Thursday, February 28, 2008
Sleeper awakes with freight train on top
A man had a miraculous escape yesterday, sustaining only minor injuries when a freight train rolled over the top of him while he slept between the tracks. The Bendigo man, 20, whose name has not been released, was sleeping at a level crossing in Port Augusta, 300km northwest of Adelaide, when the train approached about 3.40am. (Snip) The train rolled over the man, still lying between the tracks, and stopped just ahead of him. It is believed the man hit his head on the train while trying to sit up. It is understood he may have been intoxicated.
[may]
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23035691-29677,00.html
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Heroes: Squad Leader’s Idea Helps Afghan Police
With the approval of his platoon leader, Burke came up with a training program to increase tactical and technical competence in the Afghan police by incorporating reading and writing courses with essential police training.
“Being able to read and write will increase these guys’ ability in so many ways,” ... "We are teaching both English and Pashto, so they are better able to communicate with villagers and us.”
“I’m over here pretty much all day trying to teach them when I need to be training my guys,” Burke said. “As a solution, I started involving my guys in the training."
“Burke has always been someone willing to take that extra step to help someone else,” Sorkin said. “He understands that education is one of the keys to prosperity in this country and took the initiative to do his part here in Nawa.”
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Local Governance Center Opens South of Baghdad
[snip]
“This is where people can get problems solved,” Adgie said, adding that this also is a step forward in political progress in Arab Jabour.
[snip]
Local Iraqis in attendance praised the opening of the center and the overall improved security in Arab Jabour. “Today is a great day for our region and for all of Baghdad,” said Majid Hamad Yasien al Jabouri. “This is a great day for all of the Iraqi people.”
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Hooray (for some in) Hollywood!
[credit where due]
To help the traumatized and physically injured residents of Sderot, Israel, a small town in southern Israel up against the Gaza Strip where terrorists daily pound the town with rockets, some prominent Hollywood personalities including Paula Abdul, Sylvester Stallone and Jon Voight, will be participating Tuesday in a charity and solidarity concert for the rocket-battered town of Sderot in Beverly Hills.
The concert, entitled "Live for Sderot", which will include a performance by Israeli singer Ninet Tayeb and will be attended by Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, will also launch the celebrations of the State of Israel's 60th anniversary in the city. Guests of honor at this special concert will be a delegation of 10 teenagers from Sderot which were flown to visit Los Angeles and share their experiences of life in Sderot with local American youths.
And what is daily life like in Sderot? Terror and horror combined with the strength, courage and resiliency of the victims as their government ponders the best way to respond. And meanwhile the Gazans demand an end to an Israeli blockade, claiming it is creating a humanitarian crisis; however they seem to have no problem obtaining all the materials for deadly rockets which they value.
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Bush Lobbies Again for Surveillance Law
WASHINGTON - President Bush on Monday lobbied again for an intelligence law allowing government eavesdropping on phone calls and e-mails, as the tone of the dispute between the White House and Congress over terrorist surveillance grew increasingly sharp. "To put it bluntly, if the enemy is calling into America, we really need to know what they're saying, and we need to know what they're thinking, and we need to know who they're talking to," Bush said at the start of his annual meeting with the nation's governors at the White House.
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Turkey in radical revision of Islamic texts
Turkey is preparing to publish a document that represents a revolutionary reinterpretation of Islam - and a controversial and radical modernization of the religion.
The country's powerful Department of Religious Affairs has commissioned a team of theologians at Ankara University to carry out a fundamental revision of the Hadith, the second most sacred text in Islam after the Koran.
The Hadith is a collection of thousands of sayings reputed to come from the Prophet Muhammad. As such, it is the principal guide for Muslims in interpreting the Koran and the source of the vast majority of Islamic law, or Sharia. But the Turkish state has come to see the Hadith as having an often negative influence on a society it is in a hurry to modernise, and believes it responsible for obscuring the original values of Islam.
[snip] "This is kind of akin to the Christian Reformation. Not exactly the same, but... it's changing the theological foundations of [the] religion..."
[snip]
According to Fadi Hakura, an expert on Turkey from Chatham House in London, Turkey is doing nothing less than recreating Islam - changing it from a religion whose rules must be obeyed, to one designed to serve the needs of people in a modern secular democracy...
[reads like the real deal - exactly what I've been hoping for but frankly didn't believe I'd see in my life time - how it actually plays out will be 'interesting' to say the least; you don't have to be a rocket biologists to know this will represent the greatest of all threats to the extremists...]
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The Culture of Tyranny
[meanwhile, from the 'West'...]
The ancient city of Damascus received another mark of recognition last week: UNESCO last week designated Damascus as the Arab Capital of Culture for 2008.
Damascus serves as the headquarters of a long list of designated terrorist organizations, including Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC), and an alphabet soup of smaller organizations similarly committed to the practice of violence against civilians. Syria has successfully defended its position at the top of the USA's list of "countries supporting terrorism" since 1979.
The new Capital of Culture and Resistance also, according to U.S. defense and intelligence reports, maintains an active chemical weapons program. Other reports suggest that Syria was clandestinely working on a nuclear program when these efforts were halted by a successful Israeli attack in September, 2007. [a few months ago]
Thus, the 'culture of resistance' means acts of terror against civilians, the deliberate subversion of the governments of neighboring countries, the assassination of political opponents and the apparent attempt to stockpile weapons of mass destruction. One wonders if this is what UNESCO -- which describes its own goal as 'to build peace in the minds of men' had in mind.
The title of 'Arab capital of culture' is currently held by the capital of one of the most brutal and lawless regimes in the world. Arab culture - which has given so much of lasting beauty and value to humanity - surely deserves a better representative.
[UNsalvageable]
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US sounds sour notes on North Korea
Seoul, South Korea -- Despite a symbolic symphonic thaw with North Korea, the only music the Bush administration is making here is with South Korea's new, pro-U.S. president who has vowed a tougher line on his Stalinist neighbor. (Snip) Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was next door in Seoul on Monday lauding President Lee Myung-bak and his intent to hold North Korea to its pledge to abandon nuclear weapons.
[keep its pledge?!! How unfair! - oh, the inhumanity - more cowboy diplomacy ... {ad infinitum}. Another country that's never kept a pledge in its history - while receiving American tax dollars year in and year out.]
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Bad Blood in Canada
You would think that a massive malfunction of Canada's health care system, involving an incompetently run blood banking system, thousands of HIV and hepatitis C infections and deaths caused by negligence, and criminal prosecutions, would be found newsworthy by the US media. Incredibly, aside from brief reports of dismissals of the criminal indictments given with no explanation of the underlying disaster, the whole affair has been virtually blacked by our media. Such a screw up in a health care system which has been portrayed as a desirable alternative to our own certainly deserves closer scrutiny. Read about it at Hot Medical News.
[the root cause? the bane of all government run health'care' systems: once it's government, it's open to the full gamut of politically correct insanity - in this case, not excluding homosexual men from donating blood in the early '80 when screening techniques were rudimentary. obviously nothing newsworthy there.]
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WAL-MART CAN BE GOOD FOR YOUR HEALTH
Self-interested doctors need to get over their archaic ways of doing business, says Rahul K. Parikh, M.D. In our current system, costs keep rising and being shifted to consumers while access to care is unpredictable for almost any practice:
> According to a 2004 report by the Government Accountability Office about Medicare preventive services, 30 percent of people over age 65 did not receive a flu vaccine and 37 percent had never had a pneumonia vaccine.On the other hand, retail clinics are thriving, in large part because they provide excellent access. After all, what's more convenient than showing up any day, night or weekend without telephone time spent on hold trying to make an appointment, only to shuffling your personal schedule to theirs? Then there's cost:
> Another example: In 2000, Medicare estimated that 6.6 million beneficiaries were never told by their doctor that they had high blood pressure.
> Retail clinics operate on a fee-for-service basis and don't accept insurance. [nor endure the costs of its processing]Overall, the growth of clinics, and the desire to pay out of pocket, is a not-so-subtle sign that consumers are asserting their purchasing power in the health sector, just as they would with other goods and services, says Parikh.
> Most charge a maximum of $50, which is significantly cheaper than the $100-plus your insurance company will pay when see your doctor.
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End of Global Warming?
Dr. David Whitehouse, the British astronomer and former science editor of the BBC, tells us:
"The fact is that the global temperature of 2007 is statistically the same as 2006 and every year since 2001'Whatever warming trend was going on has flattened out in the last seven years. Which is an odd thing, because China and India have been pumping out more CO2 from cars and industry. And an ever increasing avalanche of ugly facts are nailing the biggest scare story in history.
[snip]
"The fact is that the global temperature of 2007 is statistically the same as 2006 as well as every year since 2001. Global warming has, temporarily or permanently, ceased. Temperatures across the world are not increasing as they should according to the fundamental theory behind global warming - the greenhouse effect."
Dr. Whitehouse's wonderful news will make a lot of people angry. They don't want to believe good things about Mother Earth. They've put their money on Bad News for Momma. Which makes you wonder what they really want.
[NYT and BBC - oh my!]
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Mercury leaks found as new bulbs break
California
Compact fluorescent lamps - those spiral, energy-efficient bulbs popular as a device to 'combat' global warming - can pose a small risk of mercury poisoning to infants, young children, and pregnant women if they break, two reports concluded yesterday.
[snip]
The US Environmental Protection Agency and the states of Massachusetts and Vermont said yesterday that, based on the Maine study, they are revising their recommendations for where to use compact fluorescents in a home and how to clean up when one breaks ... recommended that if a compact fluorescent breaks, get children and pets out of the room. Ventilate the room. Never use a vacuum, even on a rug, to clean up a broken compact fluorescent lamps. Instead, use stiff paper such as index cards and tape to pick up pieces, and then wipe the area with a wet wipe or damp paper towel. If there are young children or pregnant woman in the house, consider cutting out the piece of carpet where the lamp broke as a precaution. Place the shards and cleanup debris in a glass jar with a screw top and remove the jar from the house.
[snip]
Disposal regulations vary from state to state, with some requiring broken compact fluorescent light bulbs, to be disposed of as household hazardous waste. Most states allow intact compact fluorescents to be thrown away, but some - such as Vermont, Minnesota, and California - ban disposal in trash...
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Sacked for sheep sex prank
Two British oil workers have been sacked after simulating sex with sheep due to be slaughtered for a Muslim festival. The animals were being killed for 30 foreign workers to celebrate Eid Al Adhha in the Algerian oil town Hassi Messaoud. The men, who have not been named, were reported by stunned restaurant workers and guards — then sacked by their employer, US industrial giant Schlumberger. They were accused of ''sheep violation''...
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article639408.ece
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Heroes: Wounded in Iraq, National Guardsman Wants to Return
Two prosthetic legs and plenty of physical therapy have Pannell up and walking again, and despite all he’s been through, he wants to return to the country where his life was turned upside-down.
“I think it would be vitally important for those dudes to realize that once we get hurt, we don’t forget about them,” Pannell said. “That’s something a lot of people can’t understand, but it’s impossible. It’s impossible to forget your guys.”
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Big News from Baghdad
[there...]
If you’re looking for one measure of the impact of last year’s troop surge in Iraq, look at Gen. David Petraeus as he walks through a Baghdad neighborhood, with no body armor, and no helmet. It’s been one year since the beginning of what’s known here as Operation Fardh Al Qadnoon.
“A big part of the effort, over the last year, has been to determine who is reconcilable, who, literally, is willing to put down his rifle and talk, who is willing to shout, instead of shoot.” Petraeus said.
Petraeus now expresses cautious optimism. “I have to tell you that, having been here for a number of years, this is very encouraging, actually. I mean, this is, this is potentially a big moment.” he said.
[poor delusional idiot - didn't he hear the Speaker of the House just inform us that "there's been no progress" in Iraq? shell shocked I guess]
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Our Unilateral Disarmament - Lawyers Before Safety
[here...]
It's hard to think of an action that has put as many lives at risk as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D.-Calif.) declaration of unilateral disarmament in the War on Terror last week. By refusing to renew our ability to monitor terrorist communications overseas, Speaker Pelosi has put Americans at risk. She has blinded our counterterrorism capability and shut down America's most sophisticated defenses against the irreconcilable wing of Islam. As of midnight Feb. 16 the law governing America's defense has reverted to a state inadequate to stop terrorists. Why? Because the Democratic left believes lining the pockets of trial lawyers is more important than stopping terrorists.
As Robert Novak reported Monday, the trial lawyers -- the Democrats' most important source of political contributions -- have filed dozens of lawsuits seeking millions of dollars against phone companies for helping keep us safe by responding to the request of intelligence agencies to provide critical information about suspected terrorist communications without a warrant. The continued cooperation of the telecom companies in monitoring terrorist communications is crucial to America's defense, which is why the Senate bill contained the immunity provision...
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War? What War?
A pertinent question for 2008 might be: How many 9/11's does it take to wake a sleeping giant and keep him alert at the helm? More than one, it would seem. How quickly America has been lulled back to sleep. With a heap of help from our watchful media.
For more than four years, every news outlet in the Country was stirring its anti-American pot and blasting news of the carnage from Iraq 24/7. They were counting the bodies and inflating the count. They were giving more coverage to the paltry numbers of paid anti-war protesters than they were to our military heroes and their families. We heard about the horrors of the Iraq War day in and day out.
[snip]But suddenly, we are winning the war that was lost, and you could hear a pin drop in the abandoned echo chamber of war coverage. And just as predictably, the 2008 Presidential election, according to our media elites, isn't about the war at all. It's about the economy.
And before you vote, ask yourself just one question: If we aren't safe in our homes and workplaces from another catastrophe like 9/11, will the price of your bread really matter?
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Our Balkans Error
Demonstrations and riots on Serbia's border with northern Kosovo — which Serbs consider to be their nation's heartland — have caused NATO forces in the area to seal off the border. Fearing violence, the EU has withdrawn 2,000 officials there. This leaves NATO facing a very ugly decision, and soon: Use force to prevent an escalation of the rioting and anger by Serbs, who feel betrayed by Europe and the U.S., or stand back and let it happen.
The removal of European Union officials from Kosovo, the newly independent former Serbian province, is bad news. Trouble is on the way, and once again the U.S. may be asked to clean up the mess. Supporting a Muslim separatist movement within Europe strikes us as a fool's errand, one that could lead to similar uprisings around the world from aggrieved minorities...
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Russia assures Serbia of its support on Kosovo
[to say nothing of these guys...]
Dmitri Medvedev, the Russian first deputy prime minister and the presumptive successor to President Vladimir Putin, committed the Kremlin on Monday to long-term support in backing Serbia against an independent Kosovo.
"We proceed from the understanding that Serbia is a single state with its jurisdiction spanning its entire territory, and we will stick to this principled stance in the future," he said, in remarks reported widely on news broadcasts in Russia. "Serbia," he added, faces "conditions of illegitimate actions to unilaterally recognize Kosovo."
The United States reacted quickly to Medvedev's statements and restated its own support for Kosovo. It made clear that, in Washington's view, Kosovo's break from Serbia was final.
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Pentagon Chief Says NATO's Very Survival is at Stake in Afghanistan Mission
Survival of the NATO alliance, a cornerstone of American security policy for six decades, is at stake in the debate over how the United States and Europe should share the burden of fighting Islamic extremism in Afghanistan, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Sunday.
"We must not -- we cannot -- become a two-tiered alliance of those willing to fight and those who are not," "Such a development, with all its implications for collective security, would effectively destroy the alliance,"Washington has had innumerable disputes with its NATO allies in the 59 years since it was founded as a bulwark against the former Soviet Union. But today's debate over the importance of the mission in Afghanistan and how to accomplish it was portrayed by Gates as among the most difficult ever.
A central theme of Gates' speech was his assertion that al-Qaida extremists, either in Afghanistan or elsewhere, pose a greater threat to Europe than many Europeans realize.
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MORE PRIVATE HEALTH CARE IN CANADA URGED
The architect of Quebec's now-overburdened public health care system is proposing further privatization and user fees of up to $98 for people to see their family doctor. Former provincial Liberal health minister Claude Castonguay concluded that Quebec can no longer sustain the annual growth in health care costs. The province currently spends about $23.6 billion annually on health care, or about 40 per cent of its budget. Recommendations include:
> An additional tax based on income and the number of visits made to a doctor's office or hospital in a calendar year. Low-income families and children would be exempt."If nothing is done, at one point we will reach a crisis point ... this is why we say it is urgent to act," Castonguay said. "There's no miracle solution, there is no simple solution."
> Encouraging private-sector involvement in the management of hospitals and medical clinics.
> Lifting a ban that prevents doctors from practicing both in the public system and privately.
> Raising the provincial sales tax by up to one percentage point.
[au contraire; personal medical savings accounts, established when young, tax deferred and appreciating like 401k's, but immediately available for medical reasons, with unused funds eventually returned, even if only in part, to the contributors after retirement would work miracles. It would be our money that's being spent - and free market principles could finally be brought to bear]
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Global Warming? New Data Shows Ice Is Back
according to reports from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) that reveal that almost all the allegedly “lost” ice has come back. A NOAA report shows that ice levels which had shrunk from 5 million square miles in January 2007 to just 1.5 million square miles in October, are almost back to their original levels.
Moreover, a Feb. 18 report in the London Daily Express showed that there is nearly a third more ice in Antarctica than usual, challenging the global warming crusaders and buttressing arguments of skeptics who deny that the world is undergoing global warming.
Around the world, vast areas have been buried under some of the heaviest snowfalls in decades... If global warming gets any worse we'll all freeze to death.
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Illegal Immigration and Low Wage Labor
In recent years, ripening crops regularly are accompanied by stories suggesting we need illegal immigrant labor to bring in the harvest. [snip] Visions of crops rotting in the fields make for vivid journalism. But in September, 2007 a Congressional Research Service (CRS) Report for Congress entitled "Farm Labor Shortages and Immigration Policy," found little cause to worry about crops ripening and spoiling, stating that,
"Trends in the agricultural labor market do not suggest the existence of a nationwide shortage of domestically available farm workers..."A 2007 study written by Philip Martin, a professor of agricultural and resource economics at the University of California, Davis, for the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) entitled "Farm Labor shortages: How Real? What Response" further substantiated the conclusions of the CRS Report.
Busting The Myth Across Industries
A March 2006 CIS study of the top 22 occupations in 2005 indicated that in no occupational category did immigrant employees outnumber native employees. In other words, native-born U.S. workers are already doing all jobs - and in majority numbers - where high concentrations of illegal immigrant are also employed.
[snip]
Here's one example of that wage-leveraging impact from the Federation of American Immigration Reform (FAIR):
"In Los Angeles, unionized black janitors had been earning $12 an hour, with benefits. But with the advent of subcontractors who compose roaming crews of Mexican and El Salvadoran laborers, the pay dropped to the minimum wage of $3.35 per hour. "The myth only approaches truth if amended to read: Illegal immigrants accept jobs that American workers won't do for poverty level wages and no benefits (including healthcare).
[whenever we're told about jobs Americans won't do it's a lie; natives hold the majority of all (legal) jobs - and that despite the above referenced wage-suppression. What say we exclude illegals {as you'd think the name would require} with prohibitive consequences for employers who knowingly hire them, and let market forces re-level to natural levels? Yeah, radical]
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Police hunt little old lady
Police are hunting an armed robber who tried to hold up a Post Office - described as a little old lady in her 60s. The pensioner, believed to be aged between 65 and 70, entered the shop in Northenden, Manchester, armed with the blade and threatened the cashier demanding money. Staff activated the store's alarms and the woman shuffled off empty handed.
http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/article.html?in_article_id=99830&in_page_id=2
Monday, February 25, 2008
Face of Defense: Soldier Returns to Service After Two-Decade Break
Wilkerson decided to re-enlist after the Army raised its maximum enlistment age to 42 [he's 43].
“I’ve got a 21-year-old son, and there are kids (serving) who are younger than him,” he said. “I’m still in shape and capable of doing a good job. Maybe my service will mean that another young guy his age will be able to return to his family.”
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Al-Qaeda Leaders: 'We are in Crisis'
Two captured letters released by the US military show Al-Qaeda in Iraq in desperate shape while local leaders complain bitterly about the success of "The Awakening" that has brought 80,000 Sunnis into an alliance with the Americans:
Al-Qaeda in Iraq faces an “extraordinary crisis”. Last year's mass defection of ordinary Sunnis from al-Qaeda to the US military “created panic, fear and the unwillingness to fight”. The terrorist group's security structure suffered “total collapse”.
These are the words not of al-Qaeda's enemies but of one of its own leaders in Anbar province — once the group's stronghold. They were set down last summer in a 39-page letter seized during a US raid on an al-Qaeda base near Samarra in November.
--
That second document is a bitter 16-page testament written last October by a local al-Qaeda leader near Balad, north of Baghdad. “I am Abu-Tariq, emir of the al-Layin and al-Mashahdah sector,” the author begins. He goes on to describe how his force of 600 shrank to fewer than 20...
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Arms & The Manpower
Analysts predict that equipment shortages in the military may become a source for debate in the upcoming 2008 Presidential election.
As America enters its fifth year in Iraq and Afghanistan, there is a growing need to replace “worn out” equipment. Both the need for new equipment and calls to expand the number of military personnel have led to increased projected spending in the Department of Defense budget for 2008.
While promises for a stronger military abound, finding the money to fund equipment and training will not be easy, especially if the economy goes into recession. The future President will have to make tough decisions in the contest for funds between military and domestic welfare programs.
“The question is going to be—Where is the money going to come from?”Already, new weapons programs for the Air Force and Navy have been put on hold in order to ensure that the Army and Marines are well-equipped first. The deferment comes despite President Bush’s original budget request to pump $38.7 billion into shipbuilding and $33.8 billion into new aircraft equipment.
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Iran plans to launch two more rockets into space
Iran is to launch two more rockets into space in the next few months, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced on Monday, after a firing of a rocket earlier this month sparked international concern. "Two other rockets will be launched so that we can then send a satellite into space," Ahmadinejad said at a rally in Tehran broadcast live on state television.
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Proposed Treaty Threatens Operations with NATO Allies
A proposed arms-control treaty banning use of cluster munitions and aiding countries that use them could affect U.S. operations with NATO allies, a Defense Department official said. A draft treaty to enforce the ban is now circulating among Oslo Convention nations, and it prohibits any form of assistance to countries that use cluster munitions...“A complete ban would put at risk the lives of our soldiers and those of our coalition partners, and make it more difficult to fulfill our security guarantees to others,” he explained. “And for certain types of targets, use of cluster munitions could, in fact, result in fewer civilian casualties and less damage of civilian infrastructure than would be the case if conventional unitary warheads were used against the same target.”
The Oslo process risks producing a “feel-good” arms-control outcome where nations without imminent need for cluster munitions produce a ban that has very little effect on their national security, but does have an impact on the security needs of the United States and its NATO allies. A NATO ally that signs the Olso Treaty would not be able to operate with U.S. forces in a NATO operation...
[a despicable sham designed to give our gutless 'allies' an excuse to never contribute to anything - while putting our sons and daughters at greater risk while they sit on the sidelines]
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China warns U.S. against plan to destroy spy satellite
Beijing - In response to a U.S. plan to shoot down a malfunctioning spy satellite, China has warned against threats to security in outer space, without mentioning its own successful anti-satellite missile test last year. The Chinese government also stopped short of linking the planned U.S. strike with Beijing's repeated calls for a complete ban on space weapons.
[China has never honored a treaty its signed. It uses them as a weapon against democracies who sign in good faith.]
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LINES FOR SWEDISH CARE GROW LONGER
If universal coverage can work anywhere, it should be Sweden, a small, homogenous nation where poverty is virtually unknown. Yet according to European think tank Health Consumer Powerhouse (HCP) in its Euro-Canada Health Consumer Index 2008:
> Waiting times for care, long a problem in Sweden and too often deadly wherever they're found, are now the longest on the Continent.Long waits are a hallmark of government health care anywhere it's employed. When the perception exists that treatment is free (it is not; Swedes pay more than half their gross income in taxes to support the welfare state), system overuse is inevitable. People can think of no reason to self-ration care.
> While Sweden excels at medical outcomes, its accessibility to and quality of service are bad and worsening.
Swedes are accustomed to cradle-to-grave care provided by the state. But rather than deal with long waits, they're opting for private care, which got a boost from limited reform in the 1990s. In private care, patients self-regulate and put less stress on the system.
Thanks to the profit motive, private health care providers have an incentive to cut waiting times, lest they lose customers to the competition. Government providers have no such motivation.
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Saying No to CoerciveCare
Whether it's Mitt, Hillary, or Arnold doing the sales job
...Yet many California unions argued that a mandate would force uninsured, middle-income working families to divert money from more pressing needs toward coverage whose price and quality they cannot control.
The unions are correct: This is exactly what is happening in Massachusetts, where Mitt Romney enacted a similar plan two years ago as governor. (And Mr. Romney's plan is the inspiration for both the Schwarzenegger and Clinton plans.) The experience in the Bay State deserves a lot more scrutiny than it has been getting.
...All this has inflated demand, which, combined with onerous regulations on insurance suppliers, has triggered premium increases of 12 percent for this year—double last year's national average. No one is escaping the financial sting. The state health-care bill for fiscal 2008-2009 is expected to be $400 million more than originally projected—an 85 percent increase.
...The government response to rising premiums is, unsurprisingly, price controls...
...Forcing people to buy substandard care they cannot afford is not universal care, she says. "It is a hoax." And so Massachusetts is marching toward a system of two-tiered medicine—the alleged market inequity that universal care is supposed to cure...
http://www.reason.com/news/show/124783.html
NYT Takes on Al Gore and Climate Alarmists
Moments after Investor's Business Daily presaged that "2008 just might be the year the so-called scientific consensus that man is causing the Earth to warm begins to crack," the New York Times of all entities published a rather shocking piece pointing fingers at folks like Nobel Laureate Al Gore for being part of a group of "activists, journalists and publicity-savvy scientists who selectively monitor the globe looking for newsworthy evidence of a new form of sinfulness, burning fossil fuels."
This from the New York Times? Hold on tightly to your seats, folks, for the shocks in this piece came early and often (emphasis added throughout):
A year ago, British meteorologists made headlines predicting that the buildup of greenhouse gases would help make 2007 the hottest year on record. At year's end, even though the British scientists reported the global temperature average was not a new record - it was actually lower than any year since 2001 - the BBC confidently proclaimed, "2007 Data Confirms Warming Trend."Checking that link to make sure it really goes to a Times piece? I understand - and there's {much} more...
When the Arctic sea ice last year hit the lowest level ever recorded by satellites, it was big news and heralded as a sign that the whole planet was warming. When the Antarctic sea ice last year reached the highest level ever recorded by satellites, it was pretty much ignored. A large part of Antarctica has been cooling recently, but most coverage of that continent has focused on one small part that has warmed.
When Hurricane Katrina flooded New Orleans in 2005, it was supposed to be a harbinger of the stormier world predicted by some climate modelers. When the next two hurricane seasons were fairly calm - by some measures, last season in the Northern Hemisphere was the calmest in three decades - the availability entrepreneurs changed the subject. Droughts in California and Australia became the new harbingers of climate change (never mind that a warmer planet is projected to have more, not less, precipitation over all).
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Border crossings cut by Texas crackdown
A strict policy to arrest, prosecute and jail illegal aliens who cross into the U.S. has shown significant success in reducing crossings and crime along the Texas border, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol officials said this month. The first 45 days of Operation Streamline — a collaborative effort of local, state and federal agencies in Texas — has resulted in decreased illegal border crossings and crime...
[who would have guessed? and note the inclusion of crime in the decreases]
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Grading Teachers: Kids' Test Scores Must Count
If you want good teachers in the schools, the first step is obvious: Figure out who they are. And not by relying solely on water-cooler chat and subjective judgments but by also looking at rock-hard data on teacher performance. Such common-sense thinking has led Chancellor Joel Klein & Co. to undertake a pilot project to measure and track teachers' results - based on their students' test scores. (Snip) Imagine teachers treated like other professionals - having their performance monitored and quantified, as is routinely done in other fields...
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The Ghosts of 2004...
California
The Sacramento Bee reports today that Prop. 58, the measure sponsored by Gov. Schwarzenegger in 2004 as the so-called “California Balanced Budget Act” isn’t all it was cracked up to be. Schwarzenegger made a dizzying array of promises to skeptical voters in order to win passage of the measure. He said,
“California faces unprecedented budget deficits. Overspending has led to serious shortfalls which threatens the state’s ability to pay its bills and access financial markets. This proposition is a safeguard against this EVER HAPPENING AGAIN. Proposition 58 will prevent the Legislature from ENACTING BUDGETS THAT SPEND MORE MONEY THAN WE HAVE.”As I told the Senate when it placed Prop. 58 on the ballot in December of 2003, the so-called “safeguards” were nothing more than an artful window-dressing of existing law – with one critical exception:
“Since statehood, the constitution has prevented one generation from passing on its day-to-day expenses to the next. This measure temporarily removes that provision so that you can do what no generation before you has ever dared to do: steal from the future.”Four years later those warnings have borne out. While Proposition 58 is now being proven in practice to be a toothless watchdog, the Governor has just ordered another $3.3 billion of borrowing to finance his deficit spending – borrowing that Prop. 58 made possible with the promise it would only be used to retire Davis’ deficit and prevent it from “ever happening again.”
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Sunday, February 17, 2008
Face of Defense: Real Estate Agent Chooses to Serve
“As a little girl, I always wanted to join the Army, because my father and grandfather spent several years in the military and served their country proudly,”
Even though her leaders said they already were impressed by her work ethic and determination in keeping track of more than $3.5 million worth of unit equipment, Rizzo’s most attention-grabbing performance was yet to come.
“When we were in (Hohenfels, Germany) going through ‘Iron Warrior’ training, she went up to the Iraqi role players and started talking to them in their own language,” said Army Command Sgt. Maj. Chad Cuomo, “Nobody knew that she spoke Arabic, and it especially shocked the role players; she was definitely the hero of the battle out there.”
Rizzo was promoted to specialist shortly after arriving in Iraq and went to the sergeant’s promotion board four months later.
“I just try to give 100 percent in everything I do,” Rizzo said, “and I always try to do above what is expected of me.”The soon-to-be sergeant is taking online classes toward a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice. She said she hopes to one day be an Army career counselor or an Arabic linguist.
[just another no-other-option recruit]
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Baghdad Fair Helps Residents Plan for Economic Future
"This area is on the edge of an agricultural production area and an urban area," Dose said. "We're here to provide new technology in areas such as food processing and packaging." ... "This whole area has become permissive for us to work with the local leaders," Dose said. "Six months ago, we wouldn't have come here."
In addition to enabling USAID and representatives of other groups to work with the neighborhood business leaders, the market action committees also act as advocates from the business community to local governments.
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The Director of National Intelligence Speaks
Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell gave his annual national security threat assessment to the Senate Intelligence Committee last week.
Al Qaeda is improving the last key aspect of its ability to attack the U.S.: the identification, training, and positioning of operatives for an attack in the Homeland. While increased security measures at home and abroad have caused al Qaeda to view the West, especially the U.S., as a harder target, we have seen an influx of new Western recruits into the tribal areas since mid-2006. We assess that al Qaeda's Homeland plotting is likely to continue to focus on prominent political, economic, and infrastructure targets designed to produce mass casualties, visually dramatic destruction, significant economic aftershocks, and/or fear among the population.
[snip]
... al Qaeda and other terrorist groups are attempting to acquire chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear weapons and materials (CBRN). We assess al Qaeda will continue to try to acquire and employ these weapons and materials -- some chemical and radiological materials and crude weapons designs are easily accessible, in our judgment.
[and that's the kicker, so 'distasteful' nobody wants to talk about it: the bad guys are right now working on acquiring WMD, and they'll use them when they get them, and as suicide bombers can't be deterred - they'll need to be be interdicted. To do that, our intelligence communities must be doing anything and everything to that end. I.e., progressive attempts to ham string their efforts technically or in the courts is literally placing many American lives at risk.]
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Take Me To Your Leader!
The job description is as follows: Wanted: A strong charismatic nationalist figure to guide the Arabic-speaking world toward modernization along with stability, an acceptable peace with Israel, good relations with the West, and solidarity against threats from both non-Arab Iran and radical Islamists.
Of course, there is a mirror-image role that could also be filled: A strong charismatic nationalist figure to mobilize the Arabic-speaking world for battle with Israel , confrontation with the West, and solidarity against threats from both non-Arab Iran and radical Islamists.
There are no serious applicants for the first position and only a single almost laughable one for the second...
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[and what is 'the West' doing to influence which kind of leader emerges? ... ]
[twofer:]
Russia tests ballistic missiles
Russia has successfully tested two intercontinental ballistic missiles that are to replace ageing rockets from the Soviet era. A strategic missile known as the RS-24 flew 7,000 km (4350 miles) to hit targets on the Kamchatka peninsula. Later, a Russian submarine in the Barents Sea launched another new missile, hitting the same test site. It comes as Russia has again accused the US of ignoring its concerns over a planned US missile defence system.
[don't their actions increase the need for a missile defense system?]
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[at the same time...]
Iran to Get Russian Missile Defense
Russia is preparing to equip Iran with a powerful new air defense system that would dramatically increase its ability to repel an attack, Iran's defense minister said Wednesday. The S-300 anti-aircraft missile defense system is capable of shooting down aircraft, cruise missiles and ballistic missile warheads at ranges of over 90 miles and at altitudes of about 90,000 feet. Russian military officials boast that its capabilities outstrip the U.S. Patriot missile system.
[evidently their definition of 'defense' is creditable and ours isn't? despite Iran's repeated statements of intended aggression? Why isn't the media ridiculing this Putin guy's inane statements re: our defense-only systems somehow justifying an obviously-false excuse to reignite an arms race?]
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Court Freezes $12 billion in Venezuela assets
Hugo Chavez's seizure last year of a huge oil project in the name of the state has not come without costs. US oil giant Exxon has sued Venezuela to recover costs from the project and a judge has agreed to freeze Venezuelan national assets.
Making Chavez pay for his stealing is the only way to discourage this sort of thieving worldwide. If a country wants to switch to a socialist state where all the assets are owned by the government, that's fine - as long as they pay companies for what they built.
Meanwhile, Venezuela oil production continues to decline. But as long as prices stay high, Chavez should have plenty of cash to make his mischief in South America.
[the inevitable fate of socialist systems, where there're no consequences for failure - and why all such systems are unsustainable - just watch over the coming years...]
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TELEMEDICINE HOLDS PROMISE FOR HEALTH CARE
Telemedicine can remedy several of the problems currently plaguing the health care industry, according to a new report by Devon Herrick, a senior fellow with the National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA). For example:
> For many ailments, the patient doesn't need to be in front of the doctor, but his or her information does."The only thing stopping us from using telemedicine to our advantage is a reluctance to control our own health care dollars," [?] ..."If we control the dollars, as I do with my Health Savings Account, the consumer can decide the value."
> A tech-savvy doctor can respond to a phone call or e-mail with a diagnosis, thereby saving some patients any visit at all.
> With more complete information accessible in electronic medical records, doctors could make faster and more accurate diagnoses.
> That would expedite the diagnosing process for both doctor and patient, by avoiding costly trips to doctors' offices and wasted time in waiting rooms.
[applying available technology as private industry would - now that would be real 'change']
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Power play
Utilities face a serious problem. Electricity demand is projected to increase 40 percent by 2030, according to government estimates. Meanwhile, overzealous regulators make it difficult to expand energy capacity. Unfortunately, instead of loosening regulations to induce capacity expansion, state and federal governments are moving toward rationing electricity.
Proponents make it sound so simple. Just buy a new dishwasher, build a couple of windmills, put some solar cells on the roof and — voila — energy problem solved. Not really. Maryland would have to reduce its electricity consumption by about a fifth of today's use — or the equivalent of a half a million households — to meet Mr. O'Malley's objective. Still, some may say, all this sounds fair enough. What's wrong with some aggressive conservation?
Well, there's a lot wrong when it's unjustifiably forced upon consumers. Think about it. The legitimacy of these draconian efforts is rooted in the notion there is an energy shortage. Conservation, after all, makes sense when there is a shortage of something. But energy is not in short supply. There are fossil fuels, and lots of them, right here in America. Yet America is one of the few nations that chooses to leaves much of its own reserves untapped...
[a component of our insane energy policies is that government bureaucrats are always looking for ways to increase their power - and this energy-is-bad idea plays right into their hands of taxing (and so controlling) all activity]
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OKLAHOMA'S CRACKDOWN ON ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION DRAWS TEXAS LAWMAKERS' INTEREST
According to the Pew Hispanic Center, there were between 50,000 and 75,000 illegal immigrants in Oklahoma nearly two years ago, with 20 times more -- as many as 1.6 million -- in Texas.
Last year, Oklahoma's Legislature passed, by huge margins, the nation's toughest law on illegal immigrants that:
> Restricts illegal immigrants' access to driver's licenses and ID cards.
> Cuts off several forms of public assistance for illegal immigrants. Emergency medical care, disaster aid and certain immunizations are exempted.
> Makes it harder for illegal immigrants to pay in-state college tuition.
> Encourages state and local law enforcement to enforce federal immigration law.
> Makes it a felony to harbor, transport, conceal or shelter illegal immigrants.
> Starting this summer, requires private and government employers to use a federal database to verify employment eligibility of all new hires.
> Make public schools report how many illegal-immigrant children are enrolled.
Meanwhile, some Texas lawmakers are already promising bills that mirror Oklahoma's House Bill 1804, [saying] even as Congress deadlocks on immigration, a state can protect itself against what he calls threats to public health and safety posed by a porous border.
['restricts' not bans, 'several' not all, 'harder' not prevents, 'encourages' not requires, 'federal database' means we've had a way to verify employment eligibility for years - and not used it, 'public' means tax payer funded - but previously not disclosing how many illegal-immigrants we're paying for? And these mushy 'restrictions' and 'encouragements' represent "the nations toughest law on illegal immigrants"?]
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This is certainly not a tax rebate
..According to published accounts, the rebate will add $168 billion to the nation’s deficit – to be repaid with future taxes – in order to provide varying handouts of up to $1,200 per couple plus $300 per child. But before you write that thank you letter to the local congressman, take out a calculator and do the math. There are 303.4 million Americans out there, meaning the average rebate should come to $553 per person, or $2,212 for a family of four. But the maximum grant that family of four can possibly receive is $1,800. So for that family, it means $2,212 in taxes out of one pocket to put $1,800 into the other.
Supply-side economics, says the father of supply-side economics, only works by cutting the marginal rate of taxation. Reducing a family’s marginal tax burden by $1,800 would not only cost the treasury less, but would reward that family for earning more income or sheltering less – resulting in higher productivity. That, of course, is the one thing that Congress won’t even consider. It brings to mind Mark Twain’s famous observation,
“Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.”READ MORE
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Heroes: Airman Drives 120 Convoys in Afghanistan
When she’s outside the wire, Velez is somewhat of a celebrity with the Afghan children. “They get excited because they see a female airman. They want to touch my hair and earrings,” she said. “The Afghans want to learn and have a lot of questions. They want to work and take care of their families like people in the United States do.”
This is Velez’s third deployment in three years, but she said she has no regrets.
“My job satisfaction comes from constantly thinking about all the people’s lives I have in my hands”
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Active-Duty Recruiting Marks Eighth Straight Successful Month
All four services met or exceeded their active-duty recruiting goals for January, defense officials announced today. The January recruiting numbers represented the eighth consecutive month of across-the-board active-duty recruiting successes among the services.
The Army recruited 8,693 active-duty soldiers, 101 percent of its goal, in January.
The Army National Guard bested its January recruiting goal by 3 percent, signing on 5,688 soldiers,
The Marine Corps topped its January active-duty recruitment goal by 11 percent,
The Navy met its January goals for both active-duty and Navy Reserve recruits.
The Air Force exceeded its active-duty recruiting goal for January by 3 percent,
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Deputy Secretary Urges Prompt Funding for Current, Future Challenges
Noting the “complex security environment we are in today,” [Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon] England cited the “variety of very prominent challenges” facing the country. He pointed to the threats posed by terrorism, extremism, jihadism and ethnic, tribal and sectarian conflict. But other challenges and potential challenges loom, as well: proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, failed and failing states, and emerging powers with yet-unclear intentions. [that would be China and Russia - the 'unclear' part is pure diplomacy]“Each of these threats … poses unique challenges and demands on the Department of Defense,” ... “Even while we are committed in Iraq and Afghanistan, we do have to be concerned about the other security challenges to our nation, so we look at this in a much broader context.”
England urged the senators to approve the defense and wartime supplemental funding requests quickly to avoid a repeat of the situation that occurred this year. The fiscal 2008 defense budget did not pass into law until late January, though the fiscal year began Oct. 1.
“It will be extraordinarily difficult to manage the department and to maintain our security both for our people in combat and for our citizens if we are also, at that time, in a budget turmoil like we were last year,”he said.
“We have these magnificent men and women who come forward to protect and defend our nation, and therefore it is incumbent on us, frankly, to provide them the funding they need,”['urge the senators'... sounds like a good idea to me]
senator@feinstein.senate.govsenator@boxer.senate.gov
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FBI raids house in Chinese spy case
A Defense Department analyst and a former engineer for Boeing Co. were charged Monday in separate spy cases for allegedly handing over military secrets to the Chinese government, the Justice Department said. (Snip) The arrests mark China's latest attempts to gain top secret information about U.S. military systems and sales, said Assistant Attorney General Kenneth Wainstein. He described China as "particularly adept, and particularly determined and methodical in their espionage efforts."
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Venezuela Suspends Oil Sales to Exxon Mobil
Caracas, Venezuela — Venezuela's state oil company said Tuesday that it has stopped selling crude to Exxon Mobil Corp. and has suspended commercial relations with the U.S.-based oil company. State-run Petroleos de Venezuela SA, or PDVSA, said in a statement that it ''has paralyzed sales of crude to Exxon Mobil.'' It said the decision was made ''as an act of reciprocity'' for the company's ''judicial-economic harassment.''
[how dare they take us to court for having stolen their property. Unfriendly nations are lining up to blackmail us with their oil - we need to develop our own reserves, now.]
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HOW TO PAY FOR HEALTH CARE
The health care industry looks like a big plate of spaghetti. Many insurance carriers and medical service providers have internal back-office technology systems, but few connect with anyone else. Much communication between parties is cumbersome and manual. Creating a Health Care Clearing Corp. (HCCC) modeled on the successful experience of the financial services industry could be a significant step in cutting health care costs, says Stuart Z. Goldstein, a financial services executive in New York with a background in health care issues. How would the HCCC work?
> It would operate more like the hub of a wheel with spokes electronically linking medical service providers and insurance companies to a central point where data can be processed and exchanged.Health care insurance carriers incur huge costs today by distributing millions of individual checks to cover their obligations to hospitals and physician groups. In contrast, firms in the securities industry pay for all their stock trading once a day, using the Federal Reserve's Fed wire system for electronic funds transfers.
> It would eliminate the need for medical service providers and insurance companies to manage separate procedures and processes to submit claims.
> Standardizing data exchange and recordkeeping would speed payment of claims.
In the coming presidential campaign, health care will be among the three issues (next to the economy and global leadership) deciding the election. Regardless of political party or persuasion, the answer to the rising tide of health-care costs lies not within the stars, but in forcing greater efficiency out of the current system.
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GREENHOUSE AFFECT
Trendy climate-change policies like ethanol and other biofuels are actually worse for the environment than fossil fuels, according to two studies published in Science, a peer-reviewed journal. The first study, by ecologists at Princeton University and the Woods Hole Research Center, break new ground by exposing a kind of mega-accounting error:
> About 2.7 times more carbon is stored in terrestrial soils and plant material than in the atmosphere, and this carbon is released when these areas are cleared. Compounding problems is the loss of "carbon sinks" that absorb atmospheric CO2 in the bargain.[167 years - I believe we're all supposed to be drowned by then]
> When the hidden costs of conversion are included, greenhouse-gas emissions from corn ethanol over the next 30 years will be twice as high as from regular gasoline.
> In the long term, it will take 167 years before the reduction in carbon emissions from using ethanol "pays back" the carbon released by land-use change.
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THE $3 TRILLION COP-OUT
The $3.1 trillion budget ... reminds us of the huge gap between uplifting political rhetoric and the grim realities of governing. Budgets are not just numbers. They express political choices. What should government do and who should pay? The reigning philosophy, practiced by both parties and largely approved by the public, is to evade choices /snip/
> Since 1961, the federal government has run deficits in all but five years; only the surplus of 1969 stemmed from deliberate policy: a 10 percent income surtax reluctantly passed by Congress in 1968.
> The others (1998-2001) mostly reflected good fortune: the end of the Cold War, resulting in a 40 percent drop in defense spending as a share of the economy, and an unexpected surge in taxes from the economic boom.
> Neither was a policy act of the Clinton administration or the then-Republican Congress.The most telling figures in his budget involve his proposal to eliminate or dramatically reduce 151 programs, for a savings of $18 billion. That's six-tenths of 1 percent of federal spending. What's telling, though, is that Congress will probably reject even many of these proposal...
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Obama Defends Driver's Licenses for Illegals
Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., told ABC's David Muir Saturday that his support for driver's licenses for illegal immigrants will not block his path to the White House because he and G.O.P. frontrunner John McCain share substantial overlap on immigration. "I think they will pounce on any issue that has to do with immigration," said Obama, referring to Republicans, "but my position has been very similar to John McCain's,
[too true. literally]
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DON'T WRITE VOUCHERS OFF
Vouchers are more successful than ever. A recent referendum loss in Utah should be weighed against the many victories vouchers have achieved across the nation. Consider:
> Since 2000, vouchers have had their greatest period of legislative success; of the 21 school choice programs that exist, 12 were enacted in the past eight years, and the fastest growth has been in the past three years.As to the quality argument, most high quality research finds that private schools produce better academic achievement. Ten studies of voucher programs found that students using vouchers to attend private schools outperformed their public school peers on standardized tests. The results in eight of the studies reached a high degree of statistical certainty, says Enlow.
> Moreover, 10 existing programs have been expanded in the same three years; vouchers have never been more successful in state legislatures than right now.
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Joy Behar: McCain 'Very Conservative in All His Policies'
[alright screw the rule re: campaigns - enough is enough]
Is ABC "View" co-host Joy Behar so far out of the political mainstream that she has a skewed sense of what entails a "liberal" and a "conservative?" The same woman who called Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama "very moderate" on the February 7 show, John McCain has "been very conservative in all his policies." Apparently anyone who does not march lockstep with NARAL is an arch-conservative, as Behar explained that McCain is "so conservative because he’s against choice."
[yeah, that and wanting to close Gitmo]
[oh, and favoring affirmative action and voting against every paycheck protection bill he's ever seen (union dues toward political campaigns)]
[oops, almost forgot voting against the Bush tax cuts twice - and forget the 'no reduction in spending' reason explanation he gives now, then he played the class warfare card, saying it was a tax cut 'for the wealthy' {if you're reading this on a computer, that would be you}]
[oh yeah, on the personal liberties front he's a rabid smoker-persecutionist {yes I made that up} and supported the clipper chip and {encryption} key-escrow bills as well as internet filtering]
[now that I think of it, on taxes he's supported raising social security taxes while repeatedly opposing attempts to abolish the death tax, and on business he's perpetually depicted big pharma as evil while supporting government spending on embryonic stem cell research big pharma's evidently to dumb to see the value in investing in itself]
[and all this before considering 'McCain-Feingold', the biggest attack on free speech in the nation's history, 'McCain-Kennedy', the insulting amnesty immigration bill he continues to say wasn't wrong, and his co-sponsorship of a bill (name escapes right now) that would dramatically raise taxes on 'all forms of carbon based energy' (oil., gas, coal - i.e., all our energy) in the name of 'combating global warming' because "Alaska is melting" {those are quote marks}]
[other than that I'm sure he's a real conservative guy - but what do I know, I'm just a non-declared independent]
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