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Open thread 7/19
- By Phillip Brownlee
- Posted July 19, 2007 at 1:02 a.m.
- Filed under Open thread
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“The Wichita City Council approved a letter of intent on a $29 million bond issue this morning for expansion of Larksfield Place, a luxury retirement village.”
Why is the city subsidizing a company that exists only for the very rich? That is not what IRB’s are about.
We need some serious changes on the city council. They just raised our water rates because they said they needed money but they can give money to a rich company like Larksfield Place.
This is crazy.
It’s a retirement village, with old people.
Don’t you like old people? Do you want to starve old people to death? All they have to live on is Social Security.
It would be nice to have a nice place to live.
To all the voters of Sedgwick County.The vote August 7,2007 is to approve:1. Slots at the dog track.2. Destination Casino in the county, somewhere.If the voters approve the Casino for the county the 2% allowance of the profits will be split,1% to Sedgwick,1% to Sumner.
If the voters disapprove the Sedgwick County location, it will automatically be given to Sumner County as they have already voted and approved the Casino for thier Co.Should this question be disapproved by Sedwick Co voters the 2% will go to Sumner in it’s entirety, with nothing coming to Sedgwick.
If the casino goes to Sumner County, according to a business friend in northern Kansas, Wellington will experience:
** more bankruptcies,
** increased divorces and broken families,
** closed businesses and boarded up buildings.
Not a pretty picture of what’s to come.
This happened in some of the small towns near the Indian casinos in northern Kansas.
It would also happen in Wichita/Sedgwick County although probably not so apparent.
Sotheysaid, maybe the councilpersons have been promised a discount for their parents to live at Larksfield. ;)
This is just a little example of Wichita’s Socialist Republican ethos, whose roots lie in FDR’s Works Progress Administration program that doled out money to private contractors to hire unemployed farm refugees, followed by the federal government’s creation of a large aviation industry, with massive taxpayers and savings bonds buyers’ monies being used to pay for aircraft plants and housing for workers, with contracts given to Socialist Republican builders, which was followed by GI-Bill housing benefits that bankrolled further construction in the late 40s, 50s and 60s.
We see this modus operandi today in the new arena. We see it in the Hyatt Regency. The Pritzker family of Chicago, who founded and held controlling interests in Hyatt Hotels could have built a hotel here using their own corporation’s money, perhaps with some minor property tax abatement help, but saw no profit potential. Local builder-developers could not convince private investors to take a gamble with their own capital to build a 3 star hotel. So they proffered a proposition to the city council that they would build a hotel, which Hyatt would provide its name to and manage (albeit not invest its capital in), if the city would provide taxpayer dollar insurance, to ensure that the builder-developers and their investors would make money, not lose it, by building a hotel that the Pritzkers judged would lose money because the free-market demand for Wichita, for such a facility was far too small to justify the construction expenditure.
The same issue is emblematic of the arena. In many cities, corporations provide large construction-cost and operations support for arenas, to get their names on the arenas, which is great advertising. In Tulsa, for example, which is currently constructing the Bank of Oklahoma arena, BOK is putting tens of millions of dollars into the arena. Were Beech Aircraft still an independent Wichita corporation, perhaps we would have a Beech Arena. Whether the KC arena, if proposed today, could get major funding from Sprint Nextel, headquartered in Virginia, is uncertain, but fortunately Sprint committed to arena sponsorship when its top executives worked and lived in Overland Park.
Albuquerque was well on its way to building an arena, but pulled the plug, because civic leaders realized that the city’s economic expansion would be better served by supporting high-tech development, in the face of only so many public dollars to go around. In essence, Albuquerquians looked at opportunity potentials and opportunity costs, and concluded that an arena would not sap the former, and incur the latter.
Austin considered building a civic arena, but concluded that the U Texas-Austin arena, built in 1977 (contemporary to the Kansas Coliseum), which gave facilities usage time to Arena Football, sold rock concert tickets to all citizens, not just UTA students, and operated cost-effectively by “filling in the blank spaces” of university athletic events, was perfectly adequate.
We may note here that the downtown arena proposition was framed as big expenses to remodel the Coliseum to accommodate handicapped patrons (which was ridiculously inflated, because you could convert eight tiers of seating to four tiers of generous space, and hire WSU male cheerleaders to hand-carry the wheelchair-bound to their rows, for under $10 million remodeling costs, and less than $50,000 annually to pay for the able bodies, if you’re real goal was to accommodate disabled people cost effectively), but in addition to this nobody proposed using the Koch Arena for “fill in the blank spaces” community purposes, which would have generated income for WSU.
But nobody’s ever said that Wichitans are as smart as Albuquerquians or Austinites, have they? Nobody’s ever said that Wichitans have long-term strategic vision, have they? For good reason.
On Larksfield, Wichita, as in everything else, is decades behind the curve. Del Webb first conceived of retirement communities in the late 1940′, and built retirement villages in Arizona and California when Truman and Eisenhower were in office. Following in these pioneering footsteps, Mr. Webb and others built planned retirement communities in Florida.
It was a natural evolution for healthcare services to gravitate to them. The first communities sold homes for independent living. Then in the 1970s and 80s a new model was developed for elderly people who could no longer maintain regular homes on their own, for whom the only options were to move in with their children, or go to nursing homes. They were not so disabled for the latter to be suitable, so assisted-living centers were invented, that gave the elderly apartments, recreation facilities and actitivities, prepared meals as needed, and onsite nurses. T
hese typically charged an in-advance-payment and monthly payments that represented transfer of residents’ personal assets and federal Social Security dollars to the operators, and actuaries shrewdly calculated prices according to life expectancies—much like life insurance premiums—that would generate profits. As longevity increased, and profits declined, newer residents had to pay higher buy-in prices than their predecessors.
Larksfield is a late entrant to this field. Given the model’s dependence on Social Security dollars, which is to say it is a socialist model, should it be surprising that Larksfield sought additional socialist help through a taxpayer-supported IRB? I don’t think so.
Kansas is a socialist state. Don’t believe it? Poll GOP-member Kansas farmers about giving up farm subsidies. Ask Kansas corn farmers if they want the federal ethanol subsidy program, which has created a new market for corn, and doubled per-bushel prices, to be terminated immediately, so that the free market can operate.
Truth is, even though cornahol is not free-market competitive with sugar cane alcohol from Brazil, and even though this U.S. taxpayer-subsidized program is driving meat and dairy prices sky high, do you think Kansas GOP-member farmers (and Kansas landowners who may live in Palm Beach) give a whit? It’s going to be up to American consumer-taxpayers to wake up, and say, “Return to corn production to feed livestock. Open our commerce to enable sugarhol imports without artificial trade barriers.” Unless, and until they do that, Kansas’s “Republican” socialist enterprise will continue.
I’m not opposed to socialism. I do think that government welfare recipients who love handouts for themselves, but object to other people getting them, is hypocritical. I think that pro-Iraqi War GOP polemicists who don’t volunteer or send their own kids to fight there, who demand that other people’s children do the fighting, but object to proper healthcare to those who are sent, including massive mental-health-care costs, which are being incurred, and fair-trade taxpayer-funded higher education, which the vets have earned, and other just compensations, are hypocrits.
Actually, I think that analytical inspection can arguably establish that they are abusive, manipulative sociopaths (people who have no concern for others, only themselves) who are emotionally scarred because they were mistreated by their parents through neglect, belittlement and and/or physical abuse when they were helpless children, but that’s for a later post.
PS. The Hyatt was indeed bailed out, turning a “private” enterprise into a socialist government enterprise. A government hotel? Welcome to the Union of Soviet Socialist “Republics”, Peoples “Republic” of China, Mid-Continent of North America branch.
Actually the City Council is predominantly Democrat.
Started thinking about something last night (dangerous right?)
We put Saddam in power.We messed with Iran leadership for 50 years.Bush Sr. gave Saddam ‘the nod’ to take Kuwait.We get in bed publicly with Saudi.15 of 19 (?) of the 9-11 hijackers came from Saudi.We went after Afghanistan instead. I think this is where Bush Jr. screwed up. I think he was supposed to have Iraq lined up to take the fall on that one, but he didn’t. So….We invade Iraq and overthrow Saddam.54% of foreign fighters in Iraq are Saudi.The money trail from Saudi into Iraq is not known – by the public- but I am guessing there are large sums of money, weapons, and support streaming in.But the US is all over Iran’s involvement in Iraq –spouting a proxy war with Iran.
This is a conspiracy theory and as such I am ready for my lashings, but does anyone else see a HUGE Saudi foot print on all these events, and yet no real mention is made of them.
By the way, no mention of Gore’s endangered fish dinner here?
Actually, what you just said is all bullshit SolDevVB.
Joe….BE NICE.
I’ll try Tracy.
But Bush Sr. giving Saddam the nod to invade Kuwait? I don’t think so.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-saudi15jul15,0,3132262.story?coll=la-home-centerAbout 45% of all foreign militants targeting U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians and security forces are from Saudi Arabia;Fighters from Saudi Arabia are thought to have carried out more suicide bombings than those of any other nationality, said the senior U.S. officerHe said 50% of all Saudi fighters in Iraq come here as suicide bombers. In the last six months, such bombings have killed or injured 4,000 Iraqis.
I’m lysdexic and got my numbers reversed.
http://www.rense.com/general69/41.htmAccording to the book Unholy Babylon by Adel Darwish and Gregory Alexander (Gollancz Paperback 1991):The US before the first Gulf War gave Saddam to understand that it would not interfere in its quarrel with Kuwait. US Ambassador April Glaspie conveyed the message to Saddam that the US ‘had no opinion’ on Iraq’s future intentions with regard to Kuwait.
Thanx TRACY, but I am ready for the lashings. This is quit disturbing and I would rather have someone ‘blow me up’ than believe our country has done this. That Saudi is — what? Taking over the mid-east?
*Quite* – damn, lysdexic AND can’t type
Well. I don’t know about the accuracy of that book. But I do appreciate the link from the LA Times.
I still think that we wouldn’t give Saddam the go ahead.
So let me just say that some of what you said is bullshit and your other points are not.
Joe, that which Sol posted concerning the Kuwait invasion has been widely reported in the past. The “no opinion” comment was, IIRC from other sources I’ve read, was taken by Saddam as a “no objection”. I’ll see if I can dredge up a link or two on this.
Actually the City Council is predominantly Democrat.Posted by: Joe Williams | July 19, 2007 at 08:36 AM
Carl Brewer, Mayor: DemocratLavonta Williams, 1st District: UnaffiliatedSue Schlapp, 2nd District: Republican.Jim Skelton, 3rd District, RepublicanPaul Gray, 4th District, RepublicanJeff Longwell, 5th District, RepublicanSharon Fearey, 6th District, Democrat
Joe: How the hell do you get “mostly Democrat” out of 2/7ths?
GLASPIE: I think I understand this. I have lived here for years. I admire your extraordinary efforts to rebuild your country. I know you need funds. We understand that and our opinion is that you should have the opportunity to rebuild your country. But we have no opinion on the Arab-Arab conflicts, like your border disagreement with Kuwait.I was in the American Embassy in Kuwait during the late 60’s. The instruction we had during this period was that we should express no opinion on this issue and that the issue is not associated with America. James Baker has directed our official spokesmen to emphasize this instruction. We hope you can solve this problem using any suitable methods via Klibi or via President Mubarak. All that we hope is that these issues are solved quickly. With regard to all of this, can I ask you to see how the issue appears to us?http://www.chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/glaspie.html
What other points are BS Joe? I’ll see if I dig up references to those as well.
but does anyone else see a HUGE Saudi foot print on all these events, and yet no real mention is made of them.
Posted by: SolDevVB
It is so obvious to everyone with a half a brain cell that the entire Bush family has shown their loyalty to the Saudis. From Bush Sr and Reagan having Saddam as their fair-haired boy back in the 80’s to George W. kissing the Saudi royalty’s butt. And yet Bush supporters never question why their beloved litle emperpor has shown more support for the Saudis than his own Americans.
I want to see George W. Bush fulfill his promise to go after Bin Laden. But I can kiss that goodbye because Bush has stated that he does not even think about the man that masterminded the 9/11 3,000+ deaths. How can any president just nonchalantly forget about 3,000 American deaths?
That, Joe and the rest of your ilk, should prove to you that Bush’s loyalty lies elsewhere.
I wouldn’t take it that far Fred, and I wouldn’t mass label Joe either.
I thought Jeff Longwell and and Jim Skelton were Democrats. Williams is surely a Democrat.
I know they had that deadlock about the Williams and Foster bit and I was led to believe it was a party affiliation thing.
Well. If they are Republican, then we do have a majority Republican Council. My bad then.
I remember that “no opinion” comment and it was heavily discussed after the first Gulf War. Most diplomats stated that it is a commonly used phrase and is used when relationship with countries are fragile.
Saddam was in power since the late 1960s and later on when Iraq nationalized the Iraqi Oil Fields.
The so-called supplying of arms was about one percent of what Iraq had been supplied by its major allies, Soviet Union, France and China.
There is a lot of misinterpretations of what happened in Iraq, most of the revisionist history now is just that, revisionist.
As far as the Saudi Arabians being involved in terrorists activity, yes this is true. However, one has to remember that the Saudis are the most influential group in the Middle East in just about all areas.
The Saudis started out as mercenaries in various wars and developed a taste for power and the Al Qaeda group was formed.
To state that a bunch of radical ideologists that were trained as mercenaries are officially sanctioned by the Saud government is beyond ridiculous.
What is true is that Royal Family of Saudi Arabia did little to prohibit or prevent what happened with citizens in foreign lands. In their own land, the same would have had their heads removed as the Royal Family did not tolerate insubordination in the confines of their kingdom.
There are a lot of conspiracy theories about the money supplied by some Saudi families. Who knows what is true and what isn’t. Bin Laden family was already wealthy, so Osama used his own personal wealth and his wealthy contacts to secure funds.
Of course, there are stories about the Rockerfeller family and their financial misdeeds with nuclear programs in Pakistan as well. Sometimes rich people do bad things, but it doesn’t mean that the country they are from is secretly involved in the misdeeds.
Probably fun reading, but it’s hardly the raw truth. It’s more like the raw and convenient revised history to sell books.
I’m not a Bush fan nor did I vote for him, so don’t include me as ilk.
No Opinion is far from giving him the nod to take over.
We didn’t fight the 1st Gulf War for nothing.
There is a lot in that document that you linked to about GLASPIE. I have to take the time to read through it. But you seem to be cherrypicking, but I’m willing to read and give you the benefit of the doubt.
As it was explained to me, the Arabs value body language more than words. How you say something is far more relevant than what you said.
As per the rest Joe, do you not see a very large Saudi foot print on what has and is happening in the Mid-East?
Great earnings reports out today! Woohoo! Lookin good!
…and people think you can’t make money in the stock market. Silly people.
I just don’t understand how so many Republicans are willing to give a blind eye to what is so obvious.
Didn’t Bush state that if you’re not with us, then you’re against us? Why then does he not hold the Saudis feet to the fire and ask the tough questions about them supplying/ or not intervening in this so-called war on terror?
Why do the Saudis get a free pass on everything they do and say?
The whole truth will probably never be told but the American people will have to live with the consequences for decades. All I know is that a few are getting very wealthy while someone else’s kids do their fighting for them.
Oh Yeah! I never said I trust the Saudis or the Saudi Royal Government. I know we are only friendly towards them because of Oil and all the foriegn nationals that work there that make up more than half of their work force.
I had a girlfriend back in the day that worked in Saudi for 3 years. Banked a lot of money though. She told me all about the place.
The Saudi Royal Family isn’t nothing but Bankers. They and the Saudis themselves don’t know how to do anything else. That is why all the foreigners do all the work for them. They just pay good.
But we look the other way. They are a very closed an oppressive society. Hell they still have slavery going on. Yet we look the other way.
It’s like you can be paid to look the other way and they is actually what we are doing with Saudi Arabia.
The stock market is over-inflated, over-rated and manipulated. The depression is coming and none are so blind as those who refuse to see.
That’s true about the “poetic” part of the Arabic language.
The equivalent would be if everytime I greeted someone on the street, I gave them a spiel of a mixture of Walt Whitman and the Bible while saying hello.
Arabic speakers use a lot of alliteration and poetry in their daily exchanges.
In the U.S. we might say “Those French surrender every time mentions the word gun.”
An Arab would say something like, “The lambs of Gaul tarry in the deliverance of strong virtue. They walk on flowers but do not tend their grain. They are ripe to the sword’s edge and care not the cuts upon their brothers.”
Both same the same thing sort of, the Arabic “flourishes” provide more emotion for sure. This embellishment of speech is what causes Radical Muslim speech to be effective to its followers. It’s kind of like the old “hellfire and brimstone” preachers of the past to motivate.
And yet your girlfriend, Joe, felt it was okay to work for such people. That is the problem today. People are willing to work for the devil for that extra dime.
“About 45% of all foreign militants targeting U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians and security forces are from Saudi Arabia; 15% are from Syria and Lebanon; and 10% are from North Africa, according to official U.S. military figures made available to The Times by the senior officer.”
“Nearly half of the 135 foreigners in U.S. detention facilities in Iraq are Saudis, he said.”
“He said 50% of all Saudi fighters in Iraq come here as suicide bombers. In the last six months, such bombings have killed or injured 4,000 Iraqis.”
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-saudi15jul15,0,3132262.story?coll=la-home-center
WTF? Why is Saudi getting a free pass while fingers are starting to point to Iran?
Ok….I’ll just stick my money in a can and bury it in my backyard.
U.S.: ‘No Options off the Table’ to Target AQ in PakistanJuly 18, 2007 6:32 PMBrian Ross Reports:U.S. officials are mapping out new options of how to deal with what appears to be the gravest threat facing the United States: the resurgence of al Qaeda in Pakistan.http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/
ABC News Exclusive: The Secret War Against IranApril 03, 2007 5:25 PMBrian Ross and Christopher Isham Report:A Pakistani tribal militant group responsible for a series of deadly guerrilla raids inside Iran has been secretly encouraged and advised by American officials since 2005, U.S. and Pakistani intelligence sources tell ABC News.…U.S. officials say the U.S. relationship with Jundullah is arranged so that the U.S. provides no funding to the group, which would require an official presidential order or “finding” as well as congressional oversight.http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/2007/04/abc_news_exclus.html
She didn’t know anything about Saudi before she went. She got with an agency as a contract nurse and they send her there. She is South Korean.
They send her and quite a few South Korean nurses to Saudi and they all lived in a compound together. Once a week they were allowed to shop and get groceries. They all had to be vailed of course, but they would take them by bus to a shopping area that the Saudi Government would close down for the day, just to let the foreigners shop. (meaning they didn’t want the Saudis to co-mingle with foreigners) that is why they always have foreigners stay in locked compounds.
They were escorted through the shopping centers with arm guards and the whole bit.
So fred! You have no right to pass judgment on my past girlfriend because she had no idea at the time of the Saudi politics or their society. All they were told it was a place to get good pay for contract nursing.
SolDevVB,
You need to understand the mindset of Sunni extremists and their long hatred of Shiites. Borders mean nothing to them when it comes to that controversy.
As you may recall, V.P. Cheney has been to visit the Royal Family several times since last November to discuss this and who knows what other issues.
Sol, could it be that while the Saudis are SOBs, they’re our SOBs (to paraphrase FDR’s comment on Joseph Stalin during WWII) and the Iranians aren’t? Could it be connected with the oil controlled by the Saudis as members of OPEC (seems to me that the Saudis have been willing to “violate” the production ceilings in the past when the U.S. was in “need”)? There is most definitely a “hands off” approach to the actions of the Saudis, although I’m sure you’ll admit that there is no direct Saudi government involvement (at least provable direct government involvement) in the actions of the Saudi citizens flowing into Iraq. I’ve argued the same thing with respect to the Iranians, but my case is a bit weaker there, as the “civil government” seems to not be directly involved, but the “religious government” does seem to have some involvement.
How would the Saudis be acting if Americans were kidnapping, killing, and bombing in their country?
I agree that Saudi has us by the balls as far as oil goes, but we have some power over Saudis too with as much oil as we buy from them.
If we could get off the damn oil teat at least for transportation, would we even care what was going on in the Mid-East? I mean look how we are handling Darfur…
So fred! You have no right to pass judgment on my past girlfriend because she had no idea at the time of the Saudi politics or their society. All they were told it was a place to get good pay for contract nursing.
Posted by: Joe Williams
I wasn’t passing judgement on your past girlfriend. But one does have to wonder why a nurse would sign up to go to work in a foreign country and not even learn a little bit about that country before going there. So I it sounds like her motivation was purely the money?
If the US had a leadership that was committed to getting us off the Middle East oil, then we would all be better off. But that is not going to happen when we have two oil men in the White House.
Ford is making a lot of progress in the arena. They are shipping 30 hydrogen cell/electric vehicles to Florida for ‘Real World’ testing. They are also using soy based foam for the seats in Mustangs – supposed to save 1000 bbl oil per year.
I can’t wait until we can give the middle finger to the Arabs and their oil. Can’t freakin WAIT.
Fred, that’s three oil PERSONS. Little Condi Rice was a Chevron director.
Well, MPS, beat me to it again. Haven’t the time nor inclination to look at “lesser” administration officials with respect to the oil and gas industry involvement, but would think there’s a few at least.
Here’s what Condi said to Business Week in an interview about her Cheney, and her own future,
Will Vice-President Cheney serve out his term, and if he were to step aside, would you accept the Vice-Presidency?Oh, the President has a perfectly good Vice-President. I fully expect he’s going to be Vice-President till there’s a new one.
Would you consider a position in business or on Wall Street?I don’t know what I’ll do long-term. I’m a terrible long-term planner.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_30/b4043101.htm
fred,
There is reality and there are “pipe dreams.”
The U.S. and Europe could get off the “Mideast Oil Teat” tomorrow if they wanted.
However, expect 95 percent of the aviation to shut down. No trucking or railing of goods to market. You would have to walk everywhere you go or purchase an ox and cart.
Oh yeah, no more plastic or 80 percent of oil derived products would be available.
If you didn’t live in an area that didn’t have nuclear or hydro-electric power, I imagine the coal fired plants would be able to charge their prices to you at their pleasing.
Your TV would become another piece of furniture as you couldn’t afford the electricity to watch it. Your computer would make a good boat anchor for the same reasons.
As I said, reality is what it is. Unfortunately, oil and its locations in the Middle East is the World’s reality that depends on fossil fuels to run their economies.
Would I like to see alternative energy real soon – Absolutely, I would!
Hillary Clinton was a director of Wal-Mart.
Has anybody ever seen the South Park episode about Wal-Mart. OMG! It’s classic.
VT, I haven’t beat you to anything.
Have you talked to your daughter about looking into the Preuss School? La Jolla is an amazing place for young people. Frankly, someone who has a math degree from a top 5 liberal arts college like Carleton can get a math-teacihng position. Really, she can contact the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and get a grant to do something interesting. If she has the moxy.
“Hillary Clinton was a director of Wal-Mart.”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Holy crap, thanx Joe. I didn’t know that. OMG there are soooo many lefties on here that bash Wal-Mart and their policies.
Let’s hear from you Capn & P_Mom. How ABOUT that Hillary Clinton running your favorite chain store…
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Sol–
I’m starting to look at you with new eyes, my friend.
You “get it.”
The Bush administration lies about everything that is important.
And they lie about the unimportant stuff too, just to keep in practice.
MPS, thanks for the information. I’ve talked with her a bit around some of these things, but will discuss it further.
LaJolla might, for the present, be out of the picture. Her husband has 2 years remaining on his Ph.D in Physics, so it looks like they’re in the Twin Cities for a while yet.
Here’s a link to the Village Voice on Hillary Clinton’s time at Walmart.
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0021,harkavy,15052,5.html
“she [Hillary Clinton] also served on the board of Lafarge, a company that, according to a press account, once burned hazardous fuels to run its cement plants.”
http://www.politicalfriendster.com/showConnection.php?id1=206&id2=207
Sol–
Nothing Hillary does or says surprises me anymore.
I called her “Hitlery” on DemocraticUnderground yesterday and the mods pulled my post.
She has no values. She’s an empty shell of whatever advances her career at the moment.
My biggest fear is that she’ll get the Democratic nomination. I believe she’s the only Democrat who can LOSE in November ‘08.
She’ll unite the now splintered reich-wing against her.
And if she wins . . . heaven help us.
At least she’d be a major improvement over what we’ve got now–
Worst.
President.
Possible.
Posted by: CapnAmerica | July 19, 2007 at 10:27 AM
Holy crap Capn. I never thought I’d see the day we agreed. I think IMHO that Hitlery will be worse than Bush. I think she sees the power that Cheney has added to the presidency and leech it. I don’t think GW was bright enough to fully control the powers, but Hitlery is.
Big big problems should she get elected. With her war chest bursting at the hinges… be afraid, be very afraid.
Kansas – if we had real leadership that would take the billions of dollars we have wasted in Iraq and actually put it towards alternative energey sources, then that dire doom of prophecy you rattled off would not have to come to pass.
It is time our leaders take care of our country. I’m tired of spending my tax dollars to bomb a country and then rebuild it just to be bombed again! That is stupidity at its finest.
And why are you against the pipe dreams of alternative sources of energy? You say you would be all for it, but then you throw up roadblocks to anyone merely suggesting that the US get off the Middle East oil teat.
Our billions of dollars spent on war could go a long way towards our own self-sufficiency, thus we get our super power status back.
Obama’s giving her a good run for her money though.
He’s a guy the country really needs right now.
He can pull us together if anybody can.
Kansas, I think you are a genuine Kansan, because you sound like one. Are you aware that in 1932, Kansas had EIGHT U.S. House representatives. Now FOUR. Now, please explain, why you want Kansas to be an economic failure.
I mean, like why do YOU think that Colorado went from 4 representatives in 1932–half of what Kansas had back then–to 7 representatives today, 75% increase, compared to Kansas’s 50% loss? Please, go ahead and explain what happened.
Damn right, FRED!
Wind power is out there for the taking.
Tesla is building a high performance totally electric car (after the Big Three literally scrapped their electric cars in the 90’s).
Great documentary: “Who Killed the Electric Car?” for rent at Blockbuster.
For those of you who believe that corporations don’t conspire together to kill new technology and maintain the status quo, this movie proves beyond a shadow of doubt the opposite:
The big three started a little electric car division just to make the California “zero emissions” regulators happy. They didn’t believe it could possibly be successful or that anyone would want one.
Turns out they had waiting lists. EVERYBODY wanted one. Hollywood movie stars had to fill out a questionaire to get one.
So what did the car companies do?They and their big oil buddies made sure the electric car didn’t happen.
They recalled all the cars and destroyed them.
Tesla, an independent company, may be able to change that. But it’ll take many years . . .
MPS–
You’re barking up the wrong tree there, my friend.
Troll-boy is only good at annoying people.
He’s not good at arguing positions that don’t involve cut-and-pasting Rush Limbaugh’s daily talking points.
What has Colorado got? Mountains and parks.
What has Kansas got? Farm policy that rewards big farmers to get bigger and runs small farmers off the land.
VT, USCD has great postdoctoral fellowship opportunities in physics. I mean, it depends upon what husband’s field is. Berkeley, UC Santa Barbara, UCSD, Stanford and Caltec, offer a wide range of disciplines between them, if somebody is really good.
http://www.teslamotors.com/index.php
0-60 in 4 seconds. $0.02 per mile. 250 mile range.
100% power at take off – no more power band – 100% power 100% of the time.
And a Lotus Elise chassis. One bad little motor scooter.
Solar panels. Massive efficiency increase. No batteries, you stay connected to the grid. For 10-20,000 you can have your roof paneled. Excess electricity produced is fed back into the grid and your meter runs backwards.
Look at all the pole barns out in the country. Look at the surface area on the roofs. Combine that with solar fields and wind generators.
“Free” power folks.
Now we just need to find alternative energy sources for aircraft.
Kansas, I think you are a genuine Kansan, because you sound like one. Are you aware that in 1932, I mean, like why do YOU think that Colorado went from 4 representatives in 1932–half of what Kansas had back then–to 7 representatives today, 75% increase, compared to Kansas’s 50% loss? Please, go ahead and explain what happened.
Posted by: MPS
Try beautiful Rocky Mountains, John Denver, Vail, and Coors beer for why.
If we could get off the damn oil teat at least for transportation, would we even care what was going on in the Mid-East? I mean look how we are handling Darfur…
Posted by: SolDevVB | July 19, 2007 at 09:58 AM
We can. I drive a civic hybrid. I am getting average 45 MPG. If everyone in America gor 45 MPG, the Saudi’s, Iranians, and Iraq would be back on camels and cooking with dried camel pie’s.
But nooooo, we gotta cry to the government that we NEED regulation on MPG.
AND we love our big SUV’s and Pickemup trucks.
If the demand by consumers was there, so would the fuel efficient vehicles. All we did by enacting new regulation on MPG, was give everyone an EXCUSE to NOT make improvements.
I’m invested in Tesla, via Google, Tesla’s largest VC investor. Also in Apple, whose founder Steve Jobs spearheaded the PC in the mid 1970’s, introduced what you see is what you get and mouse (which Xerox invented, but gave away), Pixar digidal movies, iPod and iPhone.
I’m investing in BHP Billiton, which has major metals mining and refining, whose products China is slurping up.
These are “no brainers”. Actually, they are “brainers” if you know what’s going on.
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/
How many NEO-CONS does it take to screw in a light bulb.
A. None. God won’t let their light bulbs go out. And it’s an impertinent question.
or
A. None. George Bush predicts the light bulb will be fully capable of changing itself within 3 months.
or
A. Neocons don’t bother with light bulbs. They declare a War on Darkness and set the house on fire.
or
A: None. The socket welcomes the light bulb with candy and flowers.
or
A. That’s an interesting question, one that I’m sure future historians will investigate in detail. Look, let me address this issue up front: I don’t know who’s been installing light bulbs or who hasn’t. That’s none of my business. There’s a lot of different views, there’s a range of views, and a lot of concerns, and we are working to accommodate those concerns. We know at this point that we still have some work to do and we are working very hard to address these issues. We’re not making estimates. At this point what you’ve had are some fairly — you had some dramatic testimony and comments — by the way, you can expect people to be ventilating these differing points of views in coming days. Our view is you have to have a resolution that offers a solution. And you’re going to have people — there is sometimes, you’ll be surprised to hear, a disparity between comments made in public for domestic audiences around the world, and comments made in private, as well. In short, we don’t want to comment on an ongoing investigation. (Tony? That you?)
Hotdog, you are so right. I love the Colorado Rockies. But do you know that Colorado was split off from the Kansas Territory?
http://media.ford.com/newsroom/feature_display.cfm?release=18794http://www.gm.com/company/gmability/adv_tech/http://www.chrysler.com/chrysler_lifestyle/index.html?context=sitemap-index&type=sitemap
Back to the Saudis, will pressure be put on the Saudis to secure their borders and stop their people from killing Americans?
Will Saudi be held to task for 15 of 19 of the 9-11 terrorists coming from their country?
Will our aiding Pakistanis attack and kidnap Iranians inside Iran come back to bite us? Is that what we want so we can wage war there as well?
Back to the Saudis, will pressure be put on the Saudis to secure their borders and stop their people from killing Americans?
Posted by: SolDevVB | July 19, 2007 at 11:25 AM
I love our country, but sometimes we sound so judgemental. How can you expect Saudi Arabia to secure their borders, when the most powerful country in the world cannot secure our own?
Who are we to be pointing fingers?
MPS, no I didn’t know that. Our loss. That might have made the water wars a little more interesting too had we stayed together.—–
So HotDog,
There are Saudis in Iraq killing American troops. What say you?
Be sure to tune in for the next episode of the Continuing Story of The Oil Man Cometh… brought to you by all major stations sponsored by the government soo.
To those who say, “We must defeat them over there, so they won’t come over here,”
that’s so 1960s rhetoric. If we didn’t stop the communists in Vietnam, they would invade the US, according to the Domino Theory.
Do I believe there is a sinister plot by the Saudi government to undermine our actions in Iraq? No.(although I agree with earlier poster than someone in government in Iran is trying to kill Americans.)
Saudi’s make up less than half of the foreign fighter’s as of the date of your data. I personally think it ebbs and flows. Young muslim and mostly arabic men are flocking to Iraq to join the fight. Weather conditions crossing the surrounding lands dictate somewhat when the highest numbers cross over.(Like our southern border)
But it is a problem and they are killing our troops. But so they come from Iran, Kuwait (whom we saved?), Jordan, etc….etc….
Interesting to make me relate the Iran to Saudi problems together.
Now I’m not sure each country deserves different approaches.
Do I believe there is a sinister plot by the Saudi government to undermine our actions in Iraq? No.(although I agree with earlier poster than someone in government in Iran is trying to kill Americans.)
Saudi’s make up less than half of the foreign fighter’s as of the date of your data. I personally think it ebbs and flows. Young muslim and mostly arabic men are flocking to Iraq to join the fight. Weather conditions crossing the surrounding lands dictate somewhat when the highest numbers cross over.(Like our southern border)
But it is a problem and they are killing our troops. But so they come from Iran, Kuwait (whom we saved?), Jordan, etc….etc….
Interesting to make me relate the Iran to Saudi problems together.
Now I’m not sure each country deserves different approaches.
Sorry for double post. I don’t know how I did that.
Kansas, I think you are a genuine Kansan, because you sound like one. Are you aware that in 1932, Kansas had EIGHT U.S. House representatives. Now FOUR. Now, please explain, why you want Kansas to be an economic failure.
I mean, like why do YOU think that Colorado went from 4 representatives in 1932–half of what Kansas had back then–to 7 representatives today, 75% increase, compared to Kansas’s 50% loss? Please, go ahead and explain what happened.
Posted by: MPS | July 19, 2007 at 10:40 AM====================
MPS, in regard to your first question about number of representatives the answer is below and has nothing to do with economics.
“If the ratio as specified by the Constitution of one representative for every 30,000 people were maintained today, the House of Representatives would have about 10,000 members”
http://www.answers.com/topic/united-states-congressional-apportionment
In 1923 for every 212,407 in population there were allowances for 1 Congressional representative.
Today one member represents about 650,000 people, which varies by state.
================Economic Failure?
Here are some figures to chew on. Granted, Kansas is not doing as well as Colorado, but there has been economic growth.
Perhaps you can explain why New Mexico and Utah are far ahead of Colorado in economic growth percentages? :)
Real GDP: Percent Growth numbershttp://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/regional/gdp_state/gsp_newsrelease.htm
Economic growth by Percentage
New Mexico of 6.2Utah at 7.2Arizona at 6.8Oklahoma at 6.7Colorado’s 4.9Kansas 3.4Nebraska 2.2Missouri 2.1Wyoming 2.2
Or MPS, explain why Missouri a known tourist attracting state had less economic growth than Kansas?
The Disney states California and Florida had 4.2.
There are more Saudis in Iraq than Iranians, yet the politicians are referencing a proxy war with Iran while ignoring Saudi.
Doesn’t pass the logic test. Smells like covering for the Saudis while trying to pick a fight with Iran.
Put that together with the US supporting Pakistanis raids into Iran.
Right Sol — Something sure doesnt smell right!!
Taking the number 650,000 for granted, consider this:
2006 General Election ResultsMcGinn 62,166 (33.9%)Tiahrt 116,386 (63.5%)Holt 4,655 (2.5%)
Not even half of the 650,000 voted. (I do not know if the 650,000 is only eligible voters.) Anyway, it’s interesting to consider how our representative is really ‘accepted’ by roughly 18% of those he represents.
DON’T EAT THAT HOG CHILI SAUCE!!!
FDA: Castleberry’s, Austex and Kroger Brands Chili Sauces Linked to Paralyzing BotulismAPThursday, July 19, 2007
WASHINGTON — Federal health officials warned consumers Wednesday to throw away certain cans of hot dog chili sauce after the product was linked to the first cases of botulism in commercially canned foods in decades.
Four people were hospitalized. The warning applies to 10-ounce cans of Castleberry’s, Austex and Kroger brands of hot dog chili sauce with “best by” dates from April 30, 2009, through May 22, 2009, the Food and Drug Administration said. It wasn’t immediately clear how widely the products were distributed.
…
Brackett urged consumers to discard any of the recalled cans without opening them.
“The toxin is so potent if they get it on their hands or it sprays in their face, it could make them ill,” he said.
Typically, commercially canned foods are heated long enough and to high enough temperatures to kill the spores.
“It’s been a triumph of food safety that canning is safe. That’s what makes this so unusual,” Lynch said.
Symptoms of botulism include double or blurred vision, drooping eyelids, slurred speech, difficulty swallowing, dry mouth and muscle weakness that moves down the body, according to the CDC.
The recall covers the following universal product codes:
—Castleberry’s Hot Dog Chili Sauce (UPC 3030000101);
—Austex Hot Dog Chili Sauce (UPC 3030099533);
—Kroger Hot Dog Chili Sauce (UPC 1111083942).
Consumers with questions may call the company toll-free at 888-203-8446.
We do know that Iranian bomb equipment is being used in Iraq. We do know we have captured Iranian Guard people in Iraq. A general stated that Iran planned the kidnapping/murder of a number of our troops in Iran (investigation pending?). We do know that Israel has in the past captured weapons shipments from Iranian ships which came directly from Iran. Iran’s president has made some pretty crazy statements, which we can ignore, or remember other crazed leaders who later followed through with their threats.
Let’s see, what has Saudi said or have we any proven evidence? Interesting about Paki, I hadn’t read about that. Sounds like our CIA at work invading Iran.
So on balance, we have the goods on Iran, but not the intestinal fortitude as a nation to go after Iran.
We don’t have the goods on Saudi yet, but we should probably pressure them to stop the flow. I agree with you.
But I don’t see them as individuals not as equals, or better as the same. (yet)
The 650,000 is total population allowed per Congressional District for the purposes of establishing the District.
But you right Proudman, it shows very pathetic voter turn out.
Ummm Proud Man??? Did you add up these percentages??? If those come from somewhere that is Published, there would seem to be a problem….
2006 General Election ResultsMcGinn 62,166 (33.9%)Tiahrt 116,386 (63.5%)Holt 4,655 (2.5%)
Those %’s add up to more than 100% You think Tiahrt did some mathematical computations??
Those are most likely percent of registered voters by District Chas and are exclusive of one another.
Ok, so who are McGinn and Holt??
Chas,
Proudman’s numbers match those on the Secretary of State’s website. If you add them up, it comes out to 99.9%. So either there’s some rounding, or write in votes, or both, that account for that final 1/10%
Tom, pardon me, but if you add up just McGinn and Tiahrt you have OVER 100% — not to mention Holt…
The troll, once again, displays its absolute ignorance of anything it hasn’t googled. The numbers listed by Proudman are the number of votes cast for each candidate for United States Representatives, Kansas 4th District.
33.9 + 63.5 = 97.4
97.4 + 2.5 = 99.9
Oops, you’re right Chas, that was the opposition of Tiahrt. Happens when you’re up all night with back spasms.
The results here:http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2006//pages/results/states/KS/H/04/county.000.html
33.9% + 63.5% = 100.4%ADD Hart 2.5% = 102.9% Total %
Holt was the Libertarian candidate for 4th District. Interestingly, she didn’t _live_ in 4th, she lives in 3rd, which is the Wyandotte/Johnson Counties area. This is legal under Kansas law – you don’t have to live in the US Congressional district you run for.
McGinn was the Democratic candidate. He didn’t have a clue what he was doing, not a single one. He only raised $23,000 for his race, and barely campaigned.
I’ll see your back pain, and raise you necki surgery/shoulder pain… LOL
Pardon me. Holt was Reform Party, not Libertarian.
Seems like the only thing you can win in KS if you have a “D” after your name, is Governor All the rest are Republicans… well, except for Dan Glickman won…
“I’ll see your back pain, and raise you necki surgery/shoulder pain… LOL”
Posted by: chas. | July 19, 2007 at 12:55 PM
No thanks Chas. :)
It’s part of my condition from my disability injuries. I put up with it and am too stubborn to take pain medication.
So, Tom, you see where I got that 102.9% .. and why it was bugging me??
Ummm I was addressing Tom’s back pain… mentioned above??
Then pardon me Chas, I didn’t read where Tom had mentioned any back pain or spasms.
Chas,
That’s less true than it once was. Nancy Boyda, a Democrat, beat James Ryun, a faaaaaaar-right Republican, in 2nd Congressional District. Paul Morrison beat Philllll Kline. The Democrats picked up five seats in the Kansas Statehouse.
Furthermore, other Republicans who ran for statewide office and won have a reputation as traditional Republicans, not wingnuts. Lynn Jenkins (treasurer) and Sandy Praeger (insurance commissioner) are both pro-choice, pro-civil rights Republicans.
In the Statehouse, in addition to the gains by the Democrats, traditional moderate Republicans picked up 4 more seats from the wingers.
sorry that was your post about back pain… i read the wrong sign line… LOL
Well, maybe there is still light at the end of the tunnel (no, not the train) for the Democrats in KS…
Chas,
I think your math is off a bit ;)
But, Tom, I am still puzzled as to how those election %’s can add up to more than 100%??
OK… I found it… had a dyslexic mathematical moment there…. Didnt get much sleep last nite… neck surgery and shoulder pain kept me awake!! Drat!!
Joe Williams,
Lavonta Williams not a Democrat, she’s registered “unaffiliated.” Many people mistakenly call that “Independent. There’ no “Independent” party in Kansas, and no “independent” checkbox on voter registration cards.
It seems we have the goods on Saudi as well.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-saudi15jul15,0,3132262.story?coll=la-home-centerAbout 45% of all foreign militants targeting U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians and security forces are from Saudi Arabia;Fighters from Saudi Arabia are thought to have carried out more suicide bombings than those of any other nationality, said the senior U.S. officerHe said 50% of all Saudi fighters in Iraq come here as suicide bombers. In the last six months, such bombings have killed or injured 4,000 Iraqis.
Now, if only we could make that connection between BushCo and the Saudi’s a little stronger, then we could say Bush has an interest in Saudi being in Iraq… and killing, or at least shooting, at our troops… Wow, what a reason to bring the troops HOME!
At MyspaceTV.com, there is a hilarious clip from a Bush Press Conference, where the reporter asks “W” what the connection between Iraq and 9/11 was… Bush asks him to repeat… The reporter repeats… Bush says NONE!! It is most funny!!
Let’s Protect our troops… Bring them home!!
Actually I believe you have to register as unaffilated when you run in City elections.
I’m not 100%, but I believe you do.
Now, if only we could make that connection between BushCo and the Saudi’s Wow, what a reason to bring the troops HOME!
Posted by: chas.
We are not bringing the troops home because of Bush. They are being brought home because America does not believe in the war anymore.
It seems some are preoccupied with finding dirt on the president. Enough already. Keep at it if you must, if you feel it will be best for America.
But don’t equate bringing the troops home with your dislike for this president. Afterall, would the Iraq War be O.K., if Hillary was President right now?
I guess I don’t see the point of your post.
TIMEThursday, Jul. 19, 2007 By MICHAEL DUFFY
There are two big schools of thought about what the U.S. should do next in Iraq, and both schools are almost certainly wrong.
On the fourth anniversary of the war, TIME.com presents a month-by-month history of memorable images, milestones and soundbites. Plus: a correspondents’ roundtable
The first, represented by many congressional Democrats, argues that it is past the time for America to leave. The best thing that could happen now is for the U.S. to pull out as quickly as possible, force the Iraqis to take control of their destinies and compel the oil-rich gulf states in the neighborhood to get off the sidelines. In this view, leaving Iraq would deny al-Qaeda its best recruiting tool, a large U.S. military presence in the Middle East. Along the way, the U.S. could save the $10 billion a month that it is spending on the war and rescue the U.S. Army and Marine Corps before they both collapse.To the other school, it’s just as clear that the only possible course is to continue to fight for as long as it takes. Espoused by Bush Administration officials, the contention of this group is that by withdrawing from Iraq, we’d unleash a bloodbath, hand al-Qaeda and Iran huge victories, destabilize the Persian Gulf and empower terrorists everywhere to attack our allies and our homeland. In the face of those dangers, say the White House and its backers, America has no choice but to remain in Iraq until a democracy emerges from the chaos of the Middle East — a project they openly acknowledge is the work of a generation.Four years after the U.S. invaded Iraq, neither approach makes much sense. Political support for the war has cratered; Americans want the troops brought home. But they also know that it isn’t likely to happen soon and that no matter when America leaves, Iraq could well become a more chaotic, violent place. They have learned that in the Middle East the U.S. has very little, if any, control over what might occur. And no matter what your views of the war or its genesis, things are likely to turn out different from what you expect.As the White House and Congress bicker over timetables and benchmarks, intelligence estimates and report cards, the real question is the one neither camp is facing very well: How do we leave in a way that maximizes the good that we can still achieve and minimizes the damage that will inevitably occur? The best strategic minds in both parties have argued for months that the answer is essentially to muddle our way out, cut our losses carefully and try to salvage what we can from a mission gone bad. Even under the rosiest scenarios, the U.S. will suffer a humbling blow to its prestige as it leaves Iraq and the Sunni-Shi’ite civil war intensifies. But with the debacle would come some dividends. Done judiciously, a pullback from the war would start restoring America’s ability to advance its interests and deter aggression beyond Iraq.What’s needed is not the sloganeering of certain politicians but a clear-eyed, multifaceted policy. That would involve making plain to the Iraqi government our intention to pull back, followed by an orderly withdrawal of about half the 160,000 troops currently in Iraq by the middle of 2008. A force of 50,000 to 100,000 troops would dig in for a longer stay to protect America’s most vital interests: denying al- Qaeda a safe haven and preventing an almost inevitable civil war from spilling into neighboring countries. At the same time, the reduction in the U.S.’s military footprint in the region should be accompanied by a sustained surge in American diplomacy.Slowly backing out of Iraq is hardly inspiring and won’t be likely to satisfy either the President or his opponents. It may look just as messy as what the U.S. is doing now. But a responsible retreat would limit U.S. casualties and move America out of a debilitating chapter that has now played out politically at home, if not militarily on the ground. In a world of bad options, a phased withdrawal is the least bad one out there.
WHAT A PULLOUT WOULD LOOK LIKEOn July 17, in yet another example of how unhelpful the political conversation has become, workers laid out cots and pillows in a marble cloakroom on Capitol Hill as the Senate prepared for an all-night debate on another in a line of doomed-to-fail resolutions. Sponsored by Democratic Senators Carl Levin and Jack Reed, the measure called on the Administration to begin withdrawing the bulk of U.S. troops within 120 days and leave an unstated number behind to go after terrorists and protect the U.S. embassy in Baghdad. Many Republicans might support such a plan in private if they did not feel that the Democrats were keeping them up all night to score points at the President’s expense. But even if Congress approved Levin-Reed, military logistics experts say it would take far longer than 120 days to redeploy even half of U.S. forces.The reality is that it’s difficult to get out fast. It took the Soviets nine months to pull 120,000 troops out of Afghanistan. They were simply going next door, and they still lost more than 500 men on the way out. Pulling out 10 combat brigades — roughly 30,000 troops, along with their gear and support personnel — would take at least 10 months, Pentagon officials say. And that’s only part of the picture. There are civilians who would probably want to head for the exit when GIs started packing. They include some 50,000 U.S. contractors and tens of thousands of Iraqis who might need protection if we left the country.Slowing things down further is the sheer volume of stuff that we would have to take with us — or destroy if we couldn’t. Military officials recently told Congress that 45,000 ground-combat vehicles — a good portion of the entire U.S. inventory of tanks, helicopters, armored personnel carriers, trucks and humvees — are now in Iraq. They are spread across 15 bases, 38 supply depots, 18 fuel-supply centers and 10 ammo dumps. These items have to be taken back home or destroyed, lest they fall into the hands of one faction or another. Pentagon officials will try to bring back as much of the downtime gear as possible — dining halls, office buildings, vending machines, furniture, mobile latrines, computers, paper clips and acres of living quarters. William (Gus) Pagonis, the Army logistics chief who directed the flood of supplies to Saudi Arabia for the 1991 Gulf War and their orderly withdrawal from the region, cites one more often overlooked hurdle: U.S. agricultural inspectors insist that, before it re-enters the U.S., Army equipment be free of any microscopic disease that, as Pagonis puts it, “can wipe out flocks of chickens and stuff like that.”Once the U.S. decides to pull its forces back, the security risks to troops leaving the battlefield would increase, and the faster the U.S. withdraws, the greater the dangers. Departing troops lose their focus and become easy targets, says Pagonis. Local militias usually try to prove their mettle by firing at departing columns. “It would be ugly,” says retired Army General Barry McCaffrey, who supports a partial withdrawal. “You’d burn or blow up a lot of your equipment or hand it over to the Iraqis. You’d be subject to attack on your way down to the coast because on the way, people would say, ‘We can either throw rose petals or shoot at ‘em,’ and they’d shoot at us.” A gradual exit rather than an immediate one isn’t merely the wiser course; it’s the only course.THE FATE OF THE IRAQISA reduction in the U.S. combat presence would probably produce one clear benefit: a lower U.S. casualty rate. But a chilling truth is that as the U.S. death toll declined, the Iraqi one would almost surely soar. Just how many Iraqis would die if the U.S. withdrew is anyone’s guess, but almost everyone who has studied it believes the current rate of more than a thousand a month would spike dramatically. It might not resemble Rwanda, where more than half a million people were slaughtered in six months in 1994. But Iraq could bleed like the former Yugoslavia did from 1992 to 1995, when 250,000 perished.There is no debate about why: in the wake of an American pullout, Baghdad would be quickly dominated by Shi’ite militias largely unbloodied by the American campaign. Already, well-armed security forces that pose as independent are riddled with militiamen who take direction from Shi’ite leaders. Death-squad killings of Sunnis would rise. Against such emboldened forces, Sunni insurgents and elements of Saddam Hussein’s former regime would retaliate with their weapon of choice: car-bomb attacks against Shi’ite markets, shrines, police stations and recruiting depots.One result of the military’s “surge” strategy is that the U.S. has handed over to Sunni tribal sheiks much greater responsibility for their security — and even the weapons to back it up — in exchange for severing their links to al-Qaeda. That’s a manageable risk while U.S. forces are nearby; if they depart, it becomes tinder in a dry forest. The danger would be not just sectarian slaughter but outright anarchy as well. “Our immediate concern,” says a senior Arab diplomat, “is that sending a signal of complete withdrawal could encourage some elements in every faction in every political group that they can now impose their own agenda. It would be not only Shi’ite versus Sunni … but [war] inside each community itself. The worst case is a Somalia-ization of Iraq.”Some experts believe Iraqis would, after a brief explosion of violence, regain control of their country. Indeed, there are those who think that is the best reason for the U.S. to set a date for a withdrawal now, to force the Iraqis to step up and take control before any kind of U.S. pullout begins to create a vacuum. But there are few indications that the Iraqi center, such as it is, can hold or that Iraq’s neighbors will be much of a stabilizing influence.The worst-case scenario is an Iraq war that becomes a regional conflict. Sunni sympathizers in the region — most notably in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Syria — would funnel arms and cash to their kinsmen in Iraq to counter the Shi’ites, just as the government of Iran is quietly helping the Shi’ites themselves. “One of the things we’ve seen elsewhere, whether it is Ireland or Palestine,” says Jon Alterman, Middle East director of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, “is that when you have people outside the country that are doing the paying, you will continue to have proxies inside the country doing the killing.”It’s easy to see how a reckless U.S. departure could spark a chain reaction that leads to further destabilization or even war among Iran, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, three of the world’s 15 top oil-exporting countries. Shi’ites who object to Saudi backing of the Sunnis might retaliate inside the kingdom — or Sunnis might take the fight into Iran. “We will have sectarian violence on a level that would likely trigger regional war,” says Michèle Flournoy, president of the Center for a New American Security, a nonpartisan think tank. “At that point, you are looking at a path you don’t want to go down.”Given that the current U.S. force has been unable to curb sectarian killings, it’s unreasonable to expect that a reduced U.S. troop presence would stop Sunnis and Shi’ites from killing one another. But even with a significantly smaller footprint, the U.S. would retain sufficient firepower on the ground and in the skies to guard against others trying to intervene. After a majority of U.S. troops depart, a military presence of some size will still be needed — not so much to referee a civil war, as U.S. forces are doing now, but to try to keep it from expanding. McCaffrey and others argue for cutting U.S. forces by no more than half for now. “If you end up with 10 combat brigades in Iraq at the end of this President’s term” — down from 20 today — “you’d still have enough combat power” to deter outside actors from further stoking the fire.
THE AL-QAEDA FACTORAdvocates of a phased withdrawal from Iraq still must overcome the Bush Administration’s most vociferous argument against it: that Americans must stay in Iraq to prevent al-Qaeda from establishing a safe haven there. As support from key Republicans has withered, the Pentagon has cranked up the al-Qaeda rhetoric. On July 17, the Administration released the latest National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), which said “Al-Qaeda will probably seek to leverage the contacts and capabilities of al-Qaeda in Iraq” to plot attacks against the U.S. homeland. Bush has turned up the volume, mentioning al-Qaeda 27 times in a speech last month. “Leaving Iraq now,” Bush said recently, would mean we’d “allow the terrorists to establish a safe haven in Iraq to replace the one they lost in Afghanistan … People aren’t just going to be content with driving America out of Iraq. Al-Qaeda wants to hurt us here.”Anthony Cordesman, a security analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says the U.S. military estimates that al-Qaeda in Iraq — a group thought to number several thousand — accounts for only about 15% of the attacks in Iraq. (Other Sunni groups account for 70%, with Shi’ite militias responsible for the remaining 15%.) But, Cordesman says, those attacks are the most deadly and “probably do the most damage in pushing Iraq toward civil war.” At the moment, al-Qaeda in Iraq is valuable to Osama bin Laden and his top deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, even though the links between the Qaeda leaders and the jihadi shock troops in Iraq are tenuous. The violence perpetrated by al-Qaeda in Iraq helps the organization raise money and draw new recruits. The declassified NIE summary says al-Qaeda in Iraq helps al-Qaeda “energize the broader Sunni extremist community, raise resources and recruit and indoctrinate operatives, including for homeland attacks.”But it’s also true that al-Qaeda in Iraq is on the run. On Wednesday, the U.S. announced the capture of the highest-ranking commander of the group in Iraq. When the U.S. leaves, many Iraqis say, they can deal with the terrorists and their patrons more harshly. The Anbar Salvation Council has been aggressively targeting al-Qaeda in that province, denying it safe haven in places it once controlled with an iron fist. The Administration has boasted in recent weeks that the Sunnis in Anbar are attacking elements of al-Qaeda. So why would that end if the U.S. withdrew? “If we withdraw from Iraq, a lot of the tensions we see today are going to be directed against al-Qaeda as well as against every other faction,” says Cordesman. “So it’s not going to be some sort of easy sanctuary for al-Qaeda.”But neither will the broader jihadist threat in Iraq or elsewhere vanish when we leave. Most plans for a reduced U.S. mission in Iraq — including the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group, headed by James Baker III and Lee Hamilton — call for retaining a small counterterrorism force there. “No one is going to complain about going after an al-Qaeda target,” says Anthony Zinni, former head of U.S. Central Command, who advocates a gradual disengagement from the sectarian conflict. Even so, the U.S. needs to be realistic about what 75,000 U.S. troops can achieve. “I want to blow up al-Qaeda wherever we can, but I don’t think we’re going to have any particular capacity to do that if we cut our troop strength in half and pull back into the desert,” says Stephen Biddle of the Council on Foreign Relations. Cordesman, who does not favor an immediate withdrawal, notes that all the worry about al-Qaeda in Iraq ignores the much larger threat that bin Laden’s ideas already pose to U.S. interests. “Al-Qaeda does not have a center,” he says. “Al-Qaeda operates in Pakistan; al-Qaeda operates in Afghanistan. It has distributed networks and affiliates in Algeria. It has ties, awkward as they are, to Hamas. We are talking about a network, which is international in character, which will be a major threat whether we win or lose in Iraq.”REDEFINING SUCCESSAs exhausting as the enterprise in Iraq has been for Americans, it remains merely the most urgent of a wide range of challenges to global stability. While it can only be glimpsed, an end to the debacle in Iraq does not mean an end to America’s responsibilities in the world. With the U.S. drawing down, Iraq would diminish as a focal point of anti-Americanism. With most U.S. troops exiting the region, Washington would have more leverage with Iran, which has continued its march toward nuclear weapons while the U.S. has been bogged down in Iraq. And most important of all, the U.S. would regain the military, economic and intellectual bandwidth it once employed to advance its interests elsewhere and start rebuilding its reputation overseas.But that will require the kind of diplomatic effort that this Administration has been reluctant to pursue. The most obvious place to start is Iraq, where U.S. diplomacy will still be needed to bring about a sustainable accord between Sunnis and Shi’ites, should they ever tire of fighting. A State Department official says what is needed is a greater willingness to engage hard-line forces on both sides of the sectarian divide as well as the Iranians and Syrians, all of whom will have a say in Iraq’s future. Resistance to this idea comes from the White House, a U.S. diplomat says. “There is a reality on the ground in Iraq that we never really wanted to confront too much, but there are real politics in Iraq,” says the official. “If we can tap into that and start working and engaging with Iraqis in a different way, we might actually become part of what emerges as a solution.”Beyond Iraq, a redoubled effort to build a viable Palestinian government that can eventually reach a settlement with Israel would undercut another source of anti-Americanism and Islamic radicalism. The U.S. must also attend to growing instability in Pakistan, a key but uncertain ally in its war on terrorism, and may need to send some of the troops coming out of Iraq to Afghanistan to shore up the shaky government in Kabul.Can it be done? Michael Mandelbaum, who teaches U.S. foreign policy at Johns Hopkins University, warns that potential gains in any salvage operation are limited, and this one is no different. “The goal here is damage limitation,” he says, “not the kind of success envisioned when the operation began.” Withdrawal from Iraq will be slow, messy and painful. But however difficult the passage, it is still possible to get to a place that is more secure than where we are now.http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1644877-1,00.html
“By the way, no mention of Gore’s endangered fish dinner here?”
Posted by: SolDevVB | July 19, 2007 at 08:40 AM
It is a good example of how falsehoods are spread.
‘Attacks on Gore backfire.’http://thinkprogress.org/2007/07/19/attacks-on-gore-backfire
‘Al Gore’s fish dinner turns out green’http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2007/07/19/eagore119.xml “But the fish enjoyed by the Gores were not endangered or illegally caught.”
“The problem is huge. This is unfortunate, we have been in touch with the society today. The really important thing is that people become more aware of this issue.”
I guess they are aware of it now. It has been all over the media. Didn’t know I had to fact check them.
My apologies, it was a false posting on my part.
I guess I don’t see the point of your post.
Posted by: Hotdog1 | July 19, 2007 at 01:39 PM
Hotdog1… The only point I making is that the article prior to my post was just another in a long line of reasons why we should get out of Iraq… There are a host of other reasons… But if this kind of Connection between Pres. Bush, and the Saudi Royal Family, it is just more fuel for the fire of forcing Bush’s hand to bring them home… So far, he hasnt agreed to bring them home…
In a partial victory for President Bill Clinton, the Senate on Wednesday rejected a proposal to cut off financing for the troop deployment to Bosnia..But Mr. Clinton, who was to leave hours later for the signing in Paris of the Bosnia peace agreement, appeared unlikely to get the clear endorsement of the U.S. mission he had sought..Chances for House backing of the Bosnia operation appeared slight. Although the full House is not expected to vote on a similar financing bill before Thursday, the Republican caucus Wednesday voted, 108 to 64, to endorse the measure to cut off money for the operation..Speaking of the legislative debate, Mr. Clinton said Wednesday morning, “I just can’t believe Congress won’t support our troops in this mission.” Mr. Clinton appeared at the White House with the Nobel Peace laureate Elie Wiesel, who backed his call for support, saying American troops could help save lives in Bosnia..But some in Congress were taking issue with the president’s comment, saying that they do support the troops, though not their presence in Bosnia..The one-sidedness of the Senate vote — the bid to cut off financing for the 20,000 American troops in the NATO peace force in Bosnia failed 22 to 77 — appeared to reflect a belief among legislators that the troop deployment would proceed regardless of any action in Congress..”This debate ultimately has no practical consequence in terms of preventing the troops from going,” said Senator William S. Cohen, Republican of Maine..Whether one approves of the mission or not, the Senate majority leader, Bob Dole of Kansas, said of the financing bill, “This is not the way to go.” Recalling fierce debates during the Vietnam War about cutting off funds, Mr. Dole said the passage of the bill would have left American soldiers exposed to greater dangers..”It is wrong,” he said, “because it makes our young men and women bear the brunt of a decision that was made not by them but by the president, who is the commander in chief.”.Mr. Clinton has said that he would like a congressional endorsement in his pocket when he reaches Paris, but it was unclear whether he would have that..The administration has invested its hopes in congressional passage of a proposal that Mr. Dole has drafted with Senator John S. McCain 3d, Republican of Arizona, which offers qualified support for the mission..Chances for that measure’s passage were thought to have been increased after President Clinton sent the two senators a letter Tuesday seeking to assure them that the United States would lead efforts to arm and train the Bosnian Muslim military..It said the United States would take a leading role “in coordinating an international effort to ensure that the Bosnian Federation receives the assistance necessary to achieve an adequate military balance” by the time the peace force leaves the region..Training programs and “nonlethal” assistance could begin immediately, the president wrote. Small-arms shipments to Bosnia could begin after three months..The administration had been reluctant to provide such assurances for fear that the rearmament effort would make it appear that the United States was taking sides..The proposal appeared likely to be approved by the Senate, but Republican leaders said the House would not even consider the Dole-McCain resolution..After a meeting of House Republicans on Wednesday morning, Representative John Boehner of Ohio, who heads the party caucus, said the House would debate three proposals: cutting off funds, opposing deployment but supporting the troops, and a Democratic proposal backing the president, but not the Dole-McCain measure. In a partial victory for President Bill Clinton, the Senate on Wednesday rejected a proposal to cut off financing for the troop deployment to Bosnia..But Mr. Clinton, who was to leave hours later for the signing in Paris of the Bosnia peace agreement, appeared unlikely to get the clear endorsement of the U.S. mission he had sought..Chances for House backing of the Bosnia operation appeared slight. Although the full House is not expected to vote on a similar financing bill before Thursday, the Republican caucus Wednesday voted, 108 to 64, to endorse the measure to cut off money for the operation..Speaking of the legislative debate, Mr. Clinton said Wednesday morning, “I just can’t believe Congress won’t support our troops in this mission.” Mr. Clinton appeared at the White House with the Nobel Peace laureate Elie Wiesel, who backed his call for support, saying American troops could help save lives in Bosnia..But some in Congress were taking issue with the president’s comment, saying that they do support the troops, though not their presence in Bosnia..The one-sidedness of the Senate vote — the bid to cut off financing for the 20,000 American troops in the NATO peace force in Bosnia failed 22 to 77 — appeared to reflect a belief among legislators that the troop deployment would proceed regardless of any action in Congress..”This debate ultimately has no practical consequence in terms of preventing the troops from going,” said Senator William S. Cohen, Republican of Maine..Whether one approves of the mission or not, the Senate majority leader, Bob Dole of Kansas, said of the financing bill, “This is not the way to go.” Recalling fierce debates during the Vietnam War about cutting off funds, Mr. Dole said the passage of the bill would have left American soldiers exposed to greater dangers..”It is wrong,” he said, “because it makes our young men and women bear the brunt of a decision that was made not by them but by the president, who is the commander in chief.”.Mr. Clinton has said that he would like a congressional endorsement in his pocket when he reaches Paris, but it was unclear whether he would have that..The administration has invested its hopes in congressional passage of a proposal that Mr. Dole has drafted with Senator John S. McCain 3d, Republican of Arizona, which offers qualified support for the mission..Chances for that measure’s passage were thought to have been increased after President Clinton sent the two senators a letter Tuesday seeking to assure them that the United States would lead efforts to arm and train the Bosnian Muslim military..It said the United States would take a leading role “in coordinating an international effort to ensure that the Bosnian Federation receives the assistance necessary to achieve an adequate military balance” by the time the peace force leaves the region..Training programs and “nonlethal” assistance could begin immediately, the president wrote. Small-arms shipments to Bosnia could begin after three months..The administration had been reluctant to provide such assurances for fear that the rearmament effort would make it appear that the United States was taking sides..The proposal appeared likely to be approved by the Senate, but Republican leaders said the House would not even consider the Dole-McCain resolution..After a meeting of House Republicans on Wednesday morning, Representative John Boehner of Ohio, who heads the party caucus, said the House would debate three proposals: cutting off funds, opposing deployment but supporting the troops, and a Democratic proposal backing the president, but not the Dole-McCain measure. In a partial victory for President Bill Clinton, the Senate on Wednesday rejected a proposal to cut off financing for the troop deployment to Bosnia..But Mr. Clinton, who was to leave hours later for the signing in Paris of the Bosnia peace agreement, appeared unlikely to get the clear endorsement of the U.S. mission he had sought..Chances for House backing of the Bosnia operation appeared slight. Although the full House is not expected to vote on a similar financing bill before Thursday, the Republican caucus Wednesday voted, 108 to 64, to endorse the measure to cut off money for the operation..Speaking of the legislative debate, Mr. Clinton said Wednesday morning, “I just can’t believe Congress won’t support our troops in this mission.” Mr. Clinton appeared at the White House with the Nobel Peace laureate Elie Wiesel, who backed his call for support, saying American troops could help save lives in Bosnia..But some in Congress were taking issue with the president’s comment, saying that they do support the troops, though not their presence in Bosnia..The one-sidedness of the Senate vote — the bid to cut off financing for the 20,000 American troops in the NATO peace force in Bosnia failed 22 to 77 — appeared to reflect a belief among legislators that the troop deployment would proceed regardless of any action in Congress..”This debate ultimately has no practical consequence in terms of preventing the troops from going,” said Senator William S. Cohen, Republican of Maine..Whether one approves of the mission or not, the Senate majority leader, Bob Dole of Kansas, said of the financing bill, “This is not the way to go.” Recalling fierce debates during the Vietnam War about cutting off funds, Mr. Dole said the passage of the bill would have left American soldiers exposed to greater dangers..”It is wrong,” he said, “because it makes our young men and women bear the brunt of a decision that was made not by them but by the president, who is the commander in chief.”.http://www.iht.com/articles/1995/12/14/yanks.t.php
Thank you for your apology, SolDevVB.
The fish story has already spread all over the Web (Google). It’ll probably be another false attack, like ‘Love Story’, etc…
It’s a good example of how our dysfunctional media works.
‘Joining the dots on an anti-Gore story’http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2007/07/joining_the_dots_on_an_antigor.php“Allow me to connect some dots here. How did the story get from People [magazine] into an Australian tabloid? And how did it get from there to [ABC's] Jake Tapper?”
See the link for the explanation.
Most people base their opinions on the information(sic) media provides.
It’s funny.
LHG (Little Headed Guy) stopped posting right after I pointed out that given what he writes, he’d have to be at least 87 years old.
Don’t run away (hobble away?), Little Headed Guy.
Push the walker up to the computer and type away, Grandma . . .
See Hillary Clinton get roundly booed on this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAH3AeFy0SY
Actually I believe you have to register as unaffilated when you run in City elections.Posted by: Joe Williams | July 19, 2007 at 01:38 PM
LOL!!
Um. No.
You can register as a member of the Communist Party of the United States if you want, and run for Mayor or Wichita City Council.
In Wichita, PACs and political parties are prohibited from contributing to candidates for city office. Furthermore, party affiliations are not printed on the ballots for city elections, and the primaries are “top two win,” not “one winner from each party.”
Theoretically, the Wichita City Council is “non-partisan.” In reality, our city council is as partisan as they come. All the wrangling over Lavonta Williams was three Republicans insisting that “one of their own” represent 1st District, even though the _people_ from 1st District did _not_ want Treatha Brown-Foster. We know her, and know she’s not qualified.
The one Republican on City Council, freshman Jeff Longwell, who consistently voted for Williams did so because he believes Williams is FAR more qualified than Brown-Foster. He also happens to be _correct_.
If the two Democrats on City Council, the mayor and Sharon Fearey, had wanted to be partisan, they could have picked Michael Kinard. His Democratic Party credentials are impeccable. However, like rational adults, they chose the person who would represent 1st District and who is smart enough and qualified enough for the job.
It’s funny.
LHG (Little Headed Guy) stopped posting right after I pointed out that given what he writes, he’d have to be at least 87 years old.
Don’t run away (hobble away?), Little Headed Guy.
Push the walker up to the computer and type away, Grandma . . .
Posted by: CapnAmerica | July 19, 2007 at 02:38 PM
Captain America why do you have to revert to name calling and flaming other posters? Is this really necessary? It just fills the blog with wasted space. You did this last night too and I don’t understand why an adult would behave in such manner.
Eagle Beak,
I don’t even see the thread of posts he is referring to. Last thing I see from an lhg was posted very early this morning on the open thread.
Looks like Fox is starting to admit that humans ARE causing global warming. If the trend continues, where will Sen. Inhofe, Steven Milloy, Lindzen, etc go to spread their lies?
‘Is Fox News finally turning the Climate Change Corner?’http://www.desmogblog.com/is-fox-news-finally-turing-the-climate-change-corner
‘Global Warming: How Do Scientists Know They’re Not Wrong?’http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,289647,00.html?sPage=fnc.science/naturalscience” “We’re confident about what’s going on,” said climate scientist Gavin Schmidt of NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Science in New York….Schmidt says that predictions by those who doubted global warming have failed to come true.
“Why don’t you trust a psychic? Because their predictions are wrong,” he told LiveScience. “The credibility goes to the side that gets these predictions right.” ”
Gavin Schmidt’s bio,http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=46
Source: Reuters
Bush chief of staff faces possible contempt chargesThu Jul 19, 2007 2:42PM EDT
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The White House chief of staff facedpossible contempt charges after a congressional panel onThursday rejected President George W. Bush’s attempt to limitthe probe of the firing of federal prosecutors.
On a party-line vote of 7-3, a Democratic-led House Judiciarysubcommittee rejected Bush’s contention that his claim ofexecutive privilege shields the top aide, Joshua Bolten, fromhaving to turn over subpoenaed documents.
Last week, the panel neared contempt proceedings againstformer White House counsel Harriet Miers after she declined toappear at a hearing on the dismissals. It rejected Bush’s claim that Miers was immunized from having to show up.
http://www.reuters.com/article/politicsNews/idUSN1943245420070719
Gee, Eagle Beak–
Maybe people should just stop LYING about themselves.
If they do that, I’ll stop making fun of their lies.
When I said “people,” I really meant this ONE person should stop lying.
Some take joy in making fun of senior citizens.
And the Big Capn somehow thinks he knows the truth, when he cannot speak it himself.
What an arrogant a**. And to think he wanted others banned from this blog!
Capn – you getting a job anytime soon? Those who earn income are tired of paying for you.
IT’s Back. And IT’S name is Capn.
“”Premature and public discussion of the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq reinforces enemy propaganda that the United States will abandon its allies in Iraq, much as we are perceived to have done in Vietnam, Lebanon and Somalia,” Edelman wrote.”
I am trying to think of the word that means “one who reinforces enemy propaganda”. Any ideas?
Nah, Little Headed Guy, I’m kicking back here on my couch I got from a dumpster using the laptop the government gave me to “ejukate” myself–haha! SUCKERS!
Just did a crack pipe and four bong hits paid for by YOUR TAX DOLLARS, LHG!
HELL YES! WOOHOO!
Now I’m gonna steal some purses from crippled up old ladies on the bus.
And if and when I ever get caught, I’m gonna spend more of YOUR TAX DOLLARS to use the services of my gov’t appointed lawyer.
Hey? Where’s the rest of my crack?
No problem, the mailman just came with all my FOOD STAMPS and my WELFARE checks. HotDOGGIE!
Once I cash those in, I’m back to being a total parasite on society once more . . .
For the sarcasm impaired, the above post was total fiction.
We now return to regularly scheduled programming . . .
Hog Futures Hillary has an anger management problem. I hear her skin is thinner than Monica Lewinski’s kneepads.
Years ago, there was a woman who worked for me who had survived cancer for over 5 years. Then her cancer returned.
I’ll never forget the moment when she came to my office and sat down crying, not because her cancer had returned, but because her doctor had ordered her to reduced work hours.
A few weeks later, she came to my office and sat down crying again. This time, her doctor told her she couldn’t work anymore at all.
Danielle love life, loved to work, took pride being a single mother who had immigrated from France with her two children, and then her cancer returned.
She worked until the last possible moment, even under severe pain, because she had that pride of taking care of her self and her kids.
She would have qualified for disability sooner, but that wasn’t Danielle.
You don’t see her kind around anymore.
Damn right, LHG.
We need more FRENCH people.
Mais oui.
By the way, what year were you born?
Yesterday, it was 1920.. remember??
Sean Hannity just announced an hour ago, that he plans opening the Vince Foster case again on his Sunday 9 p.m.(EDT) TV show…
And a judge claimed today that Joseph Wilson and Valerie Plame dont have a case against Libby/Cheney/et al, because after all, it is their JOB to leak information…
I sure hope Wilson/Plame push that ruling to a higher court..
Danielle, the French lady worked right next to Gretchen, the German and Juana Maria the Mexican.
It’s like when I worked in Japan, I came home on break and somebody I met asked if I had met “Keiko” in Japan.
It’s like half the girls in Japan are named “Keiko” . . .
CapN… You want a good laugh??
Vince Foster. Thank God!
Maybe they’ll be able to find out what really happened this time.
Since the suicide with his own gun and the suicide note weren’t enough.
Those damn Clintons’ . . .
Bring it on, Chas . . .
pbrownlee@wichitaeagle.com
lhg,
Just email to that address above and put in a complaint that CapnAmerica is stalking you for personal information.
Somebody on the Blog yesterday tried to claim we are the SAME person… LOL>>>>>>>>>
Get a life Chas/Captain America
Same IP address
Posted by: Eagle Beak | July 18, 2007 at 11:38 PM
Somebody on the Blog yesterday tried to claim we are the SAME person… LOL>>>>>>>>>
Get a life Chas/Captain America
Same IP address
Posted by: Eagle Beak | July 18, 2007 at 11:38 PM
Darn double shots… wish I knew what causes that!!
lhg,
Just email Phillip Brownlee and let him know that CapnAmerica is stalking you on the WE Blog for personal information.
Thanks Kansas, but I’ve dealt with critters on my own before.
BTW, nice post on Tiahrt today Kansas!
Sorry Kansas… but lgh yesterday claimed to be 20 yrs. old in 1940… CapN is only asking for a clarification here…
Yeah, I saw that Chas.
Then there was this duffless Half Full or Max who thought I was Clark.
I find that ONE nic is enough.
Too bad that troll boy can’t play well with others . . .
I agree — as do many others..
Asking is not stalking.
And you know it. Douchebag.
And isn’t it strange how Little Head Guy and Kansan seem to be on at the same time . . .
TY lhg for the compliment.
CapnAmerica is a known Blog stalker and won’t relent.
Chas show me the post link. Perhaps it was a typo?
I once put my birth month on a job application instead of the year. It made my age appear to be quite old and the interviewer told me, I didn’t look my age. :)
Chas–
Kansas knows because he posted it.
He’s got more personalities that Sybil.
Funny thing is, I starting to think he BELIEVES his lies.
Scary . . .
It’s true that I totally blew the lid off your cover, but that’s not stalking, that’s just re-posting what you posted to show that you actually posted it.
But you know that.
You just do this to irritate me.
Speak of admissions, CapN… Now this one should last for while >>>>> You asked lgh how old they said they were… Look who answers >>>>>
Chas show me the post link. Perhaps it was a typo?
I once put my birth month on a job application instead of the year. It made my age appear to be quite old and the interviewer told me, I didn’t look my age. :)
Posted by: Kansas | July 19, 2007 at 05:33 PM
Eggzactly, Chas.
The guy is not even a talented liar, and yet it seems to gives him so much entertainment.
Sad. Truly sad.
Well, catch you later, CapN… I want to watch the news, and get dinner started…
But the troll has made this thread ALL ABOUT IT and that’s all that matters to it.
And remember, my dinner time post is 5:39 p.m.
Yup, good night Chesty Puller wherever you are.
Somebody told me earlier today that this situation was supposed to change, but, I guess it hasnt changed yet…
Well, until they require log-ins and start pulling posts, there’s really no incentive for a troll bent on disruption to change.
It knows that.
That’s why it’s here instead of at DemocraticUnderground where it’d be tombstoned after its first post.
True… true…
You either have order or you allow chaos.
The Eagle has opted for the latter.
I’m not sure it’s by choice, or if it might be by $$$$
BTW — anybody hear anything more on the possible bomb threat at Wal Mart, at Bdwy & Pawnee??
And remember, my dinner time post is 5:39 p.m.
Posted by: chas. | July 19, 2007 at 05:39 PM
Must be an impersonator, Chas is eating supper.
Chas/Capn twins sound like a bunch of mother hens cackling. Dam noisy when they are around. Lotsa writing and nothing said.
I’m starting to think regulating this board would be a good thing.
You SOB impesonator… Nic stealing again, I see… Both ME and CapN… I highly advise you STOP your CRAP!!!!
And STOP IT NOW!!!! Good Bye!!!
Does anyone have that link to Hillary where she is talkin like a black person?
Thanx
Posted by: chas. | July 18, 2007 at 11:53 PM
and it is a violation of sensibilities….
CHAS: you must admit, you set yourself up with these wild statements. You make me laugh.
I can almost hear the drum roll, the bugles blaring, the reporters lights flashing,
“and it is a violation of sensibilities…. ”
Followed by the audience singing God Bless America.
And the constitution of the United States according to Chas includes:
“and it is a violation of sensibilities….”
ROTFLMAO!!!
Mercy, mercy Capn America, you are really into a fit tonight.
I guess I would be too if I spent all day and all night on this one lonely blog.
Do you take time to shower? Or are you stinking up your bedroom in mom’s house?
Here’s one of the videos of Hillary!
So now the Eagle is implying that Hillary is the most pious one?
If she truly believed in the separation of church and state, she wouldn’t even talk about her faith, much less campaign at the bully pulpit of a church.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxTnHx5qVQU
If you haven’t seen Hillary preach befoe, the above link will give you that picture of purely pious, and black Hillary Clinton.
Can you beleive she’s the front runner for the Democrats? LOL!!!
Oh, one more video of Hillary:
(DON’T LOOK LIBS!)
For those who don’t think Hillary preaches much in church:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaDQ1vIuvZI&mode=related&search=
Ok, one last one, just to make sure all know how religious Hillary is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UD7K4BK4exc&mode=related&search=
The truth,
‘Bush Is al-Qaeda’s Strategic Ally ‘http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/071907.html“U.S. officials have finally admitted what has long been obvious: that George W. Bush’s “global war on terror” has been an expensive failure, costing hundreds of billions of dollars and claiming possibly hundreds of thousands of lives, but making the world no safer and quite likely more dangerous.”
Details at link.
Thanks LHG,
BTW I see where old Billy Clinton made a speech complaining about Bush spreading our military too thin.
Interesting comments by the president who cut troop strength by over half a million men and cut our strength from a high of 28 divisions to 18.
All the while he was diddling Monica.
hahaha :D
True Clinton spin by the master of lies.
No way he can get by with the lie!
CLINTON GUTTED THE MILITARY!
His very first official act as president was Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. The military spent six months trying to fight it, define it, and the legit it. If you think about it, that was about the same time Bush had before 911. Thank Goodness that didn’t happen on Billy’s watch.
“The Wichita City Council approved a letter of intent on a $29 million bond issue ….”
Can some one explain to me the cost (if any) to the city (taxpayer) in doing this (the bond issue) ? It’s not a loan, but isn’t it a loan guarantee?
Since you are on the subject:
On Sept. 14, 2001, Hillary Clinton, New York’s junior senator, visited Ground Zero. You might not have read it in the New York Times, but many of New York’s finest, the police officers and firemen, refused to shake her hand. These heroes see things much more clearly than the average America who still does not know the real Hillary.
On Oct. 20, 2002 she was literally booed off the stage at Paul McCartney’s benefit Concert for New York. The boos were substantially edited out when the tape was sold to the public. That will be included in a future Hillary episode.
Fireman Mike Moran, who lost his brother and our FReeper friend, Battalion Commander John Moran, knows the real Hillary. “She doesn’t believe the things she says,” said Moran. “…I don’t think there has ever been a sincere word that has ever come out of her mouth.” The firemen know that all she cares about is a photo op to help her get back into the White House.
It would be common decency that a Senator from New York would attend the funerals of heroes who died on 9-11. There has been no such decency from Hillary. We can only find evidence that she attended one funeral — the burial of Father Mychal Judge, which was a media-saturated event. The other two events she attended were televised memorial events at Yankee Stadium and at Ground Zero. According to journalist Betty Harpaz, Hillary fears being booed by mourners. In contrast, Rudy Giuliani and Gov. George Pataka attended hundreds of funerals.
FOXNews attempted to learn from Hillary’s office how many funerals she had attended. Her office has refused to give a response. Senator Chuck Schumer’s office did respond. He attend 10 funeral services.
Anthony Gardener, who lost his brother Harvey in the World Trade Center and has become an advocate for the victims of the disaster, told FNC that he contacted Clinton’s New York office twice but got no response. “I invited her to come and be on our board of advisers to help us with the nonprofit support group that we created, WTC United Family Group,” Gardener told O’Reilly. “I never had any feedback from her office, not even an assistant to an assistant or anyone.”
Why would she fear being booed? Perhaps it is partly because of Hillary’s cozy past with the Black Panthers at Yale. Perhaps is it partly because of running cartoons in the Yale newspaper depicting officers as pigs. Perhaps it is the world’s smartest lawyer publicly declaring that the police were murderers in the tragic shooting of shooting of Amadou Diallou before they had a trial.
Her alliance with race-baiter Al Sharpton and public pronouncements actually inflamed racial tensions and helped encourage rioters in Brooklyn hurling bricks and urine-filled bottles at the police. After years of great work by the police and mayor Giuliani substantially cleaning up New York, there was a threat by the Justice Department for a federal takeover of the NYPD. Little notice by the mainstream media was given to the fact that shootings by New York City police officers were at a 30-year low.
The Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) endorsed George W. Bush for president on Sept. 8, 2000 after having endorsed Bill Clinton in 1992 and 1996. The change of heart, according FOP national president Gilbert G. Gallegos, was because of federal harassment and Justice Department lawsuits against police departments and the Clinton pardoning of FALN terrorists. That pardoning of 16 unrepentant Puerto Rican terrorists was clearly calculated to bring Hispanic votes to Hillary’s run for the senate.
Everything is a photo-op. Everything is always about Hillary. May Americans wake up in time.
“Interesting comments by the president who cut troop strength by over half a million men and cut our strength from a high of 28 divisions to 18.”
Didn’t he do this because the cold war was over and the folks over at DoD supported those cuts? And the Republican Congress could have stopped him if they wanted too?
You can order your Hillary assessories for the election here:
http://www.cafepress.com/aaronscase/424507
Where did the chickens go?
You mean like congress could have stopped the war before it began? The military could have advised the president no?
Can the Democratic Congress stop the current Commander in Chief in Iraq?
Then what makes you think the Republicans could have stopped Clinton in the 90’s?
The DOD supported the cuts? I’d be real suprised to see some facts on that!
Oh, nice videos on Clinton LHG!
ROFLMAO!
God, it amazes me that anyone can support that woman!
Can you imagine how hard Al Qaeda will laugh at Hillary?
Ken,
Revenue bonds. Yep. Read property taxes. Long term debt. Also they refinanced of $16.2 million from a 1999 bond issue, itself a refinancing of a 1994 issue.
Not sure if this was additional debt or part of the 29 million. But refinancing is usually for a lower interest rate than previously bonded debt – or the bonded debt became due.
Real good question at least ONE reporter should have asked – or maybe one of the councilmen.
Good grief, the Blog has gone berserk!!
Hey East Coast, refinancing also extends the length of the loan doesn’t it?
So, you might get a lower interest rate, lowering payment amounts. But, you also pay interest for a LONGER time period, which usually means more interest is paid over the life of the loan, right?
Actually, the end of the cold war (thank-you republican leaders), caused a sudden panic attack by our military. So to speak, they lost their special purpose (fight 2.5 wars, nuclear deterent, western europe).
So yes, they supported down-sizing, but the ultimate picture of the new military was still TBD. And to be completely honest, Bush provided Clinton with a recommended budget for the outyears. To also be fair, EVERY president does this – because our government functions on appropriations which budget formulation goes out five years. So at any given point in time: GAO, congress, or the president can look down the road at projected spending.
But Clinton was president, right? He actually MADE decisions, right? Or the buck only stops here for Bush?
Or maybe Hillary made them for him. ;-) So Ken has facts, it’s the interpretation that is important.
That is pretty much SOP for local governments. 10 year notes would be the shortest normally. Probably true all the way around at all levels.
It’s getting dark, so I need to go. The trolls come out at night you know.
Trolls? Is that what you call them? Why, they remind me more of a bunch of chirping,…………………………………….
…….toads.
This was purty good:
Posted by: chas. | July 18, 2007 at 11:53 PM
and it is a violation of sensibilities….
Here’s an article (CNN) from 2000 during the presidential campaign, in a few ways it almost supports what was said — but it also shows that Clinton isn’t entirely to blame — yes I did a cut and paste but I trade to find the parts that supports both sides of the discussion: (read the whole article?)
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2000/democracy/bigger.picture/stories/military.readiness/
Election likely to yield more defense spending, no matter who winsBy Douglas S. Wood
(CNN) — The United States has the second largest military in the world in terms of active troop strength and spends far more on defense than any other country in the world. But despite all that, there are questions as to whether the military is ready for war.Ever since the end of the Cold War, the U.S. military has been shrinking as the threat posed by the Soviet military faded and the need for the United States to maintain a large, standing, combat-ready force lessened. It was a part of the so-called “peace dividend.”
President George Bush began the cuts, pushing Congress to authorize a 25 percent cut in the military and those cuts have continued through the Clinton administration.
But even as size of the military was reduced, military deployments continued as the Clinton administration dispatched troops into peacekeeping operations in Bosnia, Haiti and Kosovo. The peacekeeping commitments have stretched the military during a time when it struggled to keep up recruiting and re-enlistment rates. The vibrant economy and higher salaries in the private sector attracted many potential enlistees and lured away veterans.
The Congressional Budget Office puts the price tag for modernization at $90 billion a year, a full 50 percent hike. And after more than a decade of personnel cuts, the Army, Air Force and Marines all want more people to offset the strain of global commitments.
But Bush does not mention what Democrats like to point out: Defense cuts began under his father’s administration and when his running mate, Dick Cheney, was secretary of defense.
Bush blames any readiness issues on the Clinton administration, which he says has neglected the military and overextended its capabilities through its willingness to commit American troops overseas.
The Navy isn’t asking for more sailors, but rather more ships, saying the Clinton administration went too far in cutting the fleet down to 310 ships.
Slimey ones for sure.
EC KS — Max
So as I understand what your saying the city is in essence loaning them the money out of property tax revenues? Something like that — net – net the taxpayers are paying / fronting the money for it? Is it assuming all the risk too?
hmmmm ….. maybe the Beagle should hire me …. ? I promise I’ll use spell check more
Ken I may have given you bump scoop on revenue bonds. Kansas allows industrial revenue bonds (IRB’s), Economic Development, and a few others. Supposedly they are paid off by the revenue derived from the project financed.
Is there a tenant signing w/city for the buildings? They’d be paying.
I butched this. Sorry. Call your city finance office, or your local elected rep for facts.
“Can you imagine how hard Al Qaeda will laugh at Hillary?”
Posted by: Max | July 19, 2007 at 07:53 PM
You might be right… but probably for the WRONG reasons. Note the last paragraph.
‘Bush Is al-Qaeda’s Strategic Ally ‘http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/071907.html“Meanwhile, over the past six years, the wily and ruthless leaders of al-Qaeda came to understand that Bush was an invaluable poster boy. The more he was viewed as the “big crusader,” the more they could present themselves as the “defenders of Islam.” The al-Qaeda murderers moved from the fringes of Muslim society closer to the mainstream.
So, in fall 2004, with Bush fighting for his political life against Democrat John Kerry, bin Laden took the risk of breaking nearly a year of silence to release a videotape denouncing Bush on the Friday before the U.S. election.
Bush’s supporters immediately spun bin Laden’s tirade as an “endorsement” of Kerry and pollsters recorded a jump of several percentage points for Bush, from nearly a dead heat to a five- or six-point lead. Four days later, Bush hung on to win a second term by an official margin of less than three percentage points.
Boomerang EffectThe last-minute intervention by bin Laden – essentially urging Americans to reject Bush – had the predictable effect of driving voters to the President. After the videotape appeared, senior CIA analysts concluded that ensuring a second term for Bush was precisely what bin Laden intended….“I thought it was going to help,” Bush said in a post-election interview about the videotape. “I thought it would help remind people that if bin Laden doesn’t want Bush to be the President, something must be right with Bush.”
Bin Laden, a well-educated Saudi and a keen observer of U.S. politics, appears to have recognized the same point in cleverly tipping the election to Bush.”
Those calling this Bush’s war need to take a check up on recent American History:
Measure Title: A joint resolution to authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against Iraq.
On the Joint Resolution (H.J.Res. 114 )October 11, 2002, 12:50 AM
Alphabetical by Senator Name Akaka (D-HI), NayAllard (R-CO), YeaAllen (R-VA), YeaBaucus (D-MT), YeaBayh (D-IN), YeaBennett (R-UT), YeaBiden (D-DE), YeaBingaman (D-NM), NayBond (R-MO), YeaBoxer (D-CA), NayBreaux (D-LA), YeaBrownback (R-KS), YeaBunning (R-KY), YeaBurns (R-MT), YeaByrd (D-WV), NayCampbell (R-CO), YeaCantwell (D-WA), YeaCarnahan (D-MO), YeaCarper (D-DE), YeaChafee (R-RI), NayCleland (D-GA), YeaClinton (D-NY), YeaCochran (R-MS), YeaCollins (R-ME), YeaConrad (D-ND), NayCorzine (D-NJ), NayCraig (R-ID), YeaCrapo (R-ID), YeaDaschle (D-SD), YeaDayton (D-MN), NayDeWine (R-OH), YeaDodd (D-CT), YeaDomenici (R-NM), YeaDorgan (D-ND), YeaDurbin (D-IL), NayEdwards (D-NC), YeaEnsign (R-NV), YeaEnzi (R-WY), YeaFeingold (D-WI), NayFeinstein (D-CA), YeaFitzgerald (R-IL), YeaFrist (R-TN), YeaGraham (D-FL), NayGramm (R-TX), YeaGrassley (R-IA), YeaGregg (R-NH), YeaHagel (R-NE), YeaHarkin (D-IA), YeaHatch (R-UT), YeaHelms (R-NC), YeaHollings (D-SC), YeaHutchinson (R-AR), YeaHutchison (R-TX), YeaInhofe (R-OK), YeaInouye (D-HI), NayJeffords (I-VT), NayJohnson (D-SD), YeaKennedy (D-MA), NayKerry (D-MA), YeaKohl (D-WI), YeaKyl (R-AZ), YeaLandrieu (D-LA), YeaLeahy (D-VT), NayLevin (D-MI), NayLieberman (D-CT), YeaLincoln (D-AR), YeaLott (R-MS), YeaLugar (R-IN), YeaMcCain (R-AZ), YeaMcConnell (R-KY), YeaMikulski (D-MD), NayMiller (D-GA), YeaMurkowski (R-AK), YeaMurray (D-WA), NayNelson (D-FL), YeaNelson (D-NE), YeaNickles (R-OK), YeaReed (D-RI), NayReid (D-NV), YeaRoberts (R-KS), YeaRockefeller (D-WV), YeaSantorum (R-PA), YeaSarbanes (D-MD), NaySchumer (D-NY), YeaSessions (R-AL), YeaShelby (R-AL), YeaSmith (R-NH), YeaSmith (R-OR), YeaSnowe (R-ME), YeaSpecter (R-PA), YeaStabenow (D-MI), NayStevens (R-AK), YeaThomas (R-WY), YeaThompson (R-TN), YeaThurmond (R-SC), YeaTorricelli (D-NJ), YeaVoinovich (R-OH), YeaWarner (R-VA), YeaWellstone (D-MN), NayWyden (D-OR), Nay
“After the November elections, Democrats promised to restore order to a budget process many had thought broken down and said they would move 12 new spending bills for fiscal 2008 individually and on time. The last part of that equation is highly unlikely. The end of the fiscal year is less than three months away, and most government agencies are likely going to have to operate on stopgap appropriations well into the winter if current trends hold up. The backlog of work remaining — the House still must pass six spending bills, the Senate has all 12 to go — summons up visions of the dreaded “O” word that many in both parties had vowed never again to utter.” GOVEXEC.com
Dear Iraqi people,
Sorry about that. We made a little boo-boo. Our mistake. We are going to pick up our marbles now and go home. Hope you and your children do well after we depart. Wishing you all the best.
PS: Please assemble at the new US Embassy and form nice and orderly lines for the helicopter ticket to the world. If you have anything that floats, we will be picking up boat people and relocating them to small cities in the US starting shortly after the withdrawal. Make sure you have some ID with you. We don’t want you getting profiled as mexican illegals.
If anyone is interested in facts rather than speculation, you can read all about Wichita’s IRBs and their characteristics at this link:
http://www.wichita.gov/CityOffices/CityManager/EconomicDevelopment/IRB/
You’ll read that IRBs, unlike some other types of bonds, place the city under no obligation to pay should the target company fail to pay.
I think the main benefit is that along with the IRB, the city usually dishes out property tax abatements, and usually a sales tax abatement too.
There was some small controversy a few years ago regarding an IRB for Genesis Health Club where some council members did not realize that along with awarding the IRB, they also awarded a sales tax exemption. Smart council members. Can’t they even read the city’s own website?
IRBs are different from TIFs and STAR bonds, which is what I think some other poster was confused about.
Kansas, thanks for the heads up on BEA data.
http://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/regional/gdp_state/gsp_newsrelease.htm
I want to direct your attention to Table I, “Real GDP by State 2003-2006″. below the “quick look graphic” regional and state map shown at the top of the page.
If you look at the first region on the table, New England, it shows a GDP growth of 2.5% for 2006. (If you add the six New England states’ GDP growth figures and divide by six, you get 2.2%, a state average for the region, not shown in the table.)
Further down, in the Plains region, Kansas posted a 3.4% increase in 2006.
So Kansas’s GDP growth looks substantially better than New England’s, right? Kansas’s relative growth was 36% higher than New England’s, right?
But if you take the preceding three years’ data, 2003-2005, the New England growth was 7.3% to Kansas’s 7.1%, non-compounded, or ca. 7.5% to 7.3% compounded. In this three year period, New England’s GDP growth was 2.7% higher than Kansas’s.
Now, if we include 2006, we get a four-year GDP growth of and 10.1% for New England and 10.9% for Kansas. So for the four-year period Kansas’s GDP growth outpaced New England’s by 8%. That’s not 36%.
Take Home Lesson #1. A single year’s data per se is not the same as longer-term trends.
Now, let’s go to Table 2, “Per Capita Real GDP by State, 2003-2006″.
In 2003, New England PCGDP was $40,796, compared to Kansas’s $31,802. In 2006, New England’s PCGDP $43,940, while Kansas’s was $34,242.
So New England’s real dollar PCGDP rose by $3144 between 2003 and 2006, while Kansas’s PCGDP only rose by only $2440.
If we only look at the 2005-2006 rise, in real dollars, New England’s increase was $1047 to Kansas’s $944. In other words, Table 1’s 2005-2006 change showing apparent outperformance by Kansas over New England, conceals the fact that Kansas actually *lost ground* to New England in *real dollars* in 2006.
Take Home Lesson #2. You have to evaluate real-dollar differences to determine how well an economy is doing.
A bigger percentage growth applied to a small number is not necessarily better, in real dollar terms, as a smaller percentage growth applied to a large number. For example, if you made $100,000 income in 2005, and got a 2% raise,that would be preferable to a $30,000 salary and a 5% raise, right? The latter person’s salary would never catch up to yours with 5% vs. 2% annual pay increases. For example, after 30 years the other person would be making $130,000 and you’d be making $181,000.
If we look at PCGDP increase in percentage terms, New England’s 2003-2006 increase was 7.70% to Kansas’s 7.67%. For 2005-2006 Kansas beat New England 2.83% to 2.44%.
I’m too tired to do the math to find the point of equalization, but given Kansas’s $31,802 starting point, vs. New England’s $43,940 starting point, Kansas would have a PCGDP in 2046 of $97,300 vs. New England having a PCGDP of $115,300. Which is better?
Finally, GDP is a sum of several factors. See Table 3, “Contributions to Per Cent Change in Real GDP”. Kansas’s single largest increase factor for the 3.4% rise was durable goods manufacture, .58%. Unfortunately for Kansas, this is a products sales value metric. Such as aircraft and components values. But Kansas doesn’t receive the product sales money. That money goes to places whose corporations own the manufacturing facilities, located in places such as Ontario, Rhode Island, Illinois, and Minnesota. It would be wonderful if the average aircraft assembly value per worker of perhaps $150,000 were banked in Wichita, but instead, only the worker’s paycheck of $50,000 is banked here. So BEA is crediting Kansas for money that is not actually here. If we want to know, “How much more money flowed into Kansas in 2006 over 2005?” the BEA data aren’t informative.
What we can say is that between 1990 and 2000, 60 of Kansas’s 105 counties lost population. Sedgwick County’s population growth (SC is a magnet absorber of farm-zone exodists) was below the national growth rate. The difference between Sedgwick County median household income versus the nation’s, continued to expand.
JoCo is doing great. Its metrics contribute substantially to whole-state metrics, such as BEA data. But this doesn’t mean that the parts of Kansas outside JoCo are doing well.
It’s not unlike Winston Brooks’ USD 259-boosterism a few years ago citing Kansas’ having a “Top 10 states” ACT average. At the time, the Kansas had a 21.6 average. But USD 259’s ACT average was 19.something. Was Kansas’s statewide ACT average relevant to the local average? Only insofar as USD 259 dragged down the statewide average, but Mr. Brooks didn’t mention this fact. He just wanted a cheap factoid ride on other Kansas districts’ coattails. USD 259’s 19.x ACT average is a failure metric, because the ACT is only taken by kids who want to go to college, but it means that USD 259 late 11th-early 12th graders in Wichita who want to go to college are performing at a 9th-grade college-preparatory level, on average.
Could our local ACT be raised by going to a 46-week instructional schedule? How could it not?
Could it be raised by USD 259’s hiring people like VT’s Carleton math degreed daughter? Or one of my children who has a UCLA engineering degree, another of whom has a Dartmouth physics degree? Or hiring the Independent School’s MathCounts, AMC-12/AIME coach?
Failure isn’t an event, it is an outcome of bad ideas, such as, “We can’t go to a 46-week school year, because that would be too much work.” “We can’t hire people who deeply understand math to teach our city’s children, because these people declined to go to ed school. They were too good at math and they wanted to learn too much math than ed school allowed, and these characteristics disqualify them from teaching math here.”
Justice will be delayed.Judge dismisses CIA leak scandal suit By Andy Sullivan1 hour, 12 minutes ago
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A U.S. judge on Thursday threw out former CIA analyst Valerie Plame’s lawsuit against Vice President Dick Cheney and other Bush administration officials for disclosing her identity to the public.
ADVERTISEMENTPlame has said her career was destroyed when administration officials blew her cover in 2003 to retaliate against her husband, Iraq war critic Joseph Wilson.
The couple had sought money damages from the officials for violating their constitutional free speech, due process and privacy rights.
U.S. District Court Judge John Bates dismissed the case on jurisdictional grounds.
Plame’s lawyer said she would appeal.
“While we are obviously very disappointed by today’s decision, we have always expected that this case would ultimately be decided by a higher court,” lawyer Melanie Sloan said in a statement.
Bates said Cheney and the others — his former chief of staff Lewis “Scooter” Libby, White House political adviser Karl Rove and former deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage — had a right to respond to criticism.
“The alleged means by which defendants chose to rebut Mr. Wilson’s comments and attack his credibility may have been highly unsavory,” Bates wrote in the 41-page decision.
“But there can be no serious dispute that the act of rebutting public criticism … by speaking with members of the press is within the scope of defendants’ duties,” he added.
Plame’s outing triggered a lengthy criminal investigation, which resulted in the conviction of Libby on perjury and obstruction of justice charges in March.
No one was charged with criminally disclosing her identity.
President George W. Bush commuted Libby’s 2 1/2-year prison sentence earlier this month.
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I wonder if the judge was a bush appointee, have to check that out.
Dear Terrorist,
Please don’t take our “redeployment” from Iraq as a withdrawal with our tail between our legs.We will chase you to the ends of the earth, and don’t you forget that. We never cut and run.We have the strength as a nation to see things through. Once our congress and presidentcommit us to something, we “git er done”.
PS: Ooops scratch most of that.
The judge sounds like a card toting Republican:Last Updated: 9/1/2004 9:46:20 PMA federal judge has refused to order the release of an American who is being held in Saudi Arabia on suspicion of having ties to terrorism.
Ahmed Abu Ali is a 23-year-old who was born in Houston and raised in Falls Church, Virginia. He took his request to a U.S court for immediate help in seeking either his release or to obtain information from the Saudis about why he is being held.
U.S District Judge John Bates denied that request late Tuesday.
The judge ruled that Abu Ali can wait without undue harm for a fuller review of the case. Bates also said the court can NOT direct U.S diplomacy or how a federal judicial system works.
Abu Ali was arrested in June 2003 while taking a university exam in Saudi Arabia.
He has since been questioned twice by the FBI in Saudi Arabia about alleged terrorist activity in Virginia.
He has not been charged with a crime and his lawyers claim the U.S government ordered the Saudi government to hold him so he may be tortured for information without the U.S being held accountable for his alleged mistreatment.
Copyright 2004 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Mrs. Clinton does not know how to cure America of all the delusional religions forcing itself like a camel into the tent of public policy.
Senator Hillary Clinton (D-New York) and 13 other senators voted against funding the Iraq war. Five years ago, Clinton voted to authorize the war, and as recently as January promised “I’m not going to cut American troops’ funding right now — they’re in harm’s way.” She also declared she was not for imposing a certain withdrawal date. So why the about-face?
Brian Darling, director of U.S. Senate relations at the Heritage Foundation, says Democrats are fighting amongst themselves over the Iraq war, just as Republicans are divided over the issue of amnesty for illegal aliens.
“You have this hard-left element of the Democrat Party [sic] which is dragging all these members [and] all these candidates that are running for president to the left,” he observes. “You’re seeing it happen where Hillary Clinton has yet to apologize for her initial vote to go to war.”
Yet she is now voting against resolutions providing funding for the Iraq war, he notes. “And she’s getting into that whole John Kerry territory where she ‘was for it before she was against it,’” he continues, “and it’s a very difficult position to be in.”
According to Darling, Clinton’s vote against the war funding bill — and that of other presidential hopefuls Barack Obama and Chris Dodd — was heavily influenced by pressure from liberal anti-war groups such as MoveOn.org and the Daily Kos. Fear of the wrath of such groups, along with continued movement to the extreme left, threatens to pull the Democratic Party out of the mainstream, he adds.
Darling also acknowledges that the 2006 election results demonstrate the American electorate is disappointed with progress in the war in Iraq. But he asserts that neither Clinton nor any other Democratic presidential candidate who chooses to abide by the philosophy of the “anti-war left” — a philosophy that does not support the use of military force at any time — will become president because “the American people are not going to elect want a commander-in-chief who is anti-war.”
Hillary and PornBy Sarah RodeJune 13, 2007
In Hillary Clinton’s America, pornography would be legal, accessible and protected. That’s the way it was while her husband was president, according to a woman who would know.
Jenna Jameson is a multi-millionaire feminist businesswoman who has endorsed Hillary because under the Clinton administration her industry flourished. She is very critical of President Bush because his administration has not been kind to her line of work — the production and sale of pornography. Despite branching out into some mainstream projects, Miss Jameson is still considered one of the most famous porn stars around. She said in a recent interview, “The Clinton administration was the best years for the adult industry, and I wish that Clinton would run again.” I suppose she would know.
It is unfortunate and inconsistent that Hillary and her “feminist” endorsers not only tolerate but also promote pornography. If they were true feminists, they would reject the objectification of women. It is interesting that in their fight to liberate women, they have instead endorsed the image of women as sexual objects. Pornography exploits women’s sexuality for money. That’s liberating?
My intuition was right.
Bates, John D.Born 1946 in Elizabeth, NJ
Federal Judicial Service:Judge, U. S. District Court for the District of ColumbiaNominated by George W. Bush on September 4, 2001, to a seat vacated by Stanley S. Harris; Confirmed by the Senate on December 11, 2001, and received commission on December 14, 2001.
Education:Wesleyan University, B.A., 1968
University of Maryland School of Law, J.D., 1976
Professional Career:First lieutenant, U.S. Army, 1968-1971Law clerk, Hon. Roszel C. Thomsen, U.S. District Court for the District of MarylandPrivate practice, Washington, DC, 1977-1980Assistant U.S. attorney, Office of the U.S. Attorney, District of Columbia, 1980-1987Chief, Civil Division, Office of the U.S. Attorney, District of Columbia, 1987-1997Deputy independent counsel, Office of the Independent Counsel, 1995-1997Private practice, 1998-2001
Race or Ethnicity: White
Gender: Male
Dear Iraqi People,
We are sorry we bombed the heck out of your country. We are sorry your infrastructure is basically gone. We even apologize for you no longer havine electricity on a regular basis, and no running water.
I’m sorry your children are malnurished, living in bombed out buildings, hungry, and carrying buckets to the river to retrieve filthy water to drink.
We are sorry your small children cannot wear clean clothes, and no longer attend school.
We are sorry your women will now revert to second class citizens. They will no longer attend school, college, or attain professional degrees. And it’s a real bummer they can’t vote anymore.
But we got Saddam for you.
America has to leave now. We can’t take it anymore. We didn’t MEAN to set up a situation where your angry religious leaders are blowing your children up.
But we MUST withdraw.
We feel justified in that. I know you are holding your starving children as I write this, but this was BUSHEE’S WAR. So we are NOT responsible for your plight.
We have to go now. We are loosing maybe on average an American a day. It sucks you are loosing like 10 of your family members each day.
But we gotta run.
We have baseball games, video movies, IPOD’s, and the internet we MUST get back to.
Hope it all works out for you.
I’m sure our government will send a few billion bucks your way -BEFORE WE IGNORE YOUR PLIGHT FOR THE TEN FOLLOWING YEARS.
We also know you WILL suffer. We didn’t learn this in Vietnam (or should I say after Vietnam). Millions were killed, tortured, and re-educated following our surrender in that “conflict”.
So you might want to get a boat and flee while the going is good.
Again, say hi to the kids, and we will leave a six month supply of good American MRE’s to keep you sustained at barely life sustaining levels.
But we have to go. It is just plain WRONG for us to stay any longer.
We have a responsiblity you see. I’m not sure to whom, but it certainly is not to you and your bombed out country.
Have a nice day. And rest assured, our new congress and democrat president will STAND TALL against agression and terrorist in the future.
Sincerely,
US People
Barack and Hillary: Can Israel rely on either?
We simply cannot afford to allow a person with incoherent, weak and inconsistent views on national security and foreign policy to become the Democrats’ presidential nominee
Published: 01.27.07, 19:29 / Israel Jewish Scene
This week three prominent Jews from Hollywood, Steven Spielberg, David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg, decided to host a fundraiser for Illinois Senator and presidential hopeful Barack Obama. According to some reports George Soros is backing him as well. This is not a coincidence: all three of these Hollywood heavyweights were ardent supporters of Hillary Clinton. This spawns the following question: which of these two Democratic Presidential frontrunners will be more effective in the struggle against terrorism and Iranian nuclear ambitions and which will be a more reliable supporter of Israeli security?
There is little doubt that since entering the Senate Hillary Clinton has been a staunch supporter of Israel and for that she deserves credit and appreciation from Jews. Some have put a question mark regarding her motives. However whichever way one wants to put it, it is extremely difficult to find in Hilary Clinton’s published remarks anything but complete and total support for Israel’s continued safety and security.
The difficulty some have with Hilary is her husband former President Bill. Yasser Arafat was a regular guest at Bill Clinton’s White House and he used extreme pressure to get Israel to make concessions that were clearly not in her long term interests. During his second term in office Bill Clinton seemed to care more about creating his legacy than about the risks his ideas posed to Israeli security. Indeed it is Bill Clinton that must take some of the blame for the second intifada and the suicide bombings and killing of innocents that followed.
Sincere support for Israel
As recently as last year during the Lebanon war against Hizbullah Bill Clinton stated that Israel was using disproportionate force and wanted a quick ceasefire. Whether Hillary sincerely disagrees with Bill’s views regarding Israel’s national defense strategies is an open question. To her credit however, she has stated publicly that she disagreed with Bill regarding both his reluctance to use force and his lack of support for Israel. On March 21, 1999 she urged Bill to bomb the Serbians: “You cannot let this go on at the end of a century that has seen the major holocaust of our time. What do we have NATO for if not to defend our way of life?” she told him. The next day Clinton declared that force was necessary.
In October 2000 she urged her husband to veto a one sided and unfair UN Security Council resolution condemning Israel’s response to Palestinian protests. She said that Bill Clinton ignored her advice and the US just abstained instead. Hillary Clinton also voted for the war in Iraq and, as of yet, has not called for a timetable for troop withdrawal despite the pressure to do so. One must conclude that there is little basis on which to doubt Hillary Clinton’s sincere support for and dedication to Israel’s safety and security and her determination and strength when it comes to national security and defense.
The story with Barack Obama is very different. Although he has visited Israel and spoken in support of US commitment to Israeli security, his view of foreign policy and national security is troubling – not least as evidenced by the incoherent treatment of it in his bestselling book “The Audacity of Hope”.
Iraq was not imminent threat in Obama’s eyes
In the chapter entitled, “The world Beyond Our Borders” he states that he did not support the invasion of Iraq from the outset because—quoting from a speech he gave at the time—he knew that, “even a successful war against Iraq will require US occupation of undetermined length, and undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences.”
Most experts at the time thought that in a post 9/11 world a combination of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and weapons of mass destruction (and at the time every intelligence agency in the world thought they had them) was a real threat to the world. However Obama nonetheless thought that if the cost, length and consequences are undetermined (which incidentally is the case regarding all wars) then the war should not be undertaken. Later on in the same chapter he argues the exact opposite point: “We have the right to take unilateral military action to eliminate an imminent threat to our security—so long as an imminent threat is understood to be a nation, group, or individual that is actively preparing to strike US targets, and has or will have the means to do so in the immediate future.”
He goes on to say that al-Qaeda poses an imminent threat but Saddam Hussein’s Iraq did not. With hindsight one can say anything; however the fact is that at the time most experts thought that Saddam Husain did pose an imminent threat and that he possessed both the intent and the weapons to attack us either on his own or by using a proxy. Furthermore Obama writes that one of the United States’ strategic goals in Iraq must be to ensure that it does not become a base for terrorist activity. Nonetheless a few lines later he advocates a phased withdrawal of US troops from Iraq to begin at the end of last year. The judgment as to how quickly this could be accomplished, he writes, must be based on “a series of best guesses”.
Jews can’t afford an inconsistent nominee
The stakes in Iraq at the moment are very high and they have a direct bearing on the United States and world security. For a presidential candidate to advocate betting world and US security on a series of “best guesses” is frightening. From reading his book one must conclude that Barack Obama is a wonderful person whose heart is in the right place. He deserves respect, and indeed he could make a wonderful peacetime president.
However the next US President will have to deal with the Iranian nuclear threat, which will impact Israel first and then the entire world. At this point we simply cannot afford to allow a person with incoherent, weak and inconsistent views on national security and foreign policy to become the presidential nominee of a major political party in the United States.
I do not mean to endorse Hillary Clinton as president – it may well be that the Republicans have an even stronger candidate. However, I sincerely hope that the prominent Jews who are contemplating throwing their support behind Barack Obama read the part of his book which deals with foreign policy and national security very carefully first.
Posted by: chas. | July 18, 2007 at 11:53 PM
and it is a violation of sensibilities….
CHAS: you must admit, you set yourself up with these wild statements. You make me laugh.
I can almost hear the drum roll, the bugles blaring, the reporters lights flashing,
“and it is a violation of sensibilities…. ”
Followed by the audience singing God Bless America.
And the constitution of the United States according to Chas includes:
“and it is a violation of sensibilities….”
ROTFLMAO!!!
GALLUP: Bush Approval Rating Sinks to Jimmy Carter Level
By E&P Staff
Published: July 18, 2007 1:30 PM ET
NEW YORK Welcome back, Carter? For decades, Jimmy Carter has been maligned as a profoundly unpopular president. But now, according to the latest from Gallup, George W. Bush, based on an average of recent polls, has nearly reached that low level and may soon pass Carter on the way down.
Gallup average presidents approval ratings for each quarter of their terms. For the most recent three-month period, Bush scored a 31.8%, his worst yet. Carter’s weakest score was 30.7, in the second-quarter of 1979.
Gallup notes that this is Bush’s 26h quarter as president, and “not all presidents who served that long suffered low approval ratings. Dwight Eisenhower and Bill Clinton had averages near 60% during their 26th quarters in office, and Ronald Reagan’s was just below 50%.”
Gallup adds: “Bush’s current string of sub-40% quarters exceeds the five Richard Nixon had leading up to his resignation from the Oval Office because of the Watergate scandal….
“Since 1945, Gallup has collected data on 247 presidential quarters. Bush’s most recent quarter ties for 234th, putting it in the bottom 5% of all measurements.”
Shove it Beak!!! he Blog is tired of you… go away…
Sounds very hateful Chas.
Come back after 4 hours and you are still here like old faithful – still spouting SHIT.
“Good night Chesty Puller, wherever you are.”
Actually, he’s dead.
Get over it.
Shove it Max… The Blog is tired of you too… go away!!!
I got an e-mail from this guy who used to post here all the time and now hardly ever does.
He said, “I got tired of conversations that went like this: F*** you! NO, F*** YOU!”
Pretty much sums it up, doesn’t it.
It was Tracy, btw, for those of you who know him . . .
I’m outta here for now.
Goodnight, Mahtma Gandhi, wherever you are.
Funny we had to go to war over WMDs just when Hans Blix and the UN inspection team were finding no evidence whatsover of recent WMD development. As the WMD pretext was evaporating, BushCo decided, “We gotta invade NOW.”
Then our forces confirmed no WMDs. No problem, the reason we are over there is to establish “democracy”.
We had to hunt down Bin Laden. Okay. But then BushCo invaded Iraq, and Bush said, “I don’t think about Bin Laden.”
Now we must stay in Iraq to defeat al-Qaida, because al-Qaida insurgents in Iraq are the same people who attacked us on 9/11.
Who’s getting tired of this game of rationales du jour runaround?
Chas,
The troll(s) can’t help it. It can’t support it’s opinions with facts and logic, so it instead posts personal attacks, lies, and ignorant stupidities.
The troll is back and it has many heads.
White Flag,
Instead of wasting spade like you did at,http://blogs.kansas.com/weblog/2007/07/open-thread-719.html#comment-76548776
just post the link to the almost identical post,http://blogs.kansas.com/weblog/2007/07/open-thread-713.html#comment-75858394Posted by: Kaeb Elgae | July 13, 2007 at 08:47 PM
And add the missing last 5 words in the last sentence.
“We don’t want you [getting profiled as mexican illegals].
btw:”It just fills the blog with wasted space.”Posted by: Eagle Beak | July 19, 2007 at 03:04 PM upthread
Eagle Beak = Kaeb Elgae ?
btw2: For intelligent people, who base their opinions on facts,
‘Construction Woes Add to Fears at Embassy in Iraq’http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/04/AR2007070401685_pf.html
Strange fascination IT has with EB/KE.
And note how quickly IT deciphered that EB was KE.
IT has grown a brain cell, finally.
Amazing.
Chicken America,
Instead of your post upthread,http://blogs.kansas.com/weblog/2007/07/open-thread-719.html#comment-76550178
you could’ve saved space by just posting this link,
http://blogs.kansas.com/weblog/2007/07/open-thread-713.html#comment-75859016Posted by: Kaeb Elgae | July 13, 2007 at 08:56 PM
Cosmos, Earth to Cosmos, WHERE ARE YOU!
They are coming to take him away ah ha, coming to take him away…
cosmos,
No one appointed you Blog monitor. How about posting your opinions on matters instead of attacking every poster you disagree with. Yes, it’s an attack, to say otherwise denies the truth.
It’s very disruptive what you do.
Good job, Cosmos.
And look at how Kansas comes b*tching and moaning about it.
Pretty soon, it’ll accuse you of “stalking” it.
I wasn’t sure at first if Eagle Beak, the “married Vietnam Marine vet with kids” was a real post-er or just another of Troll boy’s fictional characters.
But now it’s obvious.
Troll-boy, you’d better hope that a real Marine like XXX doesn’t get a hold of your sorry ass.
So, which of you slim balls re-posted my post under your name?
capn america I suspect.
And you haven’t a clue what or who a Marine is.
Posting another threat CapnAmerica?
I doubt XXX would do anything that would land him in jail, he appears to be a reasonable person.
walk on by…
Bring him on. Love to chat with a former Marine.
Hello!Look here>[url=sali
Posted October 16, 2007 at 10:58 pm | Permalink
In Iran, Putin Warns Against Military Action:http://salihome.info/show/index.html