4 hops

Today I went hopping around blogtopia (yes, skippy coined that phrase!) in search of Bush Administration misdeeds that have had negative consequences for many people in the US. Didn't take long. Here are four of my hops.
1. The Carpetbagger report making a 'statement'

2. More on Bush's signing statements from Nieman Watchdog

3. Statement on Signing Legislation To Repeal Federal Ergonomics Regulations
March 20, 2001

4. Google search organizes your results now?

The 4th one startled me and then it gave me the creeps. Not that step number four had anything to do with the Bush Administration....I think, anyway. Number three just shows how long it took for the Dictator-tot to start towing the corporate line, and paying back his buddies. Same old short term thinking, only look at next quarter's earnings, never mind that you're crippling people, just keep repealing laws that say you have to cover health insurance, or move everything to India, or switch to temporary employees.

Fuck.

I hate corporate America.

pfffft

Israel's Hostage Crisis Sparks Both Joy, Anger
A Daily Survey of What the International Online Media Are Saying
Posted at 10:34 AM ET, 06/27/2006












Ummm, sure, among the online pundits.

Missile Defense

Fund, Krauthammer overstated capabilities of missile defense system

No shit.

It has never worked right , and it probably never will.

It is very expensive

It's not worth what my great-great grandkids will be paying for it, that's for sure.

Just more M-I-C crap.

M-I-C

Lockheed Martin Uses Questionable Facts to Steer Spending Bill
June 16, 2006
For Immediate Release
Contact: Jennifer Gore jgore@pogo.org or (202) 347-1122

Duncan Hunter: Is he behind the Switfboating of Murtha?
By: John Amato on Saturday, June 24th, 2006 at 3:01 pm

KBR Fingered in Iraq Contract Fraud
By Paul Kiel - June 23, 2006, 6:11 PM
Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg, Brown, & Root? War profiteering? Iraq? Shocked!

laugh

Ok, so I needed a laugh.
(click to enlarge)

for more laughs, go see Assimilated Press

not surprised

City Authorities: Sears Tower Was Never In Danger
Tower Management Lauds Law Enforcement
(CBS) CHICAGO Chicago
Jun 23, 2006 11:59 am US/Central

No shit.

The Bush Adminstration needed a new bogeyman because they got Abu Musab al-Zarqawi .

Hey, hey, about time to ratchet up the fear factor.

What do you want to bet they find Osama binLaden...oh, about the time they think they need to, right before the November election.

votergate.tv/

Oh boy, this is rich. The MSM newz sure looked like they were trying to paint the Miami "terrorists" as militant Muslim extremists. According to Juan Cole, they're your garden variety cult.

Wow, how did I miss this little gem?
Dollars, Not Sense: Government Contracting Under the Bush Administration
By: Committee on Government Reform Minority Office
Published: Jun 19, 2006 at 08:25

And finally, you gotta love Barbara Eherenreich
Piggery Award

Working for you?

I'm going to borrow a hilarious, but also frightening nickname from WTF is it NOW?:

The DictatorTot.

I think the only book that Preznit Poopypants ever studied was Niccolo Machiavelli's The Prince.

Don't listen to what he says, look at what he and this Adminstration have done:

For security

and consumer protection

regarding deregulation of the media

and blatant abuse of power to benefit cronies


and global warming
(Asked about the environment, Hawking, who suffers from a degenerative disease, uses a wheelchair and speaks through a computerized voice synthesizer, said he was "very worried about global warming." He said he was afraid that Earth "might end up like Venus, at 250 degrees centigrade and raining sulfuric acid.")


( graph for CO2 emissions )

This Bush plan for spreading freedom and democracy, is it working for you?

pay pay pay

Congress Values Own Paychecks More Than Workers
Published on Wednesday, June 21, 2006 by CommonDreams.org
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services
by Holly Sklar


Military Charges 8 With Murder of Iraqi
By JOHN O'NEIL
Published: June 21, 2006

(Here's my list of 8 that need to be charged: Cheney, Bush, Rice, Powell, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, Perle, and Franks)

John from AmericaBlog:
19 Republican Senators think the terrorists who murdered these two US soldiers today deserve amnesty
by John in DC - 6/20/2006 08:11:00 PM

Go see if one of them is yours.

One of them looks like this to me . Guess which one?

Nasty exchange

My somewhat nasty exchange with Chris Reed of the San Diego Union Tribune . I was responding to this:

The 50th election was stolen!
So Washington Post political blogger Emily Messner encourages her readers to believe.

-----Original Message-----From: bugged voter [mailto:buggedvoter@yahoo.com]Sent: Friday, June 16, 2006 3:58 PMTo: Reed, ChrisSubject: ?

Hmmmm. Shouldn't have expected anything less from the Republican leaning, defense contractor (advertisement) moola accepting right-wing fishwrap.
Here's how I see it, you idiotic twit, and I'm not the only one who sees through the bullshit.
http://politickybitch.blogspot.com/2006/06/50th-clinging-desperately-to-status.html

Talk to that prick Grover Norquist lately?

Here, honey, you're gonna need this, and the repugnant thuglicans won't offer it to you:








Real classy. Believe it or not, I didn't vote for Bush in 2004. But no, if you don't believe in a Specific Set of Truths, you're an "idiotic twit." Nice.






-----Original Message-----From: bugged voter [mailto:buggedvoter@yahoo.com]Sent: Monday, June 19, 2006 6:05 PMTo: Reed, ChrisSubject: RE: ?
Fabulous, you want a brownie button for not voting for Bush in 04?
Does it really matter who voted at all?
Do you have any idea what a systems analyst is? I do, I called him dad. They fix bugs in computer programs. Ask a few of them how they feel about the voting machines. I'm sure there are plenty to ask, I've asked. Bet you didn't even think that's why I chose this e-mail address, did you?

Looks like "classy" overrides smart.....again.

No, as a matter of fact, you won't get "classy" out of me. If I thought the UT treated it's readers with one iota of respect I might approach the organization with more respect. They have an inordinate amount of respect for the defense contractors who pay the bills.

Did you expect me to apologize for throwing out the truth as I see it?

I've been told that I am brutally honest. I wear that badge proudly, and I live in my skin comfortably. I tried nice. Didn't work for me.

What is your definition of a Specific Set of Truths?

Pr'haps you're not an idiot, just paid to not offend the advertisers. I know of a lot of "classy" whores, most of them in the "representative" bizness, or the media.

chris.reed@uniontrib.com wrote:

Your "brutal honesty" isn't. You demand others believe in things for which there are no evidence, and if they don't, you start calling them names, all the while congratulating yourself for being morally and intellectually superior.

Have a nice life. Enjoy losing election after election.

Okay asshole, now I'm pissed.

I replied something like, of course there is evidence, but your organization will never investigate it because the system works for your organization. And sent this along.

morally superior republican "representavtive's " children (Bilbray)

you didn't answer my question, but that is not what someone in your position, or anyone on the right does any more...


chris.reed@uniontrib.com wrote:

You ARE morally superior! You think it's proper to pick on children of politicians you don't like! Your brutal honesty is soooooooo impressive!

Please, buggedvoter, go bug someone else. It's obvious I am too dumb to appreciate your fine qualities. Perhaps you can spend your time trolling on MySpace for embarrassing photos of children of journalists you don't like. It's the sort of thing morally superior people do.

Thanks for many, many good laughs today


Hmmm, embarassing photos of journalist's children?

Why the hell did this guy respond to me at all?

Should I send him some Depends?

Bubbles

Hat tip: Wonkette via Words Have Power

Brian Bilbray’s Kids Love Social Networking, Natty Light








Foreclosures May Jump As ARMs Reset
By J.W. ELPHINSTONE AP Business Writer
Monday, June 19, 2006


Howard Zinn: The Myth of American Exceptionalism
Lecture and Questions and Answer session. MIT - March 14, 2005



And ask yourself if the "war on terror" has made YOU any safer?

Or is it just a wonderful business opportunity for those well connected enough to profit from it?

Homeland security officials leave government for high-paying jobs
Associated Press
Last update: June 18, 2006 – 8:00 AM

Illegal immigration post number 43974876954937637

You think you know about illegal immigrants?

Mexico arrests man wanted in the U.S. for distributing fake documents
By OLGA R. RODRIGUEZ Associated Press Writer
Monday, June 19, 2006
...The documents were distributed in several U.S. states, including California, Illinois, Georgia, North Carolina, Nebraska, Iowa, New Mexico and Colorado, ICE said...

Here Illegally, Working Hard and Paying Taxes
By Eduardo Porter
The New York Times

... And they are now present in low-skilled jobs across the country. Illegal immigrants account for 12 percent of workers in food preparation occupations, for instance, according to an analysis of census data by the Pew Hispanic Center. In total, they account for an estimated one in 20 workers in the United States....
... But getting a Social Security number could be a little more complicated in the old days. Lily, 38, another janitor cleaning a building downtown, knew no one in Minneapolis when she arrived illegally from Guatemala 14 years ago. So when a neighbor said she needed papers, she called the smuggler who brought her across the border at his home in Mexico.
He asked her to make up a nine-digit number, which she did by combining the date she left Guatemala and the date she arrived in the United States two months later. She sent him some photos and $75 and received her fake papers by return mail...
...Cheaper Labor
Starting about 30 years ago, as illegal immigration began to swell, building maintenance contractors in big immigrant hubs like Los Angeles started hiring the new immigrant workers as part of a broader effort to drive down labor costs. Unions for janitors fell apart as landlords shifted to cheaper nonunion contractors to clean their buildings. Wages fell and many American-born workers left the industry...
...In New York City, janitors cleaning commercial buildings make $19 an hour. Mike Fishman, president of the Service Employees International Union's local in New York, points out that the union never lost ground in the city, and it is still unusual to find illegal immigrants cleaning office buildings there.

In Southern California, by contrast, unions were decimated in the 1980's, and only started recovering in the late 1990's. According to Mike Garcia, president of the union's main local in the state, Southern California's unionized janitors earn between $8.50 and $11 an hour.

(yes...we did leave, something about pride in our work, a livable wage and a new language barrier)


African Americans 'Dread' Growing Power of Latinos

Blacks refuse to compare recent Latino protests to their movement in the 60's. African Americans recall that they weren't immigrants, but fully-fledged American citizens that took to the streets after suffering centuries of slavery, rape, lynching and discrimination. We didn't choose to come to the United States, we were brought here as slaves. And we were deprived of our basic rights although we were citizens of this country. Many of these problems have remained unresolved since the 60's. But now we may relegated to the status of a secondary concern, said one Black university professor.

The Black community dreads above all that it will see its economic condition worsen due to competition from Latinos. In 2004, 72% of America's Black community between the ages of 20 and 30 having had abandoned high school and were unemployed, while only 19% of Hispanics were in a similar position. Latinos survive better because of their accommodating attitude toward employment, which fit in nicely with capitalist ethics: they accept working long hours at low salaries. They hardly ever complain and rarely avail themselves of the social protections that normal employees would.

To summarize, Black Americans are worried and are asking themselves: Will the power of Latino immigrants diminish the value of their secular struggle and speed their marginalization?

Plea for net neutrality

...The corporate media that was long ago used as a weapon against the people is still used to promulgate the lies and distortions that have torn this nation asunder and set the world ablaze with war and discord. The shameless promotion of the war in Iraq and the brutal occupation of the Palestinian people by the Israeli military are poignant examples...

...So infected are the public airwaves with the lies and distortions of capitalism and the military industrial complex, that there is no room for the expression of opposing opinions or dissent...

...Enter the Internet, one of the last bastions for democracy and the free and open exchange of ideas...

...If the world’s largest telecommunications companies have their way that will change...

...If net neutrality is defeated the result will be a familiar one that characterizes all capitalist societies divided by class. Once again, it will be those with money who get preferential treatment...

...Men like Ted Stevens, (uh huh,this dickweed) who so typify Congress these days, are a slave to his corporate pay masters. He does not serve the interest of the people or the commonwealth any more than do AT&T, Verizon and Comcast. Senator Steven’s abysmal voting record speaks for itself. It is all about socializing cost and privatizing wealth—predatory capitalism...

...More information on net neutrality can be found at http://www.savetheinternet.com/ or www.itsournet.org. ..

One Pissed Off Veteran's inspiring post

Farnsworth has a great post, on the Nafta Superhighway.

It made me think. It made me wonder. I looked for more
connections, and well, lookee here, ifn I didn't find some:

There is another union that the BushOilCo has not busted beyond all repair yet. The largest rail hub Is where the Nafta Superhighway's proposed Y split is.

Take a look at where those Nasco board members are from. Texas. Frankly, I have no use for most Texans, as their rabid (self-defeating) support of the Bush Crime Family nauseates me.

Check out the nationwide energy grid here. Most of Texas is a separate part of the grid.

Why does U Wyoming publish the western part of the US energy grid in detail? Wasn't it 'Ol Darth Cheney who was warning us about gettng hit by terrorists? Why is a college in his home territory making it easier for the terrorists?

Anyone who does not question everything this Administration does is either comatose, brainwashed, self-destructive, or profiting from the malfeasance.

Sirota

I think this guy is so hot

Please don't call me Paris Hilton.


And he was busy yesterday, debating this asshole.


Yep, I suck at the photoshop thing, but you get my point.

Improper Entry

Court Limits Protection Against Improper Entry

By LINDA GREENHOUSE
Published: June 16, 2006 NYT
WASHINGTON, June 15 — Evidence found by police officers who enter a home to execute a search warrant without first following the requirement to "knock and announce" can be used at trial despite that constitutional violation, the Supreme Court ruled on Thursday...
...Justice Antonin Scalia, in the majority opinion, said that people subject to an improper police entry remained free to go to court and bring a civil rights suit against the police...
..Justice Breyer argued that "the court destroys the strongest legal incentive to comply with the Constitution's knock-and-announce requirement. And the court does so without significant support in precedent."
He called the majority's argument "an argument against the Fourth Amendment's exclusionary principle itself," adding, "And it is an argument that this court until now has consistently rejected."

What was it Preznit RovesTalkingPoints said about "activist judge"? s

Light bulb

How many members of the Bush administration does it take to change a light bulb?
1. One to deny that a light bulb needs to be changed;

2. One to attack the patriotism of anyone who says the light bulb needs to be changed;

3. One to blame Clinton for burning out the light bulb;

4. One to arrange the invasion of a country rumored to have a secret stockpile of light bulbs

5. One to give a billion dollar no-bid contract to Halliburton for the new light bulb;

6. One to arrange a photograph of Bush, dressed as a janitor, standing on a step ladder under the banner: Light Bulb Change Accomplished;

7. One administration insider to resign and write a book documenting in detail how Bush was literally in the dark;

8. One to viciously smear #7;

9. One surrogate to campaign on TV and at rallies on how George Bush has had a strong light-bulb-changing policy all along;

10. And finally one to confuse Americans about the difference between screwing a light bulb and screwing the country.

voting machines

Vote tally may take awhile
Posted on Tue, Jun. 13, 2006
By Chris Metinko
CONTRA COSTA TIMES
ALAMEDA COUNTY: Supervisors', Oakland mayor's contests have razor-thin margins and ballots need counting
...The county was able to borrow 60 optical scanners and 50 touch-screen machines from San Diego County for the primary, but it was still well short of how many scanners and touch-screens a county the size of Alameda would normally have for an election...

Orange County residents examine voting machines of the future
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
...Republican Orange County Elections Commissioner David Green said they want the input from county residents before he and Democrat Elections Commissioner Susan Bahren make their choice...

Ummmm, yeah, since when do Republicans listen to anything but the talking points?

Group Claims New Voting Machines Can Be Tampered With
June 12th, 2006 @ 8:46am
Chris Kaye reporting

Sun power

Prodigal Sun
News: Solar energy was a rising star in the '70s -- until it was banished by the powers that be. Are we ready for its return?
By Arthur Allen
March/April 2000 Issue
...The budget for the solar institute -- which President Jimmy Carter had created to spearhead solar innovation -- was slashed from $124 million in 1980 to $59 million in 1982. Scientists who had left tenured university jobs to work under Hayes were given two weeks notice and no severance pay. The squelching of the institute -- later partly re-funded and renamed the National Renewable Energy Laboratory -- marked the start of Reagan's campaign against solar power. By the end of 1985, when Congress and the administration allowed tax credits for solar homes to lapse, the dream of a solar era had faded. The solar water heater President Carter had installed on the White House roof in 1979 was dismantled and junked. Solar water heating went from a billion-dollar industry to peanuts overnight; thousands of sun-minded businesses went bankrupt. "It died. It's dead," says Peter Barnes, whose San Francisco solar- installation business had 35 employees at its peak. "First the money dried up, then the spirit dried up," says Jim Benson, another solar activist of the day...


Was Jimmy Carter right?
Published on 2 Oct 2005 by Cleveland Plain Dealer. Archived on 13 Oct 2005.
by Stephen Koff

...Carter insisted that U.S. automakers build more fuel-efficient cars, with a goal of 27.5 miles per gallon over the following decade - a requirement passed under Gerald Ford but put into force by Carter....

...Yet solid data exist on what happened after the free market- loving Reagan chopped Carter's programs to shreds....

...Oil prices plunged in the early 80s after the Iranian crisis ended; after a worldwide recession sapped productivity (a less productive economy uses less fuel); and especially after Reagan eliminated price controls....

...Higher prices are also providing incentives to look at alternative fuels, and we are using more alternative fuels all the time, says Dougher. In fact, the biggest producer of solar energy today is an oil company, BP, in terms of solar panels.... ( BP Solar North America )


US governors adopt energy plans for the West
Reuters
Monday, June 12, 2006; 6:26 PM
...The Western Governors Association, which represents 19 states and three U.S.-flag islands in the Pacific, passed measures on Sunday that call for 30,000 new megawatts of clean energy supplies such as solar (my emphasis) and geothermal power by 2015, and development of cleaner fuels like ethanol and biodiesel and climate change policies for the West...



The domestic hot water solar systems were paying for themselves in a few years in the eighties. Ummm, a bit skeptical, Iyam Iyam. Maybe the Governors can figure out how to get around the BushOilCo Administration. We'll see. Preznit Poopypants blathers on about alternative energy, including nuclear energy. Have a look at how safe that is:

Government, plaintiffs continue wait through appeals of Hanford downwinders' cases
Monday, June 12, 2006
By SHANNON DININNY Associated Press Writer

I am aggravated today

I

am

aggravated

today


I went to see Al Gore's movie over the weekend. I was prepared for a snoozefest and I am delighted to say that it was NOT a snoozefest. Some of it was funny and all of it was engaging.

reference works

Now here is something I'll be referring to since I live in a district full of patriarchal Republican boobs. (idiots? assholes? brainwashed fuckwits?, hmmmm, how about defense contractor employees, that one works ... oh hell, they all work as qualifiers)

A Practical Guide for Shrill and Uppity Democrats

by Heresiarch514
Fri Jun 09, 2006 at 09:58:37 AM PDT
(crossposted at Heretical Tendency)

Womens be thinkin' too much

These three little tidbits that sneak through the US military-industrial-media wall might encourage more people to vote and to pay attention to how the US really interacts with the rest 0f the world. Somehow I don't see that happening. Not when American Idol is on and more people want to vote for an Idol, rather than vote in their local elections, or heaven forbid, actually get involved in local politics. American Idol is like, sooooooooo much more fun.

Unreported: The Zarqawi Invitation
By Greg Palast
06/09/06

War Criminal Nation
Murdering More 'Ragheads'
By Paul Craig Roberts
06/09/06

The following is an interesting report. The html links spew do-gooder rhetoric regarding what the United States is doing to combat human trafficking, as do the first fifteen or twenty pages of the report. If you download the whole report and plop 'united states' into the search function you will see just how many countries are gateways for trafficking into the US.

G'head, G'head, go see for yourself:

Human Trafficking Report 2006

Ohio

Ohio liberals must get a lot of grief:

Ohio Cable Network Pulls MoveOn.org Ad
Thursday, June 8, 2006

Deborah Pryce contributions

Net neutrality

JUN 09, 2006 07:59:54 AM
U.S. House Shoots Down Net Neutrality Provision

Cash wins. Whaddaya know?


and unrelated, but humorous:

Undergraduate survey: iPods more popular than beer
Wednesday, June 7, 2006
(AP) - SAN JOSE, California-College life is not just about drinking beer.
In a rare instance, Apple Computer Inc.'s iconic iPod music player surpassed beer drinking as the most "in" thing among undergraduate college students, ...

It's a good thing that they like iPods, because they're going to need them to keep some semblance of sanity after they are sentenced to a corporate cubicle.

And finally, another story I found humorous.

I'll call him mordida boy (mordida means bribery, en Español)

Mor Newz

Oh Boy, the Newz cycle is ecstatic about this one. We'll be treated to tons of reports on this:

How They Got Zarqawi:The Manhunt That Snared Him
Intelligence breakthroughs and a hot tip about a meeting spelled his doom
By TONY KARON Time Magazine Thursday June 08, 2006

And the fishwrap luvs Bilbray:
Bilbray punctures Democrats' plans to retake House
By Dani Dodge
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
June 8, 2006


While they conveniently ignore this article:

The War They Wanted, The Lies They Needed
The Bush administration invaded Iraq claiming Saddam Hussein had tried to buy yellowcake uranium in Niger. As much of Washington knew, and the world soon learned, the charge was false. Worse, it appears to have been the cornerstone of a highly successful "black propaganda" campaign with links to the White House
By CRAIG UNGER


And this will be ignored:

More Results of Close Busby/Bilbray U.S. House Special Election in Doubt!
Race to Replace Randy 'Duke' Cunningham in San Diego Was Run on Hackable Diebold Voting Machines, Kept Unsecured at Poll Worker Houses Overnight Before the Election!
Race to Replace Randy 'Duke' Cunningham in San Diego Was Run on Hackable Diebold Voting Machines, Kept Unsecured at Poll Worker Houses Overnight Before the Election!

To be clear, at this hour, we have no evidence to show that Democrat Francine Busby -- running in yesterday's special run-off election in San Diego against Republican Brian Bilbray...

50th clinging desperately to status quo

Developers run this city
(...The decision, a setback for City Attorney Michael Aguirre, is a victory for the San Diego County building industry, which sued the city ...The measure, similar to laws in cities throughout California, requires developers to set aside 10 percent of the houses in their residential projects for low-or moderate-income households....)
A hearing has been scheduled for July 14 on the motion, which was filed Friday.
Along with the
effing
military-industrial complex

Some of her supporters are fleeing (the average rent for all types of rental units countywide was $1,147, compared with $1,046 a year ago)

And interestingly enough, negative nasty campaign ads turn off more Dems than Rethugs. Well suprise suprise. Not. Of Course, I believe the repugnant thuglicans had some electronic help.

Optical scanners used
These people think they are safe....clinging to their way of life in their McMansions in the suburbs with Jose the gardener and Maria the weekly housecleaner and their double dip pensions with rental income from the second house and dividends from investments in Defense Contractors as a cherry on top

Isn't San Diego a Lovely Place?

Fucking idiots

Vote

California vote could be midterm bellwether
Primaries test ethics, immigration issues for November
Tuesday, June 6, 2006; Posted: 2:29 p.m. EDT (18:29 GMT)

Brad reports a few problems

Get your ass out and vote anyway.

The Power of China

Corporations find it hard to think of China as being populated by actual human beings. China is not viewed as a nation, or a people, or even a system of governance. Through corporate eyes, China is, first and foremost, an enormous market that is therefore populated by needs. Being a supplier of "needs" is problematic to the degree that it focuses on the object of the need and ignores the humanity of the needy. When commerce abandons conscience, market share trumps social impact, profits take precedence over scruples, then rules are bent and statutes are circumvented. The more repressive and unpredictable the regime, the greater the fear of losing access to the market and the higher the urgency to protect it by ingratiating yourself to the authorities....
As I See It: Betrayal
Published: May 15, 2006
by Victor Rozek


Goldman Sachs rules the world
June 4, 2006
With Paulson's appointment as Treasury secretary, the firm is supreme in matters political and economic.
By Kyle Pope, a former writer and editor for the Wall Street Journal, writes about business and the media.

...Goldman Sachs alums now run the White House bureaucracy (in new Chief of Staff Joshua B. Bolten), , the state of New Jersey (Gov. Jon Corzine) and the New York Stock Exchange (Chief Executive John Thain). Not since John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil — and maybe not even then — has one firm exerted such muscle over national economic and fiscal policy....
The global economy has become a mammoth, interconnected firm, with no single country able to call the shots. Although the Bush team may not accept this view, there are signs — in Bolten's appointment, Condoleezza Rice's elevation and Karl Rove's sidelining — that it finally recognizes the importance of engaging the rest of the world. This is particularly important when it comes to economic policy, where markets are more linked than ever and where one country's trading foe (say, China, in the case of the U.S.) can also be its biggest creditor (ditto).
Finally, Goldman Sachs executives in general, and Paulson in particular, are pragmatists to the point of being mercenary. It's all about the markets, politics be damned...

China scares the crap out of me. The censorship, the human rights violations, the control that the government exerts over it's people. Do we really want to owe them billions?

(Blogger was a real pain in the ass this morning)

Ha! I beat Kos to the punch on this one.

It was a good long ride

Requiem for the Faith-based Greenback


One of these pictures makes me sad and the other makes my skin crawl.
I think these people will be just fine, financially.

Tangled Web

Is the wild west culture of the Internet about to become a thing of the past? Big business is staking its claim on the information superhighway, lobbying Congress for an exclusive faster lane, which consumers could end up paying for. This week on NOW we look at a major battle brewing in Washington D.C. over the future of the Internet.

PBS NOW

Opposing Net Neutrality

...Companies such as Verizon, AT&T, and Comcast provide the lines -- copper, cable, and fiber-optic -- and other hardware that connects Web sites to consumers but make virtually no money from the content that flows through those lines.

They've been lobbying hard to push through a system of fees that would divide the Internet into two tiers: a fast lane for companies who can afford to pay a large toll, and a slow lane for those who cannot. They say the fees are necessary to earn a return on the multibillion-dollar investment in broadband infrastructure.

The group Hands Off the Internet -- backed by companies such as AT&T and Alcatel -- is fighting the concept of net neutrality. Mike McCurry, the former Clinton press secretary who is chairman of the group, says that the telecom industry simply wants the Internet to be governed by economics, not government regulation.

"Show me the money, or I'll choke the people's access to your website" say Mikey.



Now for the good news. This man is the coolest librarian. One of thirty-thousand who told the brownshirts to back off. Interview: George Christian

FCC rules

The FCC now has 3 coroporate fellatio queens out of 5. Just like most of the "regulatory" agencies that have been hemorrhaging (good) people who used to think that their job was to protect the American people from corporate greed that caused the people harm. That's not the kind of watchdog W appoints.

Here's the crap they pulled three years ago. They just can't get enough, they never quit.

They are at it again:
FCC Confirmation
Broadcasters and newspaper owners looking for more latitude on the merger front got a lift with Senate confirmation of the Federal Communications Commission's fifth commissioner, Robert McDowell.

Martin Expected To Launch Ownership Rewrite
By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 5/31/2006 6:54:00 PM

FCC's Martin Gets Ally As McDowell Confirmed
Jessica Holzer, 05.30.06, 3:40 PM ET

Rupert Murdoch is one ugly &*^#, inside and out

Complain. Protest. Tell them not to relax the media ownership rules. (Newest queen doesen't even have an e-mail address yet)

Chairman Martin

Michael J. Copps

Jonathan S. Adelstein

Deborah Taylor Tate

Or try here