Sanford will steal stimulus money from the people
- just to make a point.

post from Verbal Paintball on 11 March 2009 06:52:44 AM. © Verbal Paintball

From Huffington Post:South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford wants to use $700 million in federal stimulus money to pay off state debt, not increase spending on programs or services.Sanford has long railed against federal bailouts, and on Tuesday sent lawmakers a letter saying he wants to use the money to pay off some of the state’s [...]

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the-people-just-to-make-a-point/

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Obama Won the Kansas 3rd Congressional District

post from Kansas Jackass on 11 March 2009 06:48:00 AM. © Kansas Jackass

I know the election was months and months ago, but my attention was drawn to the fact Swing State[...]

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Sarah Palin Wuz Robbed

post from MyDD on 11 March 2009 06:19:25 AM. © MyDD

Does anyone else think it's sort of hilarious that Katie Couric won a Walter Cronkite Excellence in TV Political Journalism award for her interviews with Sarah Palin? The award was in the "Special Achievement for National Impact on the 2008 Campaign"[...]

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Sara Hoge letter to the Star News

post from Pasadena New Progressive on 11 March 2009 06:14:00 AM. © Pasadena New Progressive

83-year-old Sara Payne Hoge (my mom), is a letter writing legend in Pasadena for the past 30 years. When the March 2 headline of the Star News went after John Muir High (again!) and read:

Muir sill in trouble
Despite new academy, freshmen failing

it was time for her to get out her "pen"! Here is her (unpublished) letter to the Star New, dated March 2, 2009:

Isn't it a little soon to call "failure" out to the Muir project? How about giving it at least a year or, maybe even a few more years?

Wasn't the old plan for the students in place for a long time? What happened to "Rome wasn't built in a day" attitude? Has not the Pasadena Star News gone through a few changes in its life time?

It seems that it would follow that a little encouragement might be the path to take for a new project, rather than the "see it didn't work" attitude!

-

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html

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Obama and the hope of a benign dictatorship, at
least for a while

post from BuzzFlash.org - Progressive News and Commentary with an Attitude | Fight Ignorance: Read BuzzFlash on 11 March 2009 06:13:07 AM. © BuzzFlash.org - Progressive News and Commentary with an Attitude | Fight Ignorance: Read BuzzFlash

THE FIFTH COLUMNIST by P.M. Carpenter

I appreciate that President Obama, as the new kid on the block, wants to play nice with everyone. I'm aware he's trying his darnedest to be flexible, so as not to be rude. And I know that he, a former purveyor of constitutional law, repels at even the passing thought of executive brutishness.

But I also know, without fixing my tongue too snugly in cheek, that what this country really needs right now, as they say, is something closer to a benign dictator -- a kind of presidential Mr. Rogers on meth -- to offset and reverse the ruinous effects of the malignant one whose combination criminal-stumblebum regime ruled for eight horrific years too long.

Here we are, with countless problems both deepening and metastasizing, while friendly pundits and even a few Congre Bookmark/Search this post with: buzzflash | delicious | digg digg | yahoo yahoo | technorati Technorati Tags: P.M. Carpenter obama congress economy budget

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Tiahrt: Long on Hackery, Short on Statesmanship

post from Kansas Jackass on 11 March 2009 06:11:00 AM. © Kansas Jackass

I'd like to concur 110% with the following from the Wichita Eagle blog:Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Goddard,[...]

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CNBC's Jim Cramer tried to fight back against Jon
Stewart. All he did was give Stewart more fodder.

post from AMERICAblog News| A great nation deserves the truth on 11 March 2009 06:03:00 AM. © AMERICAblog News| A great nation deserves the truth

Jim Cramer and Joe Scarborough are no match for Jon Stewart. They shouldn't even get in the ring with him. Stewart makes them look like jackasses. Watch Stewart's latest rebuttal to the multi-pronged attack from Cramer and his NBC toadies.

We love a good CNBC-bashing here at AMERICAblog. Definitely worth a watch:

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10cBasic Cable Personality Clash Skirmish '09

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Muse in the Morning

post from Docudharma - Front Page on 11 March 2009 06:00:00 AM. © Docudharma - Front Page

Muse in the MorningDream Catcher #1AspirationHopes and dreamsof a better futuremight be capturedin designs whichsimultaneouslyregisterthe disappointmentof a second-ratepresentand the struggleto escapethe entanglementsof a pastconstructedout of[...]

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KS GOP Blocks Stimulus Funds for HIgher Ed

Sometimes I really just don't understand what gets into the Republican members of the Kansas House[...]

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Chas Freemans Out.

I can't be the only person who finds this depressing:

Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair announced today that Ambassador Charles W. Freeman Jr. has requested that his selection to be Chairman of the National Intelligence Council not proceed. Director Blair accepted Ambassador Freeman?s decision with regret.

Glenn Greenwald and Andrew Sullivan have already written superbly regarding what this is actually about:

Summing up the attacks on Freeman, Andrew Sullivan wrote that he finds "the hysterical bullying of this man to be repulsive." There's no question about that. Hysterical bullying -- rank character smearing -- is what they've been doing for many years in an attempt to intimidate people out of dissenting from their so-called "pro-Israel" orthodoxies. But last night, Sullivan made the more important observation about this controversy:
The idea that Obama should not have advisers who challenge some of the core assumptions of the Bush years, especially with respect to Israel-Palestine, seems nuts to me. And the impulse to blackball and smear someone as a bigot is reprehensible.

It's destructive enough to artificially limit debate on a matter as consequential as U.S. policy towards Israel. We've been doing that for many years now. But it's so much worse that the people who have been defining and dictating those limits are themselves extremists in every sense of that word when it comes to Israel and U.S. policy towards that country. Their demands that no distinctions be recognized between Israeli and Americans interests have been uniquely destructive for the U.S. Few things are more urgent than an expansion of the debate over U.S. policy in this area, which is exactly why this radical lynch mob is swarming with such intensity to destroy Freeman's reputation and fortify the limitations on our debates which, for so long, they have thuggishly enforced.

Well, they have won. The Obama camp have thrown in the towel regarding Freeman because of nothing other than his views of US policy towards Israel do not strictly adhere to the prevailing Washington wisdom.

The people who brought us, amongst other things, the Iraq war, are now the arbiters of what is and is not an acceptable view which one can hold if one is fit to serve in an American administration.

Freeman, because he dared to waver from the pro-Israeli stance, has been deemed unfit for office.

I mean, let's face it, the policies of the Bush years were hardly successful in this area, indeed, they were a total bloody disaster. But we are now being told that a fresh perspective on this disastrous policy is some form of heresy?

What depresses me most is this, if Obama won't stand up to them over the appointment of Freeman, what chance is there for his wider Middle East policy? For this is school gate stuff compared to what he will face if he ever attempts to ask Israel to make real concessions.

Freeman himself has issued a statement:

The libels on me and their easily traceable email trails show conclusively that there is a powerful lobby determined to prevent any view other than its own from being aired, still less to factor in American understanding of trends and events in the Middle East. The tactics of the Israel Lobby plumb the depths of dishonor and indecency and include character assassination, selective misquotation, the willful distortion of the record, the fabrication of falsehoods, and an utter disregard for the truth. The aim of this Lobby is control of the policy process through the exercise of a veto over the appointment of people who dispute the wisdom of its views, the substitution of political correctness for analysis, and the exclusion of any and all options for decision by Americans and our government other than those that it favors.

Indeed, people like Chuck Schumer are making it very clear as to why Freeman was simply unacceptable to them:

?Charles Freeman was the wrong guy for this position. His statements against Israel were way over the top and severely out of step with the administration. I repeatedly urged the White House to reject him, and I am glad they did the right thing.?

He didn't stick to the script which makes him unacceptable. I'm sorry, but the fact that only one point of view on this matter is deemed acceptable seems to me to be the antithesis of democracy.

Click title for source.

Tags: Chas Freeman, Obama, Israel, Palestine, Middle East, US Foreign Policy

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http://the-osterley-times.blogspot.com/2009/03/chas-freemans-out.html

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