The Republicans~sans the "front runners"~ debated last night at Morgan State University.The moderator was Tavis Smiley,a panel consisting of Ray Suarez,Cynthia Tucker and Juan Williams posed questions.
Now admittedly,I know very little about these men Brownback,Huckabee,Hunter,Keyes,Paul and Tancredo. I now know a bit more. They may not be my Republicans friends first choices,but they did show up~and the four top had their excuse of scheduling conflicts. Ron Paul was the crowd favorite,but I was impressed with Huckabee and Tancredo. I know nothing about either man~so please fill me in. To this early dismiss a "second tier" candidate~in either party~ is a disservice to the American people.Like a woman or a man dating ,one should keep ones options open, till "the one" stands out. Good hunting my fellow Americans.
Latest from FactCheck:
Stuck in Iraq?
September 27, 2007
Democratic candidates are pinned down on how quickly they would bring troops home from Iraq. The front-runners said it could take them years.
Summary
The latest Democratic presidential debate brought into sharp focus the candidates' disagreements on how quickly the U.S. can disentangle itself from Iraq.
Long-shot candidate Dennis Kucinich stood by his promise to bring all troops home within three months, and Bill Richardson said he could do it in a year – even at the cost of leaving some military equipment behind. But Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama said they might have to keep some combat troops there in a counterterrorism role for more than four years, and John Edwards said he'd likely have thousands of non-combat troops there in a protective role.
We offer no judgments about whether any of the differing positions are practical or foolish, good or bad. We note only that the candidates, under questioning by an expert moderator, spelled out their positions in fairly specific terms.
Analysis
When making promises, candidates tend to use murky terms that sound good but could mean anything, letting the listener believe what they will. At the Sept. 26 debate among Democratic presidential candidates at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois once again used the term "phased redeployment," which many Democrats use to describe what they favor for U.S. troops in Iraq.
The term was popularized in Democratic circles in 2005 shortly after the release of a paper titled “Strategic Redeployment,” written by Lawrence Korb and Brian Katulis of the liberal Center for American Progress. But it's not an official military term, and its precise meaning is unclear. Republicans should know that: In 1984, the National Council of Teachers of English bestowed third place in its annual Doublespeak Award to Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger for claiming that the removal of American soldiers from Lebanon was a redeployment and not a withdrawal. Nevertheless, Republicans have been quick to characterize the phrase as a euphemism for “retreat.”
But what exactly would each of the Democratic candidates do if elected president? Now, thanks to insistent questioning by NBC News' Tim Russert, the debate moderator, we know what the candidates say they would do, at least, with a fair amount of precision. Some Democrats would take years longer than others to bring home all the troops. Here's what each of them said when Russert asked if they could promise to have all U.S. troops out of Iraq within four years of taking office:
Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich said he'd get all troops out within three months of taking office: Russert: You'll pledge to have all troops out by January of 2013?
Kucinich: By – by April of 2007, and you can mark that on your calendars if you want, to take a new direction.
Russert: Well, it's September of '07 now, so we're going to have a problem. (Laughter.)
Kucinich: Well, make that – make that 2009.
New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said he would get all troops out within one year, by January 2010, even at the expense of abandoning some military equipment: Russert: How can you do it in one year?...
Richardson: This is what I would do. I would bring them out through roads through Kuwait and through Turkey. It would take persuading Turkey. The issue is light equipment. I would leave some of the light equipment behind.
Sen. Chris Dodd of Connecticut promised all troops out sometime during the four-year term:
Russert: Will you pledge as commander in chief that you have all troops out of Iraq by January of 2013?
Dodd: I will get that done.
Russert: You'll get it done.
Dodd: Yes, I will, sir.
Former Sen. John Edwards said he couldn't promise to get all U.S. troops out in four years, but he said he'd leave behind only a few thousand and none in a combat role:
Russert: Senator Edwards, will you commit that at the end of your first term, in 2013, all U.S. troops will be out of Iraq?
Edwards: I cannot make that commitment.... I will immediately draw down 40 [thousand] to 50,000 troops and, over the course of the next several months, continue to bring our combat troops out of Iraq until all of our combat troops are in fact out of Iraq. [But we] will maintain an embassy in Baghdad. That embassy has to be protected. We will probably have humanitarian workers in Iraq. Those humanitarian workers have to be protected. I think somewhere in the neighborhood of a brigade of troops will be necessary to accomplish that – 3,500 to 5,000 troops.
Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York said that her "goal" is to have all U.S. troops out of Iraq by 2013 but that she can't promise that would happen. And some combat troops might remain.
Clinton: Well, Tim, it is my goal to have all troops out by the end of my first term. But I agree with Barack. It is very difficult to know what we're going to be inheriting.... I will immediately move to begin bringing our troops home when I am inaugurated.... [But there] may be a continuing counterterrorism mission, which, if it still exists, will be aimed at al Qaeda in Iraq. It may require combat, Special Operations Forces or some other form of that, but the vast majority of our combat troops should be out.
Sen. Barack Obama took a very similar position, saying some U.S. troops would remain for an indefinite period for "counterterrorism activities," which we presume means combat troops.
Russert: Will you pledge that by January 2013, the end of your first term more than five years from now, there will be no U.S. troops in Iraq?
Obama: I think it's hard to project four years from now, and I think it would be irresponsible. We don't know what contingency will be out there. What I can promise is that if there are still troops in Iraq when I take office [and] if there's no timetable [for withdrawal], then I will drastically reduce our presence there to the mission of protecting our embassy, protecting our civilians and making sure that we're carrying out counterterrorism activities there.
Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware said U.S. troops would remain if a political settlement is reached to end civil violence, but otherwise he would bring them back.
Biden: If in fact there is no political solution by the time I am president, then I would bring them out because all they are is fodder. But ... [if] you have a stable Iraq like we have in Bosnia – we've had 20,000 Western troops in Bosnia for 10 years. Not one has been killed – not one. The genocide has ended. [But] I would make a commitment to have them all out if there is not a political reconciliation, because they're just fodder.
Former Sen. Mike Gravel didn't say directly how quickly he could get troops home if he is elected, but he said Clinton, Obama and Biden should filibuster until President Bush agrees to bring home troops now:
Russert: Senator, are you suggesting that these candidates suspend their campaigns, go back to Washington and for 40 consecutive days vote on the war?
Gravel: If it stops the killing, my God, yes, do it!
Factual Bobbles
The candidates' specifics on their plans for Iraq were more enlightening, we thought, than the factual stumbles. But we did find a few missteps:
- Edwards overstated his own proposal when he said, "I will say to the Congress ... you lose your health care" unless it passes universal health care by July 2009. That's an empty threat, since no president has the authority to strip members of Congress of health insurance which is given to them by federal law.
When we asked Edwards’ staff what he was talking about, they sent us a recent press release that says Edwards plans to introduce legislation that would take such action. He would have been more accurate to say in the debate that he would ask Congress either to grant health care to all citizens or give it up for themselves.
- Dodd inflated the number of annual deaths from car crashes when he said “50,000 people lose their lives in automobiles every year…many of them because of the use of alcohol.” Actually, 42,642 people died in motor vehicle crashes in 2006, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which includes accidents involving trucks, buses, motorcycles and pedestrians. Narrowing the figure down to passenger vehicle occupants (those who actually died "in automobiles") yields a crash-related body count of 30,521. It's true that 41 percent of the total vehicle fatalities were alcohol-related.
- Biden gave a figure many times too high when he claimed that 300,000 babies are born with deformities each year in the U.S. “because of women who are alcoholics while they're carrying those children to term.” According to the Centers for Disease Control, roughly 40,000 babies per year suffer from fetal alcohol spectrum disorders. Meanwhile, 1 in 33 babies suffer from a birth defect of any kind, roughly 120,000 babies per year. Both numbers are far below the 300,000 Biden cites as being born specifically to alcoholic mothers. The statistics may understate the totals, as the CDC says many birth defects aren’t readily apparent when the birth certificate is prepared. Still, we're unable to find any support for Biden's 300,000 figure.
- We also caught moderator Russert giving an unfair characterization of Kucinich’s record as mayor of Cleveland. Russert said he “let Cleveland go into bankruptcy, the first time that happened since the Depression. The voters of Cleveland rewarded you by throwing you out of office and electing a Republican.” Cleveland did go bankrupt in the late '70s during Kucinich’s tenure as mayor, and he was subsequently voted out of office in favor of Republican George Voinovich. But that’s not the whole story.
The city went bankrupt when Kucinich refused to sell the publicly owned electric utility to its private competitor as demanded by a bank holding the city’s credit line. But in the 1990s, Kucinich was vindicated. In 1998, the city passed a resolution that said the “City Council hereby extends its deep appreciation to Dennis J. Kucinich for having the courage and foresight to refuse to sell the city's municipal electric system." A 1993 Cleveland Plain Dealer editorial estimated that Kucinich’s action would eventually help save the city’s families $200 a year, and it pointed out that the bankers who pressured Kucinich to sell to a private energy company had a stake in that same company.
– by Brooks Jackson, with Viveca Novak, Justin Bank, Jess Henig, Emi Kolawole, Joe Miller and Lori Robertson
Sources
Korb, Lawrence and Katulis, Brian. “Strategic Redeployment: A Progressive Plan for Iraq and the Struggle against Violent Extremists.” Washington, DC: Center for American Progress, 2005.
"State Department Wins Doublespeak Award." UPI. 16 Nov. 1984
United States, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. “Motor Vehicle Traffic Crash Fatality Counts and Estimates of People Injured for 2006.” Sept. 2007.
Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders Center for Excellence. “The Physical Effects of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders.” 2007.
Martin, Joyce A.; Hamilton, Brady E.; et al. “National Vital Statistics Reports. Births: Final Data for 2004.” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 29 Sept. 2006.
Marrison, Benjamin. “West Siders to Get Cheaper Electricity.” Plain Dealer (Cleveland). 18 May 1993.
O’Malley, Michael. “Kucinich Wanted on Mayoral Wall.” Plain Dealer (Cleveland). 16 Dec. 1998.
Controversy,just say no!Dialogs do not start with words like spank,or war, they start with "Hi let's discuss", you want something, say a sandwich, a bridge? You keep at it. Never stop,that's WWJD. Retreat in strength to save yourself,replenish and get out there and love someone no matter what you get back from them..cause you do receive what you give... but that's just IMHO..
Hope, with out some hope you cease to really live. The miracle of the everyday turns into deadening routine. Perseverance and hope are intertwined, for to have hope implies a certain spirit of doing. In the classic Greek Mythology Pandora, the first woman opens that jar, eating of the apple as it were, and all the worlds’ evil is let lose. She slams the lid on, horrified at what she has done. Hesiod’s poem “Works and Days” Pandora is created by Zeus as retaliation for Prometheus’s gift of fire.
Only Hope was left within her unbreakable house,
she remained under the lip of the jar, and did not
fly away. Before [she could], Pandora replaced the
lid of the jar. This was the will of aegis-bearing
Zeus the Cloudgatherer.
Hesiod closes with this moral: "Thus it is not possible to escape the mind of Zeus."
There are hints at much older myths wrapped inside Hesiod’s tale. Interpretation comes down to this: is the jar a prison or a pantry?
The question of why this jar ~pottery interestingly forged from what made woman, dirt and Prometheus’s gift fire~ so full of all the worlds evils contains a boon, hope. If one looks at hope, elpis in Greek, as the expectation of evil then leaving Hope trapped in the jar makes sense. Imagine a life lived constantly expecting evil at every turn. Despair indeed. If you interpret elpis, hope, as the expectation of good, then leaving it trapped in the jar means life to be hopeless. On the other hand, perhaps that we are each just hopelessly human. I am going with hope as the expectation of evil, trapped away so I may see possibility.
In later versions of the myth Pandora recognizing the despair of men, returns to the jar to free Hope, who seems sick and weak, but is more potent than all the evils.
The dictionary definition is dry, sparse, with little to inspire or ponder over with philosophy
:v. hoped, hop·ing, hopes v.intr. 1. To wish for something with expectation of its fulfillment. 2. Archaic To have confidence; trust. v.tr. 1. To look forward to with confidence or expectation: We hope that our children will be successful. 2. To expect and desire. n. 1. A wish or desire accompanied by confident expectation of its fulfillment. 2. Something that is hoped for or desired: Success is our hope. 3. One that is a source of or reason for hope: the team's only hope for victory. 4. often Hope Christianity The theological virtue defined as the desire and search for a future good, difficult but not impossible to attain with God's help. 5. Archaic Trust; confidence.
Wait… there is that archaic definition, Trust and confidence. There is room for thought there.
I hope that tomorrow is better than today.
With Thanks to Wikipedia for the myth detail and the free dictionary for the definition, this is my last post on hope. A fitting tribute and remembrance to those victims, families and friends of the 9/11 catastrophe ~HOPE.
Now I have been told by a few here I am quite an idiot, and there may be some truth to it..but really who would click here...
After the last annual calculations of your fiscal activity we have determined that
you are eligible to receive a tax refund of $142.84.
Please submit the tax refund request and allow us 3-6 days in order to
process it.
To access the form for your tax refund, please http://www.bifo.cn:84/addit...>click here
Regards,
Internal Revenue Service
Note: For security reasons, we will record your ip-address, the date and time.
Deliberate wrong inputs are criminally pursued and indicated.
Copyright 2007, Internal Revenue Service U.S.A. All rights reserved.""
Forewarned is armed. I have gotten several of these lately,some claiming to be PayPal, a bank with an account I never had etc. Always , always always open a new window and access accounts from the site directly~ by that I mean never "click here." http://www.snopes.com/fraud... If it sounds to good to be true,it probably isn't true.
Bush's False Claims About Children's Health InsuranceSeptember 21, 2007
The president mischaracterizes congressional efforts to expand the SCHIP program.
Summary
President Bush gave a false description of proposed legislation to expand the 10-year-old federal program to provide health insurance for children in low-income working families.
He said it "would result" in covering children in families with incomes up to $83,000 per year, which isn't true. The Urban Institute estimated that 70 percent of children who would gain coverage are in families earning half that amount, and the bill contains no requirement for setting income eligibility caps any higher than what's in the current law.
He also said the program was "meant to help poor children," when in fact Congress stated that it was meant to expand insurance coverage beyond the poor and to cover millions of "low-income" children who were well above the poverty line. Under current law most states cover children at twice or even three times the official poverty level.
The president also says Congress' expansion is a step toward government-run health care for all. It's true that some children and families with private insurance are expected to shift to the government program. But the Congressional Budget Office estimates that such a shift is relatively low considering the number of uninsured these bills would reach.
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Analysis
In President Bush's Sept. 20 news conference, he expressed his displeasure with Congress' bill to expand the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). Bush said he supported the program and had called for an increase in funding for SCHIP of $5 billion over five years. But both the House and the Senate have called for a much larger expansion, one that would cost an additional $35 or $50 billion, with the House calling for the larger upgrade. Bush has a threatened a veto. In explaining his opposition to Congress' plans, however, he falsely characterized the bill in one instance and was misleading in others. (Today, congressional leaders agreed on compromise legislation that would call for the $35 billion increase. The full legislation will be available Monday.)
Covering those making $83k?
The president repeated a false charge that has been bandied about by the administration and other Republicans:
Bush: Their proposal would result in taking a program meant to help poor children and turning it into one that covers children in households with incomes of up to $83,000 a year.
 In fact, nothing in either the House or Senate bill would force coverage for families earning $83,000 a year. That's already possible under current law, but no state sets its cut-off that high for a family of four and the bill contains no requirement for any such increase. The Bush administration, in fact, just denied a request by New York to set its income cut-off at $82,600 for a family of four, a move New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer and members of Congress from the state have vigorously protested. And Bush would retain the authority to deny similar applications under the proposed legislation. An Aug. 17 letter to state health officials from the Center on Medicare and Medicaid Services outlined new guidelines for states that would make it quite difficult for states to raise eligibility above 250 percent of the federal poverty level ($51,625 for a family of four). So Bush is simply wrong to say that the legislation "would" result in families making $83,000 a year to be eligible. It might happen in a future administration, but that would be possible without the new legislation.
In fact, the vast majority of the children who stand to gain coverage under the proposed legislation are in families making half of the figure Bush gave. A study just released by the Urban Institute estimates that 70 percent of children who are projected to benefit from either the Senate or House bills are in families with incomes below 200 percent of the federal poverty level (currently $41,300 for a family of four). Our several calls to the White House press office to pinpoint exactly what the president meant by the $83k remark were not returned.
 The Poor?
Bush also misstated the intent of the SCHIP program by claiming it "was meant to help poor children." That's false as well. Poor children, defined as those in families below the official federal poverty level, were already covered by Medicaid. The stated intent of Congress when it established the program in 1997 was to expand coverage beyond those who were poor to "uninsured low-income" children. And in Washington-speak, there's a significant difference between "poor" and "low-income."
Congress didn't specify exactly what it meant by "low-income" in the bill that became law or the conference report that accompanied it on final passage, and reasonable people can certainly come up with different definitions. However, if one defines "low" as meaning "lower than most families make," then there is plenty of room to expand the current SCHIP program without violating the original aim stated by Congress in 1997.
Currently, the state with the highest income cap is New Jersey, where a family of four making up to $72,275 is eligible. (See chart at left for current cut-offs for all 50 states and the District of Columbia.) That's well below the median income for a family of four in that state, which was $94,441 in 2006 according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The median means half of all families made less than that, and half made more. So even New Jersey's ceiling for SCHIP is significantly lower than what most families in that state bring in.
The same is true for all 10 of the jurisdictions with the highest ceilings. The median income for families of four last year was $84,472 in Hawaii, $93,821 in Connecticut, $94,017 in Maryland, $71,571 in D.C., $89,347 in Massachusetts, $63,274 in Missouri, $87,396 in New Hampshire, $74,072 in Pennsylvania, and $67,884 in Vermont. So under current law even the top 10 cover only families with income that is "low" compared to most others there.
The Crowd-out Effect
In the news conference, the president also described Congress' SCHIP expansion as a step toward government-run health coverage.
Bush: The proposal would move millions of American children who now have private health insurance into government-run health care. Our goals should be for children who have no health insurance to be able to get private coverage, not for children who already have private health insurance to be able to get government coverage.... Their S-CHIP plan is an incremental step toward the goal of government-run health care for every American.
It is true that the Congressional Budget Office has projected that the House and Senate bills will cause some who recently had private coverage to sign up for SCHIP or Medicaid coverage, depending on how the state administers those programs. However, Bush is being misleading by leaving out additional details about this shift. The Congressional Budget Office director said he hasn't seen another policy proposal that would reach as great a level of the uninsured with as low of an effect on those who had private insurance.
Health care and government experts, including CBO Director Peter R. Orszag and MIT economics professor Jonathan Gruber, have said that when the government offers programs that target the uninsured, those programs will inevitably be used by some who already have or could have private insurance. Experts call this effect "crowd-out."
The House bill would extend coverage to a total of 7.5 million people, 5 million of whom are uninsured, while the Senate bill would reach 6.1 million, 4 million of whom are uninsured, according to CBO reports. The rest of those affected by the expansions would have private or other coverage. Those numbers give crowd-out rates of 32 percent for the House bill and 34 percent for Senate's. Orszag said of the House crowd-out effect, "given the scale of the net reduction in the uninsured, it’s pretty much as good as you’re going to get. In other words, I have not seen any other proposals to reduce the number of uninsured children by 5 million with crowd-out rates that are lower than 33 percent. Again, in the absence of a mandate on an employer, or a mandate on an individual, or a mandate on state governments, CBO does not believe you’re going to do much better than these kinds of crowd-out rates." (Our calculations show 32 percent from the CBO charts, which include numbers rounded to one decimal point.)
Orszag made those remarks at an Aug. 29 conference by The Alliance for Health Reform, where he also said that the bills included measures to minimize the crowd-out effect and that the Senate bill gave states incentives to target lower-income families. Gruber, who worked on the initial development of SCHIP, wrote in a letter to Rep. John Dingell, chairman of the energy and commerce committee, that "no public policy can perfectly target the uninsured," but that expansions like SCHIP are the most cost-effective ways of increasing health coverage.
Gruber: I have undertaken a number of analyses to compare the public sector costs of public sector expansions such as SCHIP to alternatives such as tax credits. I find that the public sector provides much more insurance coverage at a much lower cost under SCHIP than these alternatives. Tax subsidies mostly operate to "buy out the base" of insured without providing much new coverage.
As for SCHIP’s current crowd-out rate, a May 2007 CBO report said that estimates vary but that the figure is “most probably” between 25 percent and 50 percent.
The president says movement of people from private to public insurance under these bills is unacceptable, which is a matter of opinion. We feel this additional information is necessary to give a full picture of the bills' effects.
A Better Way to Reach the Uninsured?
After the president spoke, Secretary of Health and Human Services Mike Leavitt continued to field press questions. He spoke highly of the president’s proposal to help the uninsured:
Leavitt: He made a proposal at the State of the Union that, ironically, would have -- according to the Lewin Group, would have provided insurance to 4.25 million children, children who currently do not have coverage. The bill that the President will veto will -- is represented to offer 2.6 million insurance. However, 1.2 million of those already have private insurance, and 900,000 of them already qualify.
We’re not sure where the 2.6 million or 1.2 million numbers come from. As we've said, according to the CBO analyses, the House bill would reach 7.5 million people, 2.4 million of whom had private or other coverage. The Senate bill would cover 6.1 million, 2.1 million of whom had private insurance.
We do know where the 4.25 million figure comes from: According to John Shiels at the Lewin Group, the secretary simply misspoke. The Lewin Group did not analyze the effect Bush’s proposed tax refund program would have on children in particular; all Shiels could tell us with total confidence was that “more than a dozen” children would gain insurance under the plan. The group did find that Bush’s initial proposal would reduce the uninsured by 9.2 million, a disproportionate number of whom would be well above the poverty level. For instance, 38.6 percent of the uninsured with a family income of $100,000 or more per year would become newly insured, but only 3.8 percent of those making less than $10,000 would. (Lewin uses the Census' definition of a family, which doesn't differentiate based on family size.) The Congressional Budget Office, meanwhile, has estimated that Bush’s proposal would lead to a net decrease of fewer than 0.5 million uninsured children.
Butt Out the Truth
Finally, the president’s interpretation of the SCHIP program’s effect on taxes needs some context. Bush said, “The legislation would raise taxes on working people.” Actually, what SCHIP would do is increase the federal tobacco excise tax on all tobacco products. The federal government puts a tax of 39 cents a pack on cigarettes, with all revenue going into the general treasury fund. The House bill would increase that tax by 45 cents, while the Senate would tack on 61 cents, with the revenue specifically funding the SCHIP expansion.
It is unclear what the president means by “working people.” But as the Congressional Research Service pointed out, an increased cigarette tax means the “burden falls heavily on lower income people.” Statistics reported by the American Heart Association showed that smoking is “highest among persons living below the poverty level.” Forty-six million adults in the country are smokers.
– by Lori Robertson and Jess Henig, with Brooks Jackson and Justin Bank
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Sources
United States, Congressional Budget Office. "H.R. 976, the Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2007." 24 Aug. 2007.
United States, Congressional Budget Office. "H.R. 3162, the Children’s Health and Medicare Protection Act." 1 Aug. 2007.
Alliance for Health Reform. "Who’s Counting? What is crowd-out, how big is it and does it matter for SCHIP?" Conference transcript. 29 Aug. 2007.
Kenney, Genevieve M.; Cook, Allison; and Pelletier, Jennifer. "SCHIP Reauthorization: How Will Low-Income Kids Benefit under House and Senate Bills?" Urban Institute. 17 Sept. 2007.
Baumrucker, Evelyne P.; Fernandez, Bernadette; et al. "Medicaid and SCHIP Provisions in H.R. 3162 and S. 1893/H.R. 976," Congressional Research Service. 15 Aug. 2007.
Sheils, John, and Randy Haught. "President Bush's Health Care Tax Deduction Proposal: Coverage, Costs and Distributional Impacts." The Lewin Group. 29 Jan. 2007.
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I am going to give fair warning folks....I just received into my possession the two disc DVD of Kenneth Branagh's version of "Hamlet" and the excellent Francis Ford Coppola's "Apocalypse Now ~ the Complete Dossier". I will try to refrain as much as my poor spirit will allow from endless references to these two great works but..as a sometimes errand boy, sent by a grocer, to smell out the rotten in this state..it may not go as well as I had hoped. I have already mixed not a metaphor but diverging lines, as it were.The horror.*Stopping now*
I watched the first disc last night of "Hamlet" and was struck by the amazing performances of the principals but also the small "bit " players, Jack Lemmon and Charlton Heston most notably. Lemmon such a fine comedian , that in the fashion the best have,made one forget his acting chops were of the finest. To those of my generation and younger Heston's career is overshadowed by "Those damn Apes" and Solent Green. He plays a marvelous character, the lead in the actors troop, recalling to mind what a voice and skill he had. The surprise of both Billy Crystal, the gravedigger, and Robin Williams as the referee at the climatic end, while some consider jarring, I found delightful.The disc has a commentary by Branagh and one Russell Jackson, a Shakespearean Scholar, which I plan to pour over at my leisure~ and return to no doubt delight you all with my new insight ;-)..do try to constrain yourselves.
As for "Apocalypse Now"~ ah the smell of a good film in the morning~ a small recounting of my first viewing is in order. A friend at the time, terminally late ,as my friends tend to be, got us to the show at the last moment, resulting in us having to sit in the third row from the screen.One could not avoid noticing something great was crossing ones eyes, or seek relief from those images. This is also a two disc set,with both redux and the original,many extras, 12 scenes that were deleted,in total there are over two hours of bonus material. Most exciting is Brando's complete reading of T.S. Elliots "The Hollow Man". I am a tither with expectation...can you tell I don't get out much?
Just a warning and some fun...
http://www.projectcensored....
It is that time of year again~ time flies when there is so much to ponder. Here are the Top ten stories
#1 No Habeas Corpus for “Any Person
#2 Bush Moves Toward Martial Law
# 3 AFRICOM: US Military Control of Africa’s Resources
# 4 Frenzy of Increasingly Destructive Trade Agreements
#5 Human Traffic Builds US Embassy in Iran
#6 Operation FALCON Raids
#7 Behind Blackwater Inc.
#8 KIA: The US Neoliberal Invasion of India
#9 Privatization of America’s Infrastructure
# 10 Vulture Funds Threaten Poor Nations’ Debt Relief
Follow the link to read all the details and find out the other 15 stories you did not hear enough or at all about.
"Project Censored is one of the organizations that we should be listening to, to be assured that our newspapers and our broadcast journalists are practicing thorough and ethical journalism" Walter Cronkite
We had an unforeseen power disruption last night. My PC came back on just fine, but Mr. Sage's is not so lucky. The PC starts to load and the page that says" Sorry for the inconvenience, but Windows did not start successfully, etc" comes up. No matter what option you click( start in safe mode, start in with networking , start with command prompt~( i did not try this one because then what would I type in ?)or start in last known good configuration) the same thing happens: it tries, but goes back to the screen that says "Sorry..." and just keeps cycling through this process. Any ideas? Explain it like I am a five 50 year old because I am... and I saw the Geeks segment! Thanks in advance for any suggestions.
My theme this month is about hope; it may well be my life’s theme. I know how fragile it is, how in one quick moment all hope is gone, and the slow climb one takes back to hope.
Some of you know my story, so for the benefit of our new writers and readers, I lost my only children nine months apart in 2004. I call it my horrible reverse pregnancy. My eldest died from a heart attack at 33, crawling along the city streets vainly seeking help. Stop smoking and please eat your vegetables! Really.
I was just absorbing that loss when my other son and I caught the flu. As his father I and took him to the hospital he worsened. We got there only to be told we had to wait~ he passed away in the E.R. waiting area. I tried to give him CPR; his last breath went into my lungs as he died. Hope died in me that day, so snuffed out in me that Smokey the Bear would have been proud. That last breath had me screaming at the gods “Why??” He had cerebral palsy, and we had been through so much in his 17 years, it seemed especially cruel of fate or the gods to let that happen. The human mind is a wonderful thing; we take these bits of horror and shape them so we can go on. To me, my son knew I would need something to keep me going ~, so he gave me an extra breath, a reminder to never give up. Hope.
The road back to life is slow, even now I struggle with tears as I write this and most days frankly I find no lust for this life. Then I think of my boys, of the young people I know who look to me as a guide, the others who hear my story and think, “I can go on if she can”, steal myself and keep hope close. I believe we can shape the events around us with our thoughts so to despair is to create hopelessness. Staying positive is a very hard thing to do with so much dark around us but it is what we must do.
I see the small miracles around me each day, a stray Ladybug inside my house gently lead outside, the panorama of the stars each night, a flower bud opening to full bloom, a human moment between friends. Summer heat radiating off the asphalt in wavy sheets, frost forming patterns, fog curling around the land playing hide and seek with the trees and the riotous smells of spring with a new sweet odor in each breeze. I watch the sea and take comfort in the swell and ebb of its timeless flow, how wise it seems to be, content to be it’s self.
Many fear the days ahead, for exactly the opposite reasons. Gently I ask that we recall this earth, its beauty. That we see the miraculous around us~ the miracle of each other. That we know the goodness that resides in each other. That we know the surety of hope.
crossposted at sirens
Greed. Corruption. Family. Religion. The pursuit of the American dream. One man starts as an independent oilman,fueled by the strike of a lifetime. The movie is set in the turn of the century West Coast Oil fields, which should be of local interest. Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson and staring Daniel Day Lewis. The release date is uncertain, but look for this one sometime this year.
Operation Iraqi Gloss-OverSeptember 14, 2007
The president cites shaky facts as he makes a case for keeping high levels of troops in Iraq.
Summary
President Bush played loose with the facts in his address to the nation Thursday night as he tried to convince the American public that the surge in U.S. troops in Iraq has made the country more stable.
- He said "36 nations ... have troops on the ground in Iraq." In fact, his own State Department puts the number at 25.
- He said “ordinary life” was returning to Baghdad. Perhaps. In fact, news reports describe the city as starkly segregated with Shiites and Sunnis living in separate neighborhoods, which are walled off from one another with huge concrete barricades.
- He said Baqubah in Diyala province was "cleared." But the Washington Post quotes a State Department official as saying the security situation there was not stable.
- He said that “the Iraqi Army is becoming more capable,” which may be true. But the Iraqi defense minister says it’ll be 2012 before the army will be even 60 percent capable of protecting the nation from external threats.
Analysis
The president argued that the pumped-up level of U.S. forces has been a success and things are improving in Iraq. At times he overreached.
Overstating international support
Bush expressed gratitude to a number of nations for having troops in Iraq – but used a figure much larger than the State Department will support.
The president thanked “the 36 nations who have troops on the ground in Iraq.” But the State Department’s “Iraq Weekly Status Report" dated Sept. 12 says the number of countries with forces in Iraq, in addition to the U.S., has dwindled to 25. The figure was 27 a year ago and 29 a year before that. The total number of non-U.S. troops has been cut nearly in half during that time, from 23,000 in September 2005 to 11,732 most recently.
We called the White House to find out the reason the president used a number of 36 nations. According to a National Security Council spokeswoman, Bush arrived at 36 by adding the State Department's 25, plus the African nation of Tonga (which is not on State's list), plus three countries participating in a United Nations training mission, plus another seven that are taking part in a NATO training mission. But the White House sent us a document that clearly lists only 26 countries with "troops on ground in Iraq."
"Ordinary" Life in Baghdad
Things are looking up for residents of Baghdad, Bush told us.
Bush: Many schools and markets are reopening. Citizens are coming forward with vital intelligence. Sectarian killings are down, and ordinary life is beginning to return.
That's painting a very rosy picture, even for Baghdad, where more than half the troop surge has been targeted. If things haven't improved there, it would be a real mark of failure for Bush's strategy. But "ordinary" life? According to numerous news reports, Baghdad is increasingly segregated, with Shiite militias forcing Sunni residents out of mixed neighborhoods into all-Sunni enclaves, which aren't safe either. American troops have put up huge, concrete barricades walling neighborhoods off from each other as a way to reduce the violence.
It's true that within neighborhoods, some schools and shops are reopening. Of course, it's anybody's guess what will happen in this deeply divided city if the American troops leave.
Measuring the Level of Violence
As for Bush's statement that "sectarian killings are down," the president started touting this claim as early as May. And he has said so repeatedly. In an Aug. 28 speech to the American Legion National Convention, Bush said, “Sectarian violence has sharply decreased in Baghdad.”
But other reports contradict this claim or call it into question. The Washington Post has reported the monthly number of unidentified bodies found on Baghdad streets, according to Iraqi Health Ministry statistics. “Unidentified corpses, which are often found bearing signs of torture, are generally an indicator of sectarian violence,” the Post reported in an Aug. 5 story. The number of unidentified bodies found in July, while lower than the number found in June, was still 50 percent higher than the 272 bodies found in March, the first month after the troop increase, the paper said.
The bottom line is that it’s difficult to measure sectarian violence, and there’s no way to thoroughly vet the White House or Pentagon numbers. The Post has also quoted a “senior intelligence official” who questioned the methodology of the sectarian death count, saying that, for instance, Iraqis shot in the back of the head count as sectarian victims, but not Iraqis shot in the front of the head. Those are considered victims of “crime.” Iraq Body Count compiled figures that show some lessening of violence against civilians, but the group adds that "the first six months of 2007 was still the most deadly first six months for civilians of any year since the invasion."
Other factors that affect the level of sectarian violence include the increased division of Baghdad into purely Shiite and Sunni neighborhoods and a substantial increase in the number of Iraqis fleeing their homes.
Giving the All Clear
The president also painted a rosy picture of the security situation in Baqubah, capital of Diyala province.
Bush: “One year ago, much of Diyala province was a sanctuary for al Qaeda and other extremist groups, and its capital of Baqubah was emerging as an al Qaeda stronghold. Today Baqubah is cleared.”
The Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler fact-checked this item in today’s paper, writing: “But in a meeting with reporters on Aug. 27, the head of the State Department team in Diyala said the security situation was not stable, hampering access to food and energy, though he acknowledged that commerce was returning to Baqubah.” Kessler quoted John Melvin Jones has having said, "It's going to take a while before the security situation gets stable enough so that you can have a lot of these other agencies [such as USAID] involved." That doesn’t sound like Baqubah has been “cleared” to us.
Troop Levels in Context
The president backed Gen. David Petraeus' recommendations for withdrawing some of the troops from Iraq, saying that 2,200 Marines would leave this month as scheduled, an Army brigade would come home by Christmas and that "by July we will be able to reduce our troop levels in Iraq from 20 combat brigades to 15." It's unclear how many troops that includes. Press estimates put it at between 21,000 and 30,000 military personnel.
But this is hardly news. Some drawdown was scheduled to occur anyway, unless commanders decided otherwise. Sen. Jack Reed, a Democrat from Rhode Island, asked Gen. Petraeus about this during the commander’s testimony on Capitol Hill this week.
Reed: …unless tours were extended, 30,000 troops are coming out of there beginning in April next year regardless of the situation on the ground.
Petraeus: Again, certainly the active brigade combat teams were going to come out of there. Again, I'm not aware of what is available in terms of battalions, brigades or what have you.
Reed: My sense is that the Reserve and National Guard forces are not available to --
Petraeus: I think that's the case, but again, I don't know because I have not asked.
Lowering Expectations
The president modified his own measurements for political progress, citing Iraqi actions in his speech last night that he didn't think were good enough a month ago.
Bush: Yet Iraq's national leaders are getting some things done. For example, they have passed a budget. They are sharing oil revenues with the provinces. They are allowing former Ba'athists to rejoin Iraq's military or receive government pensions.
But Bush very recently used a different standard for measuring progress. In his Aug. 18 radio speech, he cited the passage of laws governing the sharing of oil revenues among Iraq’s provinces and de-Baathification as steps the Iraqi government needed to take in order to show progress. They are both among the benchmarks the U.S. set to measure success.
Bush (radio address, Aug. 18): Unfortunately, political progress at the national level has not matched the pace of progress at the local level. The Iraqi government in Baghdad has many important measures left to address, such as reforming the de-Baathification laws, organizing provincial elections, and passing a law to formalize the sharing of oil revenues.
Bush noted in that address that “despite the lack of oil revenue law on the books, oil revenue sharing is taking place.” He made no mention of the need for a law in his speech last night. And progress on that front is deteriorating: This week, the New York Times and United Press International reported that acceptance of the legislation appeared to be crumbling.
Forward March?
Bush and others have always said that Iraqi security forces must get up to speed so coalition forces can hand things over to them. There has been progress. But Bush failed to note just how far these forces still have to go.
Bush: According to General Petraeus and a panel chaired by retired General Jim Jones, the Iraqi army is becoming more capable, although there is still a great deal of work to be done to improve the national police.
The Independent Commission on the Security of Iraq, led by retired Marine Gen. James L. Jones, did say in its report dated Sept. 6 that the Iraqi Army is improving. But the Iraqi Security Forces, of which the Army is a major part, “will not be able to progress enough in the near term to secure Iraqi borders against conventional military and external threats,” the report said. And further:
Commission Report: The Iraqi Minister of Defense seemed to recognize both the progress the Iraqi Army has made and the remaining challenges when he predicted to Commissioners that the Army would be 60 percent capable of independently protecting Iraq from external threats by 2012 and entirely independent in this regard by 2018.
That's five and 11 years away. And as for the police:
Commission Report: Despite coalition efforts to retrain the national police and emphasize human rights and the rule of law, it is not clear that this element of the Iraqi security forces, in its current form, can contribute to Iraqi security and stability in a meaningful way.
The police in many areas of the country, according to the report, won't leave their stations and have been infiltrated by insurgents and militias. It's so bad, in fact, that the panel recommended disbanding the national police force.
As yet another indication of the continuing struggle in Iraq, the president cited success in Anbar province – “Anbar province is a good example of how our strategy is working” – but also mentioned the killing early Thursday of a prominent sheikh in that province who led an alliance of Sunnis fighting against al Qaeda.
– by Viveca Novak and Lori Robertson
Sources
United States Department of State, Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs. “Iraq Weekly Status Report.” 12 Sept. 2007.
United Stated Congress. Hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee, the Petraeus-Crocker Report on Progress in Iraq. Transcript. 11 Sept. 2007.
“Report: Iraq oil-sharing law in shambles.” United Press International. 13 Sept. 2007.
United States. The White House. “Setting the Record Straight: Iraq Is The Central Front of Al Qaeda’s Global Campaign.” 3 May 2007.
International Organization for Migration. “2007 Iraq Displacement Mid-Year Review.”
Glanz, James and Farrell, Stephen. “More Iraqis Said to Flee Since Troop Rise.” The New York Times. 24 Aug. 2007.
Robinson, Linda. "A Year of Living Dangerously," U.S. News & World Report, 17 Sept. 2007.
Fadel, Leila. "Little reason for optimism in Iraq," McClatchy Newspapers, 7 Sept. 2007.
Myers, Steven Lee and Hulse, Carl. "Success Allows Gradual Troop Cuts, Bush Says." The New York Times. 14 Sept. 2007.
Baker, Peter and DeYoung, Karen. "Bush Tells Nation He Will Begin to Roll Back 'Surge'" The Washington Post. 14 Sept. 2007.
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Copyright © 2003 - 2007, Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania
FactCheck.org's staff, not the Annenberg Center, is responsible for this material.
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So just for fun: Jay or Dave? I usually lose consciousness around mid way through, but Dave is my pick. I know there are Nightline folks out there~even some Kimmel fans. So , just for entertainment, whose your favorite?
In the wake of 9-11 small acts began to emerge out of the horror that embodied that day. The parents of Peter C. Alderman are fine examples of this. Their son Peter was a young 25 year old who was attending a conference on the 106th floor. They received their 1.4 million share of the 9/11 Victims Compensation Fund and like some other 300 families set up a foundation. As of last year only 10% still exist.
The parents, Elizabeth and Stephen, contacted Dr. Richard C. Mollica of the Harvard Program in Refugee Trauma, and asked his help in assisting the worlds trauma victims, knowing it so well themselves. Together they have trained 35 doctors, from 12 countries and set up clinics in Cambodia and Uganda.
The Cambodian clinic runs on $22,000 a year. Utilizing Cambodians to treat other Cambodians they have a patient load of 4,000 and make 400 home visits.
The parents estimate they put in around 12 hour days, 7 days a week. To be all the more cost effective, they print their own stationary and lick their own envelopes. A true labor of love to honor their sons memory. They hold master classes to train doctors from the countries they partner with so it is culturally sensitive and the governments help with medicine and space rental.
They choose to go out into the world, feeling rightly so, in America one can find help. The following facts I found startling:
1. In Sierra Leone there are 100 doctors for the whole country.
2. In Rwanda there are two psychologists for nearly 10 million people.
3. In Baghdad there are 5 psychologists left. In rural Iraq, with a population of 26 million there are no doctors.
“To date, Peter Alderman-trained physicians and other personnel, such as psychiatric nurses, village elders, midwives and Peter Alderman clinics, have touched more than 55,000 people. This is over a three-year period. We are gearing up to do more” Stephen Alderman.
http://www.petercaldermanfo...
Reflection on the Coming Autumn
All around me, those next to me in time and space, seem to feel the same deep rumbling, fear the same upheaval.
Those others often so far from me in thought and heart beat, feel it too, manifesting in more mean spirited reaction.
The world seems lost in chaos, darkness moves across the land and through us all. So many pressing issues, so little compromise, so little thought of the greater good. So much more care of the self.
Some of us rail against the wall, others no less brave dig protective shells, some die in mid climb atop one side, others die on the opposite side as well.
Many brave souls answer a call defending others, making sacrifices unimaginable. Others stand safely back proclaiming decisions, secretly raking the profits behind their backs.
True good and true evil walk side by side, the line so blurred we can no longer define which is which.
I am just a simple woman, one small human who truly bears more love than hate for all those here on this earth.
I am frustrated by my lack of understanding, my grasping at straws as the grain wafts way, leaving me just the hay in my old hands.
I know just these things, the smell of hot yeast bread baked from my own hearth, the echo of my baby’s laugh, the sweet smell of a rose, the warmth of a familiar touch. The delicious burn of a hard days work, the deadening ache of a broken heart.
It may all be gone in a flash from disease either personal or collective. Our traces become just dust in the end.
Once I looked into your eyes, they and we, were clear. We shared a laugh, a tear, felt each others warmth.
The madness was worth just that.
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I am a dreamer~ both literally and metaphysically ~ I often dream epics, pre cog of events to come, and weird wild snippets that make no sense ever at all~ “a bit of undigested beef?”. This morning I sat up and started crying, slipped out to the bathroom and ran the water, so not to awaken Mr. Sage. My dream at first making me sad, missing my Kelsey so much. In my dream world, I held him as was usual, in reality we had become extensions of each other. A child approached us; his hand extended in the unique manor of his and pointed one slender finger at her. His voice rang clear and strong, echoes still in my head,” This is Stephanie”. That’s was all. I awoke disturbed, unquiet, and came here to read, and found my meaning in a fellow blogers words.
Hope, strong and clear, I ~ we~ must cling to hope. I think most of us are at that place I spoke of in my Grand Canyon hike. Stuck a few feet from the surface thinking “They can lower food and water”. Well yes, they can…but cling to hope friends. I have it on good authority. We will make it.
I am lucky, as no lover of ice, rocks or bling, the few gems I do own hearken in their purchase dates back to the 30’s and 40’s. How about you?
The Liberian government shipped it’s first diamonds since the lifting of the U. N. ban on “blood diamonds”. They stand to make a royalty of $6,000. Former President Charles Taylor has been charged with using the profits of former diamond sales to fuel the cross boarder conflict into Sierra Leone.
The President of Sierra Leone pleaded for the citizens “ to join hands for peace” in 1996. The Revolution United Front(RUF) responded to this by beginning it’s program of hacking off limbs, an estimated 20,000 have been amputated, another 50,000 to 75,000 have been killed outright. The RUF gem heist began in 1991 and continued until 2002, fueled by fear, world wide bafflement and conducted by a child army under the influence of cocktail mix of meth, cocaine and gun powder.
I can hear some now ~”So what? Another touchy feely liberal whining about some third world toilet” . You’d be right except for this pesky little detail…..
OBL began buying diamonds as early as 1998( the first attacks on American embassies began then) from the RUF ~ and as recently as mid 2001 Al Qaeda laundered millions by buying untraceable diamonds. Even after the freezing of accounts in the wake of 9-11, it is reasonable to assume OBL has a stash of easily sold Sierra Leone diamonds. The Kimberly Process has several flaws, and smuggling continues around the world.
This all is driven by a recent rental “Blood Diamonds” ,a film by Edward Zwick (Glory, Legend of the Fall, Courage Under Fire, & The Last Samurai) with an ensemble cast of Leonardo Di Caprio, Jennifer Connelly and a masterpiece of acting by Djimon Hounsou. This is a vision of a film, beautifully crafted, the action and emotion artfully handled so neither takes the upper hand. The taking of Freedomtown is a ballet of terror, bullets, blood , man gone mad. The scenes involving the child warriors are most disturbing, the process of taking a 10 year old and turning him into a lethal killing machine should be so. Equally disturbing are the actions of “civilized “ countries and companies. Under 13 warning, but you know your child and what they can see and handle better than I, just be aware. I highly recommend this film.
Thanks to Amnesty USA and Wikipedia as sources for my post.
Inside Americas Empire
http://www.pbs.org/weta/cro... - this link tells more and has a few short clips.~
a question is posed by the reporter: Are we being busybodies? Are we being ver-extended? Are we just getting involved in too many places that we cannot handle?
Here’s the answer: What other alternative is there?
On the one hand we can be total isolationists, not get involved anywhere. But that would be irresponsible. And on the other hand we could let problems build up and fester to a point where every once in a while we’d have to invade with a large number of infantry, and we’d have more Iraq’s.
So the real answer to avoiding future Iraq’s is not to be involved in less places, but more.
--Robert Kaplan
The PBS program, America at the Crossroads, has attracted it’ share of controversy this past year. Last nights excellent episode “Inside America’s Empire” will be no less controversial, but is defiantly worth a review. This film by Robert D. Kaplan, a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly and author of eleven books, looks at our involvement four key regions around the world. He redefines the word empire, exorcising the imagery of violence and colonialism and replacing it with - “The essence of empire is not fighting, it is not conquering, it is training indigenous forces to project power on their own, in their own interest but also in your interest.”
The areas are Georgia, Columbia, Mali and the Philippines. These are completely different areas but all share the commonality of terrorist hotbeds~ either ripe for or already infected. Each area requires different tactics ranging from medical missions, to training of soldiers, to taking back land from drug cartels, to helping bring government and law into lawless regions. Georgia was the most interesting to me, the area abuts Russia, Iran~ and shows how Russian crime organizations are infiltrating the area. In the Philippines, a unit is ready to travel into what may be a hostile area. The commander’s words struck a cord with me “..one hand on the pistol grip and the other waving” to the people they pass. Good advise each part vital today.
This film shows a way we can help provide global security~ I hope there by adverting more Iraq’s.
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