#1
Nearly a third of all cocaine seized in the United States is laced with a dangerous veterinary medicine - a livestock de-worming drug that might enhance cocaine's effects but has been blamed in at least three deaths and scores of serious illnesses.
The medication called levamisole has killed at least three people in the U.S. and Canada and sickened more than 100 others. It can be used in humans to treat colorectal cancer, but it severely weakens the body's immune system, leaving patients vulnerable to fatal infections.
Scientific studies suggest levamisole might give cocaine a more intense high, possibly by increasing levels of dopamine, the brain's "feel-good" neurotransmitters.
Drug Enforcement Administration documents reviewed by The Associated Press indicate that 30 percent of all U.S. cocaine seizures are tainted with the drug. And health officials told the AP that most physicians know virtually nothing about its risks.
Drugs have levamisole, paraquat, camel shit and other nice ingredients in them.
Then there are the "high" drugs that helped Aids migrate to humans. Stuff popular in San Fran communities like Amyl that totally wipe out your immunity...
#5
Or they could just recognize that it was legal for longer than its been illegal and allow it to revert to its prior status. I've always thought that people hell-bent on killing themselves shouldn't necessarily be discouraged but that we might want to give some though to taxing their stupidity as they exit.
#1
Cambodia has long been the bottom feeder capitol for the sex trade. The really terrible part of all this is the parents know what they are selling these kids into and when returned they are punished and resold. The actual selling/pimping/managing of the kids are usually run by women. I found it suprising that in every case I had visability into while working at an embassy, the operations were run by women.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
08/31/2009 12:31 Comments ||
Top||
An employee of a pawn shop shot and critically wounded one of two gunmen who had pointed a gun at a worker during a robbery attempt Sunday morning, Phoenix police said.
At about 11 a.m., two armed Hispanic men wearing masks entered Casa De Empeno Pawn Shop at 4126 W. Indian School Road. One of the gunmen pointed his weapon at the neck of a 15-year-old worker seated by the door, said Sgt. Andy Hill of the Phoenix Police Department.
The store manager stepped out and fired several shots at the robbers, Hill said. A bullet struck one of the robbers in the head and the other fled.
The robber who got away stole a vehicle from a customer, Hill said. There are parts of the movie 'Raising Arizona' that are surprisingly accurate. The tribulations of armed robbers is one of them. We have guns here.
#1
I can't agree more. Although Marvel is a public company in its own right, Stan Lee had often been quoted as saying he wanted his own company producing these types of movies because no one else seemed to be capable of doing them "right". The only hope of that happening is having Disney take a hands-off approach and let Marvel stand on its own as a separate subsidiary while raking in the profits.
Posted by: Shearong Scourge of the Swedes5210 ||
08/31/2009 10:32 Comments ||
Top||
#2
I wouldn't bet on it. More than anything else, Disney does things the Disney way. Conform or get out. In past this meant an initial quality product, followed by the lowest order of cheap crap imaginable. This was the hallmark of the Eisner years.
Now, the biggest influences are the new CEO Iger, and the chief shareholder, Steve Jobs.
Headline of the Day
Have a hankering to visit a hospital in Hawaii?
You could win a trip to tour the hospital where President Barack Obama was born. All you have to do is to submit the winning idea on how people can help Obama change the country for the better.
Progress Now, a liberal grass roots group, launched a new program to urge people across the country to help Obama pass healthcare reform and enact his other core campaign promises. According to a press release, this campaign is the first part of the national launch of the '50 Ways You Can Help Obama Change America' -- a book by ProgressNow founder Michael Huttner.
"The campaign and book are designed to inspire more people to help -- at a time when progressive values are under attack in Washington and across the nation," Huttner said.
ProgressNow and its state partners are seeking entries on how to help Obama change America. The grand prize will be a trip for two to Honolulu for a private tour of the hospital where Obama was born, followed by a chance to take part in a community service project there on Jan 18.
The contest comes as Obama struggles to win enough support in Congress to pass a plan to overhaul the U.S. healthcare system amid mounting public skepticism and unified Republican opposition.
#5
So which hospital was he born in? Like all matters relating to his place of birth, there are no facts publically available to confirm which hospital he was born in and Obama has refused to clarify by allowing permission for the hospital to confirm or deny. I'm looking forward to when they get confirmation from the hospital that it is indeed Obama's place of birth. That will certainly put the birther issue to rest.
There is an epidemic in an old gold mining town in western Arizona: The wild burros that roam the town's single street are overweight, with rolls of fat on their necks and big, full bellies. But don't blame them. They'll eat anything.
It's the half million tourists who visit tiny Oatman each year. They're the ones who have been feeding these critters carrots, hay or anything else, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management says.
The agency, which manages the burros, has launched a campaign it hopes will eventually steer the burros back into the desert to forage for grass and shrubs -- and get them back into shape.
"The town has really encouraged burros to be down there; it's part of the draw of Oatman," said Roger Oyler, the program lead for wild horses and burros at the BLM in Phoenix. "We want to try to work with them to have burros around town, but we don't want the people feeding them."
Oatman attracts tourists wanting to see the honeymoon spot of Clark Gable and Carole Lombard and ogle the wild burros. The town of about 120 also boasts staged shootouts, tour bus holdups and shotgun weddings in a throwback to the Wild West.
The dozen burros that roam the street lined with antique, craft and gift shops are descendants of domesticated donkeys that miners released when the federal government shut down the gold mines after World War II.
"If it weren't for the burros, the rest of us wouldn't be here," says Jerry Love, who has worn many hats at the local chamber of commerce.
The BLM acknowledges that its campaign to stop feeding the burros will be a hard sell but likens it to when Yellowstone National Park told visitors there to stop feeding the bears. "As the feed is diminished over time, I think they'll start wandering out and remember what's out there for dinner," Oyler said.
Oatman storekeepers have been asked to stop feeding the burros or providing the treats the animals are so accustomed to. The BLM also has drafted scripts for gunfighters and shop owners that tell tourists quite bluntly that the burros are fat and are being loved to death.
Some slogans that could end up on posters or signs around town include, "No Diet-Busting Cubes or Carrots -- Please!" "Keep Oatman Burros Happy and Healthy -- No Extra Food," and "Give Burros Care, not Carrots."
The BLM says the burros that don't come into town are a lot healthier and don't have behavioral problems or pain caused by their hooves growing to a thickness that makes it hard for them to walk. "It's a matter of educating the public, but it's not going to happen overnight," Love said. "We don't want to discourage people from coming here because they can't feed the burros."
Love believes that the burros will roam the town regardless of whether they are hand-fed by tourists, but he said he doubts that all tourists will heed the BLM's message.
"BLM is certainly not going to put a carrot cop up here to make sure that nobody feeds the burros," he said. "They don't have the funding nor the manpower."
Jolene Brown, who owns Amargosa Toads, understands the premise of not feeding the animals, but said to cut them off completely from food is wrong.
The animals have been demanding, lately, kicking in the door to her gift shop and chewing at the door panel and on books because they're not getting the food they're used to, she said.
"I'm sure they can learn to forage, but people come from the entire world to feed the burros," said Brown, who refers to herself as the burros' grandma. "I don't agree to feed wild animals at all, but if they have been fed their whole lives, how can you take that away?"
If the burros are unable to fend for themselves and become too skinny, Oyler said the BLM has the option of rounding them up and putting them up for adoption.
A galaxy of pioneers in the south-west city of Chongqing ventured out of confines lately to address a taboo turning against the conservative Chinese culture by opening the first ever sex theme park in the country with the aim to improve sex education, but the idea was rapidly poured scorn on and many local residents even see the display as vulgar. The park manager, Lu Xiaoqing, released to the media that he had been inspired by South Korea's popular sex theme park in Jeju before coming up with the idea to set up his Love Land in China's largest municipality. The park, still under construction, is due to open in October. However, he and his staff already captured enough public gaze last Friday, putting some of the exhibits on display ahead of the schedule—
'A giant revolving model of a woman's legs and lower torso, clad only in an unflattering crimson thong. An oversized replica of a set of genitals, naked human sculptures, and so on,' as was kept in a witness' blog. This, needless to say, delivered more than an emotional shock to the locals, most of whom expressed discontent about the development of China's first sex theme park, which has been described as 'vulgar' and 'distasteful'.
The premature show quickly set up nation-wide debates and then evolved into a general protest, forcing bulldozers to roar into the construction sites. Lu's enlightened idea was thereby nipped in the bud before its flourishing, as demolition already started on Sunday by the order the Chongqing authorities had given.
Last week, China Daily cited Mr. Lu in an interview as saying, 'we are building the park for the good of the public. I have found that the majority of people support my idea, but I have to pay attention and not make the park look vulgar and nasty.' Now it looks as if he were unduly optimistic. Or perhaps, the idea in itself falls short of a close study and scrutiny of the true public mindset. In China, sex is still a taboo subject, and not allowed to be exposed to such an extent.
Fluctuations in strength are likely during the
next day or so ...with a decrease in oceanic heat content and some increase in west-southwesterly shear during the next 36 hours. However these environmental influences should not prevent Jimena from maintaining major hurricane strength [category 3]
prior to landfall
[probably on west coast of Baja sur; waves may get to 20' on east side of eyewall].
Posted by: lord garth ||
08/31/2009 17:08 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
Much of the world knows Petra, the ancient ruin in modern-day Jordan that is celebrated in poetry as "the rose-red city, 'half as old as time,'" and which provided the climactic backdrop for "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade." But far fewer know Madain Saleh, a similarly spectacular treasure built by the same civilization, the Nabateans.
That's because it's in Saudi Arabia, where conservatives are deeply hostile to pagan, Jewish and Christian sites that predate the founding of Islam in the 7th century. But now, in a quiet but notable change of course, the kingdom has opened up an archaeology boom by allowing Saudi and foreign archaeologists to explore cities and trade routes long lost in the desert.
The sensitivities run deep. Archaeologists are cautioned not to talk about pre-Islamic finds outside scholarly literature. Few ancient treasures are on display, and no Christian or Jewish relics. A 4th or 5th century church in eastern Saudi Arabia has been fenced off ever since its accidental discovery 20 years ago and its exact whereabouts kept secret.
No doubt it can be found using GoogleMap's satellite function. There are real advantages to being a member of the culture that invented the tools now in common use.
Ah-ha! The 2,309,874th most holy place in all Christianity!
In the eyes of conservatives, the land where Islam was founded and the Prophet Muhammad was born must remain purely Muslim. Saudi Arabia bans public displays of crosses and churches, and whenever non-Islamic artifacts are excavated, the news must be kept low-key lest hard-liners destroy the finds.
"They should be left in the ground," said Sheikh Mohammed al-Nujaimi, a well-known cleric, reflecting the views of many religious leaders. "Any ruins belonging to non-Muslims should not be touched. Leave them in place, the way they have been for thousands of years." In an interview, he said Christians and Jews might claim discoveries of relics, and that Muslims would be angered if ancient symbols of other religions went on show. "How can crosses be displayed when Islam doesn't recognize that Christ was crucified?" said al-Nujaimi. "If we display them, it's as if we recognize the crucifixion."
True facts are such a downer, man...
In the past, Saudi authorities restricted foreign archaeologists to giving technical help to Saudi teams. Starting in 2000, they began a gradual process of easing up that culminated last year with American, European and Saudi teams launching significant excavations on sites that have long gone lightly explored, if at all. At the same time, authorities are gradually trying to acquaint the Saudi public with the idea of exploring the past, in part to eventually develop tourism. After years of being closed off, 2,000-year-old Madain Saleh is Saudi Arabia's first UNESCO World Heritage Site and is open to tourists. State media now occasionally mention discoveries as well as the kingdom's little known antiquities museums.
#1
Everything is politics. This also signals the decline of Wahabbi influence in the government. The Wahabbis hate and fear historical artifacts of all kinds, and have even systematically destroyed any physical traces of ancient Islam.
#4
I think perhaps there is a translation error. I always thought the Muslims believed Jesus was Crucified but he was not the Christ, not the son of God but just a prophet. Of course having never read the Quran so who knows.
#5
Koran 4:157 And because of their saying: We slew the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, Allah's messenger - they slew him not nor crucified him, but it appeared so unto them; and lo! those who disagree concerning it are in doubt thereof; they have no knowledge thereof save pursuit of a conjecture; they slew him not for certain.
Posted by: ed ||
08/31/2009 21:00 Comments ||
Top||
CULIACAN, Sinaloa - Gunmen opened fire on a crowd of young people partying at a seaside boulevard in northwestern Mexico, killing eight people and wounding four, an official said Sunday.
A 15-year-old boy and a 17-year-old girl were among the victims of the shooting Saturday night in Navolato, a Pacific coast town in Sinaloa state, said Martin Robles, a spokesman for the state prosecutor's office. Another was the 20-year-old daughter of a local policeman.
Police had no information on a possible motive. Sinaloa, the cradle of at least two of Mexico's main drug cartels, has long been a hotspot for gang violence.
Robles said the unknown assailants fired at the crowd with AK-47 rifles as they drove by the festive crowd.
Gang violence has claimed at least 13,500 lives since President Felipe CalderĂ³n took office in 2006 and sent tens of thousands of troops and federal police to battle cartels across Mexico.
The government attributes most of the deaths to violence between rival gangs, although cartels have also stepped up attacks on police and other officials.
Meanwhile, authorities arrested four men accused of killing at least 211 people for the Juarez cartel.
Most of the killings took place in Ciudad Juarez, a city across the border from El Paso, Texas, according to a statement from the joint military and police force in charge of security in the city.
In Tijuana, about 100 relatives of missing people demonstrated at site where a man allegedly helped a top drug lord dispose of 300 bodies over several years by dissolving them in a corrosive substance.
And so they are. To the security of Hugo Chavez and his chums on their rickety thrones, anyway.
Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez spoke about the UNASUR meeting, held last week in Bariloche, and said that "any external attempt to divide the organism" will fail.
What kind of organism: paramecium, blue-green algae, or chupacabra?
In addition, he said that the meeting, at which the 12 presidents were present, put an end to "hidden agendas and under-the-table agreements."
The meeting was called to discuss the presence of US military bases in Colombia.
Through written declarations where he analyzed the results of the UNASUR meeting, Chavez said that it was "absolutely relevant" that, for the first time, the presence of foreign military bases in the region "was discussed in a public manner, open to our people."
Chavez titled his findings "¡Bariloche: Bueno Boche!" and said that, although the discussion was "frank and crude," the meeting "was able to save Latin America's unity."
He added that "the UNASUR is more than a project of simple alliances, and is an analysis of the urgency put on the people" from the area "that share a history, a memory and hope."
However, he added that "President Alvaro Uribe's rhetoric is worrying," and warned that "the problem is that Colombia will not be able to guarantee security to anyone, once the seven military bases are installed.
"Once the bases are installed on Colombian soil, they will be there for who knows how long. And, as a result, peace in the region will be perpetually threatened," said Chavez.
Chavez also referred to the coup in Honduras, which ousted President Manuel Zelaya on June 28, saying that "it is worrying that the situation in Honduras may lose international importance," and that "the international pressure on the guerrillas" be weakened.
"What happened in Honduras was the first step in a military agenda which will only escalate with the presence of US military bases on Colombian territory," said Chavez.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/31/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
definitely the dreaded Chupacabra...
Posted by: abu do you love ||
08/31/2009 1:59 Comments ||
Top||
#2
You hear that, Obama Boy? Hop to it! Get those nasty troops out of Columbia. Has anyone else noticed that since the last election, Chavez has treated our president as a lackey to be ordered around? No respect, just none...
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
08/31/2009 9:23 Comments ||
Top||
#3
Barry Soetoro... Favorite food; lobster. Favorite beer; Budweiser. Last book read; "The Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent" by Eduardo H, Galeano.
Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa announced Saturday he is seeking to definitively shut down a private television station that he accused of "espionage" on his office.
The station Teleamazonas, a private broadcaster that has been critical of Correa and his government, has already been fined multiple times for breaking broadcasting law, notably for reporting opposition charges of voter fraud during April's general elections.
This week the station broadcast a secretly recorded conversation between Correa and a Quito lawmaker -- seemingly the last straw for Correa, who has sought the station's closure for months.
"I ask that Teleamazonas... is finally closed," Correa said on his own weekly television and radio show Saturday.
"They have spied on a meeting in the office of the president -- that's an attack on national security.... We will not accept these things," said Correa.
Also Saturday, Correa ordered that the pan-American Telemundo talk show helmed by wildly popular Peruvian host Laura Bozzo be taken off Ecuadorian airwaves, describing the show as "junk" and "corruptive." Within minutes of the order the show's broadcast in Ecuador was terminated.
Earlier this month the leftist leader, a strong ally of regional firebrand leaders Hugo Chavez of Venezuela and Evo Morales of Bolivia, proposed further restrictions of press freedoms by calling for controls of media "excesses."
Posted by: Fred ||
08/31/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
#2
General Chen's comments appear to suggest that China doesn't really share a view of collective threats like piracy and terrorism, suggesting those are threats to the global system China should abstain from sharing the responsibility towards unless there is something to be gained militarily. I think it is striking in that China, as a nation dependent upon the global liberal trade order fueling globalization, is perhaps the worlds biggest beneficiary of the global security arrangement provided by other major powers.
The free rider problem is of more than academic interest when security is what's at stake. But don't tell the western Europeans that ....
But I'm not sure that the Chinese position is hurt all that badly by these reported comments. They see us as weak, themselves as strong and growing stronger, and expect the local countries to respect them more as a result.
#3
The Chinese never have and never will "appear to suggest" anything. There should be no mistaking their meaning.
I think it is striking in that China, as a nation dependent upon the global liberal trade order fueling globalization, is perhaps the worlds biggest beneficiary of the global security arrangement provided by other major powers.
The Chinese don't see themselves as dependent on anything. They believe they can easily shut the door again. If the US thinks that China thinks they are dependant on anything, they will be mistaken.
If China's true military intentions are truly for the ideals of global security and peace, offering assistance in threats to global security and peace specifically for national military strategy objectives like undermining the security of Taiwan seems like a strange way to demonstrate such intentions.
The Chinese regard Taiwan as an unannexed province and the civil war between them and the Nationalist government as unfinished business. Nothing the US can do offer or threaten will change that view.
The only security arrangement the Chinese will deliberately enter into are the ones which enhances its own security.
[Iran Press TV Latest] Japan's new Premier-in-waiting Yukio Hatoyama has vowed to pursue new politics that would take Tokyo away from the 'excesses of US-style capitalism'.
Hatoyama, 62, who is expected to announce a transition team on Monday, said that he wanted 'Japan to be more independent'.
The winner of Sunday's general elections emphasized that he would distance Japan from 'US diplomatic policies'.
The new Japanese new prime minister is said to be a strong critic of what he calls Tokyo's 'subservient position to Washington'.
His Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) made history on Sunday with an overwhelming victory in the election. DPJ won 300 seats in the 480-seat lower house, ending half a century of Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) rule.
Hatoyama had regularly criticized the pro-US ruling party for joining in refueling operations in the Indian Ocean in support of the US-led forces in Afghanistan. He has also insisted that his DJP party will question the role of thousands of US troops deployed throughout Japan under a post World War II security pact.
Hatoyama wrote an opinion piece for The New York Times last week, noting that US hegemony was coming to an end in different parts of the world. "As a result of the failure of the Iraq war and the financial crisis, the era of US-led globalism is coming to an end," Hatoyama wrote.
Yes, yes. So we've been told for a good many decades now. Only it seems China considers itself cued up for next in line, which I think Japan would enjoy a good deal less than they enjoy the status quo.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/31/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's next leader Yukio Hatoyama, fresh from a historic election win, faced the task on Monday of forming a government to tackle challenges such as reviving the economy and steering a new course with close ally Washington.
Sunday's victory by the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) ends a half-century of almost unbroken rule by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and breaks a deadlock in parliament, ushering in a government that has promised to focus spending on consumers, cut wasteful budget outlays and reduce the power of bureaucrats.
But the untested Democrats, which will face an upper house election in less than a year, will have to move quickly to keep support among voters worried about a record jobless rate and a rapidly aging society that is inflating social security costs.
"Everything begins now. Everything depends on how we can modestly create politics which considers the people," Hatoyama, the wealthy grandson of a former prime minister, told a news conference early on Monday.
Official figures have not yet been released, but media forecasts show the Democrats with about 307 seats in the 480-seat lower house, compared with only 119 for the LDP.
Hatoyama was expected to quickly set up a transition team to prepare to take power but said he would not name his cabinet until the new parliament voted him in as prime minister.
Financial markets are expected to welcome the end to a political deadlock that has stymied policies as Japan struggled with its worst recession since World War Two. The Democrats and its small allies won control of the upper house in 2007. Analysts say the decade-old Democrats' spending plans might give a short-term lift to the economy, just now emerging from recession, but worry that its programs will boost a public debt already equal to about 170 percent of GDP.
The party has vowed not to raise the 5 percent sales tax for four years while it focuses on cutting wasteful spending.
"The problem is how much the Democrats can truly deliver in the first 100 days. If they can come up with a cabinet line-up swiftly, that will ease market concerns over their ability to govern," said Koichi Haji, chief economist at NLI Research Institute.
The Democratic Party victory ended a three-way partnership between the LDP, big business and bureaucrats that turned Japan into an economic juggernaut after the country's defeat in World War Two. That strategy foundered when Japan's "bubble" economy burst in the late 1980s and growth has stagnated since.
The Democrats want to forge a diplomatic stance more independent of the United States, raising fears about possible friction in the alliance. They have also vowed to improve ties with Asian neighbors, often frayed by bitter wartime memories.
You might start by apologizing ...
"(Hatoyama) is basically articulating the idea that the U.S.-led Pax Americana era has come to an end," said Sheila Smith at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. "My sense of the DPJ is that they have wanted a little distance between Tokyo and Washington."
Sure. Go ahead and handle the Norks for us. We'll step back, no problems ...
And China. Mustn't forget that great big expansionist country on the mainland, the one buying up all the raw materials.
Posted by: Steve White ||
08/31/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
"(Hatoyama) is basically articulating the idea that the U.S.-led Pax Americana era has come to an end
#2
..steering a new course with close ally Washington.
Unless you're a neo-Marxists government or on the way, the winds of change along the Potomac means that you're not an ally. Just ask the Poles or Czechs.
#1
This bloke is fit,experienced and well outfitted, the distances involved are not so great, yet he is missing for two nights.
I wish Australia would get it's act together with cell phone coverage in places like this. Not good enough.
#2
Don't count on cell service in Idaho either, especially in the back-country. Rough terrain means no service unless you have line-of-sight to a tower (don't count on it). Many folks forget that a Cell is only a small radio transmitter. And the towers require power where there isn't any.
Or like Idaho City where the provider wanted to put the tower on the approach to the airport (short final, stupid). Still no service 5 years later.
And while the tech boom of the late 1990's was driven by some very real secular shifts caused by unique technological innovation which, aside from the exuberance associated with some of the dot com names, brought a marked benefit to the global economy, how does one explain the subsequent ramp up as the credit bubble was being inflated and subsequently imploded?
Simple - it was all liquidity driven. ... the underlying market did absolutely nothing for the duration of the entire credit bubble.
And the scariest part of the chart is the tail end: even with the unleashed dam of liquidity, the market still has a massive retracement ahead of it before it can recover the adjusted losses it has suffered since the last credit bubble. Ironically a 50% run up in the S&P has not been enough to offset on an apples-to-apples basis the unprecedented liquidity efforts let lose by Chairman Ben.
HT: Powerline for the link & ZeroHedge for the analysis.
It appears that the addict has finally reached the stage of addiction where the drug no longer produces the desired result and the Fed, acting in true addict fashion, is presently engaged in administering ever more massive doses of the drug in hopes of recapturing its earlier impact. This will end badly.
#1
You can think of the economy as a momentum equation i.e. the mass of money times the money velocity (how fast we exchange it with each other).
We've got a money velocity problem, and they're trying to fix it by increasing the money volume! The trouble is that this is inflationary and inflation also destroys money velocity.
What's needed is simple. We need to remove barriers to people exchanging their time, that means cutting taxes on working, employing, profiting and spending.
#2
"cutting taxes on working, employing, profiting and spending"
GFL on that one, BP. :-(
That's not even on the radar for the clowns in "charge"
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
08/31/2009 20:00 Comments ||
Top||
#3
BP I'll see your conclusion and raise you one issue: the overbearing regulatory state. Cutting taxes is important, reversing the growth of the regulatory state is probably even more important.
Levy & Mellor in their recent book The Dirty Dozen counted 70,000 pages of new federal laws, rules & regulations vomited forth by our federal government in a 12 month period which (IIRC) ended in March, 2006. Layer on fifty state & thousands of local bureaucracies staffed by millions of government do-gooders and you've a recipe for entirely depleting the dynamism that for so long drove the US economy. Until and unless the regulatory state can be significantly rolled back I doubt we'll see that dynamism return.
Glenn Reynolds has a bit of commentary on the darker side of this problem over on Instapundit today. He and others are wondering about the selective enforcement of the laws now that there are enough laws to pretty much guarantee that every citizen is a criminal.
To the outsider, the attempted Opel sale looks like chaos. There are no fewer than three bidders for General Motors' European division. Opel has plants in seven European countries, each of which wants a say in Opel's future; European unity does not exist on this file. Opel is becoming an election issue in Germany and is raising anxiety levels in recession-stricken Britain, where the cars are produced under the Vauxhall brand. The Russians want a piece of the Opel action. The company is running out of cash and could go bankrupt. In short, it's a mess. This in spite of more than three months of effort to get the rusty brute sold, shored up and shiny again.
But from GM's point of view, Opel's limbo status is a thing of beauty.
GM's decision not to make a decision on Opel's future is, of course, a decision in itself. As the clock ticks, the bidders and the governments keen to spare Opel from the wrecker's yard are becoming more desperate even as GM itself, out of bankruptcy since mid-July, becomes less desperate. The longer the Opel saga plays out, the better the outcome for GM. That, at least, is GM's gamble. So far the strategy seems to be working – a remarkable achievement for a company that could do nothing right for so long.
If it all falls apart, Opel's bankruptcy and court-ordered sale to the highest bidder, in whole or in parts, is not out of the question. In a sense, GM has little to lose. If Opel isn't fixed in a way that would eventually return it to GM's control, General Motors might be just as happy to see it implode.
[Dawn] Pakistan rejected accusations its army illegally modified American-made missiles to increase its land-strike capability, denying Sunday that it reconfigured anti-ship weapons in a way that could target India.
The denial was in response to a news report that the Obama administration made a diplomatic protest to Pakistan's prime minister over the alleged alterations to the anti-ship missiles Islamabad bought in the 1980s.
Nuclear-armed Pakistan is a key US ally in fighting the Taliban and hunting down al-Qaida terrorist leaders along its north-western border with Afghanistan. However, it's aggressive weapons development and antagonistic relations with giant neighbour India, also a nuclear power, have raised concerns of an arms race.
A statement from Pakistan's Foreign Ministry said Sunday that it 'categorically rejected' the article in The New York Times saying that Harpoon anti-ship missiles had been modified and that they could pose a potential threat to giant rival India. The newspaper cited senior Obama administration and congressional officials as saying the allegation first surfaced in June in an unpublicized diplomatic protest to Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani.
Husain Haqqani, Pakistan's ambassador to the US, also denied the report. 'The accusations are incorrect and based on wrong intelligence,' Haqqani said in a report carried by the state-run news agency, Associated Press of Pakistan.
The Harpoon missiles were sold to Pakistan by the Reagan administration decades ago as defensive weapons.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/31/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
Given that we have evolved the Harpoon from its original anti-ship role into a land attack version (SLAM), it obviously can be done. I suspect the Pak denial lies more in the details than the act itself.
LEH: Two Chinese helicopters have reportedly violated the Indian airspace in recent months in Leh area of north Jammu and Kashmir during which they air-dropped some canned food in barren land at Chumar, northeast of this Himalayan town, along the border.
The MI series helicopters were reported to the nearby defence post by residents of this high altitude area living along the Pangong lake, located in the lap of majestic hills, prompting the Army Aviation Corps to rush its Cheetah and Chetak helicopters.
However, they could only find tell-tale signs left by Chinese helicopters which hovered in the Indian territory for nearly five minutes dropping the food material on June 21 this year, sources said.
When contacted, Army spokesperson for Udhampur-based Northern Command said that "there was a report of a helicopter flying in the area south of Chumar, where India and China have differences in perception on the Line of Actual Control. It was reported by grazers."
A confidential defence document shows that Chinese helicopters entered into Indian air space along Damchok area and Trig Heights in Ladakh and air dropped canned food containing frozen pork and brinjal, which had passed the expiry date.
Chinese People's Liberation Army has been crossing over into the Indian side in this region quite frequently with August reporting the maximum number of incursions.
Trig Heights also known as Trade junction, which connected Ladakh with Tibet in earlier days, is an area where Chinese patrol have frequented this year in June, July and August.
Chinese Army patrols have made 26 sorties in June, including two incursions by helicopters, and 21 in July.
In August this year, Chinese patrols have entered into the Indian Territory 26 times and walked away with Petrol and kerosene meant for jawans of the border guarding forces. The Chinese army had made 223 attempts last year and left tell-tale signs.
The Army spokesperson, however, tried to downplay these incursions attempts saying "there are a few areas along the border where India and China have different perceptions of the LAC. Both sides patrol up to their respective perceptions of LAC."
"Due to perceived differences in the alignment of LAC, the Chinese patrol does transgress beyond our perception of the LAC in a few areas. The pattern of transgressions has remained similar over a long period of time," the spokesperson said.
Posted by: john frum ||
08/31/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Ummm dropping food means roops to follow and eat the food
Posted by: Redneck jim ||
08/31/2009 23:14 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Troops (Keys sticking)
Posted by: Redneck jim ||
08/31/2009 23:15 Comments ||
Top||
Former President Jimmy Carter has just released a new book, We Can Have Peace in the Holy Land: A Plan that Will Work in which he advocates a straightforward solution: Israel should embrace the Quartet [Russia, the UN, the EU and the US].
The plan is backed by a group known simply as The Elders, an NGO started by Nelson Mandela in 2007 to promote peace and assist in conflict resolution and funded partly by British entrepreneur Sir Richard Branson, who originally proposed the idea for the group, and musician Peter Gabriel. Jimmy Carter and the Carter Center are heavily involved with this endeavor; Carter is one of three appointed 'Elders' to the Middle East. The delegation currently in Israel accompanying Carter includes South African Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu and former Irish president Mary Robinson (who recenty received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from US President Barack Obama despite strong objections by Jewish groups over her leadership role in the 2001 UN Durban Review).
The group's objectives were met with skepticism by Israelis, but according to Carter, were eagerly embraced by the "Palestinians, peace groups and human rights activists in the region."
How could he ask the Jewish people to embrace a group known as The Elders? The controversial Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion is the biggest best-selling book in a bigoted world, and is charged with fueling anti-Semitism.
CARTER'S PLAN is to allow the Quartet to solve the Middle East conflict, plain and simple. He calls for peace-loving organizations such as Hizbullah and Hamas and states like Iran and Syria to be involved in the negotiating process in order to bring peace to the Holy Land. The Quartet, Hizbullah, Hamas, Syria, Iran - according to Carter, everybody but Israel can bring peace.
For Israelis only, Carter reserves the word 'radicals' in his book. He also calls former prime minister Menachem Begin by the same abjective and then describes him as the "most notorious terrorist in the region." Of course, he said the British said that, not him. Carter goes on to describe Binyamin Netanyahu as a "key political associate and naysayer" who was strongly opposed to Israel relinquishing control over the Sinai.
It appears that Jimmy Carter is revising history. The Binyamin Netanyahu I know was attending college during the Camp David meetings in the late 1970s. In fact, when I recommended him to Begin for a government job, the prime minister did not even know who Netanyahu was. I have no idea how Carter was so aware of Binyamin Netanyahu's political ideology; he was selling furniture at the time to help fund his schooling.
The former president also writes that at the time, Begin agreed to divide Jerusalem. I found that to be astonishing, especially since Begin had given me a copy of the letter he penned to Jimmy Carter on September 17, 1978, in which he wrote, "Dear Mr. President, on the basis of this law, the government of Israel decreed in July 1967 that Jerusalem is one city indivisible, the capital of the State of Israel." According to Begin, Carter informed him that the US government did not recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital.
Begin told me he responded, "Excuse me sir, but the State of Israel does not recognize your non-recognition."
Carter further charges that Begin agreed to a freeze on building Jewish settlements but Begin told me he had not agreed to a total freeze; he only agreed not to build new settlements for three months, during the negotiations.
Carter also gives the impression that he and Begin were close friends by saying that Begin and then Egyptian president Anwar Sadat visited him in Plains to reaffirm the personal commitments each had made to the other, which I found quite humorous.
Begin told me he had refused to meet with Carter when the president traveled to Jerusalem. At that time, he was no longer prime minister but was outraged that Carter had misrepresented the events during their meetings.
COULD IT be that Jimmy Carter's ideals are formulated by the number of zeros before the decimal on the contributions to the Carter Center by oil-rich Gulf States? These same states do not now, nor will they ever, allow Jews to worship freely within their borders no matter how much land Israel relinquishes. It is then surprising and hypocritical to call Israel an "apartheid state" and to infer that the region's only democratic country is an obstacle to peace - thus the only solution to the Middle East conflict is through intervention.
Carter's final plea is for President Barack Obama to "shape a comprehensive peace effort between Israel and the Palestinians...then use persuasion and enticements to reach these reasonable goals with the full backing of other members of the International Quartet and the Arab nations."
It is likely he would call on The Elders for their expertise. The best thing President Obama could do is completely ignore Jimmy Carter and his plan.
The writer is a New York Times bestselling author of Jimmy Carter: The Liberal Left and World Chaos. A television special based on the book is currently being produced (www.carterbooktv.com)
#1
I imagine Jimmy and "the elders", all wearing long robes, and standing around a sacrificial altar, chanting nonsense words in the hope of invoking Cthulhu or something.
#2
His book sounds like a Protocols of the Elders of Anti-Zion. Like the UN, whatever else this self-selected group of 'elders' is working on will fall by the wayside in their rush to defame Israel.
And traveling with the condemnable Ms. Robinson on a 'peace mission' is breath-taking in its shamelessness.
#3
Begin told me he responded, "Excuse me sir, but the State of Israel does not recognize your non-recognition."
And the horse your non-recognition rode in on!
Impressive though it is that Jimmy Carter can still astound and appall us with his idiocy even at his advanced age, I wonder if he is doing this out of fear that his title of Worst President Ever is being challenged by the current resident of the White House.
#4
Jimmuh Kahtah needs to hurry up and die, like Ted Kennedy. Jimmuh can't even be used for anything remotely "constructive" after he dies, so it's a double-win.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
08/31/2009 22:04 Comments ||
Top||
The new head of Iran's judiciary, Ayatollah Sadiq Larijani, fired the main prosecutor in the trials of dozens of opposition figures accused of plotting to overthrow the country's leadership, the semiofficial ISNA agency reported.
Prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi had built a case based on confessions and intended to prove that senior aides of the defeated candidates in the June 12 presidential election were involved in a foreign-backed plot to bring down the leaders of the Islamic Republic.
The opposition says that the election was rigged and that the confessions were coerced. Mortazavi was replaced by Abbas Jafari Dowlatabadi, who is known to be less ideological than his predecessor, according to lawyers defending several high-profile defendants.
"I hope the court will now free the accused," said Saleh Nikbakth, who is defending six prominent politicians, including former vice-president Mohammad Ali Abtahi.
"Mortazavi was the judicial cover for the arrests. He issued the warrants three days before the elections." The dismissal was Larijani's first important move since his appointment by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei two weeks ago, and it appears to signal that he is trying to follow a course independent of the government.
"This is a good start, but he must make more replacements in order to make the people feel safe," said Abdul Fatah Sultani, a human rights lawyer. He was detained for 72 days for questioning the election outcome before being released last week. "If that happens, some of the negative things that happened might be countered."
These guys should really give the White House a call. I think BO and Co. are in desperate need of any "stimulus" they can get their hands on right now.
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.
A galaxy of pioneers in the south-west city of Chongqing ventured out of confines lately to address a taboo turning against the conservative Chinese culture by opening the first ever sex theme park in the country with the aim to improve sex education, but the idea was rapidly poured scorn on and many local residents even see the display as vulgar. The park manager, Lu Xiaoqing, released to the media that he had been inspired by South Korea's popular sex theme park in Jeju before coming up with the idea to set up his Love Land in China's largest municipality. The park, still under construction, is due to open in October. However, he and his staff already captured enough public gaze last Friday, putting some of the exhibits on display ahead of the schedule—
Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez spoke about the UNASUR meeting, held last week in Bariloche, and said that "any external attempt to divide the organism" will fail.
Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa announced Saturday he is seeking to definitively shut down a private television station that he accused of "espionage" on his office.
