The submarine USS Hawaii became only the second Naval submarine in history to receive the U.S. Coast Guard Meritorious Unit Commendation for its role in tracking drug runners on its first mission, officials said.
The Virginia-class attack submarine, which is expected to arrive at its new home port at Pearl Harbor for the first time in late July, received the award in Groton, Conn., on Thursday for its part in counter-drug operations off Central or South America. The operations took place in the Eastern Pacific in support of Joint Interagency Task Force South from Feb. 20 to April 17, 2008, the Navy said.
"I had no imaginable idea that this is what we'd be doing," said Sonar Tech Master Chief Petty Officer Bob Crossno, the chief of the boat for Hawaii. "We're not doing the stuff we did in the Cold War or World War II. With our advanced technologies, we can interact with other fleets and other services to support maritime security operations."
Much of the submarine's support during the operations is classified, the Navy said.
But according to the citation read during the award presentation, the crew demonstrated "highly professional tracking of suspected drug traffickers and aggressively gathered intelligence on shipping throughout the area of operations (which) directly aided in the interdiction of various drug-laden vessels, seizing large quantities of cocaine and detaining multiple narcotics smugglers." In addition, the Hawaii was part of a "complex, covert surveillance network involving Navy and Coast Guard surface, subsurface and air assets along with other coalition assets" in this counter-drug effort.
Officials said the Hawaii was operating for at least part of the time with the USS Crommelin, a Pearl Harbor-based frigate, two other ships and P-3C Orion surveillance aircraft. U.S. Defense Department policy bars the Navy from performing law enforcement duties. Partnering with the Coast Guard makes drug interdictions possible, and Coast Guard personnel fly and operate from Navy helicopters and ships.
Virginia-class submarines are designed to operate in both the open ocean and nearshore shallows, and have improved stealth, sophisticated surveillance capabilities and special warfare enhancements.
#1
Naval submarine
Deh took the fly from the eye of a purdy gurls eye
and sold a little hemlock too!
And they thru the castaNet that fell so true
On boobs like me and you...
And you can miss it too....
During a speech to Duke University's graduating class, Oprah talked about the secrets and joys of success. Among them: owning a mansion and a jet.
"It's great to have a nice home. It's great to have nice homes! It's great to have a nice home that just escaped the fire in Santa Barbara," she told the students. "It's great to have a private jet. Anyone that tells you that having your own private jet isn't great is lying to you."
She went on to explain that "you haven't completed the circle of success until you help someone else move to a higher ground and get to a better place."
The golden nugget here is the jet part. In these times of hair-shirt capitalism and envy politics, the wealthy have been going to great lengths to pretend they don't enjoy luxury or want nice stuff. If Oprah were like most of the faux-populist rich today, she would have said something like, "I don't need private jets, in fact I'm happier flying commercial and living in a small house. I like the simple life." Of course, she would be lying.
But she didn't. She told the truth, which is that flying in a private jet is one of the great material perks that money can buy. Talk to anyone who used to be rich and they will say one thing they really miss is the jet.... [AlGore]
So, Oprah, how do you sleep at night? Do the dead polar bears and snail darters haunt your dreams? You'll be first agaist the wall when the revolution comes, you know that, don't you?
[/AlGore]
Posted by: Mike ||
05/12/2009 09:55 ||
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#1
Wait, I'm confused. Isn't she a member of the "Evil Rich" that we're supposed to be taxing the crap out of?
#4
Does anyone have any idea how this woman got to be where she is? Because I don't have a fuckin clue...
It's a simple formula really, it is called a pity party. Same principle as a circus freak show. They find some poor person with a tale of woe and they parade them out to the stage. Everyone feels sorry for the pity-freak but feels strangely better about their own pathetic lives.
My life may suck, but not as bad as that!
The audience then feels that they have performed some sort of service to the freak by listening and feeling bad for them.
The Boston-area transit authority trolley driver who allegedly slammed into another train while text-messaging his girlfriend Friday was hired as a minority because of his transgendered "female-to-male" status and had three speeding tickets on his driving record in recent years, ABC News has learned.
Aiden Quinn, 24, was born Georgia Quinn and boasts on an Internet networking site that he was one of the first transgender hires by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority.
The trolley driver lists his sexual orientation as "FTM" and was hired as a minority using his transgender status, two sources told ABC News. "[Quinn] was initially hired as a minority and used her transgender status,'' an MBTA source said today.
MBTA spokesman Joe Pesaturo told ABC News today that there was "nothing unusual" about Quinn's hire, and that he was picked out of a lottery that he entered in 2004.
The Green Line trolley Quinn was driving rear-ended another trolley that was stopped between two underground stations in downtown Boston on Friday night, injuring 46 people, and he told police he was texting at the time of the crash, officials said. Three of four trolley cars were crushed and MBTA officials estimated the cost of damages from the crash at $9.6 million.
Formerly a part-time trolley driver, Quinn was hired as a full-time trolley operator from a streetcar motorman in March. Sources said he received the three speeding tickets in his private vehicle, two in New Hampshire in April 2007, one in Massachusetts 2002.
Quinn did not show up for a scheduled meeting Sunday between MBTA officials and National Transportation Safety Board investigators, claiming that he was sick, Pesaturo said.
Quinn could face criminal charges.
He will be fired later this week if investigators verify that he was using his cellular phone before the crash, MBTA general manager Daniel Grabauskas said.
Meanwhile, the head of the Boston-area transit authority said Saturday he'll ban all train and bus operators from even carrying cell phones.
Federal investigators have said the crash was not caused by mechanical problems, but was a result of the operator running through a red light and a yellow light before the collision. "Then the train encountered a yellow signal and a red signal. The point of collision occurred 80 feet past the red signal," NTSB board member Debbie Hersman told Boston ABC affiliate WCVB.
Officials said the trolley Quinn was driving was traveling at 25 mph when it hit the waiting train. They said it was not clear whether Quinn was braking, but if he wasn't, the idling train would have been visible for at least 13 seconds before it was struck.
The waiting trolley was pushed 31 feet down the tracks after it was struck, officials said.
Boston Carmen's Union president Stephen Macdougall told WCVB the preventable accident does not reflect the behavior of most MBTA workers. "The individual involved in last night's incident and the issues led up to that tragedy were avoidable," he said. "This was an individual act by an individual who does not represent the attitudes or the professional conduct of all or most MBTA workers."
If it turns out to be true that Quinn was texting his girlfriend at the time of the crash, he would be at least the 10th driver guilty of the offense in the last year. At least nine other bus and trolley drivers have been suspended in the last yearfor texting or talking on their cell phones while driving.
#5
Didn't know whether (s)he was comin' or goin'...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
05/12/2009 11:11 Comments ||
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#6
But seriously ... what relevance does that have to an accident investigation. I don't care of the driver was trans-species, you don't text while driving. Why the information about the person's gender has anything whatsoever to do with the accident investigation or why it is news absolutely escapes me.
The driver probably had BROWN HAIR too! What does THAT mean?
#8
Ok, crosspatch, not much on the investigation part, true, but it would have a definite impact on where they can put him/her/whatever in the big house when the arrest takes place....
#9
Are you serious that you don't understand why this is being brought up? HeShe was hired ONLY because she was transgendered and NOT because she was qualified for the job.
I guess the question that should be asked is would three speeding tickets have disqualified her if she was not a minority.
It is being brought up because we should all care if unqualified people are getting hired solely because of their sexual orientation.
I have an idea. Let's hire people not based on their color, creed or sexual orientation. How about we hire based on the fact that they are the most qualified for the job.
CLEVELAND (Reuters) - Suspected Nazi death camp guard John Demjanjuk was deported from the United States on Monday, flown from Ohio to Germany where he faces trial in the deaths of 29,000 Jews. A chartered jet carrying the 89-year-old Ukraine-born Demjanjuk took off from Cleveland's Burke lakefront airport at 7:13 p.m. EDT for an overnight flight to Munich.
An airport official said Demjanjuk showed no emotion and said nothing as he was put on the plane seated in a medical transport chair. He was taken from his home near Cleveland earlier by an ambulance, shielded from cameras by a bedsheet and driven to an immigration office in downtown Cleveland.
Posted by: Steve White ||
05/12/2009 00:00 ||
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Posted by: ed hardy ||
05/12/2009 2:54 Comments ||
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#2
So much for the UAW membership, 65+ years of rehab and tax paying. Franziskaner beer board him! He's old and weak, he'll talk. There are others you know, out there somewhere.... on the internets. They claim they're all dead, but some could be dug up and hung again, movies made, etc.
#4
If you want a good account of just how many people were aware and took part in various aspects of the final solution read "The Good Old Days" by Klee, Dressen & Riess.
It's a real eye opener to see just how many of these SOB's disappeared into the woodwork after the war.
#5
He lied when he came to the U.S. after the war. What has he done since to make up for what he did before? Quietly enjoying the benefits of a law-abiding life shows that he took advantage of his neighbors' trusting ignorance, not that he repented for his previous choice of career. A parallel would be that Sixty-eighter terrorist who changed her name, married a nice man and gave him several children, and lived as a prosperous suburban housewife until her past caught up with her. She never repented, never did anything to make up for the grief and terror she caused, merely deceived the world for her own safety. Should she be forgiven too, Besoeker?
#6
When Dad's division liberated one of those places in April 1945, they just up and shot all the guards. Every. One. Of. Them. (Yeah, I know, violation of the Geneva conventions, yadda yadda yadda.)
This bastard got to avoid that justice for 64 years--64 more years than most of the people in that camp got. Even now, he won't get what he truly deserves in this life.
Posted by: Mike ||
05/12/2009 9:46 Comments ||
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#7
Even now, he won't get what he truly deserves in this life.
No Mike but rest assured, he will get what's coming to him.
Vengance baby! It's mine.
Posted by: The Lord ||
05/12/2009 10:08 Comments ||
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#12
It's truly amazing how he can be so disabled one minute.....yet be caught on tape about a month ago strolling to his car and yapping with a buddy.....and have such a terrible relapse on the way to Germany....not that he would be deceptive about that too, would he?
All the neo-nazi-muss'slime sites are
tearing up their tunics in awe and
desperation!!!
A new Aryan saint martyr is born!
Note that he was acquitted by an Israeli
court...which goes to show how far the
Red-Brown-Green Axis' corruption has spread!
http://www.alexandredelvalle.com/publications.php?id_art=131
Posted by: Ming the Merciless ||
05/12/2009 21:24 Comments ||
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#14
He was indeed acquitted by the Israeli court -- of being the camp guard Ivan the Terrible, but not of being an evil death camp guard. That is what he's is being deported to Germany to stand trial for, Ming.
#1
We (not me, ground crew) left the engine covers on a plane taxiing for takeoff once. Passenger freaked and wanted to know why there was smoke coming from the engine LOL. I told him it was 'steam' :)
Now that the end is in sight (it's expected the Ice Team will be lifted off the ice later this week), the three, independent of the others, has been reflecting and commenting on how one of the many truly positive aspects of the expedition is the way in which they've worked so well together. In 70 days they failed to cover 50% of the distance; they suffered from the elements, endured -50C temperatures but they made some minimally valuable measurements; sucked up a lot $ from Prince Charles and the other sponsors and left a bunch of nearly empty oil drums on the ice to pollute the environment.
Posted by: lord garth ||
05/12/2009 05:50 ||
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#1
Too bad they didn't encounter a herd of polar bears.
#3
Minimum expectation is that they'd work well together; that's what grown-ups do, after all, when they share an important goal. The only thing that matters is whether they actually collected the data they set off to get.
[Maghrebia] Italy returned another 163 "boat people" rescued at sea to Libya on Sunday (May 10th), international press reports said. The African haragas were picked up on Saturday near the Italian island of Lampedusa. Last Thursday, three Italian navy launches ferried some 227 illegal migrants back to Tripoli. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was quoted by AFP as saying on Saturday that Italy was entitled to hand back Thursday's boat people because they were not intercepted in Italian waters.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/12/2009 00:00 ||
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#1
To be sent north when the Eye-ties stop looking ...
Posted by: Steve White ||
05/12/2009 0:03 Comments ||
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Hasanali Khoja, 60, said he feared he would be splashed with fat from the pork products and that even wearing gloves and using tongs to cook would not protect him. Mr Khoja alleges he was discriminated against due to his religion and that, during a meeting to resolve the situation, a human resources manager pulled faces and made racist gestures. He said he had raised the issue of pork handling at his interview in 2004 for a senior catering manager job with the Metropolitan Police Service and was told no food handling would be involved as it was a supervisory role.
Mr Khoja was successful and started the job at Hendon police training centre on March 7, 2005 but was found to have inadequate IT skills and in August that year accepted a job as higher catering manager at the same site. His objections to touching pork products were respected and, during training assessments, a colleague cooked sausages and bacon for a so-called 999 breakfast while he cooked toast and eggs, he said.
On February 1, 2007 Mr Khoja said he was told he was being transferred to a kitchen at Heathrow Airport. When he reported to Heathrow he was told he was expected to prepare, cook and serve all food and immediately voiced his objections to touching pork products. A meeting was arranged to discuss the problem on February 12, which continued on February 13. During the second day, Mr Khoja said the human resources manager, Paul Bell, told him his job was at risk if he did not follow instructions. Mr Bell then pulled faces and made racist gestures, Mr Khoja said. "I was very humiliated and stressed out and was unable to continue," he said.
Mr Khoja told the tribunal in Watford, Hertfordshire, that he had refused to handle pork products even if gloves and tongs were provided. "The reason for this refusal is because of the fact it is well known that if you are cooking bacon or sausages, which I was asked to do, I was exposed to splash and contact with pork which I object to. Gloves and tongs would not make any difference."
#4
There must be something in British culture I'm missing. What is a "racist gesture" in this context? And if he's so worried about touching non-halal food, why does he want a job cooking for infidels?
Posted by: James ||
05/12/2009 12:48 Comments ||
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#5
Similar thing happened here. Muslim cashier at Target sued because she was 'forced' to handle packaged bacon at the checkout. As I recall, she was told to either do her job or hit the road.
#6
As true as Bob, a doctor at the local hospital here, Conquest, E Sussex, claimed for being asked to do the donkey work. Got compensation and a transfer. First name wasn't John or William or George.
The political turmoil deepens in Georgia as a meeting between the opposition and the president fails to bear fruit with the former refusing a proposed power-sharing deal. President Mikhail Saakashvili offered to share power with his most outspoken opponents on Monday. The opposition, however, insisted that the president should step down, vowing to intensify the protests that have resulted in thousands demonstrating outside government buildings, occasionally clashing with police over the past month.
Opponents accuse US-backed Saakashvili of having mishandled the five-day war with Russia in August 2008 and of having become increasingly autocratic since coming to power in 2003. The Caucasus conflict resulted in the independence of two of Georgia's provinces - South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
"We will keep on fighting for Saakashvili to resign, for the freedom of the press, and for the protection of all our citizens," said Irakli Alasania, an opposition figure who attended the meeting with Saakashvili.
Opposition leaders did not say whether they would hold another round of talks with the president. However, they said that they would expand the mass protests throughout the country.
"From today, we have the legitimate right to hold public protests that are larger, more urgent and take them all across Georgia," said Levan Gachechiladze, another opposition politician.
On Wednesday, the protests turned violent for the first time since the beginning of the demonstrations. The number of protesters has dwindled since a peak of some 60,000 in the first days after demonstrations began on April 9.
Posted by: Steve White ||
05/12/2009 00:00 ||
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(Fortune Magazine) -- Even as the nation's economy is showing some tentative signs of bottoming out, another calamity looms: the public pension bomb.
For years, states nationwide have shortchanged the retirement programs that cover teachers, police, and other public employees; now the stock market plunge has wiped out billions of dollars from already underfunded plans. California, New York and Illinois are among the states scrambling to plug multibillion-dollar holes in their pension systems. The growing obligations raise the specter of higher taxes, diminished services, or even another round of costly federal bailouts.
"States have long needed to reduce their unfunded liabilities, and widespread investment losses have made it even more necessary to put money in," says Lance Weiss, author of a 2006 Deloitte study of state pensions. "But the market crash also means there's less money available to use for contributions. Everything is coming together to create a crisis."
To better understand this ticking time bomb it helps to focus on a single state, and New Jersey makes a compelling case study. For one thing, its situation is dire. In June 2008 the state estimated that the plan - one of the nation's largest, covering teachers, state employees, firefighters, and police - had $34 billion less than it needed to meet its obligations. Since then the market value of the plan has dropped from $82 billion to $56 billion (a new estimate of underfunding is due in July). Notice the liability seems to double every eight years. Could this contibute to the problem? Nah!
And it's not all due to an aging workforce ...
Also, New Jersey is in some ways ahead of the pack in trying to deal with the crisis - Gov. Jon Corzine, a Democrat, made addressing the problem a central theme of his 2005 campaign - and the obstacles it is encountering shed light on the hard choices facing other states.
"The pension obligations could spark a huge problem for New Jersey," says Thomas Kean, a former Republican governor. "They must be paid because they are absolutely an obligation of the state, but as it is, the budget is balanced with chewing gum and sealing wax."
The pension fund assets dropped by almost 40%, but no one's thought to ask the retirees to take a modest, temporary haircut to help out.
To figure out how such a wealthy state (with a median household income of $65,933, New Jersey ranks No. 1) dug itself into this hole, set the clock back almost 20 years.
In 1990 the country was hit by a recession, and the new Democratic governor, James Florio, responded with a wildly unpopular $2.8 billion income and sales tax increase to balance the budget. Two years later, facing another budget shortfall, he turned to the state pension system for help. With almost unanimous support in the legislature, he pushed through the Pension Revaluation Act of 1992.
We'll spare you the minutiae of pension accounting and just say that the law permitted the state to recognize investment gains in the fund more quickly than under previous rules. It also lifted the projected rate of return on the fund's investments to 8.75% from 7% (since lowered to 8.25%). These "adjustments" had a big impact: According to an official Benefits Review Task Force report published in 2005, they allowed the state to cut its pension contributions by more than $1.5 billion in 1992 and 1993.
Republican Christine Todd Whitman, running on a tax-cutting platform, defeated Florio in the 1993 governor's race. To help pay for her promised tax cuts, Whitman, like her predecessor, turned to the pension fund. In 1994, at her urging, the legislature adopted another pension "reform" act that allowed her to reduce state and local contributions to the plan by nearly $1.5 billion in 1994 and 1995, according to the task force report. Florio's and Whitman's accounting changes were "the one-two punch from which the retirement system has never recovered," says Douglas Forrester, who was the assistant state treasurer under Kean.
#1
so who was the Governor and legislature party those 2002,3, 4 years when minimal or no contributions were mad? Appears they expected the inflated asset value via stock market to continue, and cut back contributions...
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/12/2009 19:21 Comments ||
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#2
Governor Grayhame the Technocrat and Defeater of Tuna Sandwiches?
This year, we basically took a pay cut and increased contributions. Sign of the times mebbe, but our pension trust is as sound as any. (knock on wood)
Senate leaders are considering new federal taxes on soda and other sugary drinks to help pay for an overhaul of the nation's health-care system.
The taxes would pay for only a fraction of the cost to expand health-insurance coverage to all Americans and would face strong opposition from the beverage industry. They also could spark a backlash from consumers who would have to pay several cents more for a soft drink.
On Tuesday, the Senate Finance Committee is set to hear proposals from about a dozen experts about how to pay for the comprehensive health-care overhaul that President Barack Obama wants to enact this year. Early estimates put the cost of the plan at around $1.2 trillion. The administration has so far only earmarked funds for about half of that amount.
The Center for Science in the Public Interest, a Washington-based watchdog group that pressures food companies to make healthier products, plans to propose a federal excise tax on soda, certain fruit drinks, energy drinks, sports drinks and ready-to-drink teas. It would not include most diet beverages. Excise taxes are levied on goods and manufacturers typically pass them on to consumers.
Senior staff members for some Democratic senators at the center of the effort to craft health-care legislation are weighing the idea behind closed doors, Senate aides said.
The Congressional Budget Office, which is providing lawmakers with cost estimates for each potential change in the health overhaul, included the option in a broad report on health-system financing in December. The office estimated that adding a tax of three cents per 12-ounce serving to these types of sweetened drinks would generate $24 billion over the next four years.
So far, lawmakers have not indicated how big a tax they are considering.
Proponents of the tax cite research showing that consuming sugar-sweetened drinks can lead to obesity, diabetes and other ailments. They say the tax would lower consumption, reduce health problems and save medical costs. At least a dozen states already have some type of taxes on sugary beverages, said Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest.
By the way. Don't be surprised if this was conjured up as a slap at the tea party activities, all be it a indirect slap of the face by the politicians.
Posted by: Wild Indian ||
05/12/2009 14:20 Comments ||
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#7
Along the lines of, "Those tea party yahoos are the kind of people who sit in front of the boob tube, gorging on sweet fizzy drinks and potato chips", Wild Indian? As compared to their august selves, who watch Masterpiece Theater (Did you see what they did with Austen's Pride and Prejudice my dear? Finally, someone has done it justice!) and BBC news, while sipping an insouciant little white and nibbling on crudites.
I think the Senate leaders have forgotten what their children and grandchildren consume by preference. This could prove very amusing indeed.
WASHINGTON The Senate's top tax writer said Tuesday he is considering limits on the tax-free status of job-based health insurance to help pay for President Barack Obama's plan to cover all Americans.
Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., described his idea as senators began to grapple with how to pay for the costs of the plan, which independent experts put at about $1.5 trillion over 10 years. There are no easy options.
The final package is likely to include a mix of tax increases and spending cuts. Among the possibilities: tax hikes on alcoholic beverages and sugary soft drinks, and restrictions on other health care related tax breaks, such as flexible spending accounts.
But some taxes don't seem to be on the table, such as a federal sales levy to pay for health care, or a new payroll tax.
On the controversial question of taxing health benefits, Baucus is staking out a position that could put him at odds with Obama.
The president adamantly opposed such taxes during the campaign, arguing they would undermine job-based coverage. Obama's aides now say he's open to considering suggestions from Congress, even if he criticized Republican presidential rival John McCain for proposing a sweeping version of it.
Baucus said he wants to readjust the tax break, not abolish it. "We are not going to repeal it," he said.
But Baucus suggested that the benefit could be limited by taxing health care provided to high-income individuals or by taxing the value of extravagant health insurance plans. Baucus did not specify at what income level the tax would kick in.
Employer-provided health insurance is considered part of workers' compensation, but unlike wages, it is not taxed. The foregone revenue to the federal government amounts to about $250 billion a year.
Proponents of repealing the benefit say it encourages lavish health insurance plans that only add to waste in the health care system. And they argue that the benefit is unfair, since self-employed people don't get as big a tax break for health care.
Many experts say that Congress won't be able to come up with the kind of money needed to provide coverage for all unless limitations on the health care tax break are part of the mix.
So, Senator, when are you going to propose that Congress junks their primo health care program and get's in the same boat with the rest of us?
I'll wait...
By several measures, health care spending continues to rise at a rapid rate and forcing businesses and families to cut back on operations and household expenses respectively.
In 2008, total national health expenditures were expected to rise 6.9 percent -- two times the rate of inflation.1 Total spending was $2.4 TRILLION in 2007, or $7900 per person1. Total health care spending represented 17 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP).
U.S. health care spending is expected to increase at similar levels for the next decade reaching $4.3 TRILLION in 2017, or 20 percent of GDP.1
#10
numbers schmumbers. Facts have little or no place in the land of HopenChange. Details to be worked out. In the meantime. Obama saved 2.3 trillion jobs today.... a few ten thousands lost theirs, but the rest were saved...
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/12/2009 19:26 Comments ||
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#11
Yokay, I'll bite, methought the MSM-Net repor this RECESSION + DEPRESSION 2 was going to end by this SUMMER 2009; + the BAMMER = US FDA wants to sink "CHEERIOS"???
WASHINGTON -- The financial health of the government's two biggest benefit programs may have slipped over the past year, reflecting the deep recession that has already bitten into other areas of the budget.
The trustees for Social Security and Medicare are scheduled to provide their annual report on the finances of both programs on Tuesday. In advance of the release, many private analysts said they expected both programs could run out of cash sooner than last predicted.
A year ago, the trustees projected that the Social Security trust fund would start paying out more in benefits than it collects in taxes in 2017 and that the trust fund would be depleted in 2041.
For the Medicare trust fund, which pays for hospital care, the situation was more urgent. It was projected to start paying more in benefits than it collects in taxes within a year, and the trustees forecast that it would be depleted by 2019.
But many analysts said the worst recession in decades will produce a bleaker forecast for both Social Security and Medicare in the new trustees' report. The downturn has resulted in a loss of 5.7 million payroll jobs since it began in December 2007 and an unemployment rate that hit a 25-year high of 8.9 percent in April.
Fewer people working means less being paid into the trust funds for Social Security and Medicare.
The Congressional Budget Office recently projected that Social Security will collect just $3 billion more in 2010 than it will pay out in benefits. A year ago, the CBO had projected that Social Security would have a much higher $86 billion cash surplus for the 2010 budget year, which begins Oct. 1. The difference in the two estimates is the result of the recession.
While the smaller surplus will not have any impact on Social Security benefit payments, the government will need to borrow more at a time when the federal deficit is already exploding because of the recession and the billions of dollars being spent to prop up a shaky banking system.
For years, the Social Security trust fund has taken in more than it spent on benefits, resulting in a cushion of billions of dollars that the government could spend on other programs while giving the trust fund an IOU.
Even with the big drop in the Social Security surplus, Medicare's condition is more precarious, reflecting the pressures from soaring health care costs as well as the drop in tax collections. For that reason, President Barack Obama is expected to focus on Medicare before he addresses Social Security.
Obama on Monday praised a pledge by the health care industry to achieve $2 trillion in savings on health care costs over the next decade, but it was unclear how much help those pledges would be in achieving Obama's goal of extending coverage to some 50 million uninsured Americans. The administration is pushing Congress to pass legislation in this area this year, preferring to tackle health care before Social Security.
The trustees report is still expected to set off a heated debate over the government's two large benefit programs, with critics saying it will highlight the failure of the Obama administration to take on the most serious problems in the budget -- soaring entitlement spending, before the retirement of 78 million baby boomers makes the problems even worse.
The administration on Monday revised its deficit forecasts upward to project an imbalance this year of $1.84 trillion, four times last year's record deficit, and said the deficits will remain above $500 billion every year over the next decade.
But we all knew that...
Reporter: Every so often, diseases develop in different corners of the world, and disappear after wreaking damage to the tune of billions of dollars. After avian flu, the time has come for pigs. It is a disease that afflicts pigs, but because of the physiological similarity between humans and pigs, this disease afflicts humans as well. Now, the main actors in this great movie must go into action. The director has fulfilled his role very well, and gathered the boldest and most famous actors for this blockbuster. Ummmmmmmm...okay. Angels and Demons? Ya lost me...
The international news networks air the trailers of this movie for free. With the outbreak of this disease, the American president went into action, and said in a sensational speech: "My government has consulted health officials, and they have not advised the closing of the U.S. borders." In his speech, Barak Obama mentioned a medicine called Tamiflu but what exactly is Tamiflu? Who are the compassionate manufacturers of this medicine? This great pharmacist is none other than Rumsfeld, the former American secretary of defense. Rumsfeld! I knew it!! Actually, I figured it was Cheney. It usually is...
He is one of the shareholders, and an active and influential member on the board of directors of Gilead Science, which is the main provider of medicine for this disease. It should be noted that the Gilead Sciences is a Jewish company. Its name, in Hebrew means "holy place," and all its shareholders are Zionists. Ha! Case closed!
Dr. Ali-Reza Mehrabi, Shaid Beheshti University: The United States is one of the few countries with an arsenal of viruses. It is one of the countries with the largest arsenals of smallpox. It is interesting that last year, [Rumsfeld] bought, if I'm not mistaken, 18 billion dollars worth of new Gilead stocks. Oh, I think you might be "mistaken". Rummy probably wishes you weren't...
If we accept the assumption that work was conducted in a laboratory in Mexico whether in a pig farm or some other place the mere fact that this substance found its way out, even if by mistake, shows that the U.S. is conducting experiments in a peripheral country, rather than on its own soil. In this case, the U.S. might have lost control. Geez, maybe a coupla jars of it might fall off a truck in Iran maybe. Them CIA Zionist Mossad guys is tricky, ya know...
#1
Yep, it's caused by Peek Oilz or the 2nd wave of the flying-pig flue or the refinancing thing. Take you pick and have a seat. Odds are most of the audience won't survive until the end of the year.
How bad is it?
Well my friends, even a simple, (albeit heavily armed) goatherd could have seen what would happen when Enron meets ChryCo. If you have any money left at all I suggest flinging it into the wind or getting your ass up to the nearest HomeDepot (McNullery Mangery) and fetch a wheel barrow... you can bring how the flu in that babe. Remember the future is just the past with kooks in every corner.
#2
WORLD MIL FORUM [GOOGLE Chinglish transl.] > IIUC, ARTIC > BEIJING sees no merit to perceptions of pending US collapse due to vari economic and financial crises becuz even iff it did, IT WOULD TAKE ANOTHER 15-20 PLUS YEARS, i.e. Year 2025-2030 or afterwards, for any POST-US "NEW WORLD ORDER" TO BECOME ESTABLISHED, PLUS THE USA WILL STILL LIKELY REMAIN THE WORLD'S LEADING SUPERPOWER [thru 2050].
Also on WMF > IIUC CHINESE , RUSSIAN BINATIONAL RELATIONS ARE LIKELY TO REMAIN MUTUALLY POSITIVE FOR ANOTHER 5-10 YEARS [2015-2020], THEN MAY BECOME INCREASINGLY STRAINED DUE TO GROWING MULTI-DIMENSIONAL GEOPOL IMBALANCES BETWEEN THEM. THEIR STRATEGIC FOCUS IS NOTSOMUCH TO DIRECTLY CHALLENGE US GLOBAL SUPERIORITY OR EVEN DOMINANCE, BUT TO MAINTAIN THEIR MUTUALLY POSITIVE RELATIONSHIP [Read, as the US overextends/destroys itself].
#3
The biggest mistake America might ever have made is not to have marched on to Damascus and Tehran in April 2003
Posted by: European Conservative ||
05/12/2009 21:39 Comments ||
Top||
#4
We went to war with the army that we had, European Conservative. We didn't have an army capable of pacifying both countries after conquering them. You're right about how much easier life would be now, though, with only the two Lands of the Pure (Pakistan and Saudi Arabia) as serious contenders. :-(
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.
(Fortune Magazine) -- Even as the nation's economy is showing some tentative signs of bottoming out, another calamity looms: the public pension bomb. 
Senate leaders are considering new federal taxes on soda and other sugary drinks to help pay for an overhaul of the nation's health-care system. 
WASHINGTON -- The financial health of the government's two biggest benefit programs may have slipped over the past year, reflecting the deep recession that has already bitten into other areas of the budget.
