name Trenberth -- either as the main recipient or CC'd -- and "anything being picked up is being cherry-picked and taken out of context," he told TechNewsWorld.
Trying to "Muddy the Waters'
Indeed, "I think what's most important to remember is that there's an overwhelming scientific consensus that human emissions of greenhouse gases are changing our climate," Bill Magavern, director of Sierra Club California, told TechNewsWorld.
"There is a relatively small but very fervent band of deniers who will do anything they can to protect the fossil fuel industries and try to muddy the waters of the science," Magavern explained. "I think that's the context in which this is playing out."
That small band, in fact, is "now trying to make this much bigger than it is and use it for their agenda of preventing real change that could curb global warming," he added.
In truth, however, "there's nothing in this information that undermines the real scientific consensus about global warming," he concluded.
UK hack reveals climate science's ugly side, little more
The document trove makes it clear that scientists communicate on three levels: in common and emotional terminology during personal conversation, which gets translated to detached and technical terms when writing papers, which (ideally) is phrased in cautious language and analogy when presented to the public. The hackers have basically short-circuited that process, and given the public a window into the messy world of day-to-day scientific communications.
Hacked climate e-mails awkward, not game changer
For one thing, the researchers involved were only a handful out of thousands across the world that have contributed to a vast convergence of data that shows the world has warmed.
"Whilst some of the e-mails show scientists to be all too human, nothing I have read makes me doubt the veracity of the peer review process or the general warming trend in the global temperature recorded," said Piers Forster, an environment professor at the University of Leeds.
Analyst Book doesn't see it changing the debate in the U.S. Congress where with few exceptions lawmakers have moved past the issue of whether mankind was warming the planet.
Lawmakers reached that conclusion even before the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued an assessment by thousands of scientists around the world that concluded in 2007 that warming was real and more than 90 percent certain that it was caused by man-made gases.
Book said "there are many reasons why the climate bill could choke, but it won't be about a group of e-mails."
Hacked E-Mails Fuel Global Warming Debate
An online debate over global warming science has broken out after an unknown hacker broke into the e-mail server at a prominent, British climate-research center, stole more than a thousand e-mails about global warming research and posted them online.
Global warming skeptics are seizing on portions of the messages as evidence that scientists are colluding and warping data to fit the theory of global warming, but researchers say the e-mails are being taken out of context and just show scientists engaged in frank discussion. [...]
But Trenberth, who acknowledged the e-mail is genuine, says bloggers are missing the point he’s making in the e-mail by not reading the article cited in it. That article – An Imperative for Climate Change Planning (.pdf) — actually says that global warming is continuing, despite random temperature variations that would seem to suggest otherwise.
Barbi,
Good to see you. And good post. Thamk you for clearing that up for all of us.
Seven Global Warming Misconceptions
The 26 world class climatologists who wrote the Copenhagen Diagnosis decided to dispel seven of the most common of them in the report, which is the first comprehensive update of leading peer-reviewed climate science in the three years since the last report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was finalized.
They include enough detail -- though in plain language -- to communicate with common folk and policy makers alike.
Here are condensed versions of their explanations, with page-number references to the report. The full report can be read here.
QUESTION: Is the atmosphere already filled up -- saturated -- with enough CO2 so that any more won't add much warming?
ANSWER: "No, not even remotely. It isn't even saturated on the runaway greenhouse planet Venus, with its atmosphere made up of 92 percent CO2." They explain how adding more CO2 will keep warming Earth, and in the not too distant future, could warm it far beyond temperatures that civilization is prepared for. (p. 12)
QUESTION: "Has global warming recently slowed down or paused?"
ANSWER: "No. There is no indication in the data of a slowdown or pause in the human-caused warming trend." That data reflects fully the natural year-to-year up-and-down readings caused partly by natural "short-term variability" that "always has and always will be present in the climate system." (p. 15)
QUESTION: "Can solar activity or other natural processes explain global warming?
ANSWER: "No. The incoming solar radiation has been almost constant over the past 50 years, apart from the well-known 11-year solar cycle. In fact, it has slightly decreased over this period." The scientists explain that the known natural cycles and processes are accounted for in climate models. (p. 15)
QUESTION: "Isn't Antarctica cooling and Antarctic sea ice increasing?"
ANSWER: "Antarctica is not cooling. It has warmed overall for at least the past 50 years." They explain how, overall, Antarctic sea ice cover (frozen sea surface), for separate reasons involving wind changing in relation to the location of certain warming sea water currents, shows a slight upward trend, though it also shows significant melting in some areas. They also explain how the "sea ice extent around Antarctica" is very different from the sea ice in the Arctic because the Arctic is not covered by land, but by ocean, albeit mostly frozen most of the time, whereas Antarctica is a vast continent covered by massive ice sheets with the South Pole at its center. (p. 35)
QUESTION: "Isn't climate always changing, even without human interference?"
ANSWER: "Of course. But past climate changes are no cause for complacency." The scientists explain how Earth's history of climate change is precisely why scientists are so worried, since it shows both that rapid and extreme climate change has happened before and that it could easily be triggered now by human heat-trapping emissions. (p. 47)
QUESTION: "Are we just in a natural warming phase, recovering from the 'Little Ice Age'?"
ANSWER: "No. A 'recovery' of climate is not a scientific concept, since the climate does not respond like a pendulum that swings back after it was pushed in one direction. Rather, the climate responds like a pot of boiling water on the stove: it can only get warmer if you add heat." The study explains why Earth's current rapid warming is not a natural "recovery." (p. 48)
QUESTION: "Didn't CO2 rise after the warming that ended ice ages, thus showing that the melting of the ice ages -- and thus all global warming -- was not from CO2?
ANSWER: That's precisely why scientists are so worried, the report's authors explain. They know that the highly regular ice ages are caused primarily not by CO2 increases and decreases in the atmosphere but by well known wobbles in the earth's rotation -- over tens of thousands of years. What's so frightening to them is that after one of the regular warming periods begins, they can see (in air bubbles trapped in glaciers from those past times) that CO2 starts increasing, and they know that this is because of the warming and thawing of vast natural stores of carbon dioxide in the oceans -- as well as in the frozen or frigid earth of the northern tundra. Since CO2 is also a greenhouse gas -- a warming agent -- it then warms the earth even further, thawing out even more gas. The problem is that today, humankind is putting enormous amounts of the same gas in the air by burning fossil fuels and deforestation, warming the planet even further, thus thawing out even more natural stores of greenhouse gas in what they call a feedback loop. This process warms the earth even more, thawing out even more CO2. It is driving the temperature towards levels dangerous for civilization, they say. (p. 49)
--->Chicago on November 24, 2009 at 11:53 PM
Hi, Chicago.
So much for "no MSM" news, eh?
Sally should head out of the wingnut alley. But with its head stuck so far up its arse, it's too blind to see.
Evening Barbi.
It's 24.5 degrees here and supposed to get down to 18 tonight. We are at 5300 foot elevation and about 100 miles east of the Continental Divide.
It's been very dry just like the global warming experts predicted.
November 24, 2009
Pelosi keeps door open on war tax
Posted: November 24th, 2009 07:52 PM ET
From CNN Congressional Producer Deirdre Walsh
Speaker Pelosi said Tuesday that 'there is serious unrest' in the House Democratic Caucus over funding the Afghanistan war.
Washington (CNN) - Speaker Nancy Pelosi kept the door open Tuesday to a proposal by several senior House Democrats to impose a graduated surtax on American taxpayers to finance the war in Afghanistan.
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/
Absolutely right, Nancy.
They got the Bush tax cuts for the top 1%.
It's time they started to "poney up" for the benefits they have reaped. Someone must pay for Bush's wars. It aught to be Bush and his cronies.
Chicago,
If I remember correctly President Johnson imposed a 5% surtax to pay for the Vietnam War. It certainly makes sense.
148johhne on November 25, 2009 at 12:08 AM
Johnne,
SOMEONE must pay for Bush's wars. I think it should be those with the most expendable capital. Makes sense.
G'nite, Chicago.
Jeebus, JohnE!
It's 51 degrees here! And so humid it's foggy.
JohnE,
I forgot to add that this is as warm as it's probably going to be, at least for a while. We have 40s in the forecast, for our day high temps for the next week!
That's okay. I'm not ready for snow, anyway. Not that I ever am.
Record highs far outpace record lows across US
Daily record high temperatures occurred twice as often as record lows over past decade
Spurred by a warming climate, daily record high temperatures occurred twice as often as record lows over the last decade across the continental United States, new research shows.
The ratio of record highs to lows is likely to increase dramatically in coming decades if emissions of greenhouse gases continue to climb.
Results of the research, by authors at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colo., Climate Central, The Weather Channel, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), has been accepted for publication in the American Geophysical Union journal Geophysical Research Letters.
"Climate change is making itself felt in terms of day-to-day weather in the United States," says NCAR scientist Gerald Meehl, the lead author. "The ways these records are being broken show how our climate is already shifting."
The research was funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), NCAR's sponsor, the U.S. Department of Energy, and Climate Central.
"This intriguing study provides new evidence of climate change," says Steve Nelson, NSF program director for NCAR. "And it's change that's affecting our daily lives."
If temperatures were not warming, the number of record daily highs and lows being set each year would be approximately even.
Instead, for the period from January 1, 2000, to September 30, 2009, the continental United States set 291,237 record highs and 142,420 record lows, as the country experienced unusually mild winter weather and intense summer heat waves.
A record daily high means that temperatures were warmer on a given day than on that same date throughout a weather station's history.
The authors used a quality control process to ensure the reliability of data from thousands of weather stations across the country, while looking at data over the past six decades to capture longer-term trends.
This decade's warming was more pronounced in the western United States, where the ratio was more than two to one, than in the eastern United States, where the ratio was about one-and-a-half to one.
The study also found that the two-to-one ratio across the country as a whole could be attributed more to a comparatively small number of record lows than to a large number of record highs.
This indicates that much of the nation's warming is occurring at night, when temperatures are dipping less often to record lows.
This finding is consistent with years of climate model research showing that higher overnight lows should be expected with climate change.
In addition to surveying actual temperatures in recent decades, Meehl and his co-authors turned to a sophisticated computer model of global climate to determine how record high and low temperatures are likely to change during the course of this century.
Goodnight Barbi and Chicago.
One more workday they off for four days.
East Antarctic ice sheet melting faster than expected 23/11/2009
...A new study shows that the world's largest ice shelf has lost almost 60 billion tonnes of ice per year for the past three years.
It's in eastern Antarctica, long thought to be largely unaffected by climate change.
The new study by scientists at the University of Texas uses measurements from NASA satellites.
The scientists say that if this ice sheet continues to melt it may cause sea levels to rise sooner than expected.
Antarctica Loses Ice From Eastern Sheet, Study Shows
Antarctica is losing ice from its larger eastern side as well as the western part, an indication the southernmost continent may add “significantly more” to rising seas, researchers in Texas said.
The eastern sheet, 10 times the size of the western one, lost about 57 billion metric tons of ice a year from 2002 to 2009, contributing to the continent’s total annual average loss of about 190 billion tons, scientists at the University of Texas at Austin said in the journal Nature Geoscience.
United Nations scientists in 2007 said most of Antarctica’s contribution to rising sea levels amid global warming comes from the western sheet, with the eastern side either holding steady or gaining mass. The continent holds enough ice to raise sea levels by about 57 meters (187 feet), though melting isn’t likely for thousands of years, according to the UN.
“The east Antarctic ice sheet is the largest chunk of ice on Earth,” the study’s lead author, Jianli Chen, a geophysicist at the University of Texas, said today in a telephone interview. “If the current signal is confirmed in the future, it could pose a more significant contribution to global sea level.”
Since 2006, Antarctica’s ice loss may be as high as 220 billion tons a year, the University of Texas scientists said in the paper. Ice loss for the 2002 through 2005 period averaged 144 billion tons a year, Chen said.
East Antarctic ice began to melt faster in 2006
East Antarctica's ice started to melt faster from 2006, which could cause sea levels to rise sooner than anticipated, according to a study by scientists at the University of Texas.
In the study published in Nature's Geoscience journal, scientists estimated that East Antarctica has been losing ice mass at an average rate of 5 to 109 gigatonnes per year from April 2002 to January 2009, but the rate speeded up from 2006.
The melt rate after 2006 could be even higher, the scientists said.
"The key result is that [we] appear to start seeing a large amount of ice loss in East Antarctica, mostly in the long coastal regions (in Wilkes Land and Victoria Land), since 2006," Jianli Chen at the university's centre for space research and one of the study's authors, told Reuters.
"This, if confirmed, could indicate a state change of East Antarctica, which could pose a large impact on global sea levels in the future," Chen said.
Previous estimates for East Antarctica projected anywhere between a 4 gigatonne per year loss and a 22 gigatonne per year gain, according to the report.
The full study is available at www.nature.com/ngeo.
Climate change is turning Antarctica's ice into the one of the biggest risks for coming centuries. Even slight melting could drive up sea levels and could affect world's cities.
Rising temperatures are thought to be the main cause of melting ice, and world leaders are under pressure to agree on a new climate treaty at an upcoming U.N. summit in Copenhagen to curb global warming.
MELTDOWN
The scientists used satellite observations of gravity change over the period April 2002 to January 2009 to calculate the rate of the ice loss in East Antarctica's coastal regions.
The ice sheet's mass has long been difficult to estimate.
"At various times, estimates have disagreed on the sign of the mass balance, as well as its magnitude," the report said.
The whole Antarctic region could be losing ice at a rate of 113-267 gigatonnes a year, with 106-158 gigatonnes coming from West Antarctica, the scientists estimate.
A separate study on Thursday found that melting ice from Greenland and Antarctica will lead to a much sharper rise in sea levels than previously thought.
Global Warming Report: Ice Sheets, Glaciers Melting Faster Than Predicted
All ice types, including massive ice sheets, mountain glaciers and Arctic sea ice (frozen sea-surface), are for the most part melting far faster than predicted three years ago.
Greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming are surging, with global emissions from burning fossil fuels now 40 percent higher than in 1990 and climbing.
Scientists are at constant pains to point out that recent (or any) slight and brief emissions drops in a few countries cause no reduction of the greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere that set the global temperature thermostat.
This is because CO2 emissions stay in the air, on average, for hundreds of years.
Somerville and other scientists say they frequently have to make sure people they talk to understand the difference between "emissions" -- the amount of additional heat-trapping gas humanity puts in the atmosphere per year, and "concentrations" -- the amount of those gases that has piled up in the atmosphere and goes on hanging there for a long time.
Concentrations, which are measured in parts per million, have been rising steadily since the beginning of the industrial age some two centuries ago.
Devilish Coincidence: CO2 Plus H2O Makes Acid
Ocean acidification has been discovered in the past two years to be rising into fish-rich shallow waters far faster than oceanographers expected. A significant portion of the CO2 emissions that trap heat in the atmosphere are absorbed by the oceans.
By what appears to be a devilish coincidence, this same molecule that warms the atmosphere, CO2, happens, when combined with H20, to form carbonic acid.
Scientists report the sea is already 30 percent more acidic than it was at the start of the industrial age.
A wide range of studies and reports of damage to sea life as a result of this rise in acidity is now coming in from the world's marine biologists.
The rising cost of health care is straining the wallets of American families, the balance sheets of our businesses, and the long term health of our federal budget. Two out of three personal bankruptcies in 2007 were a result of medical debt and last year, more than half of Americans postponed medical care or skipped their medications because they couldn’t afford it. The broken health care system will cost us as much as $248 billion in lost productivity this year alone and providing health care for the uninsured costs insured American families $100 billion every year. These are just some of the reasons that explain why a poll released yesterday by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation shows nearly eight in ten Americans view health reform as key to addressing the economy (79%). The poll also found seven in ten believe that their access to health care will improve or stay the same (72%) with reform.
According to the news release from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation announcing the results of the poll:
Americans’ confidence in their health insurance coverage and ability to access health care increased sharply in October, amid signs of economic recovery and Congressional momentum on health reform.
A large majority of Americans view health reform as key to addressing the economy. Nearly eight in 10 Americans (79 percent) believe it is important that President Obama includes health reform in plans to address the economy.
My gerber daisies, along with other annual plants are still growing and blooming. High's in the upper 50's for Thanksgiving here in SE OH.
Miles to go before I sleep.
Enjoy the day, everyone.
Jesus answered, "The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent."
John 6:29
Probe reveals lead-up to Iraq war
LONDON (AFP) – The first full-scale inquiry into Britain's role in the Iraq war opened with testimony suggesting Washington was gearing up for possible conflict two years before Tony Blair led London to war.
So you have the Bush Administration with war plans to go in before 911. When did Washington scale up to invade Iraq, as soon as Bush was elected. Who were the people who manipulated the data?
Stick this in your pipe and smoke it frostyass with emphasis on the ass.
By SETH BORENSTEIN AP Science Writer The Associated Press
Wednesday, November 25, 2009 7:32 AM EST
Studies: Fighting global warming reduces diseases
Obama expects support for more Afghanistan troops
Stars, top Dem donors make state dinner guest list
Evening gowns, saris at Obama's first state dinner
More Political News
WASHINGTON (AP) — Cutting global warming pollution would not only make the planet healthier, it would make people healthier too, newly released studies say.
Slashing carbon dioxide emissions could save millions of lives, mostly by reducing preventable deaths from heart and lung diseases, the studies show. They were published in a special issue of The Lancet British medical journal, released Wednesday.
The calculations of lives saved were based on computer models that looked at pollution-caused illnesses in certain cities. The figures are also based on the world making dramatic changes in daily life that may at first seem too hard and costly to do, researchers conceded.
Cutting carbon dioxide emissions would also reduce other types of air pollution, especially tiny particles that lodge in the lungs and cause direct health damage, doctors said. Other benefits could come from encouraging more exercise and less meat consumption, to improve heart health, researchers said.
"Reducing greenhouse gases not only helps save the planet in the long term, but it's going to improve our health virtually immediately," said Christopher Portier, associate director of the U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. That agency helped fund the studies along with the Wellcome Trust and several other international public health groups.
"It's not 50 years from now, it's now," Portier said.
Instead of looking at the health ills causes by future global warming, as past studies have done, this research looks at the immediate benefits of doing something about the problem.
And for places like the United States, those advantages of reduced heart and lung diseases are bigger than the specific future health damage from worsening warming, Portier said.
Some of the benefits would only come from dramatic — and what could be considered unlikely — changes in everyday life, such as more bicycling and walking and reduced meat consumption. Other proposals studied are more concrete and achievable, such as eliminating cook stoves that burn dung, charcoal, wood and other polluting fuels in India and the rest of the developing world. All are part of a number of proposals examined by researchers that are aimed at cutting global greenhouse gas emissions, mostly from the burning of fossil fuels, by 50 percent by 2050.
Frosty the fool has been duped by Rush and Faux "News" AGAIN.
----------------------------------------------
Quick Fact: Fox Nation falsely characterized reportedly stolen CRU emails as "Global Warming's Waterloo"
November 24, 2009 12:33 pm ET — 17 Comments
Under the headline "Global Warming's Waterloo?," The Fox Nation linked to a November 23 Gateway Pundit post asserting that "Senator James Inhofe [R-OK] will call for an investigation into the Climate Research Unit (CRU) emails that showed that global warming scientists were deliberately mainpulating [sic] and hiding information from the public to further their cause." But Gateway Pundit's claim that the emails -- which were reportedly stolen by a hacker -- "showed that global warming scientists were deliberately mainpulating [sic] and hiding information," and consequently Fox Nation's headline suggesting that these emails represent a "Waterloo" for climate change, are false; in fact, numerous climate change experts have explained that such a characterization is predicated on reading the emails out of context and distorting their scientific language
http://mediamatters.org/research/200911240017
-------------------------------------------------
Wake up and smell the coffee, Frosty. They are using the fact that you are stupid to dupe you into believing things. Open your eyes. Rub both those brain cells of yours together until they generate some original thoughts. And by all means, put down that Faux "News" site. It's rotting both those brain cells.
Good morning Johnne.
Good to see you are keeping an eye on the idiot trolls. I see the Duo of Dumb is on this morning: Harporrhoid and Frosty the fool.
Hey Dumbsh*ts,
Where is your pet idiot Dufus? Is he off chewing on book covers again?
Morning Chicago,
It is 17 degrees here in beautiful downtown New Mexico. Brrrrrrrrr. This Republican Global Warming is hell.
It would be unheard of if Democrats supported a repelican filibuster. If Lierman supports the filibuster he should be stripped of his chairman seat. The three democrats that are threatening to join the filibuster should be stripped of any seats on any committee. They should be roundly boo'ed any time they come to the floor to speak. They should be outcasts. They should be challenged in primaries and the Democratic party should fund their primary challengers. If they want to vote nay on the bill, that is their right. But to vote to support a repelican filibuster is unheard of and completely unacceptable.
139Chicago on November 24, 2009 at 11:45 PM
Morning Chicago,
You are correct that Lieberman must be stripped of the remaining Committee seats he holds in place of a Democrat.
PLEASE EVERYONE, CONTACT SENATOR REID, TELL HIM TO LET LIEBERMAN KNOW RIGHT NOW, IF HE VOTES FOR FILIBUSTER AGAINST THE DEMOCRAT'S PLAN, HE WILL LOSE ANY BENEFITS HE GETS, LIKE HIS COMMITTEE SEATS, FOR DOING SO:
EMAIL:
http://reid.senate.gov/contact/index.cfm
FAX
1-202-224-7327
CALL
1-202-224-3542
They are on break right now, but you can leave a voicemail if you call.
There was a vigil last night outside of his office in Hartford and outside his house in Stamford, where many Rabbis, priests, ministers and other people stood and prayed that Lieberman would use his conscience as his guide, and vote so the uninsured could get health insurance.
This would not be so hilarious if Lieberman did not keep saying he was a man of Principles! what a laugh !
Off to work. My $4 million project starts Monday and lasting until January 2011. It will be a hoot.
Of two other smaller projects, one is about 1/3 complete and the other starts in January.
I will be as busy as a one-arm wallpaper hanger.
It is 17 degrees here in beautiful downtown New Mexico. Brrrrrrrrr. This Republican Global Warming is hell.
185johhne on November 25, 2009 at 08:47 AM
That's odd. It's a balmy 44 degrees here and "drizzly".
Good morning PamB. Good to see you.
I have to run an errand. BBL.
OH THE REBULICIANS ARE NOT GOING TO LIKE THIS!!
Jobless Claims Below 500,000, Durable Orders Slip
Published: Wednesday, 25 Nov 2009 | 8:46 AM ET Text Size By: Reuters
The number of U.S. workers filing new applications for jobless insurance tumbled last week by a surprisingly large amount to the lowest level in more than a year, according to government data Wednesday that gave fresh evidence the battered labor market is improving.
However, a report on durable goods order was disappointing, as new orders for long-lasting U.S. manufactured goods fell unexpectedly in October, according to a separate government report that reinforced views of a gradual economic recovery from the recession.
Initial claims for state unemployment benefits slid to a seasonally adjusted 466,000 in the week ended Nov. 21, from a revised 501,000 in the prior week, the Labor Department said.
Seasonal adjustments turned a smaller-than-anticipated unadjusted rise in claims into a drop, a Labor Department economist said.
Meanwhile, the Commerce Department said durable goods orders dropped 0.6 percent after rising by an upwardly revised 2.0 percent in September. New orders in September were previously reported to have increased 1.4 percent.
Analysts polled by Reuters forecast orders rising 0.5 percent in October. Durable goods orders are a leading indicator of manufacturing activity, which in turn provides a good measure for overall business health.
Meanwhile, consumers got back in the buying mood in October as their incomes grew modestly, an encouraging sign for the budding economic recovery.
The Commerce Department reported Wednesday that consumer spending rose a brisk 0.7 percent last month, following a pullback in September when spending plunged by 0.6 percent.
It was the best showing since a big 1.3 percent jump in August when the government's now-defunct Cash for Clunkers programs enticed people to buy cars.
Incomes, the fuel for future spending, rose 0.2 percent for the second straight month.
The rebound in spending shows that consumers — who power 70 percent of national economic actiivty — are managing for now to hold up under the weight of some heavy negative forces.
The fear among Federal Reserve officials and other economists, though, is that those negative forces — rising unemployment and hard to get credit, which makes it difficult to finance big-ticket items like homes, cars and appliances -- will eventutally cause consumers to turn more cautious in their spending in the months ahead, making for a lethargic recovery.
Still, Wednesday's figures seemed to blunt fears that consumers could clam up, sending the country into a "double dip" recession, although there continues to be concern that consumer spending will slow early next year.
The increase in consumer spending in October was bigger than the 0.5 percent rise economists were forecasting. The growth in incomes matched expectations.
With spending outpacing income growth, Americans' personal savings rate — savings as a percentage of after-tax income — dipped to 4.4 percent in October from 4.6 percent in September.
Consumers spent more on costly "durable" manufactured goods — such as cars and appliances — last month. Such spending rose 2.1 percent, compared with a 8.5 percent drop in September. They also boosted spending last month on "nondurables," such as food and clothes, and on services.
Inflation, excluding food and energy, rose 1.4 percent over the past year, well within the Fed's comfort zone.
Chicago=
It is actually scary when you see Stevie nit pick which articles to post on here, because I think in his dark, twisted mind he actually believes them.
I posted a couple of articles the last few days, which said that experts looking at those leaked emails ----SAID THERE WAS NOTHING IN THEM THAT INDICATED ANY FALSIFYING HAD TAKEN PLACE !
Yet, because Stevie cannot find anything good to say about Palin, Republican Party, Replican politicians, Republican health plan, Republican ideas----he has to Grasp and find these little right wing articles to try and disprove global Warming, that Most scientists, experts, NASA, smart people all have to admit is REAL.
Stevie will not look at facts!! OH NO, that would be having to admit he is wrong, and we all know narcissists never admit they are wrong.
For somebody who's whole self esteem is tied up in thinking he is smart----he proves day after day just how stupid he is ! He could never make it out in the real world---only in his little hovel where he has had his MENSA certificate sewn onto his jacket to impress the local hicks, who do not realize they could take the same on-line Lake Woebegoten test and get one too.
Two dozen scientists issued a report Tuesday arguing that the effects of man-made global warming have intensified in recent years, as controversy has ratcheted up over whether the views of scientists who disagree have been squelched over the past decade.
The 60-page report, prepared by many scientists who helped write a 2007 United Nations study that blamed humans for rising global temperatures, seeks to spur policy makers at the big climate summit in Copenhagen next month to take aggressive action to curb greenhouse-gas emissions.
View Full Image
Reuters
Climate scientists including Richard Somerville, shown second from right at a 2007 conference in Bali, Indonesia, issued a new report Tuesday on global warming.
Previously
Climate Emails Stoke Debate Lawmakers Probe Climate Emails Climate Science and Candor "Science has not stood still, and it is quite clear scientifically that we cannot continue to procrastinate," said Richard Somerville, one of the report's authors and a research professor at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego.
The report addresses an issue that has become a political hot button: the fact that global average temperatures have fallen since 2005, though the years 2006-08 remain among the hottest on record. The report says that the decade from 1999 to 2008 showed overall warming.
The new report also says that effects of global warming, including melting ice sheets in the Arctic and Antarctica, now approximate the worst-case scenarios foreseen in the 2007 report.
But both that U.N. climate report and climate science in general have come under increased scrutiny in the wake of the release Thursday of documents hacked from the Climate Research Unit at East Anglia University in the U.K.
The hacked documents, widely disseminated on the Internet and the subject of intense scrutiny by climate scientists across the spectrum of opinion, portray leading researchers in the human-made global warming camp slamming rivals, pressuring scientific publications and possibly tampering with data subject to Freedom of Information Act requests.
Journal Community
Vote: Do you believe humans are responsible for climate change? Phil Jones, head of the East Anglia Climatic Research Unit, said in a statement Tuesday that he and his colleagues "accept that some of the published emails do not read well." He added that some "were clearly written in the heat of the moment," but that he and his colleagues "are, and have always been, scrupulous" in their scientific work.
One of the scientists who prepared the new report -- and whose emails figured prominently among those hacked -- is Michael Mann, director of the Earth System Science Center at Penn State University. He described the hacking as "unfortunate" and part of a "smear campaign" ahead of the Copenhagen summit.
The documents prompted congressional Republicans to start investigating how the report from the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was prepared, because such reports form the principal foundation for U.S. government action on climate change. That action includes increased regulation by the Environmental Protection Agency and proposed legislation to curb greenhouse-gas emissions.
Sen. James Inhofe (R., Okla.), ranking member of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works and vocal skeptic of man-made global warming, on Tuesday sent letters to several of the scientists involved in the hacked emails, as well as to six federal agencies "notifying them to retain documents related to the release of emails from the Hadley Center's Climate Research Unit."
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125911350443163363.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsSecond
U.S. Initial Jobless Claims Fell to 466,000 Last Week (Update1) Share Business ExchangeTwitterFacebook| Email | Print | A A A
By Bob Willis
Nov. 25 (Bloomberg) -- The number of Americans filing claims for unemployment benefits fell last week to the lowest level since September 2008 as the economic recovery encourages companies to fire fewer workers.
Initial jobless claims declined to 466,000 in the week ended Nov. 21 from 501,000 a week earlier, Labor Department figures showed today in Washington. The number of people collecting unemployment insurance dropped in the prior week, while those getting extended payments also declined.
After slashing more than 7 million jobs in the past two years, companies may have little margin to cut further without threatening their capacity to ramp up production as the economy recovers. The government may report next week that employers in November shed the fewest jobs in 20 months.
“It is on an improving trend,” said Julia Coronado, a senior economist at BNP Paribas in New York. “We are steadily seeing a trajectory toward smaller and smaller job losses. It seems we’re still a ways away from positive job growth.”
Separate reports from the Commerce Department showed personal spending rose 0.7 percent in October, more than forecast, while orders for durable goods unexpectedly declined 0.6 percent on lower demand for defense equipment.
Stock-index futures extended gains after the reports. Futures on the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index rose 0.6 percent to 1,110.0 at 8:51 a.m. in New York.
Claims Forecast
Jobless claims were estimated to decrease to 500,000 from 505,000 initially reported for the prior week, according to the median forecast of 43 economists in a Bloomberg News survey. Estimates ranged from 460,000 to 512,000.
The Labor Department released the data a day earlier than usual because of tomorrow’s Thanksgiving holiday. Last week’s claims were the fewest since 459,000 in the week ended Sept. 13, 2008.
The report showed the four-week moving average of initial claims, a less volatile measure, dropped to 496,500 last week from 513,000 the prior week.
Continuing claims declined by 190,000 in the week ended Nov. 14 to 5.423 million. They were forecast to drop to 5.57 million.
The continuing claims figure does not include the number of Americans receiving extended benefits under federal programs. Today’s report showed the number of people who’ve used up their traditional benefits and are now collecting extended payments fell by 18,253 to 4.18 million in the week ended Nov. 7.
Benefits Extension
President Barack Obama on Nov. 6 signed into law a plan to extend jobless benefits, giving the unemployed as many as 20 additional weeks of assistance.
The economy probably lost 125,000 jobs in November, the least since March 2008, economists surveyed by Bloomberg forecast the Labor Department will report on Dec. 4. The jobless rate probably stayed at a 26-year high of 10.2 percent for a second month, economists forecast.
Today’s report showed the unemployment rate among people eligible for jobless benefits, which tends to track the jobless rate, fell to 4.1 percent in the week ended Nov. 14 from 4.3 percent. The correlation has broken down this year as more people receive extended payments.
Forty-nine states and territories reported a decrease in claims, while four reported an increase. These data are reported with a one-week lag.
Initial jobless claims reflect weekly firings. They have risen as job growth -- measured by the monthly non-farm payrolls report -- has been negative since January 2008
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a9kz1T4286TU&pos=1
Yes, isn't it just too too coincidental that these HACKED email turned up right before the Climate summit!!! hmmmmmm, couldn't be something fishy and illegal going on, could it?
HACKED??? Isn't that illegal by itself? But then these crazed Right wingers have no morals, values, ethics anyways.
Wonder how much money crosses Inhofe's palm, as he is on the Environmental committee?? What a scum bag he is.
Official: Obama going to Copenhagen climate summit
11/25/2009 6:47:49 AM
By JULIE PACE Associated Press Writer
Share|WASHINGTON
President Barack Obama will go to Copenhagen next month, a White House official said Wednesday, to participate in a long-anticipated, high-stakes global climate summit.
The president will attend the summit on Dec. 9 before heading to Oslo to accept the Nobel Peace Prize, the official said. Obama's attendance had been in question until now.
The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because the formal announcement has not been made.
The conference had originally been intended to produce a new global climate change treaty on limiting emissions of greenhouse gases that would replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. However, hopes for a legally binding agreement have dimmed lately, with leaders saying the summit is more likely to produce a template for future action to cut emissions blamed for global warming.
While Obama himself tried to tamp down expectations during his eight-day trip to Asia earlier this month, he also called on world leaders to come to an agreement that has "immediate operational effect" and is not just a political declaration.
Administration officials said earlier this week that the U.S. will present a target for reducing carbon dioxide emissions at the summit. The development came as the European Union urged the United States and China to deliver greenhouse gas emissions targets at the summit, saying their delays were hindering global efforts to curb climate change.
The administration has indicated for nearly a year that it would eventually come up with specific targets for quick reductions in pollution that causes global warming, as part of international negotiations. Those targets will soon be made public, officials said.
This will be Obama's second trip to Denmark this year. He made short trip to Copenhagen on Oct. 2 to make a vain pitch for 2016 Summer Olympics in Chicago during a meeting of the International Olympic Committee
Garlic Price Rises Surpass Gold, Stocks in China
Published: Wednesday, 25 Nov 2009 | 10:03 AM ET
The price of garlic in China has nearly quadrupled since March, propelled by its very pungency to rank ahead of gold and stocks as the country's best-performing asset this year.
The trigger for the bull run may have been the idea that the potent bulb can ward off H1N1 swine flu, Morgan Stanley economists said.
That chimes with some anecdotal evidence. The China Daily reported last week that a high school in Hangzhou, a prosperous city in eastern China, had bought 200 kg of garlic and forced students to eat it every day for lunch to stay healthy.
"I don't know about H1N1, but it can prevent ordinary colds," Zhang Ping, 74, told Reuters at a vegetable market in Beijing. "Take me. I've not had cold for many years and every year I buy several dozen pounds of garlic."
Others have been looking for darker forces behind the surge.
China Business News said coal mine bosses -- who are often depicted as being both extremely rich and nefarious speculators -- had been playing the garlic market, hoarding bulbs and hauling them between storehouses.
Garlic served as a case study of the asset price appreciation that Morgan Stanley thinks China will have to contend with after a flood of lending by banks to help fight off the global financial crisis.
In some parts of Shandong province, the wholesale price of garlic is up as much as 40-fold.
"Too much liquidity in any market can lead to speculation," analyst Jerry Lou said in a research note this week. "The most recent evidence of asset speculation in China's commodity markets has been for garlic."
But a more mundane factor may lie at the root of it all.
Garlic prices were extremely low last year, convincing many farmers that it was not worth planting the crop again, a wholesale trader was quoted as saying in the Nanfang Daily.
Supply could not keep up with a pick-up in demand from home and abroad, sending prices sky-high, the trader said.
Yi Xianrong, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, a top government think-tank, said there was no need for panic.
"The garlic market is cyclical.
Global Warming Facts & Our Future
Global Warming
Global warming has been a topic of concern and much controversy for many years. Whatever the disagreements have been in the past, most scientists and policy makers now recognize that if the Earth’s surface temperatures continue to rise as much as they have in the past decade or so, then many parts of the world could face dire consequences, including food and water shortages, coastal flooding, and health consequences.
Based on the Koshland Science Museum’s exhibit Global Warming: Facts and Our Future, the following webquest will allow students to learn firsthand how society and environment might be impacted by global warming and how to help people make better decisions regarding all the complicated issues surrounding climate change, energy use, and available policy options. Students will take on the role of scientist, business leader, or policy maker and be part of a climate action team, which will make some of the same discoveries and decisions that are made in the “real world” every day.
http://www.koshland-science-museum.org/teachers/wq-gw-gd001.jsp
Leaves "Magnetized" by Air Pollution, Study Finds Richard A. Lovett
for National Geographic News
Tree leaves are "magnetized" by air pollution, and the phenomenon may offer a new and inexpensive technique for quickly identifying air-pollution hot spots, scientists say.
The technique, they add, could help city officials plan healthier bike paths, walkways, and running paths.
Chinese Air Pollution Deadliest in World, Report Says
Vehicle exhaust and other sources of air pollution spew out metallic fragments that then adhere to nearby tree leaves, said study leader Bernie Housen, a geophysicist at Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington.
Conventional tests for measuring the amounts of these tiny particles are often expensive and time-consuming, Housen said.
"But they are very easily detected using magnetic techniques," he said.
Even "a strong magnet wouldn't [attract] the leaf, but it definitely gives you a detectable signal."
Healthy Commute?
Housen, who bikes to work, was inspired to look for leaves' magnetism when he found out what diesel exhaust from passing buses might be doing to his lungs.
"Particles [from the exhaust] are deeply inhaled into our lungs," he said. "There is growing concern about the health effects of fine-particle exposure."
For example, studies suggest that particulates can cause asthma and scarring of lung tissue and, because of strain on the lungs, can even lead to heart problems.
(Related: "Pollution Can Change Your DNA in 3 Days, Study Suggests.")
Housen's study revealed that leaves plucked from trees along regular bus routes were up to ten times more magnetic than those on quieter streets.
While the finding wasn't exactly a surprise, it could inspire big changes among local governments.
"Up here in Whatcom County, there is only one air-quality monitoring station," Housen said, "so there isn't really any detailed picture on how variable air quality concentration is and what sorts of effects there are as to heavy traffic, et cetera."
With the new technique, "we can pinpoint places that have significantly higher particulate matter."
That information can then be used to help city planners design healthier transportation networks. (See related pictures of plans to make Paris a greener city by 2030.)
"You don't need to use fancy particle collectors," he added in a statement. "You could even have kids collect leaves."
Housen presented his findings Sunday at a meeting of the Geological Society of America, in Portland, Oregon
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/10/091019-leaf-leaves-magnetic-pollution.html
What happens if the earth warms 6 degrees?
Watch Video.
http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/news/environment-news/six-degrees-wcvin.html
What Causes Global Warming?
Scientists have spent decades figuring out what is causing global warming. They've looked at the natural cycles and events that are known to influence climate. But the amount and pattern of warming that's been measured can't be explained by these factors alone. The only way to explain the pattern is to include the effect of greenhouse gases (GHGs) emitted by humans.
Photograph by Peter Essick
To bring all this information together, the United Nations formed a group of scientists called the International Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC. The IPCC meets every few years to review the latest scientific findings and write a report summarizing all that is known about global warming. Each report represents a consensus, or agreement, among hundreds of leading scientists.
One of the first things scientists learned is that there are several greenhouse gases responsible for warming, and humans emit them in a variety of ways. Most come from the combustion of fossil fuels in cars, factories and electricity production. The gas responsible for the most warming is carbon dioxide, also called CO2. Other contributors include methane released from landfills and agriculture (especially from the digestive systems of grazing animals), nitrous oxide from fertilizers, gases used for refrigeration and industrial processes, and the loss of forests that would otherwise store CO2.
Different greenhouse gases have very different heat-trapping abilities. Some of them can even trap more heat than CO2. A molecule of methane produces more than 20 times the warming of a molecule of CO2. Nitrous oxide is 300 times more powerful than CO2. Other gases, such as chlorofluorocarbons (which have been banned in much of the world because they also degrade the ozone layer), have heat-trapping potential thousands of times greater than CO2. But because their concentrations are much lower than CO2, none of these gases adds as much warmth to the atmosphere as CO2 does
http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/global-warming/gw-causes.html
The globe recorded its sixth warmest October since record keeping began in 1880, according to NOAA's National Climatic Data Center. NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies rated October 2009 as the 2nd warmest October on record, falling 0.06°C short of the record set in 2005, while the UK HADCRUT3 data set rated October the 7th warmest (this data set does not include most of the Arctic, Antarctic, and Africa, where there are few land stations). NOAA rated the year-to-date period, January - October 2009, as the fifth warmest such period on record. The October satellite-measured temperatures for the lowest 8 km of the atmosphere were 6th - 7th warmest on record. Global ocean Sea Surface Temperature (SST) anomalies were the 5th warmest on record
http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=1387
Science News 11 Warmest Years On Record Have All Been In Last 13 Years
ScienceDaily (Dec. 13, 2007) — The decade of 1998-2007 is the warmest on record, according to data sources obtained by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). The global mean surface temperature for 2007 is currently estimated at 0.41°C/0.74°F above the 1961-1990 annual average of 14.00°C/57.20°F.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/12/071213101419.htm
Tue Nov 24, 2009 2:33pm EST
By Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent
OSLO (Reuters) - Global warming is happening faster than expected and at worst could raise sea levels by up to 2 meters (6-1/2 ft) by 2100, a group of scientists said on Tuesday in a warning to next month's U.N. climate summit in Copenhagen.
In what they called a "Copenhagen Diagnosis," updating findings in a broader 2007 U.N. climate report, 26 experts urged action to cap rising world greenhouse gas emissions by 2015 or 2020 to avoid the worst impacts of climate change.
"Climate change is accelerating beyond expectations," a joint statement said, pointing to factors including a retreat of Arctic sea ice in summer and melting of ice sheets on Greenland and Antarctica.
"Accounting for ice-sheets and glaciers, global sea-level rise may exceed 1 meter by 2100, with a rise of up to 2 meters considered an upper limit," it said. Ocean levels would keep on rising after 2100 and "several meters of sea level rise must be expected over the next few centuries."
Many of the authors were on the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which in 2007 foresaw a sea level rise of 18-59 cms (7-24 inches) by 2100 but did not take account of a possible accelerating melt of Greenland and Antarctica.
Coastal cities from Buenos Aires to New York, island states such as Tuvalu in the Pacific or coasts of Bangladesh or China would be highly vulnerable to rising seas.
"This is a final scientific call for the climate negotiators from 192 countries who must embark on the climate protection train in Copenhagen," Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, Director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, said in a statement.
AMAZON, MONSOON
Copenhagen will host a December 7-18 meeting meant to come up with a new U.N. plan to succeed the Kyoto Protocol beyond 2012. But a full legal treaty seems out of reach and talks are likely to be extended into 2010.
"Delay in action risks irreversible damage," the researchers wrote in the 64-page report, pointing to a feared runaway thaw of ice sheets or possible abrupt disruptions to the Amazon rainforest or the West African Monsoon.
The researchers said global carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels were almost 40 percent higher in 2008 than in 1990.
"Carbon dioxide emissions cannot be allowed to continue to rise if humanity intends to limit the risk of unacceptable climate change," said Richard Somerville of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California.
In a respite, the International Energy Agency has said emissions will fall by up to 3 percent in 2009 due to recession.
The report said world temperatures had been rising by an average of 0.19 Celsius a decade over the past 25 years and that the warming trend was intact, even though the hottest year since records began in the mid-19th century was 1998.
"There have been no significant changes in the underlying warming trend," it said. A strong, natural El Nino weather event in the Pacific pushed up temperatures in 1998.
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