Chuck Hagel Passes Committee: Vote Strictly Along Party Lines

With just ten minutes left for one Senator to possibly scramble upstairs and cast a vote that would not change the outcome, Chuck Hagel’s secretary of defense nomination was sent to the Floor….

One of the more surprising moments was the very Senatorial response given by Mazie Hirono, the replacement for Dan Inouye, who passed away after the election.

In a brief statement she noted (at exactly the 2:00 mark) that the national security need for an immediate Secretary of Defense was necessary, and to abort the process and begin anew was irresponsible, for with sequestration, budget reductions, downsizing after Afghanistan, re-pivoting to the Pacific, challenges of North Korea, Syria, North Africa, cyber attacks to our data systems, power grid, infrastructure, all requiring immediate attention. Chuck Hagel exemplified himself in war, as a CEO, and in the chambers of the Senate itself. That puts him as equally qualified as anyone else in that room. Simply put, we need someone now, this man is capable, he has my vote.

Courtesy of C Span
I guess she hasn’t learned to be long winded yet.

Which brings up the Republicans… What on earth is wrong with them? Are they nuts?

Every unbiased report confirms they are nuts.

Republican foreign policy is farce, not even worthy of Shakespeare.

So Republicans have decided that Afghanistan doesn’t exist. At last summer’s Republican National Convention, Mitt Romney never mentioned the Afghan War (that was left up to Clint Eastwood).

During Hagel’s seven and a half hours of questioning by the Senate Armed Services Committee last month, the country where 66,000 American troops are still fighting, and dying, was mentioned 27 times. How many mentions did it receive from the Armed Service Committee’s 12 Republican members combined? Four.

Drones, Zero mentions.

Cyber warfare, two came from Committee Republicans..

China, only one mention came from a Senate Republican. (and that occured when Texas Sen. Ted Cruz asked Hagel if he had traveled to China with Chas Freeman, a former American diplomat known for critical views toward, you guessed it, Israel.)

Israel (178 Republican mentions)

America must help Israel prevent the development of Iran’s nuclear weapon. (171 mentions)

The GOP campaign against him has descended even deeper into triviality. Republicans on the Armed Services Committee are now refusing to vote on Hagel’s nomination until he provides evidence that no organization he was affiliated with received foreign funding over the past decade? WTF? Every Republican on that committed gets foreign political funding from AIPAC….

His answer: no.

Republicans stoop even lower.

Republicans are demanding that he prove that no company or non-profit he has been involved in has received any foreign funding either!

Chuck Hagel’s answer? “That information…is legally controlled by the individual entities and not mine to disclose.”

This is “unprecedented,” as well as “ridiculous and outrageous,” especially since there’s zero evidence that Hagel—a decorated Vietnam veteran—has ever subverted the interests of the United States in service of a foreign power.

One senses Chuck Hagel’s ridiculous farcical hearing process, brought to its knees by these Republicans, has not one iota of relevance to Mr. Hagel’s qualifications, and every bit of relevancy to fending off a potential evangelical Tea Party primary challenger chomping for a run against these Republicans in the next election season….

Chik-Fil-A …Hate Da Gays…..Chik-Fil-A …. Hate Da Gays…..

It’s from a video spoof called Sheik Fil A….. Delaware Liberal introduced to us a week and a half ago.

A lot of people, especially men have trouble dealing with anal penetration of the buttocks, especially when that anus belongs to another man.

For that reason,  their squeamishness causes them to be against da gays.  Those most adamant against this act usually come from areas where if that act is done, it is not done in love, but is instead used as a brutal weapon.  Bluntly put, it is used in rural America,  Arab nations, and areas of the inner city, as rape, … a crime of violence and not mutual respect.

Therefore those from areas where this constantly occurs ( a more violent version of Mitt Romney pinning a boy down and cutting his hair,) tend to be consistently  against that act.   Ironically, most often none tend to see anything wrong when that practice occurs between heterosexual couples.  It is safe.  It is harmless.  It is exploratory, and it is consensual.   Most often, those who are violently against da gays, see nothing wrong with two old ladies living together.  They never venture to wonder what goes on in that old house.  But they have no problem with them being roomies.  Likewise they see old men living together as acceptable.  They are old.  Surely nothing goes on inside that old house…

Because of the horrible trauma that they have endured,  they fail to see that marriage equality is about love… nothing more.   People don’t stay together for years just to get off.  They stay because that person is who they want to spend their time with.   Every day they face a question?  Do I want to go to a club and hook up, or do I want to go home to my best friend, and every day they choose to go home to their best friend.

To be fair the same choice exists for hetero-sexual couples.   Should I take this easy lay being offered at work, or should I go home to my life-partner… It appears now that 50% of us choose to go home to our spouses.  The other 50% take the easy lay.   Based on divorce figures that is…

The more you look at it, the more two gays in a relationship appear better if not as good, as a man and a wife in a relationship.   It certainly isn’t about sex in a hetero sexual marriage.   Those of you who have been married forty years…. how often do you have sex now?  How about thirty?  Twenty?   Sadly there are an awful lot of people out there not having sex these days… despite the invention of viagra…

So why is it “only” about sex in a single sex couple?  It isn’t.  It is about finding someone you love, and choosing to last long enough together to see what that love will grow…..

So if you are against single sex marriage, you are against love.   And in the words of our Lord and Saviour, being against love,  is not where you want your heart to be when you pass over to the other side…

So what do you do about Chik Fil A appreciation day.  Their chicken is soooo good,  like butter… butter it is..  It is the only thing worth waiting for in a Drive Thru line…  So how does one balance ones innate desire to support something soo good you can’t do without, versus  someone else’s problem with someone expressing their freedom of speech…..

What if instead of gays, Chik Fil A was busting on Christians?..  What if they were busting on Muslims?  What if they were busting on Catholics?  What if they were busting on Jews?  What if they were busting on wet backs?  What if they were busting on Spics?  What if they were busting on Pollacks?  What if they were busting on Talley’s?  What if they were busting on Indians?  What if they were busting on Mexicans?  What if instead of gays, we were in the deep south of the 60’s, and they were busting on blacks, saying blacks shouldn’t get married; saying blacks can’t vote; saying blacks can’t go to restrooms with whites; saying blacks have to sit on the back of the bus;  saying blacks can’t sit at the part of the counter that plainly says…. “white’s only”?   Would you be one of those southerners laughing it off as something them northern city-fied liberals were instigating, and damn it, someone with southern pride was gonna buy every piece of chicken that Chik Fil A put down in the grease?

If so… I hope you choke on your chicken……..

SOPA BLACKOUT DAY

Image direct result caused by actions of the stupid fools impersonating a US Congress

This Wednesday, on January 18th 2012, we too will be participating in SOPA Blackout Day… I encourage every true American patriot left, to do likewise.

Foreign Companies! If You’re In a Right To Work State, GET OUT NOW!

Fact, Alambama’s law is just the first.
Fact, Right to Work States are also anti-foreigner states.
Fact, Union states, have a more balanced approach to business.
Fact, laws passed by Alabama, Arizona, South Carolina, Georgia, Indiana, and Utah, will apply to your executives as well as Mexican farm workers.
Fact, in Alabama, one German executive was detained from a Mercedes Plant, and one Japanese executive visiting a Honda plant, was picked up in a dragnet.. Because they couldn’t prove they were citizens (they weren’t), they were incarcerated.. In both those cases hush money and calls from the state executive, took care of the issues, putting the executives out of jail.

If you are a foreign company, thinking of building in any redneck state to save labor, there is a good chance you might find yourself in jail the next time you visit…

As they currently say in Alabama (while the crops rot in the fields…). “The Law… is the Law.” You would be safer building a plant in Venezuela where, yes, it could be nationalized, than you are in building in Alabama where you can’t visit… or find decent workers who will work for the prices you want to pay.

Move North. Safest place? Delaware.

Taxes and The Wealthy

Right click to open full image… Pictograph Courtesy of Viral..

So, can someone tell me again, why we shouldn’t tax the rich, and instead, balance the budget on the backs of everyone else?…….

I seem to be missing that little detail where that all makes sense……

Of Course Mother Nature Hates Republicans!

Many of the areas hit by the storm had also been hit by Irene. In New Jersey’s Hamilton Township, Tom Jacobsen also recalled heavy spring flooding and a particularly heavy winter before that.

“I’m starting to think we really ticked off Mother Nature somehow, because we’ve been getting spanked by her for about a year now,” he said while grabbing some coffee at a convenience store…..

OF COURSE YOU DID, DUMMY. YOU VOTED FOR REPUBLICANS!

Why I Read The Foreign Press Instead of The Crap Found In American Ones

I’m printing this article in full: tell me, where in America can you find journalism this “fair and balanced”?

Another crisis in the horizon?

A | A | A |
Winarno Zain, Jakarta | Tue, 07/19/2011 7:00 AM A | A | A |

It seems the world economy has faced endless threats preventing it from sailing smoothly into a strong recovery this year.

First there was the Greek debt crisis that jolted several major banks, and then a political uprising in the Middle East that pushed up oil prices, and then a tsunami in Japan that disrupted manufacturing activities in many countries.

The world economy has not fully dusted off the adverse impacts of these three events. Yet another headwind is looming large on the horizon. This time it is the possible default of the US government of its debt on Aug. 2, if the US Congress fails to approve an increase to its debt ceiling as requested by President Barack Obama. By that date, the US government debt would have reached its maximum allocated limit of US$14.3 trillion.

The current negotiation between representatives of Democratic and Republican parties on the US budget deficit has run into a deadlock, and so the possibility is real that there won’t be any substantial agreements reached, since the dateline is nearing. Major rating agencies such as Standard and Poor, and Moody’s have warned they are ready to downgrade the US government debt rating from top grade AAA.

This would be the first time in 90 years that the US government debt has been downgraded.

It is not hard to imagine what will happen if by Aug. 2 the US government has exhausted its credit ceiling and can not get additional debt to pay for its spending needs.

The US government would have to curb its spending, and because some of these relate to payments to government employees, pensioners and other social benefits, this would strike a severe blow to the consumer spending that is so essential to the US economic recovery.

With debt default and credit rating downgrades, it would be difficult for the US government to get loans. Faced with increasing risk, investors would ask for higher returns for US government bonds. This would push interest rate higher, further depressing the economic recovery.

The US dollar would plunge, triggering a surge in commodity prices and another round of inflation around the world. A deadly combination of inflation and economic stagnation could spin the world economy into a tailspin as happened in the early 1970’s.

How would this worst case scenario affect the Indonesian economy? As capital flows out of the US, investors have tended to seek safe havens elsewhere. Commodities, especially gold and oil, would be their first targets. Emerging markets could be the next destination of this capital flight, depending on the assessment of investors on the strength of its economy and their vulnerability and exposure to the US economic fallout.

But financial crises always result in a loss of confidence and produce negative sentiments in the financial markets. They put financial markets into disarray, and as investors panic, capital starts flowing out of emerging economies.

During the global financial crisis in 2008-2009, capital moved out from emerging economies back to the advanced economies. At that time, the US government bonds and commodities like gold were considered safe havens.

If the US government defaults on its debt payment this time, the question is will the situation change? Will the US government bonds still be considered a safe haven for investors? If not, then where else will they put their money? Or maybe they would prefer to keep their money in the same place and not move it anywhere. If so, the Indonesian economy could get some benefit and may not have to face another shock.

In the longer term, however, the situation may change. No country is immune to the negative ripples of a US economic crisis. As US imports plunge from weakening domestic demand, exports from emerging countries will also suffer. The extent to which these negative impacts affect each country will depend on their trading and banking exposure to the US economy.

What is disturbing about this debt talk is the use of this debate as a political game. This is especially apparent in the Republican stance.

Economist, market analyst and CEOs of financial institutions and even the IMF itself have warned that if Congress fails to raise the ceiling of the US government debt, the world economy would slip into deep recession.

The Republicans did not fully accept Obama’s proposal to raise the debt ceiling. They only agree on a smaller number, but even it was given with some conditions. The Republicans asked Obama not to raise taxes, especially for the wealthy, and Obama should cut social spending, a sacred cow for the Democrats.

By using tit for tat tactics in the negotiation and by seemingly ignoring the impending consequences and dangers, the Republicans were trying to push Obama into an intricate political dilemma.

If the US economy slip into another crisis, economic contraction would be inevitable. Corporate bankruptcies would spread, and jobless rate would surge.

A presidential election is still slightly more than one year away, and Obama’s reelection prospects are solid. But his popularity rating is highly dependent on the unemployment rate. That is why the Republicans think the only way for them to erode Obama’s popularity now is by pushing the US economy into crisis.

As the stakes are high, the two political parties should temporarily set aside their ideologies and adopt a pragmatic stance for the interests of saving the world economy from another catastrophe.

President Obama demonstrated his willingness to compromise his political ideology during the global financial crisis of 2008-2009. Being a Democrat, Obama’s political inclination is generally anti-big business.

Obama realized that it was reckless lending by some big banks on Wall Street that triggered the financial crisis. But he also realized that saving these banks from bankruptcy was key to saving the world economy from further disaster.

His decision to pour $800 billion of taxpayer’s money to bail out these banks was hard to swallow by his fellow party members, but it worked. Now it is expected that the Republicans will be willing to do likewise.

The writer is an economist.

Fascinating Stuff

(Reuters) – Forget about getting a job as a police officer in Indonesia’s Papua if you have had your penis enlarged. You won’t get it, according to local media reports citing the Papua police chief.

An applicant “will be asked whether or not his vital organ has been enlarged,” said Papua police chief Bekto Suprapto, quoted on local website Kompas.com. “If he has, he will be considered unfit to join the police or the military.”

The ban was applied since the unnatural size causes “hindrance during training,” said police spokesman Zainuri Lubis in Jakarta, quoted by news portal Detik.com.

Indonesia’s remote easternmost province is home to Papuan tribes, many of whom wear penis gourds. To achieve enlargement, they wrap the penis in leaves from the gatal-gatal (itchy) tree so that it swells up “like it has been stung by a bee”, a local sexologist said.

Too Close to Call in the Skies Over Baghdad

We have heard so often that the surge is working. Perhaps it is working far too well. Four arch-Conservative Congressional delegates flying out of Baghdad, came under fire just as their C130 lifted off from the Baghdad airport. Judging from the depth of the Pentagon’s reaction, it was a close call.

The C-130 cargo aircraft conducted evasive maneuvers after a nighttime takeoff from Baghdad, said Ken Lundberg, spokesman for Sen. Mel Martinez of Florida, who was on the plane.

In addition to Martinez, the plane was carrying fellow Republican Sens. Richard Shelby of Alabama and James Inhofe of Oklahoma, and Alabama Rep. Robert “Bud” Cramer, a Democrat.

With the exception of Cramer the Blue Dog Democrat, all of the three republicans would be considered extremely conservative. Shelby, was the individual responsible for announcing that we had intercepted Osama bin Laden’s phone messages. Inhofe accused the Weather Channel of creating global warming. Martinez was in charge of Bush 2000’s Florida campaign, and we all know what happened there. In 2006, he helped craft the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006 that would be referred to by much of his own party, as “amnesty”.

All three of these are extremely conservative; all three are potentially embarrassing to the future Republican party; all three have uttered controversial statements like this one…. by Inhofe:

“I am outraged by the ‘outrage’ over the revelations of abuse at Abu Ghraib”, suggesting that liberals being outraged over Rumsfeld’s abusive tactics, were more of a outrage to American values, than the actual torture practiced on Iraqis by American servicemen.

Each of these Republicans has become and will be a future embarrassment to their party in the upcoming elections. Each of these statements will be pounded over the airwaves with undulating precision.

But if you look beyond the glossed over press reports there seems to be something deeper going on behind this incident. Perhaps it was more than just a close call?

For one, why would the C 130 fired upon as it left Baghdad, just happen to carry three of the most conservative members of Congress? Of course one option, and the first considered, is that it occurred randomly. However two other possibilities that could occur, are 1) either the Iraqi insurgents have remarkable intelligence capabilities, capable of communicating the precise moment the plane lets go its brakes to a position miles away, or……2) it was an inside job.

Was it random? At roughly 150 of these planes flying in and out of Baghdad on a daily basis, the odds at firing on this one randomly selected over the last five years, would be: 1 chance out of 273,750. That would be a 2737.5% chance of not happening. But anything is possible, right?

So let’s examine the logistics behind the alternatives. To fire upon this one plane, the enemy would need to know which plane out of the twenty five lined up on the tarmac awaiting takeoff, contained the conservative legislators. That means the insurgents would have had access to Baghdad military airport, in the heart of the super safe Green Zone.

If the enemy was this intelligent, they should know that killing four congressional legislators would not end the war. It would escalate it further. (To end the war they would need to kill liberals.) They would also know that creating martyrs out of the four most conservative Congressional members, would embolden a 9/11 response across this country. It would rally international support behind the US, now waning worldwide, and create an international environment more hostile to Al Qaeda. The insurgents would be foolish to fire upon that plane.

So who stands to gain if these men were shot down? Obviously those republicans waiting in the wings in their safe red districts, would benefit. So would the RNC. There would be NO chance of a blue taking any of these seats. Obviously the Republican party would be better off by not having their own comment blaming “the Weather Channel for creating global warming”, receiving international airplay. (They are so losing this next election; I hope that Mondale lives long enough to see his dubious record broken.) Obviously the next big republican scandal that will come out of Florida (Martinez), would be nice to nip in the bud. Furthermore anyone having a vendetta against that one single person responsible for leaking that nugget that we were listening to Osama’s phone calls just after 9/11, causing his GPS location to be lost to us forever, would rub their hands with revenge.

These shots fired, based on a cross reference of the press reports description and the Pentagon’s map of Baghdad, originated from an area safe from insurgents, and entrusted to private corporate mercenary services. The location of these shots makes it even more unlikely that an insurgent pulled the trigger. The odds that an operative of Al Qaeda, infiltrated a private security service such as Blackwater, was in real time informed as to when this very plane was taking off, and knew exactly when to pull the trigger seconds before he even saw or heard the plane, all without any experience of ever having done so before at this location…….. are impossible to calculate…………….

If this was an inside job, perhaps instead of an assassination, it was a mere attempt at a scare. They missed on purpose. For by instilling fear in some of the most conservative members of the Congress, one could continue to count firmly on their future loyalty and support.  No doubt as they spoke before their respective branches of Congress, they could then be counted on to convey to others, that the threat was real.

For if on their return, had these four wavered and decided that all future expenditures were nothing but a massive waste of money, that the surge was not working, and that it was time to make a change in Iraq policy, then dreams of all neocons everywhere, would be nothing more than a wisp of gunsmoke……………

But such talk is just “hullabaloo” , really……… it was nothing more than a random event, a one in a 273,750 chance.

Can Someone Take Santorum to Guantanamo?

Possibility of another terrorist attack?

Unconfirmed talk is that international terrorist chatter is as high as it was in August of 01, just before the planes came………Definitely expect an attack within 90 days we are told. Code Red.

Wasn’t it a former Pennsylvanian senator named Santorum who said last week that what ultraconservatives needed to push their agenda forward is another terrorist attack like 9/11? What?

Isn’t that what Mitch McConnell is currently peddling around Congress, this heightened level of chatter? But who is the source? Silence…..Is there any independent confirmation? Silence…… The only answer the public hears is a rumble from the gut of Chertoff. ……..Feed me……

The fear every American has, is not from the random violence of a terrorist, who supposedly will fight the sharks and swim across the ocean to get here, but of our own self-appointed president, declaring martial law, stripping us of our rights, in order to stay in power forever. What better method than to use a massive terrorist attack to push ones agenda…… It worked the last time, right?

This time I am not so sure it would work. If one has an employee who makes the same mistake twice, big time, one fires his ass. A terrorist attack is definitely big time. And whose ass did we entrust the last time to make us safe? And now miraculously those same people are telling us that Al Qaeda is as stronger than it was in the summer of 01?

That doesn’t make me scared. It really pisses me off!  How on earth can the greatest country in the world, be completely powerless to contain Robin Hood and his band of merry men, climbing over moon rocks while carrying a kidney machine? Bottom line is that they can’t…. unless not finding him is being done on purpose.

“What is most troubling is that no one in a position of authority is trying to get to the bottom of this.

If GOP leaders like Dennis Milligan (R-Ark) and former Senator Rick Santorum (R-Pa) possess information that could protect the American people from another terrorist attack, the CIA should interrogate them using the techniques our Vice President has approved,” Fetzer observed. “Let’s water-board them and subject them to sexual humiliation. After all, that’s what we are doing to prevent attacks abroad. Why aren’t they being used here? Chertoff appears to be making no effort to get to the bottom of this. Bush can’t claim to be ‘the security president’ if he won’t keep us secure.”How much money have we sunk into Iraq, where according to every nation’s intelligence agencies, there were NO terrorists before we started. How many bridges could we have inspected and repaired in this country if we had used that money less foolishly?……..

If we have an administration that allows us another terrorist attack, this time killing between 30,000 and 300,000, we need to impeach that administration; not give them more power. What the hell have we been spending our children’s money on? and they are telling me that terror is worse now?…. than it was before 9/11?

And they want us to trust who? Should another attack occur, an attack more viscous than 9/11, the ugly truth is that such an attack could only occur because one man fell asleep at the wheel: George W Bush. America will be furious. They will not reward him with powers of tyranny, they will impeach!

Cheney’s diversion in Iraq provided a lull in the war on terrorism. Had we finished Afghanistan first, maybe made a couple or secret raids across the border into Pakistan, there would be no Al Qaeda. But no, we are now being warned of an eminent attack………..

If the unthinkable occurs and we are attacked, America must get it’s own house in order first before striking back. America must replace its 2 leaders with ones who are competent,… so that when our time comes to return the favor to Al Qaeda………we won’t make the same mistake twice………..

Bush can’t claim to be ‘the security president’ if he won’t keep us secure