The U.S. attorney in New York on Tuesday charged a New York investor and major Democratic fund-raiser with a $74 million scheme to defraud Citigroup.
Hassan Nemazee, 59, was charged with one count of bank fraud, and faces up to 30 years in prison plus a fine. His lawyer Marc Mukasey, a former federal prosecutor, did not immediately return a call seeking comment.
Nemazee was a national finance chair of U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's 2008 presidential campaign, and a supporter of John Kerry's run for the White House in 2004. He typically donates more than $100,000 annually to Democratic political candidates, including Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Senator Charles Schumer, and sits on the board of the Iranian American Political Action Committee. Bill Clinton, when he was president, nominated Nemazee to be U.S. ambassador to Argentina.
Prosecutors said Nemazee, the chairman and chief executive of Nemazee Capital, sought to induce Citigroup's banking unit to lend up to $74 million based on fraudulent and forged documents suggesting that he had hundreds of millions of dollars of accounts available as collateral.
They said Nemazee also provided Citigroup with fake references so that when the bank would try to confirm details about his accounts, it would actually be contacting him. The scheme lasted from December 2006 to this month, the prosecutors said.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/26/2009 00:00 ||
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he didn't eat at Taco Bell, but did try the "Run for the Border". The FBI was not amused or unaware
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/26/2009 19:13 Comments ||
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Hassan's mistake was not adding 2 or 3 zeroes to the amount. Then the federal govt would have bailed him out.
Posted by: ed ||
08/26/2009 20:46 Comments ||
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#2
as a friend put it: Kennedy has been in the congress since 1962 and is considered a "lion of liberalism". His passing marks the first time he has done something that is good for the country.
Guess Mary Jo Kopechne will finally be able to tell Ted how much fun she had in the backseat of his Oldsmobile back in '69
Posted by: abu do you love ||
08/26/2009 2:16 Comments ||
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Everybody is wrong about Mary Jo talking to Teddy. They're in two completely different places. I picture Teddy's 'circle of hell'. Everybody gets to die the way their victim did, over and over and over again. Take a deep breath Teddy.
Posted by: Total War ||
08/26/2009 2:31 Comments ||
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#4
My comment was tongue in cheek: picture Ted Kennedy haunted by remorse. I know it is impossible.
#7
mcnamara, kronkite, uncle teddy...the devil's hat trick. camel's lot ist kaput
Posted by: Spomoper B Hayes ||
08/26/2009 5:16 Comments ||
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#8
Despite detesting the man and his politics, the loss of life is regrettable, and I hope his family finds a way through their grief.
God will judge him as he judges us all.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
08/26/2009 5:55 Comments ||
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#9
Sen. Jahn F'n Kerry, Senior Senator from Masshole. Jeebus
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/26/2009 6:47 Comments ||
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#10
Condolences to the hundreds thousand of victims in Ireland of the decades of support rendered to terrorists from the halls of the US Senate. May you now have some peace knowing that a judge far higher than anyone is now engaged to handle the issue.
#18
There is no need to gloat. Let God be the judge. I am no Kennedy fan and believe he got away with a crime, but most of the comments today are disappointing. Life has a way of taking care of things, the Kennedy family has suffered many tragedies and who knows whats in their future.
#19
Guys, brain cancer is not a fun way to go. My mother died from that many years ago. While I disagreed with the man and many of the things he stood for, I wish his family comfort and peace at this difficult time.
I only hope that his death won't be used as a rallying cry to pass a monstrosity of a health care bill that will cause other victims of brain cancer to hope that they will have access to late 80's technology to fight that disease (since the newest methods, which I am certain that Senator Kennedy took full advantage of, may then be considered too "expensive" for the proles after it passes.)
#21
Kennedy (and his family) deserve the same consideration they gave the Kopechne's (which was zero, unless you count the effort of the massive coverup of LardAss' cowardice)!
#22
Total War,
Actually, Ted and Mary Jo will meet at St. Peter's Gate when St. Peter reviews Ted's life. I can just imagine Ted's face when he realizes murder has consequences.
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
08/26/2009 11:15 Comments ||
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#26
No, Flash91, we'll name the National Health Care Bill in his honor, and we will have to pass it for just that reason. And sadly, I am not being sarcastic - watch for it to happen.
#27
From your keyboard to Robert Byrd's mouth, Glenmore.
"Byrd said he hoped healthcare reform legislation in the Senate would be renamed in memoriam of Kennedy.
"I had hoped and prayed that this day would never come," Byrd said in a statement. "My heart and soul weeps at the lost of my best friend in the Senate, my beloved friend, Ted Kennedy."
Byrd's wistful statement focused on the work accomplished with Kennedy during decades together in the Senate, and called on the healthcare bill before Congress to be renamed in honor of Kennedy."
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
08/26/2009 12:17 Comments ||
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#28
Condolences to the hundreds thousand of victims in Ireland of the decades of support rendered to terrorists from the halls of the US Senate.
#31
Adios Senator. Where you're going, you get to be the meat in the sandwich.
Posted by: ed ||
08/26/2009 14:05 Comments ||
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#32
He was an inspiration to drunk drivers everywhere.
Posted by: regular joe ||
08/26/2009 14:27 Comments ||
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#33
As with all of us, he has been part of both good and not so good things. And how you define good and not so good probably depends on which end of the beer bottle you are looking into. Seems to me he was instrumental in getting the Americans with Disabilities Act and No Child Left Behind passed, both of which I consider to spring from good motivations, even if not executed perfectly.
#34
Way back when, Teddy called for the US military to be pulled out of Vietnam and instead to invade Northern Ireland, to force out the British. Seriously. But that is now buried so deeply in the ancient congressional records that it would be a miracle to find it.
#40
The Donks will overplay their hand in using his death to advance their agenda. It will not work - in fact it will backfire. They are incapable of learning from their past mistakes as they are enslaved by their ideology. Obamacare will be renamed Teddycare, and it must me squashed just the same.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
08/26/2009 16:36 Comments ||
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#41
I'll hold with th.... "if you can't say anything good about the SOB, then don't say anything."
The last word on Teddy Kennedy. A National Lampoon Surprise Poster, entitled "The Delegate From Chappaquiddick", when Teddy still had ambition to run for president. The theme was after an EC horror comic.
May his memory bring comfort to those he left behind.
Sen. Ted Kennedy died shortly before midnight Tuesday at his home in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, at age 77. "We've lost the irreplaceable center of our family and joyous light in our lives, but the inspiration of his faith, optimism, and perseverance will live on in our hearts forever," the Kennedy family said in a statement. "He loved this country and devoted his life to serving it." I thought about several different headlines for this article: "Teddy Deaddy" or maybe "Teddy & Mary Jo: Together Again." Then I decided not to pay attention. De mortuis nil nisi bonum dicendum est and all that. But after a while, it occurred to me: What if The Distinguished Gentleman from Chappaquiddick had died in 1980? Or 1970? Or any time after 1969? What would we be saying about him now, if anything? I come to bury Teddy, not to praise him.
Sen. Edward Moore Kennedy, the youngest Kennedy brother, was left to head the family's political dynasty after his brothers President John F. Kennedy and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated. Kennedy championed health care reform, working wages and equal rights in his storied career. In August, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom -- the nation's highest civilian honor -- by President Obama. His daughter, Kara Kennedy, accepted the award on his behalf. Kennedy championed every liberal prescription there was. He was the baseline of liberalism, utterly lacking in any concept of cause and effect or the Law of Unintended Side Effects. As a result, programs he championed have been damaging the nation for year after year, and will form a legacy that will live on for years after his Eternal Flame has flickered out. Mocked by Vaughn Meader when his elder bother was president as the dumbass of the boyz, he lived up to his billing when he inherited the Senate seat -- with the exception of his political skills, which were machine-like in their smooth workings. He was returned to the Senate for term after term by the people of Massachussetts, who are legendary in the willingness to abide and even take pride in corruption that would make the Tweed Gang blanch.
Kennedy was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor in May 2008 and underwent a successful brain surgery soon after that. But his health continued to deteriorate, and Kennedy suffered a seizure while attending the luncheon following President Barack Obama's inauguration. Being polite and well-bred folk, we've mostly been reluctant to gloat at Kennedy's illness. On the other hand, it hasn't distressed me all that much. I didn't like him, thought him a bad person personally -- entirely too conscious of the inferiority of the Little People® he championed, with cocktail waitresses high on the list. He was a souse. He was a serial ass-grabber and an adulterer. He probably practiced several other sins I don't know about.
For Kennedy, the ascension of Obama was an important step toward realizing his goal of health care reform. At the Democratic National Convention in August 2008, the Massachusetts Democrat promised, "I pledge to you that I will be there next January on the floor of the United States Senate when we begin the great test." Sen. Kennedy made good on that pledge, but ultimately lost his battle with cancer. I had no doubt he was going to lose his battle with inoperable brain cancer at the age of 76. It was merely a question of how long he was going to last, and how much further damage he cold do to the nation before Beelzebub came to carry him off.
Kennedy was first elected to the Senate in 1962, at the age of 30, and his tenure there would span four decades. A hardworking, well-liked politician who became the standard-bearer of his brothers' liberal causes, his career was clouded by allegations of personal immorality and accusations that his family's clout helped him avoid the consequences of an accident that left a young woman dead. That would be Mary Jo, of course. I remember listening to His Enormity's talk on the accident on the radio a day or two after it happened. That was 40 years ago, so I can't recall the exact words. I can remember my eyebrows bumping into my hairline, though. It sounded phony at the time, and what I was left with was the certainty that he had left the girl to drown. His description of the event couldn't disguise that, even taking his description as literal truth. He spent the night sleeping in bourbon-induced slumber, while her body bobbed inside the car.
But for the younger members of the Kennedy clan, from his own three children to those of his brothers JFK and RFK, Ted Kennedy -- once seen as the youngest and least talented in a family of glamorous overachievers -- was both a surrogate father and the center of the family. And certainly it was Ted Kennedy who bore many of the tragedies of the family -- the violent deaths of four of his siblings, his son's battle with cancer, and the death of his nephew John F. Kennedy Jr. in a plane crash. more at link
Three pages of dense text more. Everything you didn't realize you wanted to know.
Rhode Island will shut down its state government for 12 days and hopes to trim millions of dollars in funding for local governments under a plan Gov. Don Carcieri outlined Monday to balance a budget hammered by surging unemployment and plummeting tax revenue.
The shutdown will force 81 percent of the roughly 13,550-member state work force, excluding its college system, to stay home a dozen days without pay before the start of the new fiscal year in July.
The closures come as the worst recession in decades has eliminated hundreds of millions of dollars in tax collections and pushed unemployment to 12.7 percent, the second-highest jobless rate in the nation behind Michigan.
Carcieri predicted the state's fiscal future could grow even bleaker. "There are going to be inconveniences for the public, and there are going to be sacrifices, as I said, for state employees," Carcieri said at a Statehouse news conference. "These steps right now are unavoidable if the state is to live within its budget, live within its means."
Posted by: Fred ||
08/26/2009 00:00 ||
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..excluding its college system,
It's time for a lot of states to reevaluate their college systems. How much redundancy is in the system? How many do they actually graduate that stay around to support the local/state economy? For state institutions it time to move back to A&Ms. That use to be agricultural and mechanical, but in today's terms it would be application and medical. Time for expensive tracks with little or no job employment opportunities be given up to private schools. It's time to end programs and studies that do not support those who are taxed/stuck with supporting them.
#3
That's 1 out of very 20 work days. Beats being laid off like the taxpaying schmoes.
Posted by: ed ||
08/26/2009 13:53 Comments ||
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#4
Last week in Maryland a Federal judge declared a very similar program in violation of labor contracts, and has ordered Prince George's County to pay out $17 million on lost wages to the affected unionized employees. Link here.
#5
But the work still needs to be done. Some will be working as hard on their off days as they do when permitted into their offices, only unpaid. One hopes there will be some quiet reprioritization.
Mr. Wife had an experience like that while on assignment in Germany. Like any good American manager, he'd been going in on weekends to get his paperwork caught up. After about six months of this behaviour, he got a letter telling him that if he did not cease and desist he would be called before a Works Council for reprimand -- his contract called for 40 hours per week, and he was therefore not permitted to work more. But the work nonetheless had to be gotten done, so he brought it home. In Belgium there were no such issues.
#6
Work still needs to be done, but we've been warned (U. Wisconsin) not to dream of working on furlough days no matter what happens. The consequences weren't specified. (Fermilab warned employees not to even look at their email on those days.)
We're getting a pay cut in lieu of layoffs. It seems more honest just to say so instead of dinking around with "furlough days," but I suppose they needed some fancy nonsense to get around labor contracts.
Posted by: James ||
08/26/2009 17:29 Comments ||
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#7
Nobody can stop y'all from thinking, James, not even yourselves. Nor jotting those thoughts down. (I saw my father trying when he was supposed to be asleep at night. It might have been easier had he been in some way athletic.) Whoever is warning you is covering himself against lawsuits for lost pay when y'all think about your projects anyway.
(Bloomberg) -- U.S. unemployment will surge to 10 percent this year and the budget deficit will be $1.5 trillion next year, both higher than previous Obama administration forecasts because of a recession that was deeper and longer than expected, White House budget chief Peter Orszag said.
The Office of Management and Budget forecasts a weaker economic recovery than it saw in May, as the gross domestic product shrinks 2.8 percent this year before expanding 2 percent next year, according to the administration's mid-year economic review issued today. The Congressional Budget Office, in a separate assessment, forecast the economy will grow 2.8 percent next year. Both see the GDP expanding 3.8 percent in 2011.
"While the danger of the economy immediately falling into a deep recession has receded, the American economy is still in the midst of a serious economic downturn," the White House report said. "The long-term deficit outlook remains daunting."
The budget shortfall for 2010 would mark the second straight year of trillion-dollar deficits. Along with the unemployment numbers, the deficit may weigh on President Barack Obama's drive for his top domestic priority, overhauling the U.S. health care system.
"It throws a wrench in health-care reforms," Maya MacGuineas, president of the bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, said in an interview. "No matter the specific numbers, they're a constant reminder that we're in bad, bad shape."
Posted by: Fred ||
08/26/2009 00:00 ||
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It is actually 12 Trillion but they like to lie.
When the US bond rating is reduced, it will be 22 trillion dollars.
#3
This is on top of the estimated 2009 federal deficit of $1.8-2.0 trillion. 2,000,000,000,000. Those numbers have gotten are so large they are beyond any meaning for most people.
Everett Dirksen's subterranean rotation rate should be approaching the speed of light.
Posted by: ed ||
08/26/2009 21:13 Comments ||
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#4
I guess a harvard education isn't all it's cracked up to be...
#3
Or the nooks and crannies 4 rent controlled apartments he leases. Mr. Rangel, who has a net worth of $566,000 to $1.2 million, according to Congressional disclosure records, paid a total rent of $3,894 monthly in 2007 for the four apartments at Lenox Terrace, a 1,700-unit luxury development of six towers, with doormen, that is described in real estate publications as Harlems most prestigious address.
The current market-rate rent for similar apartments in Mr. Rangels building would total $7,465 to $8,125 a month, according to the Web site of the owner, the Olnick Organization.
Posted by: ed ||
08/26/2009 13:50 Comments ||
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A freshman House Democrat from Alabama said Tuesday he would not vote for Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) as Speaker again because of her "divisive and polarizing" image.
"I would not vote for her," Rep. Parker Griffith (D-Ala.) told a constituent at a town hall meeting when asked if he'd support Pelosi. "Someone that divisive and that polarizing cannot bring us together."
Griffith represents a conservative district in Alabama that had been long held by former Rep. Bud Cramer (D), who retired after nine terms. Griffith is one of the most conservative Democrats in the House and has bucked leadership and the White House on healthcare and other issues.
Griffith told constituents that only Blue Dog Democrats could prevent the healthcare bill from moving forward in the House, The Huntsville Times reported. He said that conservative Republicans couldn't stop Democratic priorities.
The first-term lawmaker won last fall with 52 percent of the vote in a district carried by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). He's expected to face a tough reelection challenge from a Republican next fall.
Analysts have highlighted Griffith's district as one likely to flip to Republican control next fall. The Cook Political Report recently projected that Democrats could lose at least 20 seats in next year's midterm elections.
Griffith joked that if Pelosi didn't care for his criticism, he has a message for her. "If she doesn't like it, I've got a gift certificate to the mental health center," he said, according to the Times.
In 2007 and again in 2009, Pelosi received unanimous support from House Democrats in the elections for Speaker.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/26/2009 00:00 ||
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House Ways and Means Chairman Charles B. Rangel , already beset by a series of ethics investigations, has disclosed more than $500,000 in previously unreported assets.
Among the new items on Rangel's amended 2007 financial disclosure report were an account at the Congressional Federal Credit Union worth at least $250,000, an investment account with at least $250,000, land in southern New Jersey and stock in PepsiCo and fast food conglomerate Yum! Brands. None of those investments appeared on the original report, which was filled out by hand and filed in May 2008.
According to the original report, Rangel's net worth was between $516,015 and $1,316,000, while the amended report showed his net worth, as of Dec. 31, 2007, roughly double that amount -- at least $1,028,024 and as much as $2,495,000.
Rangel also revised his disclosed investment income from 2007. The original report showed he had received between $6,511 and $17,900, but the new report shows between $45,423 and $134,700.
House rules allow lawmakers to exclude their personal residences and report asset values within broad ranges.
Rangel's office, his lawyers and his forensic accountants have not yet responded to requests for comment. So a congressman has a forensic accountant?
Rangel, D-N.Y., filed the new paperwork Aug. 12, along with his months-late 2008 report. They were released by the House this week. The reports are required annually for members. Lawmakers frequently amend their financial statements, but rarely do they make such drastic changes.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/26/2009 00:00 ||
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PITY Leon Panetta. The CIA director counseled the Obama administration against releasing classified interrogation memos from the Bush years. And got ignored.
Then, Nancy Pelosi said his agency lied to her about post-9/11 interrogations, and Democrats rushed to try to back her up.
Now, Attorney General Eric Holder has tasked a prosecutor with looking into reopening criminal cases against CIA employees and contractors.
Such is life at Langley under an administration betraying liberalism's typical contempt for covert action and its inevitable moral complications.
No wonder ABC News is reporting that Panetta recently uncorked a profanity-laced tirade about the Justice Department at the White House and is contemplating quitting. (The CIA denies it.)
If Panetta were shrewd, he'd make a play for a position that would command more respect -- say, assistant secretary for planning and evaluation at the Department of Health and Human Services.
Panetta has had to write another letter to CIA employees meant to keep their morale up. For those keeping count, it's his sixth. No matter how many missives he writes earnestly committing himself and his agency to looking ahead, the rest of his administration and party drags him back into the past.
As far as they are concerned, he's merely a frontman for Bush-era criminality.
In response to an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit, a judge ordered the administration to release a 2004 CIA inspector general report about interrogation practices. Although often discomfiting reading (one incident involved a power drill), the report also outlines the CIA's nearly obsessive quest for legal guidance and its intolerance for unauthorized methods as piddling as blowing cigar smoke at detainees.
Consider the fate of the CIA officer who used a gun to frighten Abd al-Nashiri, the alleged mastermind of the USS Cole bombing. He did it in 2002. The agency immediately called him back to headquarters. He faced an internal accountability board, suffered a reprimand and eventually resigned.
The Justice Department looked into the case because threatening a detainee with "imminent death" is torture, but declined to prosecute.
Proving torture in a court of law is much harder than braying about it on op-ed pages.
The CIA certainly didn't act like an agency with a guilty conscience. It didn't try to cover up any abuses, but undertook the inspector general investigation and forwarded the report to Congress and the Justice Department.
In one case, Justice got a conviction against a contractor who -- in an obvious crime -- beat a detainee to death.
But what possible public interest can be served in reopening murkier cases years after the fact, when the CIA already took internal action and career prosecutors already examined them?
The next time CIA officers are told that they have to be more aggressive in protecting their country, they could be forgiven for saying "no thanks."
Which is precisely the point ...
Posted by: Fred ||
08/26/2009 00:00 ||
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Leon is vilified by pretty much everyone's contempt at this point. Even his mom thinks he is a bit of a dipswitch. Nice that Obama could bring us all together, though.
Glenn Beck used his popular Fox News show this afternoon to attack the background of Van Jones, a White House environmental advisor who co-founded an African American political advocacy group that organized an advertising boycott of his program.
During his 2 p.m. PDT show, Beck did not address the boycott spearheaded by Color of Change to protest the talk show host's remark last month that he believes President Obama is "a racist."
Instead, he spent a large share of his program suggesting that Jones, who co-founded Color of Change in 2005, is a radical. Jones now serves as a special advisor for Green Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation at the White House Council on Environmental Quality.
During a six-minute biographical profile, set to ominous music, Beck said Jones was twice arrested for political protests and has described himself as a "rowdy black nationalist." The talk show host cast the piece as part of a broader examination of Obama's "czars," special advisers to the president who "don't answer to anybody."
"Why is it that such a committed revolutionary has made it so high into the Obama administration as one of his chief advisers?" Beck asked.
Christine Glunz, a spokeswoman for the White House Council on Environmental Quality, noted that Jones has been lauded as an environmental hero and said his entire focus is on "building clean energy incentives which create 21st-century jobs."
"Glenn Beck is trying to change the subject," said James Rucker, executive director of Color of Change, who noted that Jones has not been active with the group in almost two years. "The issue is his baseless fear mongering."
Beck has gone after Jones in the past. On July 28, he called the activist a "self-professed communist" and questioned the role he was playing in the administration. His latest assault on Jones came as Color of Change announced that it has secured commitments from 36 companies who have pledged not to advertise on Beck's popular program, including Wal-Mart and Sprint. However, some of the companies never had a presence on "Glenn Beck." Representatives of Procter & Gamble and AT&T -- listed by Color of Change as companies that had signed onto the boycott -- told The Times that their companies did not run spots on Beck's program to begin with.
While the advertising boycott has generated substantial media coverage, Fox News said it has not impacted the network's revenues or Beck's audience. "The advertisers referenced have all moved their spots from Beck to other programs on the network so there has been no revenue lost," a spokeswoman said.
Since his Fox News show launched in January, Beck has attracted a sizable audience with his strident denunciations of the Obama administration and apocalyptic warnings about the country's direction. Late last month, during an appearance on the morning show "Fox & Friends," he accused Obama of having "a deep-seated hatred for white people or the white culture."
"This guy is, I believe, a racist," he added.
The flap that ensued did not appear to dampen Beck's viewership. This month, his show has averaged 2.25 million viewers, 99% more than tuned in during the same period last year, when the network aired "America's Election HQ" during the time period. And his ratings are up from July, when Beck's program averaged 2.05 million viewers. Fan websites such as Defend Glenn have called for viewers to fight back against the advertising boycott, and some media veterans have denounced the tactic as a suppression of free speech.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/26/2009 00:00 ||
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A friend isn't even a Beck fan but wrote to several advertisers that pulled their spots and is now boycotting them. He's been nailing it lately, tying several radical czars and the unions to Obama. Expect more vitriol after this week's show.
#2
Becky has MAHA-RUSHIE RUSH LIMBAUGH as his Call-In guest this AM > IIRC RUSH has broadly labeled POTUS BAMMER's ADMIN = TENURE + POLICIES as the "MOST DANGEROUS TIME/PERIOD IN AMERICA", AT LEAST WITHIN [RUSH'S] LIFETIME.
Also, RUSH > the Bammer's Agendum + Policies, etc. are bringing "STATE-ISM + TOTALITARIANISM" IN AMERICA, but in the end will fail becuz Amers LOVE THEIR FREEDOM OF SPEECH + LIBERTIES TOO MUCH TO ALLOW ANY FORM OF GOVT TO TAKE IT AWAY FROM THEM.
So many people just dying to see him, the business guys, the pols, the lobbyists -- lots and lots of lobbyists. They circle Charlie Rangel -- birthday boy, Democrat and, of course, House Ways and Means chairman -- circles like rings on a tree planted in the party room here at Tavern on the Green. Simple math: the more powerful the pol, the more rings on the tree. This is a very thick tree.
Not a problem, though, for Heather Podesta.
"It's like doing the tango!" she says, all smiles yet all business.
A "furious" Rep. Peter King, the hawkish, maverick Long Island Republican, blasted a "disgraceful" Eric Holder for opening an investigation of CIA interrogators and chided his own party for what he described as a weak response to the move in an interview just now with POLITICO.
"It's bulls***. It's disgraceful. You wonder which side they're on," he said of the attorney general's move, which he described as a "declaration of war against the CIA, and against common sense."
"It's a total breach of faith, and either the president is intentionally caving to the left wing of his party or he's lost control of his administration," said King, the ranking Republican on the House Committee on Homeland Security and a member of the House Select Committee on Intelligence.
King, channeling both the sense of outrage and of political opportunity felt in parts of the GOP, defended in detail the interrogation practices -- threats to kill a detainee's family, and or to kill a detainee with a power drill -- detailed in a CIA inspector general report released yesterday.
"You're talking about threatening to kill a guy, threatening to attack his family, threatening to use an electric drill on him -- but never doing it," King said. "You have that on the one hand -- and on the other you have the [interrogator's] attempt to prevent thousands of Americans from being killed."
"When Holder was talking about being 'shocked' [before the report's release], I thought they were going to have cutting guys' fingers off or something -- or that they actually used the power drill," he said.
Pressed on whether interrogators had actually broken the law, King said he didn't think the Geneva Convention "applies to terrorists," and that the line between permitted and outlawed interrogation policies in the Bush years was "a distinction without a difference."
Posted by: Fred ||
08/26/2009 00:00 ||
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i have not wondered at all which side they are on for quite a while. 0bama and his crew are firmly in the tank for the enemy.
Posted by: abu do you love ||
08/26/2009 2:00 Comments ||
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I was invited by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to take part in a conference call that invited a group of rising artist and art community luminaries to help lay a new foundation for growth, focusing on core areas of the recovery agenda - health care, energy and environment, safety and security, education, community renewal.
...
it felt to me that by providing issues as a cynosure for inspiration to a handpicked arts group - a group that played a key role in the Presidents election as mentioned throughout the conference call - the National Endowment for the Arts was steering the art community toward creating art on the very issues that are currently under contentious national debate; those being health care reform and cap-and-trade legislation. Could the National Endowment for the Arts be looking to the art community to create an environment amenable to the administrations positions?
...
We were encouraged to bring the same sense of enthusiasm to these focus areas as we had brought to Obamas presidential campaign, and we were encouraged to create art and art initiatives that brought awareness to these issues. Throughout the conversation, we were reminded of our ability as artists and art professionals to shape the lives of those around us. The now famous Obama Hope poster, created by artist Shepard Fairey and promoted by many of those on the phone call, and will.i.ams Yes We Can song and music video were presented as shining examples of our groups clear role in the election.
#1
The public won't notice any difference from the NEA carrying the Soviets' water to giving Comrade One a tongue bath. Well, except for the nasty aftertaste.
Posted by: ed ||
08/26/2009 20:59 Comments ||
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#2
HEY! THAT'S OUR JOB!!
Posted by: The Press ||
08/26/2009 21:41 Comments ||
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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.
Sen. Ted Kennedy died shortly before midnight Tuesday at his home in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, at age 77. "We've lost the irreplaceable center of our family and joyous light in our lives, but the inspiration of his faith, optimism, and perseverance will live on in our hearts forever," the Kennedy family said in a statement. "He loved this country and devoted his life to serving it." 
Kennedy championed every liberal prescription there was. He was the baseline of liberalism, utterly lacking in any concept of cause and effect or the Law of Unintended Side Effects. As a result, programs he championed have been damaging the nation for year after year, and will form a legacy that will live on for years after his Eternal Flame has flickered out. Mocked by Vaughn Meader when his elder bother was president as the dumbass of the boyz, he lived up to his billing when he inherited the Senate seat -- with the exception of his political skills, which were machine-like in their smooth workings. He was returned to the Senate for term after term by the people of Massachussetts, who are legendary in the willingness to abide and even take pride in corruption that would make the Tweed Gang blanch.
Rhode Island will shut down its state government for 12 days and hopes to trim millions of dollars in funding for local governments under a plan Gov. Don Carcieri outlined Monday to balance a budget hammered by surging unemployment and plummeting tax revenue.
(Bloomberg) -- U.S. unemployment will surge to 10 percent this year and the budget deficit will be $1.5 trillion next year, both higher than previous Obama administration forecasts because of a recession that was deeper and longer than expected, White House budget chief Peter Orszag said.
A freshman House Democrat from Alabama said Tuesday he would not vote for Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) as Speaker again because of her "divisive and polarizing" image.
House Ways and Means Chairman Charles B. Rangel , already beset by a series of ethics investigations, has disclosed more than $500,000 in previously unreported assets.
A "furious" Rep. Peter King, the hawkish, maverick Long Island Republican, blasted a "disgraceful" Eric Holder for opening an investigation of CIA interrogators and chided his own party for what he described as a weak response to the move in an interview just now with POLITICO.
