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Straight Talk Express -- Off The Track

08-28-08

Now that a few of the press have been noticing that McCain's brain seems to be missing a lot of the time, and some of the more competitive of mainstream sources are actually reporting what they see instead of what the McCain camp want them to say, McCain is no longer playing the straight talk express game. So it make you wonder why they try to fake it. Well a couple weeks ago the media complained that he nevers talks to them anymore, so.. embarassing, and useless sessions like this will most likely be the norm for the rest of the campaign. I guess McCain figures, that being in the presence of what his people consider is the next POTUS should be enough.

Huffinton Post -- Peter Drier: John McCain Lives In Subsidized Housing

08-28-08

JHC. You mean for all those homes? JHC! And get this, only the rich need apply for the subsidies!

Bob Herbert: The Dog That Isn’t Barking

08-27-08

I hope he's wrong, this time.

RMN: Vets, military families: McCain has been 'AWOL' on needs

08-27-08

Excerpt: It was Barack Obama, vets and military family members said, who had fought to repair the scandalously decrepit facilities at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and pushed legislation to help an estimated 200,000 homeless vets. Now, Democratic vets, say it’s the non-veteran Obama – not the revered war hero McCain – whom they can trust to help veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress and combat brain injuries and military families strained by the pressure of four or five combat tours in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Paul Krugman: Accentuate the Negative

08-26-08

Krugman shows that Republicans and their hate radio enablers smeared John Kerry in 2004 with class warfare charges of having a Sugar Daddy relationship with his wife, but are downplaying the same type of unbalanced between John and Cindy McCain. Dirty pool apparently rules American politics and so does shadow financed hate radio.

AP: Convention speakers scheduled for Monday

08-25-08

AP: Speakers at the Democratic convention on Tuesday

08-25-08

Center for Public Integrity: [McCain's Big Donors Also Lining the Pockets of His Reform Institute

08-25-08

Excerpt: For a non-partisan think tank, though, the Reform Institute sure attracts a striking array of big-time contributors and bundlers for McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign. Of the 74 individuals, corporations, and foundations that donated more than $500 to the Institute, more than half of them — 42 — contributed to at least one of McCain’s “other pockets”: his presidential campaign, his Straight Talk America PAC, or the Republican National Committee. The year after McCain resigned from his post as honorary chair of the Institute, he announced his presidential campaign’s exploratory committee. At the same time the Institute expanded its areas of interest to include energy and climate stewardship, homeland security, immigration reform, and economic policy — all key planks of McCain’s platform.

"We Are All Georgians"? Not So Fast Russia Georgia Conflict -- A Basic Explanation

08-23-08

WP's Michael Dobbs hosted at Truthout gives a great basic explanation free from the posturing that so many politicians and even news venues are basting their analysis in.

The bottom line on Obamanomics

08-23-08

More Reich than Rubin, but definitely centrist. Build alternative energy sources and restore infrastructure to put the left behind working class to work (because they can't all become nurses). Create affordable health insurance programs that are good enough to entice the uninsured. Obama is new, but has the great Team Obama behind him with hundreds of years experience to help. And he's shown he will listen to the best minds, even ours.

Oil falls 5.4 percent in biggest drop since 2004

08-23-08

Now watch as the "handful of companies" mentioned in the report I posted on the other day who had cornered the oil speculation market start wailing for handouts and help from the US federal government.

Democracy Arsenal -- Max Bergman: (McCain is) A Pundit Not a President

08-23-08

I agree with Mr. Bergman. Maybe they should give John McCain a radio talk show where he can rant the day away instead of letting him run for the position of actually leading the free world. His confused hyperbolic foreign policy would be a lot more dangerous in the White House than on the air waves.

WP: Take the McCain House Tour!

08-22-08

I wonder which is the one he couldn't remember. Let the Post introduce you to the many homes of John McCain.

Eugene Robinson: Johnny, We Hardly Know Ye

08-22-08

The other ways we really don't know John McCain (and he doesn't seem to know himself). (Robinson also reminds us of the time when McCain's camp told reporters that the candidate doesn't speak for the campaign--in so many words). Obviously the Pillsbury Doughboy is just a figurehead for the rabid right wing neocons running his campaign.

Glenn Greenwald: Journalists and their good friends in the White House

08-22-08

Believe me. It's not a puff piece.

Time.com: Sending America a Message. Hallmark Starts Selling Same Sex Marriage Cards

08-22-08

(Sending a message.... That was just a way of making a spiffy headline. Hallmark says that what it wants to do is to serve everyone according to the article.)

NYT Op Ed -- Mikhail Gorbachev: Russia Never Wanted a War

08-20-08

Yes, he wrote one for the Post a week ago, but things have changed and he has more to talk about this time anyway. I recommend that we hear him out.

Mo Dowd: Two Against the One

08-20-08

Well, you have to wonder.

Thomas Friedman: What Did We Expect?

08-20-08

The experts of the Clinton and Bush administrations got the whole Post Soviet period wrong by trying to cram NATO down the throat of Russia, and thinking we would never actually have to risk anything by actually having to protect our new allies. Plus Friedman has advice for US and Russia leaders going forward.

Allegations: Florida Republican Representative Forced Employees to Contribute to His Campaign

08-19-08

My Thoughts: The sad part is, apparently the man had money given to the workers so that they could contribute, apparently from his car dealership, ie from himself. If he had given his campaign the money himself, I believe it would have been as legal as Diet Soda, but from what I learned reading about the Romney campaign, it donating to your own campaign makes a good news story about how you can't attract outside money. (Except in CA where you can loan your gubenatorial campaign millions and take money after you're elected from the Indian and prison guard unions you promised not to take money from before you were elected and the great mainstream press never says a word -- if you're a Republican prince of Hollywood.)

Luckovich: John McCain channels Reagan in Bush's Office

08-19-08

Frank Rich: The Candidate We Still Don’t Know

08-19-08

Excerpt: Most Americans still don’t know, as Marshall writes, that on the campaign trail “McCain frequently forgets key elements of policies, gets countries’ names wrong, forgets things he’s said only hours or days before and is frequently just confused.” Most Americans still don’t know it is precisely for this reason that the McCain campaign has now shut down the press’s previously unfettered access to the candidate on the Straight Talk Express.

McCain is Completely Nuts! He Wanted to Invade 4 Nations For 911!

08-17-08

The man is a lunatic warhead. Obviously, he wouldn't have used overwhelming force in Iraq because he would be going into Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and Iran all at the same time, once he got his dander up. There will be crises in every administration. Apparently the solution to crises according to John McCain is to go out and kill thousands, hundreds of thousands of people, and destroy nations. Aren't we already carrying enough burden from the glory hungry president (and his puppet) that we have now? Article also shows that McCain actually decided on his current path of hyper international antagonism when he and advisers were planning his presidential run in 2000 and wanted to appeal more to conservatives.

NY Times: Russians Melded Old-School Blitz With Modern Military Tactics

08-17-08

Those evil Russians had plans and conducted military exercises they might need if the people of Ossetia were attacked by Georgia. This article screams outrage as it presents the Bush administration talking points on the Russia Georgia war.

Bill Boyarsky-- Truth Dig: McCain Is More Dangerous Than Bush

08-17-08

Excerpt: Forget the moderate image, promoted by an admiring media. Forget the so-called straight talk and independence. With the Russian-Georgian war winding down, McCain has firmly established himself as an old-fashioned Cold Warrior and a supporter of the huge oil companies that have a big stake in Georgia and the rest of the Caucasus.

Barry Obama's Family Vacation

08-17-08

Photos

Inventory of Conflict and Environment: Maps, History, Ethnic, and Environmental Details on Georgia-South Ossetian Problem

08-16-08

Are the Ossetians immigrants to the area or the real natives as they claim? This site predates the current flare up and seems to have a balanced report on the history of South Ossetia and it's relations with Georgia. The Ossetians mostly share the same religion with Georgians, but are of darker, Persian stock.

Bus Lifted by New Yorkers. Baby Saved

08-16-08

The report says that 30 men lifted a bus off an off duty traffic cop who had been hit and was under a city bus. The men were able to lift the vehicle enough to pull the woman, who was 6 months pregnant, out. She was rushed to the hospital where the baby was born by caesarian section before the mortally injured woman died. Okay, You guys are tough. We get it. Too bad about the woman though.

Rosa Brooks: Who got Georgia into this?

08-14-08

We've heard a lot of this, but Brooks put it together the best I've ever heard.

Council on Foreign Relations: Wilted Rose (Revolution)

08-14-08

As early as January 2006 CFR reported: The bloom is off the Rose Revolution. Saakashvili’s accomplishments have been undercut by the excessive concentration of power in his own hands—what the intelligentsia calls the “Putinization” of Georgia. Saakashvili combines his lust for power with a blustery patriotism, a particularly troubling mix. He vows to restore Georgia’s territorial unity by defeating separatist movements in South Ossetia as well as Abkhazia, and he has backed up the confrontational rhetoric with a major increase in military spending. And concluded: As in other countries in the midst of political transition—such as Russia, Ukraine, Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, and Egypt—the Bush administration’s freedom march has focused too much on democratic elections and not enough on what comes next. Much more at the link.

Cindy McCain Miss Buffalo Chip? John suggests Cindy join a Biker Beauty Pageant

08-13-08

Blogger Anti-McCain has a video of last years pageant. Warning Parts of pageant get pretty offensive. John's anti-women campaign continues.

Bob Herbert: An Empty Promise

08-13-08

Excerpt: Public officials should be disabusing the electorate of its delusions, not encouraging them. The widespread mistaken notions about the potential impact of offshore drilling on gasoline prices reminds me of the large percentages of Americans who were encouraged to believe, and did believe — erroneously — that Iraq and Saddam Hussein had something to do with the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Expanding Govt. Numbers Racket Could Lead To Disaster

« H E » Nation :: email

posted 05-20-08

According to Kevin Phillips, a long term trusted Republican economic analyst, successive administrations have been fudging the financial numbers. Think elephant doing enpointe on a house of cards.

Excerpt MarketWatch report "Megabubble waiting for new president in 2009 ":

How bad is it? "The real numbers ... would be a face full of cold water," says Phillips. "Based on the criteria in place a quarter century ago, today's U.S. unemployment rate is somewhere between 9% and 12%; the inflation rate is as high as 7% or even 10%; economics growth since the recession of 2001 has been mediocre, despite the surge in wealth and incomes of the superrich, and we are falling back into recession."

A, well, 25 years ago would be early eighties when numbers were considered fudged compared to decades earlier. They're now completely skewed, in other words.

More excerpts from Market Watch:

Scene 5: Most economists hushed, work inside conspiracy
Compare that to the phony stats Washington feeds the press and public: Unemployment 5%, inflation 2% and long-term growth at 3%-4% (actually more like 1%). For example, just last week the L.A. Times reported that while "gasoline prices are up more than 20% from a year ago and food prices have risen 5%," Washington says "inflation was fairly mild last month." A Wells Fargo economist shook his head in disbelief: That report isn't "worth the paper it was printed on." Most economists are quiet, working for the conspiracy.

Scene 6: No integrity, they cannot be trusted to tell truth!
The same can be said of any government report, every speech made by today's leaders: All hype, lies and propaganda intended to deceive us. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's clearly playing the game: Remember what the former Goldman Sachs CEO told Fortune last July as our credit meltdown was metastasizing into a worldwide contagion: "This is far and away the strongest global economy I've seen in my business lifetime." He has no credibility. He knew the truth. He knew the government's "numbers racket;" after all, he helped create the problems years earlier at Goldman.

More at site, and it's based on a Harper's report called "Numbers Racket" which is here , but the catch is that you can't see the full size pages unless you're a subscriber. So Market Watch's Paul B. Farrel recommends buying the magazine at the store. Or you could dish out an whole $16.97 and get a year's worth.

Author Phillips has a new book out. It's the one featured in the Amazon.com widget above (widget provided to me by blog masters. They may get a nickel for a hit. I don't. BTW, this time, I have not read the book and can only recommend it on the basis that it looks interesting and important. Most books I recommend here, I have read.)

As you may know I've been covering fudged unemployment numbers since 2004.

I've also reminded people often that 6% more men have taken an early retirement during the Bush administration than during the Clinton administration, at which time 6% of men were already taking earlier retirement. So you can see one way the unemployment numbers have been smoothed out over two administrations. I only compared the numbers between Clinton and Bush because Bush people and their sold out pundits (and then cowardly mainstream news media) would constantly chant about how the Bush administration's unemployment numbers were about the same as Clinton's, ignoring the fact that 3% more working age folks (during both decades women were just about half of the work force) had dropped off the charts. The inflation numbers were was questioned during the Clinton years and laughed at by many business people during the Bush years.

If inflation was actually higher then reported GDP was actually lower by the same amount as GDP = Goods and Services sold - Inflation.

tags: inflation gdp unemployment rate economy

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