Bill O'Reilly's accuser showed no signs of letting her multimillion-dollar windfall affect her yesterday as she spent the morning in typical New York fashion - grousing about a $4 cup of coffee. On Madison it can be more
"It's over and I get to move on now," Andrea Mackris said a day after the 33-year-old TV producer and her former boss agreed to an out-of-court settlement reportedly worth between $2 million and $10 million for her. (photo in link) She lives on The Upper 'West' Side of Manahattan, home to the majority of this city's far out leftists!
I guess she'll be moving on to a new job, but with a $2 - 10m windfall, no doubt she can take her time. Unless she drinks a lot of coffee...
Yet as a pack of reporters tailed Mackris from her West Side apartment to a nearby Starbucks, the price of a grande skim latte struck the new millionaire as a bit steep. "Four bucks for a cup of coffee? What is that?" she quipped, fending off a question about whether her first move would be to jet to some fun place, like the Bahamas. "That's not what it was about, or what I was focused on," she said, adding that after reaching the settlement she merely "ordered in sushi." She and O'Reilly were mum on details of the deal that ended an embarrassing scandal for the Fox News titan.
Whoopdy doo. He likes to talk dirty. She likes to dig gold.
As part of the pact, Mackris agreed to drop her sexual harassment suit against O'Reilly and Fox, and O'Reilly agreed to drop his lawsuit claiming Mackris and her lawyer tried to shake down the network for $60 million. The paperwork ending the lawsuits was filed yesterday. Though O'Reilly wasn't talking, his friends scoffed at the idea Mackris pulled down a seven-figure settlement. Mackris reportedly had turned down an offer of $2 million before she filed her lawsuit. Both
"I'm just a little girl from Missouri," she said.
sides agreed to a confidentiality clause and issued a statement Thursday that "there was no wrongdoing whatsoever by Mr. O'Reilly, Ms. Mackris or Ms. Mackris' counsel, Benedict P. Morelli & Associates." But in New York, everyone takes sides. lol
"You should have fried him!" doorman Nelson Santiago, 33, called out when he recognized Mackris sprinting past for her morning cup of coffee. "That's nice," she laughed, a bit taken aback by the notoriety she said went so far as partygoers dressing up as her for Halloween. "It's weird. I'm just a little girl from Missouri," she said. Now a shark in the big city
And unemployable, to boot...
... awaiting calls from publishers for her book ...
Mackris jumped into the spotlight with her bombshell accusations that O'Reilly tormented her with unwanted phone sex, and observers speculated she had tapes to back it up. Fox spokesman Brian Lewis declined to comment on the settlement other than to say the statement of no wrongdoing "speaks for itself" and to note that Mackris is "no longer employed at Fox." Soon to be at CNN maybe?
Not if they have any sense. Maybe producing the weather at a UHF station in Anchorage.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 5:41:59 AM ||
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She better invest well - she just got the lump-sum total of her income int he TV biz for the rest of her life. No more in the pipeline.
"If I could fly"R. Kelly hip-hopped out of a concert with Jay-Z at Madison Square Garden last night after he told the sold-out crowd he saw two men in the audience waving guns at him.
"Feet, don't fail me now!"
Then the R&B star got a face full of pepper spray backstage and ended up in the hospital, his spokesman said.
"Where'd you learn to sing? You suck!" [Pffffttt!]
Garden security checked the audience, found no guns and let the show go on. Jay-Z enlisted some high-wattage help, including Usher, to keep fans rocking. The incident left tonight's show up in the air, Jay-Z said early this morning.
"I don't think he's stopped yet!"
Kelly bailed out of the concert an hour into the scheduled 2-1/2-hour show and was taken to St. Vincent's Medical Center in an ambulance, said his spokesman, Allan Mayer. "He was brought to the emergency room and had his eyes flushed," Mayer said. "It appears he will be okay and will spend the night in his hotel room. And he is ready, willing and able to perform Saturday."
"Don't make me go back there!"
Kelly walked out of the hospital at 1:25a.m. "I'm gonna be there tomorrow to go with the show," he said.
"Them guyz is gone, right?"
Mayer said cops told him their main concern was keeping the concert crowd peaceful and that an arrest in the spraying could come today. Police had no immediate comment.
"Stop rolling your eyes like that, Mulligan! And you, Riley! Stop that giggling!"
Kelly and Jay-Z have been headlining their "Best of Both Worlds" tour amid rumors of a chilly relationship between them. Kelly, who faces child porn charges, has shown up late or left early for a number of performances on the tour. Early this morning, Jay-Z lit into his colleague in an interview on 105.1-FM, detailing Kelly's misses. "When I do the best of what I do, he had a problem with it," Jay-Z said.
"He's obviously jealous of my search for excellence. I can sing. He can get the pants off 13-year-olds."
Last night's show began about 8:30 p.m. with both artists on stage for a set, then Kelly performed alone followed by a solo set by Jay-Z. When Kelly came back for his second set, he told the audience he couldn't continue - but that he wasn't going to notify security. He was apparently Maced in a corridor a short time later, concert sources said.
I'm sure anybody would have done the same...
Jay-Z picked up the slack and more with the help of some friends including Foxy Brown, Ja Rule and Mary J. Blige. "The good news is I have a lotta hits and I'm going hold you down New York. I'm gonna give you your money's worth."
Ummm... These guys are all voting for Kerry, right? Tell me they're Kerry supporters...
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 5:29:32 AM ||
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Al-JOUF, 29 October 2004 — A Saudi newspaper yesterday reported the discovery of what it called a rare coin with unique features that belonged to an ancient civilization. The paper said the coin had an inscription in an unknown language that was not English. It described the coin as having a palm tree with eight branches, a woman sunbathing, a ship and a castle with a dome. According to the newspaper, the coin belonged to an ancient civilization that flourished in Al-Jouf. The strange thing is that the "strange" coin, which the paper claimed had an inscription in an unknown language, had Puerto Rico inscribed clearly on it. The coin is believed to have been left behind by one of the tourists visiting the area and does not belong to any ancient civilization as claimed by the newspaper.
pichure at em link
Looks like it fell off somebody's charm bracelet...
#1
"...According to the newspaper, the coin belonged to an ancient civilization that flourished in Al-Jouf..."
If I were an official of Puerto Rico, I'd call the Saudi paper and tell them that their citizen obtained the coin while visiting Sheba! Let them find where it is.
#2
"...According to the newspaper, the coin belonged to an ancient civilization that flourished in Al-Jouf..."
If I were an official of Puerto Rico, I'd call the Saudi paper and tell them that their citizen obtained the coin while visiting Sheba! Let them find where it is.
#6
Clearly Al-Jouf belongs to Puerto Rico. Does it have oil?
Posted by: Tom ||
10/30/2004 10:08 Comments ||
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#7
Bad news -- no oil. Good agriculture though! "...one of the best areas in Saudi Arabia due to availability of water, fertility and suitable weather conditions..."
Posted by: Tom ||
10/30/2004 10:16 Comments ||
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#8
Al-Jouf is the 3rd holiest site in Puerto Rico...
Posted by: Fred ||
10/30/2004 12:05 Comments ||
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Can't feed the ducks any longer as well?
Domestic ducks may be infecting humans with bird flu, even though they show no external signs of having the disease, the U.N. health agency warned. Bird flu has been reported in ducks that exhibit no clinical signs of the disease, Dr. Klaus Stohr, the World Health Organization's influenza chief, said on Friday. "In the last few months there is an increase in the number of human cases which cannot necessarily be linked to poultry exposure," Stohr said. "We
There is a high risk of transmission to humans because many villagers in affected areas in southeast Asia have ducks inside their houses...
don't know the infectious dose for humans, but assuming that poultry can infect humans, we must consider that apparently healthy ducks can also infect humans." There is a high risk of transmission to humans because many villagers in affected areas in southeast Asia have ducks inside their houses, Stohr said.
Boy, is that hard on the carpeting. Ducks don't do much but eat, quack, and poop...
"What is urgently needed now is that governments invest in research to discover just how widespread H5N1 (bird flu) is in domestic ducks," he said, adding that no human cases can be directly traced to ducks. The deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu appeared throughout Asia early this year, ravaging poultry farms and sparking a region-wide health scare. Authorities in Asia culled tens of millions of birds in an attempt to thwart the spread of the disease, but it resurfaced in July. Oh, this is just ducky news!
Bird flu does not transmit easily from human to human, he said, while human influenza is highly infectious. But it can ...
Stohr said there is no vaccine for bird flu. or the regular flu either!
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 5:02:37 AM ||
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Flooding also reported across the interior, from the Galilee to the Negev
A severe hailstorm hit Jerusalem late this morning, as the first significant rainfall of the season arrived. The rains have fallen primarily on the southern and eastern parts of the country, caused flooding in several places. Flooding blocked highway 90 between Ein Gedi and the Dead Sea, and rescue workers are trying to extricate a bus filled with children that got stranded in the flood. Several vehicles also got stuck in floods in Beer Sheba and other places in the south. The drivers were rescued by emergency teams, no casualties or injuries have been reported. In the north heavy winds caused a tree to collapse on a car in Nahariya, mildly injuring the occupants. A man was struck by lightning while walking in a field in the Galilee. He is in hospital, in satisfactory condition.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 2:47:44 AM ||
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...The frogs and flies will be here momentarily.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
10/30/2004 12:48 Comments ||
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Somewhat prophetic that the rains come as Arafat leaves.
House prices may fall by up to a quarter over the coming years, one of Britain's top economists said yesterday. Prof David Miles, who prepared a report on mortgages for the Chancellor in the last Budget, said growing concern about the property market could be enough to send it over the edge and into a crash. "A significant fall in nominal house prices is not implausible," he said, before adding that houses currently seemed to be overvalued by as much as 25 per cent. "It does not require some trigger - a rise in interest rates or in unemployment. Expectations of a degree of over valuation becoming widespread can itself be the factor driving prices down."
The comments from Prof Miles, a visiting professor at Imperial College and the chief British economist at the investment bank Morgan Stanley, coincided with official figures confirming that mortgage approvals had dropped to their lowest level for more than four years. The Bank of England said banks and building societies lent £7.7 billion in mortgages in September, considerably lower than the £8.4 billion recorded in August. Mortgages approved also dropped from 95,000 to 89,000 - the lowest since August 2000. Britons also borrowed less on credit cards and through overdrafts, the Bank said, adding that consumer credit grew by £1.6 billion, compared with £1.9 billion in August. The numbers are further signs that households are struggling under the weight of their debts, with the total amount now owed by the British public up to £1,032 billion. Ed Stansfield, a property economist at the research group Capital Economics, said: "The figures suggest that not only has housing demand cooled over recent months but also it has cooled at a very rapid pace. This developing situation could cross the pond and begin to effect the American inflated housing market in the 1st or 2nd quarter of 2005. Energy costs are begining to take a bite out of formerly strong performing sectors.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 6:10:59 AM ||
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#1
There will be a correction in real estate values more along the lines of a decrease in the rate of properties appreciation and perhaps a slight decline in value, but it's all a cycle. Back in the late 80's people were bailing out of condo's around here for 20K less then they bought them for, and are now kicking themselves because the are worth 4 times what they were originally.
In this area of the country I've read estimates that there will be complete build-out within the next 20 years, and since there is only so much real estate and people will always want some - prices certainly will not collapse.
The ninnies have been crying the sky is falling over real estate for the past 5 years, mostly because they are the ones that can't afford to buy any.
#3
Ain't gonna happen Bomb-a-rama. There are too many young professionals with relatively high incomes and new families stuck in the rental trap to allow prices to actually decline. Most listings are still selling in days with a lot getting offers above the asking prices. Bleah.
#4
Avg house price here in San Diego is $500,000 (+/-). I worry my three kids will never have the chance to remain here and own their own home (at least until they inherit my debts money...)
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/30/2004 11:12 Comments ||
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#5
I, Frank G being of sound mind and body did spend it all.
#6
Don't worry, Frank, the doctors will take care of the inereitance problem.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
10/30/2004 11:17 Comments ||
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#7
SSSshhhhh - the $ hopes are the only reason my children acknowledge me
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/30/2004 11:23 Comments ||
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I don't know whether we are in a bubble, but I do know that a precondition for an unsustainable bubble is most people not recognizing that one is occuring. If there is a bubble, a 25% decline is probably too optimistic. Pessimism and forced liquidation will likely take it down much further.
#9
Like I said, now's the time to get in on the ground floor of Tunisian eggs. Everyone has to eat and eggs are food as well as inexpensive industrial building blocks.
#10
True that desirable locations in the bubble-icious east and west coasts are scarce and that high-quality school/housing districts there will probably hold their value. However, there's another factor that's not well understood yet and that could let some air out of the bubble in coming years: a remote workforce connected with broadband.
Most service industry jobs, incl finance, consulting, creative and high tech professional jobs, are not location-dependent.
Therefore the best solution to SV's and the NE corridor's ridiculous housing prices is continued migration of professionals and professional jobs to neighboring low-cost, desirable locations like the Rocky Mountains, rural Pennsylvania/VA/WVA etc.
#12
I have to admit that it might not be _totally_ a bad thing if house prices plummet next year. Property taxes, which are tied to assessed house values, have been skyrocketing in Prince William County (VA), where I live, for the last three years or so, and I suspect most homeowners would be relieved to have smaller tax bills even as they mourn their lost equity.
Posted by: Joe ||
10/30/2004 8:06 Comments ||
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Princess Alice, aunt of Queen Elizabeth II and the oldest member of the British royal family, has died, Buckingham Palace said Saturday. She was 102. The palace said the princess died peacefully in her sleep on Friday with her family around her. A spokesman said the queen was greatly saddened by the death of her aunt. He said the queen "remembers with gratitude Princess Alice's service to the monarchy and to the country."
Born Lady Alice Christabel Montagu Douglas Scott on Christmas Day, 1901, the princess married Henry, Duke of Gloucester -- the third son of King George V and brother of the queen's father, King George VI -- in 1935. After helping to boost morale on the home front during World War II, Alice moved with her husband to Australia, where the Duke was governor general from 1945 to 1947. Back in Britain, she kept a busy schedule of charitable work and official duties until she was in her 90s. She was the second member of the royal family to reach her centenary, after the Queen Mother Elizabeth, who died in March 2002 at the age of 101. The princess and her husband had two sons -- William, who died in a flying accident in 1972, and Richard, the current Duke of Gloucester. The princess's husband died in 1974. She is survived by her son and three grandchildren. Funeral details were not immediately announced.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 5:45:01 AM ||
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#4
I think Shipman is right - we won't see her like again.
I just hope Harry turns out to be more like her or his grandmother than like his father. But I'm not holding my breath.
My condolences too, Bulldog and other UK Rantburgers. Though she had probably been out of the public's eye for some time (considering her age), she sounds like she was a good person and a responsible royal.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
10/30/2004 12:43 Comments ||
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....Respects and Sympathies to the Cousins. She was born a Royal in an age when they still commanded armies and power, and by all accounts she lived up to the job.
Think about it - she heard first hand what it was like when Grandmama Victoria was not amused. She would have been old enough to see the Empire fight for its life not once but twice...and she lived long enough to see us find other planets around other stars. That, ladies and gents, was someone to be cherished.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
10/30/2004 16:10 Comments ||
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The old standard was that a true lady only appeared in the newspapers on the occassion of her birth, marriage and death. It's a bit limiting, that is--- no scope for a Nobel Prize in medicine, or flying around the world, single-handed, or all sorts of other amusing and ground-breaking achievements. Still, I'll bet it was a standard the royals devoutly wish was still a doable proposition...
The Economist has annoyed me for ages with its sneering coverage of the American scene. Now they've topped their Rumsfeld resign cover for editorial and journalistic incompetence. I've always thought that the Economist had asinine and incompetent American coverage. I used to think I'll continue to read them, because they continue to cover international business reasonably well. Now I'm starting to ignore their international coverage, on the assumption that they are probably equally incompetent at covering other issues as well. The incompetent or the incoherent?
Oct 28th 2004
With a heavy heart, we think American readers should vote for John Kerry on November 2nd.
With a straight face, we think they shouldn't.
You might have thought that, three years after a devastating terrorist attack on American soil, a period which has featured two
...John Kerry, who often seems to have made up his mind conclusively about something only once, and that was 30 years ago.
wars, radical political and economic legislation, and an adjustment to one of the biggest stockmarket crashes in history, the campaign for the presidency would be an especially elevated and notable affair. If so, you would be wrong. This year's battle has been between two deeply flawed men: George Bush, who has been a radical, transforming president but who has never seemed truly up to the job, let alone his own ambitions for it; and John Kerry, who often seems to have made up his mind conclusively about something only once, and that was 30 years ago. But on November 2nd, Americans must make their choice, as must The Economist. It is far from an easy call, especially against the backdrop of a turbulent, dangerous world. But, on balance, our instinct is towards change rather than continuity: Mr Kerry, not Mr Bush. Truly an editorial worthy of al-Jazeera. After some reflection, I can't think of any business stories they cover better than the American business magazines. I think I'll just let my subscription lapse.
Are you sure they didn't send you the Euro edition by mistake?
#1
Are you sure they didn't send you the Euro edition by mistake?
No such luck. But the Economist has been trending more and more towards socialist schemes. I think it is time for al-Economist to change its name to "the Socialist". The problem is that it might be a little more difficult to get businesses to subscribe to a business magazine with that kind of title.
#2
I let my subscription lapse 6 months ago after 20 years. More or less the same reasons as ZF, except for me the last straw was when they decided Kyoto made sense.
#3
Wow. I cancelled The Economist (after many years of being a subscriber on three continents) a few months ago. This leader confirms to me that this bunch of silly prats in London have become completely detached from the The Economist's glorious tradition of classical liberalism. They should be ashamed of themselves.
Check this out:
The Economist's weekly sales in the United States are about 450,000 copies, which is three times our British sale and roughly 45% of our worldwide total. All those American readers will now be pondering how to vote, or indeed whether to.
Yeah, you think? Principled people in America know damn well who they are going to vote for: the candidate and the party that have some principles. If your readership in America is now the mult-culti soft socialist left, well best of luck to you. That ain't me.
I stopped subscribing to the Financial Times for similar reasons. That's several hundred dollars a year the Pearson Group doesn't see from he. I spent the first year's savings on the Cato University home study program.
Farewell Economist. It was a good run of 160 or so years. But what I'm seeing now doesn't look any better than Newseek edited in London. The great minds that would have in the past been anonymous contributors behind your banner are now out in the open with their own blogs and we are the better for it.
#4
Funny. It's been twenty years for me too. Makes you wonder what the recent attrition rate is on long term subscribers. It has to be awfully high. It would probably take Marjorie Scardino hiring Mark Steyn as editor to turn things around for The Economist at this point.
#5
This huge blunder & real shame coming from a such highly respected economics publication which I always review. What position, if any, the Financial Times has issued, or will?
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 5:16 Comments ||
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Mark,
It's not a blunder. It's a betrayal. Supporting Kerry part per se is not the problem. That would be ok and consistent with their heritage if they had a coherent, principled argument for supporting him. It's the departure from the land of reason to head off to the fragrant shores of "emotive journalism" that is the problem, something they specifically decry on their "About Us" page:
Founded in 1843 to support the cause of free trade, The Economist has remained a radical publication of opinion with a reverence for facts. It has become firmly established as one of the world's most authoritative and influential publications. The Economist is famous for its objective, factual writing, rather than for emotive journalism.
Sorry chappies, the value of Economist shares has plummeted in these parts. Get back to facts for a decade or so and you might see a bit of a recovery.
Regarding the FT: I'm sure they will take a position. They took all the position they needed for me to cancel my subscription when they published an op-ed piece by Charles Clover their Iraq editor for 2003-2004 entitled "Natural Born Killers Will Not Win Hearts And Minds". This was subtitled, "The behaviour of the US military has become the most acute source of anti-American rage". Clover is one of those pricks who drank himself silly in the bar of his Baghdad hotel "covering the war". Anyone who knows actual American service men and women would immediately recognize the outright slander in this piece. I'm am glad the FT brought this douchebag out onto the editorial section because it explained in an instant the slant of all of their Iraqi coverage and provided me with an iron clad case not to spend another nickel on the FT.
#7
My wife and I were recently considering a subscription, but after their attacks on Rumsfeld and Bush there is no way they'll get our money.
Just sent a letter to the editor. here's the heart of it:
If Kerry's desires had been enacted, Saddam Hussein would still occupy Kuwait, would have nuclear weapons to threaten the rest of the Middle East already, and would still be torturing and murdering tens of thousands of Iraqis every year. And, looking further back in time, Kerry's opposition to Reagan's challenge to the Soviet Empire would have meant that Eastern Europe would still be under Communist Dictatorship -- and the Red Army would still be aiming an increasing number of nuclear weapons at the USA and Western Europe.
Shame on you. Your judgment cannot be trusted anymore.
#8
This thread could really use that Joachim Phoenix "thumbs down" image, if anyone has it handy.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
10/30/2004 10:01 Comments ||
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I'm gonna drag my laboured stellar analogy in here again. Add The Economist to the FT, Lancet, and AI as organisations firmly in the Red Giant phase of their existences. Actually, maybe that ought to be Red Dwarf.
#10
Classic, I don't know how I missed this during the week: 'Financial Times endorses Kerry, but with riders' Describing US President George W Bush, as "a polarize" who exploited the war on terror to "divide the world into Them and Us," which is precisely what Osama has already accomplished throughout the Islamic world in relation to the 'infidels' of the Great Satan economies of the world.
It's was really funny to watch Osama reading word for word Michael Moore's anti-American ranting. I expected the cave man to also state in his video "There is no terrorist threat!" "There is no terrorist threat" with Mayor Koch after the video threat saying, 'It's a lie, It's a lie!" Long live Mayor Koch!
The Financial Times has endorsed John F Kerry, but said the Democratic Presidential candidate has to show how differently he would deal with Iraq. Does that mean unless there is immediate Zapatero sytle appeasement regarding the jihadists operating in Iraq the Euroites will bad mouth John Forbes Kerry as they have President Bush?
The Economist is owned by The Economist Group, which is itself half owned by the Financial Times? All in the globalist promoting family. When the self proclaimed elite, being in many cases left over, leftwing, 1960's druggies, hippies & radicals currently neo-socialists, but all the while really longing for the protest-of-the-week they so enejoyed of their younger years.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 15:14 Comments ||
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#11
I let my subscription lapse 6 months ago...
Looks like I wasn't the only one. They were begging for almost a year for me to re-new. Too bad though.
Posted by: Rafael ||
10/30/2004 16:00 Comments ||
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Spain's Socialist government authorised research with embryonic stem cells yesterday, the latest in a string of laws set to rile the Catholic church. Spain's previous right-wing, pro-church Popular Party government passed a law last year to allow stem cell research on embryos but only under a string of conditions. It never took the necessary steps to put the law into effect. But the new government stripped out some of the conditions and issued guidelines yesterday so that scientists can start their work.
The move came despite opposition from the Vatican. Ninety per cent of Spain's population calls themselves Catholic but liberal views increasingly coexist with traditional Catholic values. "It is not ethical to place obstacles and difficulties in the way of scientists who are using their talent and knowledge to improve our capacity to treat illness," Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega told a news conference. Research in Spain will only be allowed on embryos which have already been created for fertility treatments and then frozen when they were not needed.
To me it seems like heavy weather in a teapot. No doubt I'm missing something...
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 4:42:46 AM ||
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Zappy should just keep slapping the Catholic Church in the face... that'll make him really popular for a while with the radical elements...
Just keep on thwapping that hornets nest with a stick, and dont worry about the buzzing noise you hear.
The 25 European Union leaders on Friday signed the EU's first constitution that aims to boost the union's presence on the world stage but will face a tough ratification test at the hands of European parliaments and voters before it can take effect. The fruit of 28 months of at times acrimonious debate between EU governments, the treaty must be approved by the national parliaments of the 25 EU nations. At least nine EU nations plan to put it to a referendum - the broadest public scrutiny of an EU treaty in the union's 47-year-history - starting with Spain on February 20. A single "no" will stop the constitution in its tracks. French President Jacques Chirac said the EU "needs a strong and independent commission capable of working as soon as possible on the problems that the European Union faces."
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 2:42:42 AM ||
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#1
Hopefully a European Ranburger will comment on this but I don't see the European Constitution as anything but a positve ... for US competitiveness and a negative for European competitiveness. Yielding all power over customs, trade, & monetary policy to only nominally accountable extranational bureaucrats seems like a recipe for disaster. And the areas of legislation to be (initially) shared between the EU and member states seem broad enough to cover just about everything that the EU didn't take for themselves exclusively. Anyone want to bet which direction power will gravitate when the EU's new top court begins to adjudicate the balance of power between the EU and national legislatures? If I were European I'd be very worried about this. Am I way off base here?
#2
If I were European I'd be very worried about this. Am I way off base here?
Yes.
For example the areas you say that the Euroepan Constitution "yields" (monetary policy in the eurozone, customs, trade) have pretty much been yielded already by previous treaties, so the Constitution does absolutely nothing new here.
And the areas of legislation to be (initially) shared between the EU and member states seem broad enough to cover just about everything that the EU didn't take for themselves exclusively.
And how is that different from the currest Constitution-less EU?
If I were European I'd be very worried about this.
More than half the people scared to death of what the European Constitution will supposedly bring, don't even realize that those elements are here already without the Constitution.
When supporting or objecting to a Constitution shouldn't you be focussing on the issues and the functioning it actually *changes*, rather than the matters that it leaves unaltered?
#8
"The fruit of 28 months of at times acrimonious debate between EU governments, the treaty must be approved by the national parliaments of the 25 EU nations."
Lol. That may mean it's either (1) watered down enough to pass and is fairly pointless or (2) has been forwarded on to die a lingering death. Either way, Infidel Bob's "Ya-w-w-w-n" about sums it up. It's about as exciting as a U.S. Senate vote on Kyoto.
Posted by: Tom ||
10/30/2004 13:15 Comments ||
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#9
Don't bother, Aris -- I'm not coming back to this thread.
Posted by: Tom ||
10/30/2004 13:16 Comments ||
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#10
Tom> I'm not interested in whether you are coming back to this thread or not -- when I'm giving people info, it isn't a one-to-one thing. As for the EU constitution, there are multiple places where you can get copies of it in the Internet, so you don't need to guess at whether it's "watered down enough to pass", you can check it out yourself. Here you go: http://europa.eu.int/constitution/index_en.htm
You can even get summaries through that link.
Anyway, I'm betting on 24 out of 25 countries ratifying the Constitution. United Kingdom will whine and refuse, at the same time refusing to leave the EU and sabotaging the progress of the rest of the nations. Which will be typical. But atleast (if events happen as predict) it'll give the world a quite clear view of who's blocking EU integration. That may come in handy in future negotiations.
#11
Aris is correct, Tom. Nothing could be watered down in 855 pages of bureaucratise. Makes the Internal Revenue Code seem absolutely lucid.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
10/30/2004 13:59 Comments ||
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#12
"Aris is correct, Tom. Nothing could be watered down in 855 pages of bureaucratise."
Mrs. Davis, somehow I don't remember ever saying that the Constitution isn't "watered down".
Especially since my own belief certainly is that it *is* indeed watered down. Much more so than I would have wanted it to.
But not watered down enough for the people scared to death of it about the horrible horrible changes it'll supposedly bring (correlate my comments #2 and #10), mainly Brits and non-Europeans.
But I'd like you to make up your mind, Mrs. Davis. I remember some time ago when you used that mocking tone when I told you that the Constitution doesn't make many actual changes -- then you disbelieved *that*. Now you are using that mocking tone to disbelieve a supposed lack of watering down, and a comment you imagined me making. Contradictory, much?
#14
The constitution foresees simpler voting rules to end decision gridlock in a club that ballooned to 25 members this year and plans to absorb half a dozen more in the years ahead.
It is neither the ambitious document Euro-idealists had hoped for, nor the blueprint for a European superstate Euro-skeptics have warned against.
It includes new powers for the European Parliament and ends national vetoes in 45 new policy areas - including judicial and police cooperation, education and economic policy - but not in foreign and defense policy, social security, taxation or cultural matters.
The article mentions a "hefty charter of fundamental rights", which means that there may be limits put on the states to modify local laws affecting social security and taxation in the name of these fundamental rights. How much influence are the Courts promised, Aris?
What is the amendment process? What number/percent of states is required to approve an amendment so that it is binding on all states?
Also, and to cut down on the snarkiness here, is it really 855 pages of unique text, or does the number include doublespacing, translations, footnotes, supporting documentation, etc?
Is there an Official online link to the document in English that allows searching the document? I've tried googling, and keep coming up dry.
I have an opinion on the matter, but realize that it may be based on a lack of information, which is what I'm fishing for in this comment. I'm sure Aris can lend me a hand. (However, to avoid, umm, misunderstandings, Aris, I suggest putting your responses in one comment, and direct your response to some of the other comments in another comment. Just to avoid confusion, if you know what I mean...)
"What is the amendment process? What number/percent of states is required to approve an amendment so that it is binding on all states?"
All of them. Unanimity is required for any amendment. From a legal standpoint this Constitution is still a treaty between independent sovereign states.
Also, and to cut down on the snarkiness here, is it really 855 pages of unique text, or does the number include doublespacing, translations, footnotes, supporting documentation, etc?
Judging from my PDF documents, english version, and various tables of contents included:
Part I - 62 pages
Part II (CHARTER OF FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS) - 27 pages
Part III - 247 pages
Part IV - 14 pages
Declarations - 121 pages
Protocols and Annexes - 382 pages
That puts the total at around let's say 850 pages, 30 or so of which are probably tables of contents, and most of the rest are not part of the Constitution proper, but rather the Declarations and Protocols "annexed" to it. There's *very* large amounts of duplicated text. For example one single such "declaration" is a paragraph-by-paragraph repetition of the whole Charter of Fundamental Rights and detailed explanation of what is meant where.
So, I don't know how many pages of text if you only count the unique text.
From the Constitution proper, the huge part is Part III which describes in detail which areas of policy and for which purposes and with which procedures the Union has a right to legislate in each case.
Is there an Official online link to the document in English that allows searching the document? I've tried googling, and keep coming up dry.
This is the official text http://europa.eu.int/constitution/constitution_en.htm but it's a PDF. Sorry.
"The article mentions a "hefty charter of fundamental rights", which means that there may be limits put on the states to modify local laws affecting social security and taxation in the name of these fundamental rights. How much influence are the Courts promised, Aris?"
Interesting question. The only one I don't have a ready answer to. Will have to look into that.
From a legal standpoint this Constitution is still a treaty between independent sovereign states.
Aha. NOW the size makes sense. I would imagine, if the Federalist Papers were attached to the US Constitution, that it would inflate somewhat. (And, IMHO, would be a damn big improvement).
Seems to me the problem is the use of the word "Constitution", which means one thing to Americans, and something else to the EU. With the exception of monetary union (something which came with the US Constitution), I would say the current EU Constitution is roughly equivalent to the American Articles of Confederation. *IF* history is any guide (assuming the experience of 18th century Americans can map to 21st Europe), Y'all will probably trundle along for about a decade, then decide on a re-write. A bit of a stretch, to be sure, but exactly how many times has something like this happened in the history of the world?
AMONG the roots of British wariness of the European Union, according to the late Hugo Young, was suspicion that it was all a "Catholic conspiracy, orchestrated from the Vatican".
Ahah! Papistry sneaking in the back door with a false nose and moustache, is it?
That prejudice, the writer maintained, was held by many prominent Britons, including Margaret Thatcher. It is true that many of the moving spirits of post-war European integration—Konrad Adenauer, Jacques Delors, Alcide de Gasperi and Robert Schuman—were devout Catholics. Their faith gave them a strong sense of the cultural and religious ties between Europeans that transcend national boundaries. The European flag of 12 yellow stars on a blue background also owes something to Catholicism. Arsene Heitz, who designed it in 1955, recently told Lourdes magazine that his inspiration had been the reference in the Book of Revelation, the New Testament's final section, to "a woman clothed with the sun...and a crown of twelve stars on her head."
Well, that certainly clinches it for me...
But Catholicism and the European ideal are in danger of undergoing a messy divorce. The immediate crisis has been caused by opposition in the European Parliament to the nomination of Rocco Buttiglione, an Italian politician and devout Catholic, as European Commissioner for justice and home affairs. At his confirmation hearings, Mr Buttiglione said he regarded homosexuality as a sin. He drew a clear distinction between a sin and a crime, and said that he would have no problems enforcing Europe's Charter of Fundamental Rights. But his remarks, combined with other allegedly disparaging comments on single mothers and working women, sparked outrage from some parliamentarians; such a man should not hold the justice portfolio, they said, in an EU that calls itself a "union of values"...
Because he maintains a few personal standards of right and wrong? Oh, I can well understand. If you have such standards, next thing you know people will be expecting you to adhere to them. Can't have that, now. Though it's probably not too much to worry about; his objection seems to be to immorality, not amorality. Or did they leave that part out?
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
10/30/2004 9:53 Comments ||
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#6
Buttiglione has the right to have whatever moral values he wants, religiously-derived or not. If he think that homosexuality is a sin, that's his right. If he thought that all Jews/Americans/Red Sox fans will burn in hell that'd be his right too.
And the elected Members of the European Parliament have the right to vote him down when they disagree with those supposed "values". Especially when it is felt they will conflict with his job description.
Tell me, would you have no problem whatsoever with a person who believed that the skin-color of black people is a sign of their having fallen in the disfavour of God, taking up a post of chairman in a racial equality board?
How about a person who thought that women were inherently inferior taking up a position concerning gender equality?
But hey I'm sure you people take it as a granted that "personal standards" of politicians are there only for show, and never have anything to do whatsoever with how they perform their jobs.
#7
Recent research apparently indicating that the female relatives of homosexual men have more offspring, thus supporting the previously considered oxymoronic 'gay gene' hypothesis, perhaps also explains to a degree the success of gay-bashing as a historically successful meme in otherwise relatively enlightened and liberal societies. Suppressing homosexual behaviour and pressuring gay men into heterosexual relationships helps maintain 'gayness' in a society and may also, further, boost group fertility. It's fairly obvious that homophobia will work to sustain homosexuality in a population (if you accept that homosexuality is genetic, or that is it is in part determined by genetic factors) by artificially increasing the reproductive success of gay individuals. Has it also boosted societies' successes by helping them outbreed their more hetero/homo relaxed neighbours?
#8
I suppose just having gay individuals breed at all is going to have a bigger impact on population growth than female relatives of gay men having a slightly increased fertility rate, however that factor alone would tend to drive a 'perfectly' homophobic society to complete male homosexuality in n generations, barring the influence of other factors influencing hetero/homo male reproductive success. A degree of tolerance of homosexual behaviour might create a hetero/homo balance such as we see in most of the world today.
#9
What's "Peshawar"? I've seen the reference a couple times before, but I don't get it.
Also, the idea was never "oxymoronic", except to those who had a very limited view of biology. The idea of a male-affecting genetic combination passing through female lines, is very old. I remember mentioning it in Rantburg itself many months ago when people objected to the idea of homosexuality being genetic back then -- and my own knowledge of biology is strictly highschool-level.
#10
What's "Peshawar"? I've seen the reference a couple times before, but I don't get it
slang phrase adapted to RB - by LH, IIRC ...as in: what's that got to do with the price of AK47's in Peshawar?
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/30/2004 14:41 Comments ||
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#11
Also, the idea was never "oxymoronic", except to those who had a very limited view of biology. The idea of a male-affecting genetic combination passing through female lines, is very old. I remember mentioning it in Rantburg itself many months ago when people objected to the idea of homosexuality being genetic back then -- and my own knowledge of biology is strictly highschool-level.
Posted by: Dr Science ||
10/30/2004 20:28 Comments ||
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Canadians are buying more alcohol, including wine and beer, though less and less of the beer is being sold by domestic producers such as Molson Inc. Liquor purchases rose 6 percent to C$15.4 billion ($12.6 billion) in the year ended March 2003, led by imported beers. The average Canadian bought the equivalent of 241 bottles of beer, 17- and-a-half bottles of wine and 7.5 liters (2 gallons) of spirits, Statistics Canada said. Yesterday Molson said its share of Canada's beer market slipped 2.8 percentage points to 42.4 percent in the latest quarter, reflecting business lost to discount brands such as Lakeport Beverage Corp.'s Honey Lager and foreign ones including InBev's Stella Artois. Imported beer sales rose 35 percent.
Canadians bought close to twice as much wine as they did 10 years earlier, helping sustain domestic vintners such as Vincor International Inc. of Mississauga, Ontario. Sales of imported beer rose more than 10 times faster than domestic beer to C$960 million ($787 million). Ontarians were most likely to buy imported beer, which accounted for almost a fifth of sales in the province, followed by people in British Columbia and Quebec. Nationally, imported beer represented 12 percent of beer sales.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 3:20:09 AM ||
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Bush gains in all Party Groups, but loses 3 points of a 5 point lead
Friday Release 50-45 Overall
8-86 Dem
92-6 GOP
45-46 Ind
Saturday Release 47-45 Overall
9-86 Dem - 1 point towards Bush
92-5 GOP - 1 point towards Bush
44-41 Ind - 4 points towards Bush
Please explain...
Oversampling of Dems Fri because GOP not home?
They said the survey was conducted "in the evening"...
#2
All the Rs were at GOTV parties. All the Ds were watching OBL reruns looking for instructions.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
10/30/2004 16:47 Comments ||
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#3
end of the month - Dems need the 1st to roll around for their "Gubbmint" checks to arrive
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/30/2004 16:48 Comments ||
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#4
I just had the great satisfaction of reaming out a Dem GOTV telephone caller, letting her know exactly and at great length why I will vote straight Republican this year.
Any party that nominates John Kerry to be President deserves to lose and lose big.
Posted by: dem for over 30 yrs ||
10/30/2004 17:10 Comments ||
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#5
Oh, yeah - also gave her a piece of my mind over Gore's challenge in FL and its effects on the country.
What I didn't tell her is that if Kerry challenges this one, I'm switching parties officially. I've had it!
Posted by: dem for over 30 yrs ||
10/30/2004 17:18 Comments ||
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#6
"What I didn't tell her is that if Kerry challenges this one, I'm switching parties officially. I've had it!"
I reached that point back in early 2003. I'm now a Republican, after 31 years as a Democrat. And just like you, Gores shenanigans in Florida in 2000 were a major factor for me. It ain't our parents' Party anymore, is it?
Posted by: Dave D. ||
10/30/2004 18:12 Comments ||
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#7
No, and I've given up waiting for many in my Boomer generation to grow up and take on adult responsibility.
Posted by: dem for over 30 yrs ||
10/30/2004 19:11 Comments ||
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#8
I grew up in Youngstown, Ohio, where there are no Republicans. My father was an elected official for 25 years. He's also the classic Zell Miller Democrat: strong on defense, opposed to social engineering, pro-life.
Nevertheless, I am the black sheep of the family because, being the good conservative my father raised me to be, I'm registered with the only major party that welcomes me.
Posted by: Mike ||
10/30/2004 20:04 Comments ||
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#9
The Democratic Party left me a long time ago. THey have no room for a pro-life, string defense, social compassionate person any more. Toe the leftist party line or leave the party is what they tell people like me anymore.
Republicans are where my views are, and they are more likely to listen to and act on my pleas for compassion for the poor, than the Dems are to listen to my (much less act on) pleas for compassion for the unborn.
The Democratic party has become the party of the intolerant and inflexible.
If Jude Daniel tries to vote, poll workers won't be able to find him on the rolls, even though he filled out a voter registration form in August. "It was important to me," said Daniel, a 19-year-old Miami resident. "It would have been my first time." Instead, Daniel's voter registration form was one of 179 found in a box in the office of ACORN, or Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, according to lawyers representing him. "They'd been sitting in the corner," said Mac Stuart, the convicted felon and former ACORN employee who turned the box over to his lawyers this week after he said a friend gave them to him. "That Miami office is in shambles."
ACORN was sued Friday by two lawyers in Fort Lauderdale for disenfranchising 11 South Florida residents, one from Broward and 10 from Miami-Dade County, by taking their completed voter registration forms and not turning them in. The lawsuit alleges that the registration drive was a subterfuge, the real motive being to gather signatures for the successful petition to get the minimum-wage increase on the ballot. It accuses the organization of illegally paying workers for each voter they registered and selling the names to a union-based group in Washington, D.C. The case sets the stage for a possible challenge of the minimum wage ballot item, if it passes. "These are first-time voters from the underclass, and they screwed them," said William Scherer Jr., a Republican operative and lawyer who filed the case with attorney Stuart Rosenfeldt. He said the residents are a mixed group politically, and all but one of them black. The lawsuit comes on the heels of an announcement last week from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement that it has opened a statewide investigation of ACORN. "So far the only group we've identified with certainty in north and South Florida as having connections to some of the voter fraud issues is ACORN," said FDLE spokesman Tom Berlinger in Tallahassee.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/30/2004 12:44:51 PM ||
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#1
Crack those nuts.
Posted by: Mac Suirtain ||
10/30/2004 15:07 Comments ||
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#2
So you have an acronym...
Association of
Coordinated
Outlandish
Rabble-Rousing
Nut-Cases
Cleveland police were called to the Republican Party headquarters Friday after a scuffle reportedly took place there, reported NewsChannel5. Two volunteers were reportedly injured. Ebony Garntond told police she was roughed up by volunteers with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. But ACORN said it was simply trying to deliver a letter calling on the Republican Party to stop questioning the validity of 35,000 registered Democrats. ACORN volunteers say they were the ones under attack, and they will ask police to file charges.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/30/2004 12:39:41 PM ||
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#2
Man I only WISH some of these yahoos show up on Tuesday when I will be working. Bring it on! I am not an senior or a woman and I wont be pushed around by: A narchists C ommunists O r R acists N umbnuts
Posted by: Mac Suirtain ||
10/30/2004 15:11 Comments ||
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#4
Time to start fighting back. All this thuggery by the Loonie Left has gone unchallenged for too long, ostensibly for the purpose of giving the appearance that non-Lefties should be "above" that sort of thing. Well, harassment and thuggery won't stop unless YOU YOURSELVES do something about it.
Democratic Sen. John Kerry moved into a one-point lead over President Bush three days before the presidential election, according to a Reuters/Zogby poll released on Saturday. Kerry led Bush 47-46 percent, well within the margin of error, in the latest three-day national tracking poll. Bush and Kerry were tied at 47 percent on Friday. The White House rivals face a frantic sprint to the finish, hunting for votes in fewer than 10 battleground states that hold the key to a win on Tuesday. Neither candidate has been able to establish a clear advantage or break the 50 percent barrier since the tracking poll began on Oct. 7. "Bush continues to hold on to solid support among Republicans, investors, married voters and born again Christians," pollster John Zogby said. "Kerry expands his lead among young voters, African Americans and Hispanics." But Kerry is still getting the support of only 84 percent of black voters, short of the more than 90 percent claimed by Democrat Al Gore in 2000 and enough of a shortfall to make a difference in a few critical states in such a tight election. The Massachusetts senator had a 48-41 percent edge among newly registered voters, an unpredictable group that could be a wild card on Tuesday depending on how many actually turn out to vote. Only 3 percent of likely voters remain undecided. At this stage of the disputed 2000 election, Bush led Gore by four points in the daily tracking poll.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/30/2004 12:32:24 PM ||
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#1
Rooter poll is worthless. Methodology for "normalizing" results to 2000 levels make them suspect to begin with, but if you look at the sample, they oversmaple Dems and undercount Republicans and independants.
As evidence: Black vote is down, and Bush drawing MORE of it, a core Dem constituentcy, yet Kerry is ahead in their poll - meaning somehow the Republicans numbers must be going to Kerry to make up for the loss of black votes. Given the Bush margin in Republicans now is bigger than in 2000 ("will vote for" is well over 90%), and the Kerry margine is low (only half are voting FOR kerry as opposed to AGAINST Bush, and Dem "will vote for" for Kerry is only around 80%) this makes it HIGHLY improbablye that Kerry is leading, given the internals of the poll.
So bottom line: Reuters is playing the top-line numbers to try to create bandwagon voters for Kerry.
Hey Reuters, there are people out in the Blogosphere that can do the math too - so stopy lying and tryign to spin things.
#2
Isn't Zogby's brother a biggy in some Arab think tank associated with the Dems. Polling ultra inconsistent, and averages D +3% - only ARG is worse...
Mason-Dixon or Gallup are much more in the real world!
After months of the tightest presidential election contest in recent memory, a new NEWSWEEK poll suggests momentum may be moving toward President George W. Bush. As the bitter campaign enters its final days, against the eerie backdrop of a surprise appearance by Osama Bin Laden, Bush's lead is still within the poll's margin of error, but larger than last week. If the election were held today, 50 percent of likely voters would cast ballots for Bush and 44 percent for the Democrat, Sen. John Kerry. (Ralph Nader would receive 1 percent.) That compares to a Bush lead last week among likely voters of 48 percent to Kerry's 46 percent.
In a two-way trial heat, excluding Nader, Bush/Cheney would defeat Kerry/Edwards 51 percent to 45 percent among likely voters. Last week Bush led 48 to 47 in the two-way contest. The poll finds the race closer among registered voters. Forty-eight percent of registered voters would vote for Bush and 44 percent would vote for Kerry. One percent would vote for Nader. In a two-way race, 48 percent would vote for Bush/Cheney and 45 percent would vote for Kerry/Edwards. The worse news for Kerry: in the last lap of the race, the number of "persuadables" is falling. Now, 9 percent of registered voters say they haven't made up their minds, down from 13 percent last week. And just six percent of likely voters say they haven't decided.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/30/2004 12:22:19 PM ||
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#1
We haven't seen Sunday's 60 Minutes yet.
Posted by: V is for Victory ||
10/30/2004 18:03 Comments ||
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#2
That's why the SVBT pulled their story. It's the 61st minute.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
10/30/2004 18:06 Comments ||
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#3
just in case we don't know good places to watch poll stuff are polipundit and realclearpolitics.
the former comments on polls, especially the internals, the later has a nice meta poll
EFL
LARRY KING, HOST: Tonight, four days before America votes in the first election since 9/11, a new Osama bin Laden tape addressing the American people and naming both President Bush and John Kerry. How will this affect the race? We'll ask a living legend of broadcast journalism, Walter Cronkite, the former CBS News anchor. ...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OSAMA BIN LADEN (through translator): Your security is not in the hands of Kerry or Bush or al Qaeda. Your security is in your own hands. Any nation that does not attack us will not be attacked.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: OK, Walter. What do you make of this?
CRONKITE: Well, I make it out to be initially the reaction that it's a threat to us, that unless we make peace with him, in a sense, we can expect further attacks. He did not say that precisely, but it sounds like that when he says...
KING: The warning.
CRONKITE: What we just heard. So now the question is basically right now, how will this affect the election? And I have a feeling that it could tilt the election a bit. In fact, I'm a little inclined to think that Karl Rove, the political manager at the White House, who is a very clever man, he probably set up bin Laden to this thing. The advantage to the Republican side is to get rid of, as a principal subject of the campaigns right now, get rid of the whole problem of the al Qaqaa explosive dump. Right now, that, the last couple of days, has, I think, upset the Republican campaign.
KING: Are there enough undecideds to tilt this? Or what do you think of the whole election picture?
CRONKITE: Well, I think it's one of the biggest messes we've had in a long time. I believe that we're undoubtedly not going to know the results of this election. I don't want to knock you off the air on Monday night or anything, or Tuesday night. But I suspect that we're not going to know who the next president is, whether it is Bush or the new man, until very probably sometime in the early spring. There's so much controversy that they're planting, deliberately planting at the polls, that there's almost certainly to be a suit going back to the Supreme Court eventually, going through the other courts slowly first.
KING: Who's to blame for this?
CRONKITE: Who's to blame for it really is the intensity of this campaign. Plus the fact that we have a preface to this in the last campaign. What year was that now?
KING: 2000.
CRONKITE: 2000. Thank you very much. Right on top of events.
We saw that we could go to court. We saw that with watchers on both sides, heavily mounted police to watch from both sides the polling in many states, nearly all of the heavy states. And in those cases, they will be finding every possible reason to file against the results.
...
KING: We're back with Walter Cronkite. Why has this campaign -- and you've been through a lot of them -- been so vituperative?
CRONKITE: I think partly because of the nature of the administration. It's all Bush's fault
It has offended a large number of people quite seriously, right down to their souls, apparently. That may of them deny having
The war has not supported fully, certainly by all the people. Quagmire! Let's have a Viet Nam Redo
The economy has touched a lot of our people. And they feel very strongly about it. So there is a very definite body there in opposition to the administration, as we know. And the administration itself has a lot of support. I think that mostly it's really locked into the Iraqi situation.
I used to think a lot of him, but these comments and others he has spouted over the last few years make me wonder what Uncle Walter's real motivations were in 1968.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
10/30/2004 12:04:16 PM ||
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#1
The MSM (and that includes Larry King) let the leftist clowns get away with the most outrageous stuff imaginable.
If a Republican had said the same thing about McAwful & sKerry, King would have been all over him. Instead he let Crankcase's egregious LIE slide - meaning he agrees with it.
Not being Christian, I don't believe in Hell, but I've changed my mind - I do think there's a special Hell reserved just for these wankers.
May they burn for all eternity - or better yet, may they be completely without any power whatsoever for all eternity, which would probably be more painful for them.
@$!#%*&#!
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
10/30/2004 12:29 Comments ||
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#2
And to think we as a nation trusted this fellow who just PROVED that MSM has been baised all along.
Cronkheit is a proven CRANK now.
NOW we know why he spoke out against the Vietnam war - by pretending to be unbiased and objective, his viewpoints carried a lot of weight - which he abused.
Cronkheit may you rot in hell for the souls you caused to die in Camobdia and Vietnam with your traitorous acts.
#3
Up until now, I have almost always voted Democrat. My boyfriend, therefore, thinks my current fixation on liberal nuttiness is a bit weird. I read him this bit from the Cronkite interview:
It seemed almost, to me, that [Bin Laden] wanted to enter into negotiations, that he was really up -- he wants to move into a leadership role in international affairs instead of the role of a brigand.
His reaction: That's nuts. I told him, they're all nuts. The Democrats [and their media and academic pals] have gone completely nuts. That's what I've been flippin' on about all these months.
#4
"And to think we as a nation trusted this fellow who just PROVED that MSM has been baised all along. Cronkheit is a proven CRANK now."
As far as I'm concerned, Cronkhite was proven a crank a long, LONG time ago. I'm 55 years old, and when I last trusted "Uncle Walter" I was measuring my age in single digits. I had him pegged as a pompous, self-important blowhard back in the early 60's, and by 1968 a TREASONOUS, pompous, self-important blowhard.
Dan Rather's dishonesty is just a minor extrapolation from Cronkhite's.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
10/30/2004 13:55 Comments ||
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#5
the only soul they had they had has already sold, to the first cow-headed pinko commie socialist fascist anything but Bush. The 3/4 of real Americans left in this country can still win the war for the rest of the world, incuding the anti-american amerikan sheeple.
Posted by: Mac Suirtain ||
10/30/2004 14:06 Comments ||
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#6
Arafat isn't the only one exhibiting signs of dementia. Time to move WC to an assisted living facility.
#10
Karl Rove set up Binny....haaahahahahahahaaaahaaa.....someone ask Cronkite to draw a clock on a piece of paper, just to see if he's in the beginning stages of developing Alzheimer's.
#11
Plus the fact that we have a preface to this in the last campaign. What year was that now?
KING: 2000.
CRONKITE: 2000. Thank you very much.
Do you think he really needs to draw a clock?
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
10/30/2004 18:01 Comments ||
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#12
maybe Jimmy Castro Carter and Walter Crankcase can go hold hands in the back of the theater at the next Michael Mooron lie filled POS C movie "documentary"?
#14
This is sad... you know, he used to be a respected journalist. Shouldn't there be someone with a shepherd's crook, hanging about in the wings, to haul these goofs offstage when they begin to disgrace themselves and their profession?
You're not going to believe this. The dead in Hudson County have been disenfranchised. Remember those stories about how the deceased in Hudson rose like the Great Pumpkin every election day to vote the straight Democratic ticket? The best Democratic precinct in all New Jersey, it was said, was Holy Name Cemetery on West Side Avenue in Jersey City. Well, no more. According to a recent study, Hudson's voter rolls have been purged of the dearly departed. You've got to be above ground now to vote anywhere in the county.
The news that the dead can no longer vote in Jersey City or elsewhere in that county produced a mixed reaction among the politically attuned. "It doesn't surprise me," said Bernard Hartnett, former Hudson Democratic chairman. "Reform is finally taking hold." But it came as something of a blow to Paul Byrne, a longtime Jersey City Democratic operative and dedicated traditionalist. "I want to thoroughly discourage such erroneous reports," said Byrne.
Jersey City is pretty picky about observing proper electoral practice, Byrne said. He cited a letter written by one candidate in next Tuesday's mayoral election complaining that a rival doesn't live in the city. The offended candidate wrote that he could "embrace" the idea that the dead have been known to vote in Jersey City -- "they are, after all, permanent residents," Byrne observed. But extending the franchise to an out-of-towner is just not done. (Actually, the city once had a mayor who wasn't even a U.S. citizen, but that's another story.)
In truth, most of Hudson's hoary history as a center of exotic voting practices dates back to the Frank Hague and John Kenny Democratic machines that dominated state politics for much of the last century and operated with little oversight from law enforcement or the courts. Tom Fleming remembers those days. Now a successful novelist and historian living in Manhattan, Fleming is the son of one of Hague's "12 apostles," his Jersey City ward leaders. Hague didn't need to steal votes, Fleming said, because he had no serious opposition. But Fleming, from personal experience, has no doubt the dead did their duty on Election Day. His grandmother died in 1940, Fleming recalled, but he was instructed to tell election officials who came by asking if she lived there to assure them that Mary Fitzmaurice Dolan was still there, alive and well. It's assumed she made an annual posthumous contribution to the Democratic vote total.
The extent of graveyard voting is probably overstated. And it couldn't compare with practices such as the "four o'clock card" scam in swelling the Democratic vote. It worked like this: Anyone who hadn't voted by 4 p.m. received a visit from a Democratic worker. If no one was home, a card was inserted in the door and the voter's name entered on a list. Sometime before voting ended, committee workers checked back and, if any cards were still untouched, the voters were assumed to be gone for the day. But not disenfranchised.
Everyone in Jersey City seems to have a story of voting villainy. Paper ballots were pilfered and used to stuff precinct ballot boxes, occasionally with more votes than there were registered voters. Voting machines made theft more difficult. But Hudson Democrats were up to the challenge. State Sen. Bernard Kenny of Hoboken recalls being told that certain sprockets or gears in voting machines could be filed down to record only, say, eight or nine votes for an opposition candidate instead of the 10 cast for him. The enterprise and ingenuity of the Democratic machines in such matters knew few limits. Occasionally, they went too far, such as the time in the 1950s when whole precincts in Jersey City recorded no votes -- zero -- for Republicans. This raised eyebrows. T. James Tumulty, the 300-pound poet laureate of the Kenny machine, had no trouble explaining the apparent discrepancy. Simple, he explained: They voted Democratic -- had a Road to Damascus experience, Jersey City style...
Posted by: Fred ||
10/30/2004 10:07:43 AM ||
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Happy Halloween!
Posted by: Mac Suirtain ||
10/30/2004 14:09 Comments ||
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#2
The Sopranos have nothing over the Democrat party in terms of criminal enterprises
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/30/2004 14:43 Comments ||
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Amazing that the Democrat criminal machines existed for so long that they became an accepted part of the political process.
Posted by: V is for Victory ||
10/30/2004 18:11 Comments ||
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Republican Mayor Michael Bloomberg ditched his party's Senate candidate -- and his own earlier statements -- to endorse Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer on Friday. Asked about the same race on Oct. 5, Bloomberg said: "I've always said that who I vote for is my business. I'll do it in the privacy of the voting booth." But Friday, Bloomberg said without prompting: "Chuck Schumer is up for re-election ... and I will vote for him."
Schumer spokesman Stu Loeser said later that Schumer was "delighted" to win the mayor's vote.
Thanks for nothing Mayor
Bloomberg made the about-face during his weekly radio interview on WABC (770-AM). Schumer, he said, "has worked very, very hard for the state and I think the voters in the state should re-elect him." The timing shielded the mayor from facing potentially embarrassing questions about his conflicting statements. He made the latest remarks in the middle of a pre-taped show, free of outside callers, just before a pre-election weekend. Bloomberg's next news conference is expected to be Monday or later. A spokeswoman for Republican Howard Mills called the mayor's move "no surprise" because Bloomberg's transportation commissioner, Iris Weinshall, is married to Schumer. Schumer spokesman Stu Loeser said later that Schumer was "delighted" to win the mayor's vote. I bet he was rolling around on the floor singing 'happy days are here again!'
Bloomberg said Schumer "is running against a guy, Howard Mills, a Republican who is a -- I don't know very well, but people say nice things. But Schumer has worked as hard as anybody, and so does Hillary [Clinton], incidentally." When asked a follow-up question about Bush and Schumer, Bloomberg said: "I'm going to vote for people who I think will do the most for New York City." Don't do us any further favours ...please! Where is Rudy when we need him?
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 6:00:54 AM ||
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No suprise, Mayor Mikey is one of the biggest RINO's out there.
FOR a brief moment, US President George W. Bush was outshone by a fellow Republican, Arnold Schwarzenegger, the larger than life California governor who took the stage to promote Mr Bush's re-election - and his own bodybuilding event. But Schwarzenegger's message today was a most welcome one to Mr Bush.
"I'm here to pump you up to re-elect President George W. Bush."
The Hollywood tough guy assured Ohio Republicans that Mr Bush is the political tough guy to take on terrorists. "President Bush knows you can't reason with people that are blinded by hate," Schwarzenegger told thousands of raucous Bush backers at a rally in this crucial electoral state. "But let me tell you something: Their hate is no match for our decency, their hate is no match for America's decency, and it is no match for the leadership and the resolve of George W. Bush." In his lone campaign appearance with Mr Bush, the governor told raucous Republicans: "I'm here to pump you up to re-elect President George W. Bush."
Speaking in a hockey arena in Columbus, Schwarzenegger jabbed the air with a finger as the president and Laura Bush smiled behind him. He playfully wove in variations of some of his most famous lines. "We have gone through a lot, but I can tell you there is no two ways about it, America is back," he said, a play on the Terminator's "I'll be back". "America is back from the attack on our homeland, back from the attack on our economy and we are back from the attack on our way of life. If you flex your muscles November 2, I guarantee President Bush will be back."
Schwarzenegger opened his remarks in an unusual fashion for someone presenting the president. Such speakers invariably plug Mr Bush's accomplishments, not their own. But the former bodybuilder told Bush supporters he won the 1970 Mr World competition "right here in Columbus, Ohio". He has returned each year "for the most important reason of all, to come back here for the last 28 years to run the world championships in bodybuilding, the Arnold Classic, right here", he said.
Posted by: tipper ||
10/30/2004 1:11:28 AM ||
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George W. Bush!, George W. Bush!, George W. Bush!
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 2:44 Comments ||
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Let me guess... all the conservative voters had goa'uld symbiotes?
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
10/30/2004 12:12 Comments ||
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How many people that they surveyed were suspected to have Mad Cow disease, based on the fact that they switched from Bush to Kerry after solely after seeing debate #1. Abberant behavior can make one suspect, and medical tools such as these can provide a confirming diagnosis...
By Uttara Choudhury in New Delhi
INDIAN astrologers say that the planets favour Democratic candidate John Kerry to win the White House race over US President George W. Bush in next Tuesday's polls. "For months opinion polls have shown the race between Bush and Kerry, his challenger, to be neck and neck," author and astrologer Lachhman Das Madan, who also heads the Astrology Study and Research Institute in Delhi, said. "But the cosmic writ reveals Bush cannot become the president of the US again. On the other hand, Kerry's horoscope shows that Saturn is in the third house from the moon which is highly favourable. The planets Mercury and Mars in the fifth and third house have exchanged positions. Success in competition is certain ... Kerry will be the new president." Madan made news after he predicted former Indian premier Rajiv Gandhi would meet a "violent end" three months before his May 1991 assassination by a woman suicide bomber said by India to be a member of Sri Lanka's Tamil separatists.
#1
Remeber when the Left made fun of Nancy Reagan because she consulted an astrologer?
Now picture this: Theresa Heinz Kerry calling the Psychic Friends Network.
Posted by: Mike ||
10/30/2004 0:22 Comments ||
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"For months opinion polls have shown"... some forcasting,lol Just more bunk.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 0:48 Comments ||
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You want to catch the Indian astrologers with their pants down, ask them next time...When will India secure Kashmire for their people? Watch them back peddle like crabs! So much for "piss in the wind" predictions!!
From Iran Focus, the article includes a photograph of the girl's whipped back.
Zhila Izadyar, the 13-year-old schoolgirl from the Iranian town of Marivan (north-western Iran) who is sentenced to be stoned to death is reported to be in poor health after she was lashed 55 times in prison. Azad Zamani of the Society for the Protection of Children's Rights has said that Zhila's health has been rapidly deteriorating. Zamani has managed to visit Zhila although under close supervision of the Iranian regime's agents. Zamani stated that Zhila said, "I am scared; I want to go home; I want to be able to go back to school like other kids".
Zhila was convicted of having an incestuous relationship with her 15-year-old brother and giving birth to an illegitimate child. Zhila is reported to have been in a very bad state while she has had to spend time in solitary confinement under close guard. Zamani had reported that Zhila now has a very bad eating pattern and she constantly vomits. Another source, who wished not to be named, said that Zhila has been beaten by guards while she in jail and has not been allowed to see her newborn child. Reports have also come out that Zhila's brother Bakhtiar has also been flogged in prison. Zhila faces death by stoning while Bakhtiar faces 150 lashes as well as prison time, according to the clerical judge who issued their verdict.
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
10/30/2004 7:28:05 PM ||
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This is why the U. S. should stay out of Iran. These people really believe in family values unlike some families that have a daughter who's a lesbian.
Posted by: Michael Moore ||
10/30/2004 20:22 Comments ||
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Would someone explain to me why if yer gonna kill someone, why do you flog and beat them to a bloody pulp first? Why not just kill the wench and get it over with. Its not like the girl is gonna overpower the mob with stones if she is healthy...
Oh, thats right, these guys are Muslims! They are not civilized human beings.
Posted by: N Guard ||
10/30/2004 20:36 Comments ||
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#3
Better links please.
Posted by: Dr Science ||
10/30/2004 20:39 Comments ||
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#4
Karl Rove is behind this.
Posted by: walter cronkite ||
10/30/2004 20:50 Comments ||
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#6
N Guard, I wonder whether they are even human beings at all.
Posted by: V is for Victory ||
10/30/2004 22:15 Comments ||
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SUPPRESSED FROM THE SCENE ---
The convicting mullah fought for the right to flog her. As a convinced believer he occasionally had to stop because he was getting too excited. He was continually aroused during the flogging, and collapsed on at least two occasions... Proclaiming Allah Akhbar too many times to count, he said afterwards that it is rare to work on ones style ahead of time. When one gets to paradise one needs to know how to handle the situation when one gets to handle 72 virgns. One is tough, and she isn't even a virgin! Only Allah can give me the strength to handle 72 nubile young girls women.
#8
This would not have happened if she had done the honorable thing and kill herself. We should reach out to the mullahs, not judge them. Maybe the un can look into making this part of the international ourt? This is all Bush's fault, elect me and we wont hear about cases like these anymore. I will reach out to the mullah and have them run the courts in private or secret.
Posted by: John F. Kerry ||
10/30/2004 23:22 Comments ||
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Kerry on November 3rd.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 23:40 Comments ||
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I wonder whether they are even human beings at all.
The Benning Road hydrogen refuelling station in Washington D.C. is getting ready for the formal grand opening ceremony which will be held mid November. The Benning Road station will feature North America's first integrated hydrogen and gasoline station. The Station will be fuelling the six HydroGen3 fuel cell vehicles participating in this Shell-General Motors partnership demonstration project. The Visitor Center provides information on this project and emerging hydrogen technology.
General Motors and Shell Hydrogen are combining resources to help make hydrogen fuel cell vehicles a commercially viable reality. The initiative represents an important step forward in the commercialization of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. The construction of the facility is completed as the hydrogen storage facilities are commissioned and the compressors are up and running. The dispenser and safety devices have been tested and are working properly. The first load of hydrogen was delivered to the site and transferred to the storage system this month. The Washington DC Fire Department has certified the facility and over 250 Washington DC Fire Department personnel have received onsite safety and operational training on the hydrogen fueling system. Drivers of the GM fuel cell vehicles were also trained in filling up their fuel cell vehicles.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 8:07:22 AM ||
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Now if they can only construct comfortable, full size hydrogen powered cars, plus enough refuelling stations it's a fantastic idea for US, and as far as Opec, they can take a flying leap into the Persian Gulf....AT LOW TIDE OF COURSE.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 8:15 Comments ||
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The missing Shell hydrogen link
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 8:23 Comments ||
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Mark, here in the real world, most commercial hydrogen is created from natural gas.
Until we get serious about renewable electricity sources, and efficient ways of turning electricity into hydrogen, hydrogen's just an expensive way of pretending to do something about oil imports when you're not.
I think we'd be better off using some of those new technologies for turning natural gas into gasoline or diesel fuel... or more efficient ways of using ethanol. Even if it's not 100% efficient, it's still more compatible with existing infrastructure, and doesn't need cryogenic storage either.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
10/30/2004 9:45 Comments ||
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#4
Gimmick or not it's enormously positive to see a real-world test case emerge. The knowledge GM & Shell will gain from this experience will be invaluable going forward.
#5
AzCat: It would be invaluable going forward if hydrogen weren't made from natural gas. But it is.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
10/30/2004 11:24 Comments ||
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Phil, it is for the moment but that may not always be the case. Real-world experience with fuelling infrastructure and on-the-road vehicles will be invaluable if commercially viable sources of hydrogen arise in the future. The fact remains that GM & Shell are going to learn valuable lessons from this that simply can't be learned on a lab bench. The relative distance between our current position and a commercially viable hydrogen infrastructure doesn't diminish their capability to learn.
#7
Fuel Cells are coming online now - they are already capable of providing plenty of power, and with electric final drives instead of transmissions (like the newest Navy ships are doing), they accelerate and have torque as good as current gasoline engines.
The problem now is cost and fuel source: they need to work to get cost and weight down. Unlike typical electric cars, fuel cell powered cars don't need huge battery packs.
A solution so far is an auxilliary ethanol engine (small one) to provide constant electrical power when power demands are up, a couple of stoarge batteries to act as load smoothers (like capacitors) for peak loads (startup, etc), and the fuel cell itself.
As for fuel source, there are "catalytic cracking" units that can take current gasoline and create hydrogen - again the problem is cost and weight. And don't forget, fuel cells can produce power 24*7, thats why they are used in spacecraft. SO this might be the true "electric car" that enviros really want: when not on the road, the fuel cell can be plugged into the grid to sell its excess power - or can be "throttled back" and plug into the grid to run the catalytic cracker.
The net effect of hybrid fuel cell, battery, aux, and electic transmissions in a complete set up is to produce vehicles that are as powerful and fast as current ones, and drop the gasoline/petroleum demands by more than half.
As for natural gas - we have plenty of it, huge amounts of untapped reserves, if we were not prohibited to drill for it in places like Wyoming and Alaska and off the US coasts.
But until the weight and cost issues are resolved (i.e. the power unit and transmission have a weight and cost similar to gasoline engines), we will not see these on the market.
Myself, I'd be willing to pay a bit more for a hydrogen car if it meant we as a nation could be come self-sufficient (or close to it) in terms of petroleum, and tell these third-world idiots to piss up a rope.
#8
RE: Concerns about natural gas being the source of Hydrogen.
The best way ouf of that?
Electrical cracking of ethanol, something we can make plenty of here in the US. Problem is where to get all the electricity without burning something to produce it.
The problem is that we need to get past this idiotic anti-nuclear power bias and hysteria here in the US. Japan and France have build safe nuke plants for decades.
The US hasnt built a nuke plant in decades.
Technology has changed since the last reactors were built in the US based on designs primarily from the 1950's and 60's, with computers made in the 1970's. There are modern "fail to safe" designs out there that are capable of producing large amounts of electric power with zero risk of a "melt down", and are capable of burning their own waste products instead of having them stored forever in Yucca Mountain.
We just have to find the political will to overcome the Environmental loonies and their lawyers. Because the real cost in building nuclear power plants in the US is not in the plant, its in fighting the hundreds of nuisance lawsuits and environmental regulations and fearmongering PR by the "Green" politicial movement and their allies in Congress.
The key to fuel-cell and electrical vehicles is power - electric power, and that means nukes, as well as other "clean" reliable sources like hydropower (damned enviros again, remember the "snail darter"?), tidal capture (enviros again screaming about baby seals and probably some rare version fo sludge bacteria) along with some help from solar and wind, which are *unreliable* and not all that useful for base load conditions.
Its time we started showing that environmentalism has a cost - and that cost is American dependence on foreign oil, and the loonies that make money off that oil (in Saudi, Nigeria, Iran, etc). All those "No Blood For Oil" types should be pushing "Nukes and Dams for an energy independent America" if they truly believe what they say.
The cost of Enviro-hysteria is high, and its payoff is third-world despots weilding enormous sums of money because they would rather have a snail-darter fish preserved or raise irratiional gibbering fearmongering (and they lawyers to go with it) than put up a dam or nuke plant that would stop the importation of millions of barrels of oil.
#9
OldSpook: I think if we had the nuclear plants, and the natural gas wells, etc., probably the most efficient way of dealing with the situation would be hybrid gasoline, diesel, or ethanol-powered vehicles, this would bypass the whole problem of needing a cryogenic or pressurized fuel storage system, and would work better with existing infrastructure.
(And if you were building infrastructure from scratch, I think you'd be better off using something like an aluminum-air battery for an electric car. Change the battery to refuel...)
There are lots of different ways to get from local resources and/or grid power to motive power for your car, besides hydrogen, IF we had the grid power.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
10/30/2004 12:19 Comments ||
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RE: hydrogen: Steven Den Beste touched on its problems in a post on his blog. (Scroll down to "Hydrogen.")
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
10/30/2004 12:39 Comments ||
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#11
Gasoline is going to have to be a hell of a lot higher than $2/gallon before this kind of technology will roll economically without big tax-dollar-funded research grants and big tax-dollar-funded corporate tax incentives. You guys want to reduce dependency on foreign oil? Just having the guts to set serious mpg standards and an implementation schedule would go a long way towards solving the problem.
Anybody want to lay odds on how long before the first hydrogen vehicle accident/explosion occurs in Washington, DC?
Posted by: Tom ||
10/30/2004 12:56 Comments ||
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Tom. Mmmmmmmm hydrogen explosion in DC. Not sure anyone would notice.
How much does it cost in energy to extract hydrogen from either air or water? How efficient is the process?
Like the idea of saying screw OPEC. There is always the other option of just taking over the mideast oil fields. Ashhhhh--wishful thinking on a slow Saturday.
What about extracting oil from sand in Canada. Is it cost-effective? What is the outlook for Russian oil?
It may be that we need efforts on all fronts to cut loose from mideast oil.
#14
I believe DC's appropriate due to the daily gaseous emissions - they oughtta be able to tap Hydrogen somehow
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/30/2004 14:59 Comments ||
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#15
Just a case of nuttiness. This is not an efficent way to power a automobile. if the source of Hydrogen was sea water and the power source was nuclear maybe. Just using the electricity would be most efficent. We can have electric cars if we put our wallets to it. No wasteful conversion to hydrogen as a fuel source/storage medium. Reactors as electrical generators. Biodiesl and ethanol for internal combustion engines for simi trucks and motorscycles.
John Q. they already have a huge operation getting oil out of the Alberta oil sands, they are doing it now.
#17
Hydrogen powered cars is just a piece of greenie lunacy. Hydrogen was a solution to urban air pollution. A problem which electronics are/will solve.
There isn't enough oil in ANWAR to make a difference.
France has got it right. Cheap, safe, abundant, non-imported energy from nuclear. Its a complete no-brainer.
#18
Hydrogen powered cars is just a piece of greenie lunacy. Hydrogen was a solution to urban air pollution. A problem which electronics are/will solve.
There isn't enough oil in ANWAR to make a difference.
France has got it right. Cheap, safe, abundant, non-imported energy from nuclear. Its a complete no-brainer.
#19
We need to get the Alaska gas line built. The problem is one of pricing, but looking where other sources of gas are (Indonesia) we need to look at Alaska from the defense point of view. Just don't run the gas line through Quebec. Heh.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
10/30/2004 18:09 Comments ||
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#20
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 19:40 Comments ||
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#21
Hot 'hydrogen' stock pick of the week.
'Ballard Power shares surge on launch of Ford fuel cell demonstration fleet' (in link)
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 20:35 Comments ||
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More than 700 bicyclists, fresh off a victory in federal court, hit the streets of Manhattan Friday night, with police making 47 arrests and accusing riders of
The judge, however, did stress that police may enforce the law or seize unattended bicycles that obstruct traffic.
a "breach of faith that posed unacceptable safety hazards." Police, who escorted the bicyclists from Union Square into midtown and back, made 10 arrests at West 11th Street and Seventh Avenue, apparently because they were beyond the route the NYPD had established and were interfering with traffic. The other arrests were made elsewhere along and off the predetermined route, police said.
Critical Mass, as the monthly ride is known, has taken place the last Friday of each month in the city since 1998, but it generated little media or police attention until the weeks leading up to the Republican National Convention. It has since become a flashpoint between bicyclists who say they are just looking to promote pollution-free transportation -- though a small percentage are vocal about their opposition to President George W. Bush -- and City Hall and the NYPD, which are adamant about maintaining law and order. On Thursday, U.S. District Judge William Pauley III denied an injunction sought by the city to bar Friday's ride unless the cyclists obtained a permit. The judge, however, did stress that police may enforce the law or seize unattended bicycles that obstruct traffic. Police did just that, (bravo!) with Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne, the department's top spokesman, noting in a statement that "those arrested rode against oncoming traffic and stop signals and otherwise violated the law."
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 5:53:06 AM ||
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Im disgusted by these loons. I commute to work by bicycle daily, and I ageree with the STATED goal of improving accessability for cyclists.
The problem is that they hit the Red Giant stage almost instantly. They seem more interested in topics that are only tangentialy (sp?) rlated to the stated goals. And blocking traffic does not produce a genaraly positive reaction by the general public.
There are more constructive ways to improve access for cyclists like me.
For the record, I commute only because I can,I need exercise and gas at < $2.00/gal. is making it easier. Geoplitix dosen't even enter into the equation. I am not a LLL.
Posted by: N Guard ||
10/30/2004 13:24 Comments ||
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Next summer I plan on getting to work on two wheels both for the exercise nad the cost issues. But why is it that issues like this always attract the loonies of the fringe element. They want to promote polution free transportation. Yet they try and block traffic and never think of all the excess polution from the cars sitting blocked in traffic idling.
#3
The reason for the strong trophism is that bikes are seemingly a way to "screw Big Oil/ Corporate Whatever/ Detroit" on the cheap. (aside-- and they fail to consider tho the energy costs to produce the bikes, roads, etc.) Realy cheap-- $300 for a beater MTB. This is a major investment for a professional storytellerfolkloristwelfare recipinetbumstoner activist.
begin rant
Bikes have some aspect of an image of being one with nature, and solidarity with the world's poor. (Riiight. Lets see you commute to the office w/3" snow on the ground, Nature Boy. On semi-slicks or street tires, not studded cleats!) Remember how the Ho Chi Minh sandals were a big thing, along with the rest of the deep back to the land parphanalia? Its like that, cutting a pose rather than actualy doing something.
Talk to a real live bike messenger sometime about the issues and you will get a revealing earful!
Wow! I think I just punched one of my own Hot Buttons.
end rant.
Posted by: N Guard ||
10/30/2004 20:20 Comments ||
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Thousands of doses of the flu vaccine have started to arrive in Connecticut, and by next week the state should have enough shots to vaccinate many of the most at-risk people, state officials said Friday. Because of the national shortage, the state will only receive 77,570 doses, about half of what it ordered. All shipments should arrive in the state by early next week, Gov. M. Jodi Rell said. "We will get the shots to those most in need, and we'll do it in the fastest, safest way possible," Rell said.
The doses are being shipped from Aventis Pasteur directly to 100 local health agencies and visiting nurses associations. It is up to them to decide when to distribute the vaccine, said Bill Gerrish, a spokesman for the Department of Public Health. State officials estimate there are about 600,000 high-risk people in Connecticut who need flu shots. Health officials estimate that between 800,000 and 1 million Connecticut residents received a flu shot last year from either public health departments or private doctors. The state is also pursuing a lawsuit against a Florida company accused of price-gouging Connecticut hospitals for supplies of vaccine.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 5:49:08 AM ||
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Middle East producers are expected to provide half of the world demand for crude oil by 2030. A report by the International Energy Agency said Middle East members of OPEC would assume a larger role in oil supplies over the next 25 years. The agency said Middle East oil producers would be counted upon to fulfill most of the 59 percent increase expected in energy consumption by 2030, Middle East Newsline reported. In all, world energy demand would increase to 121 million barrels a day by 2030, the agency said in its annual study. OPEC's Middle East members were expected to provide half of the world's crude oil supply. This would mean an increase in Middle East oil output from the current 20 million to 52 million barrels a day by 2030. "As international trade [in oil] expands, risks will grow of a supply disruption at the critical chokepoints through which oil must flow," the agency said.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 3:46:53 AM ||
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#1
20 million to 52 million barrels a day by 2030 Am I the only who thinks there is no chance of getting 50 mbd out of the gulf. SA will have to double/triple/quadruple its production.
#2
"As international trade [in oil] expands, risks will grow of a supply disruption at the critical chokepoints through which oil must flow," the agency said.
...Which will result in speculation over "fears" and "concerns" that will drive the price ever higher. Crikes, I am so sick and tired of this crap.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
10/30/2004 7:42 Comments ||
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#4
Simple solution: Build more dams and nukes for electricity, drill in Alaska and off the US shore, get fuel cells and other electrical technology into cars...
= import less oil and natural gas.
Of course, the Enviro lawyers and thier fearmongering PR flacks would never allow that to happen. When will we start laying the blame where it belongs: pointing the finger at the Enviros and thier lawyers and political allies as the reason why we have to stay involved with despots and third world morons who happen to have oil?
#5
When they complete the repair/modernization of the Iraqi oil fields, won't that come close to equalling current Saudi output? (Or maybe replacing it, if the princelings succeed in driving out all the foreign technical experts without producing indigenous ones.)
#7
I've seen reports that Iraq should be capable of producing 6-8 mbd in a few years time. That still leaves a 25mbd hole to fill.
There really is no alternative to building 100s of nuclear power stations. The only issue is how bad things will get before there is a general realization of this fact.
And for the 500th time, fuel cells are not an energy source. They make the problem much worse, by putting an inefficient energy conversion process in the way of achieving the result. All other things being equal, changing all American cars to fuel cell technology would require at least a tripling of oil imports.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Al-JOUF, 29 October 2004 — A Saudi newspaper yesterday reported the discovery of what it called a rare coin with unique features that belonged to an ancient civilization. The paper said the coin had an inscription in an unknown language that was not English. It described the coin as having a palm tree with eight branches, a woman sunbathing, a ship and a castle with a dome. According to the newspaper, the coin belonged to an ancient civilization that flourished in Al-Jouf. The strange thing is that the "strange" coin, which the paper claimed had an inscription in an unknown language, had Puerto Rico inscribed clearly on it. The coin is believed to have been left behind by one of the tourists visiting the area and does not belong to any ancient civilization as claimed by the newspaper.
If Jude Daniel tries to vote, poll workers won't be able to find him on the rolls, even though he filled out a voter registration form in August. "It was important to me," said Daniel, a 19-year-old Miami resident. "It would have been my first time." Instead, Daniel's voter registration form was one of 179 found in a box in the office of ACORN, or Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, according to lawyers representing him. "They'd been sitting in the corner," said Mac Stuart, the convicted felon and former ACORN employee who turned the box over to his lawyers this week after he said a friend gave them to him. "That Miami office is in shambles."
