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Page 6: Politix
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Page 4: Opinion
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Home Front: Politix
Who Won the Shutdown Showdown? It Wasn't Even Close
At a news conference New York Sen. Chuck Schumer,
Senator-for-life from New York, renowned for his love of standing in front of cameras. Schumer has been a professional politician since 1975, when disco was in flower.
D-N.Y., agreed, "I happen to think some of their cuts are extreme and go overboard. But every week they keep upping the ante and proposing extreme cuts."
Whoa! That's so extreme!
Every week they send an email to the mailing list, asking for votes on several suggested cuts (with the amount of the savings over a given period of time noted) and suggestions for more. So they sneakily act with the confidence that voters support the proposals. Quite unlike Senator Schumer and his pals, who have only principle ("there's more money where that came from" and "benefits for support groups" mostly) and political habits to sustain them.
Over the next decade the cuts are expected to save hundreds of billions of dollars.

The deal mandates a host of studies and audits of B.O. regime policies. It also blocks additional funds for the IRS sought by the B.O. regime and bans federal funding of abortion in Washington, D.C.

The history of offers on this bill goes something like this. Democrats first offered no cuts, then $4 billion, then $6.5 billion, then $33 billion, then settled at $38.5 billion.

House Speaker John It is not pronounced 'Boner!' Boehner
... the occasionally weepy leader of House Republicans...
made numerous adjustments to his offer in recent days too, but started at $32 billion, then with a Tea Party push went to $62 billion, then dropped to $40 billion, then $38.5 billion.

Democrats claimed they met Republicans halfway after the $10 billion in cuts that already passed this year were approved. They settled late Friday night at three and a half times more.
Posted by: Fred || 04/09/2011 10:50 || Comments || Link || [6 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Baby steps
Posted by: regular joe || 04/09/2011 13:14 Comments || Top||

#2  Ever tried to turn a sea tanker? In the financial world, the world is flat and finite. There is an edge to fall off.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 04/09/2011 13:33 Comments || Top||

#3  our total deficit is approx 14T w/a annual growth of 1T in deficit...doesn't 38B in cuts only represent a 3.8% reduction in our 1T annual deficit...yeah, good job congress (sarc/off).
Posted by: Broadhead6 || 04/09/2011 13:50 Comments || Top||

#4  BH6, the next step is the 2012 budget. Sure hope Boehner has an encore planned...
Posted by: Steve White || 04/09/2011 14:28 Comments || Top||

#5  doesn't 38B in cuts only represent a 3.8% reduction in our 1T annual deficit

Actually, the deficit is growing. Taxes collected are going down since wages are falling. But the spending keeps going up. Even after this "cut", federal spending is still going up 5.5%. This again, while wages are falling.
Posted by: Zebulon Thranter9685 || 04/09/2011 15:47 Comments || Top||

#6  time to remember that Republicans control just over one-half of the 3 branches of government. 4 branches, counting the MSM
Posted by: Frank G || 04/09/2011 16:08 Comments || Top||

#7  The tanker analology is apt, and it will take years of constant, continuous pressure to keep the new course being followed. Some praise is due the Speaker, mosre praise is due Ryan and the 6.1 trillion proposal, especially the new thinking on medicare/medicaid. But it cannot be view as enough, the addiction on the left is too strong to slacken our efforts to encourage further successes, goad waivering, and attack any falling back on credit.
But equally important are the issues of entitlement fraud and waste, perhaps 25% of the current totals, and the abuse of our public largesse by immigrants, legal and illegal.
Illegal immigrants should never receive public funds except for emergency medical care, and even legal immigrants who arrive and immediately become wards of the state need to be looked at closely. We are no longer in need of people to fill our vast spaces, and frankly, the nation of immigrants story needs to be recast to much more selective admissions, not millions of unskilled laborers each year.
So bravo for a baby step, and keep going, or get out of the way!
Posted by: NoMoreBS || 04/09/2011 16:44 Comments || Top||

#8  Hello NoMoreBS; Well said. The voices from the other side are cast in biased hues of color. The Roma gypsies have a long and tortured history. Many died in the Holocaust. This video I am posting is an outreach by a normally silent group. I like his music but ignore the anger. His words may have no meaning but it is what people think he is saying- that is the power;

Posted by: Dale || 04/09/2011 21:29 Comments || Top||

#9  Again, the Fed is $$$ good = extant until this coming Thursday.

Shutdown or no shutdown, something has to give because US Debt is officially over 100%-n-counting of US GDP - its not offic 60% or 85% or even 93%, etc. anymore. AT THIS LEVEL, THE USA = UK = why don't we just turn over our NIMITZ-class CVNS + B-Bombers + Abrams MBTS, etc. to our international Allies in order to save the US Welfare-Nanny Super-State!?

US GLOBAL WELFARE-NANNY STATE - NO LONGER JUST "MULTI-NATIONAL" OR TRANS/MULTI-REGIONAL" BUT "UNIVERSAL" SOON TO BE "NEAR-SPACE"???

Plus of course "Globalism", + the OWG-NWO + related "-isms" that no American = Amerikan voted for???
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 04/09/2011 23:58 Comments || Top||


Schumer: Senate Will 'Never, Never, Never' Defund Planned Parenthood
(CNSNews.com) - Sen. Chuck Schumer
Senator-for-life from New York, renowned for his love of standing in front of cameras. Schumer has been a professional politician since 1975, when disco was in flower.
(D-N.Y.) vowed yesterday that the provision to defund Planned Parenthood
...has received federal funding since 1970, when President Richard Nixon signed into law the Family Planning Services and Population Research Act.
that passed the House earlier this year is "never, never, never going to pass the Senate."

Schumer made the remarks Thursday on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., at a "Stand Up for Women's Health" rally sponsored by the National Organization for Women, NARAL and Planned Parenthood.

"The dangerous, ideological cuts to Planned Parenthood that passed the House are never, never, never going to pass the Senate," said Schumer. "Let me repeat that, so all those who want to stomp on women's health and women's rights can hear us loud and clear. The dangerous, ideological cuts to Planned Parenthood that passed the House are never, never, never going to pass the Senate."
Posted by: Fred || 04/09/2011 10:48 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  So, the Senator will have no trouble identifying in the Constitution this as a function of the Federal government? Ignoring, of course, that little line in the 10th - The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 04/09/2011 11:26 Comments || Top||

#2  Stomp on women's health and rights? What right do they have to steal my money for their abortions?
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 04/09/2011 12:14 Comments || Top||

#3  "Never" is a dreadfully long time.
Posted by: Besoeker || 04/09/2011 12:32 Comments || Top||

#4  Proving once again that abortion is the only secular sacrament of the liberal theology.
Posted by: Heriberto Shusonter9790 || 04/09/2011 12:36 Comments || Top||

#5  Proving once again that abortion is the only secular sacrament of the liberal theology.

Nonsense, Heriberto Shusonter9790. It is important to some, just as anti-abortion is important to only some on the conservative side. Some of the rest give it lip-service on both sides, and the remainder just don't talk about it if they can avoid it, because they really don't care.
Posted by: trailing wife || 04/09/2011 13:01 Comments || Top||

#6  Proving once again that abortion is the only secular sacrament of the liberal theology.
Posted by: Heriberto Shusonter9790


Precisely Heriberto. I believe it's the terms of reference that we're all hung up on. The word "abortion".... so off-putting. The "woman's right to choose" naming convention really never caught on. Europe arrived at the solution decades ago. Permitting full term deliver, medical experimentation as needed, then Zyclon-B inhalers. Strange it is that Senator Schumer never learned of these, quite effective techniques.
Posted by: Besoeker || 04/09/2011 13:08 Comments || Top||

#7  *Yawn* ... from the looks of it, PP spends anywhere from 1 to 2 million dollars *every* year on lobbying, independent political support, and campaign contributions- almost all to Democrats.

End of story. Schumer doesn't give a damn, he likes his gravy.
Posted by: Free Radical || 04/09/2011 14:58 Comments || Top||

#8  Planned Parenthood doesn't need to be defunded - it needs to be Aborted.
Posted by: CrazyFool || 04/09/2011 18:20 Comments || Top||

#9  Because, as we all know you have "Morals", right Schumer?
Posted by: newc || 04/09/2011 19:28 Comments || Top||


Oprah Will Not Endorse Obama in 2012
h/t Instapundit
Oprah Winfrey, the queen of daytime television, will not be publicly endorsing President Barack Obama for re-election in 2012, a source told Pop Eater.

Back in 2008, the billionaire talk show host endorsed then-Senator Barack Obama -- the first time she had publicly taken sides in a US presidential election.
it is the end
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 04/09/2011 04:21 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Would Oprah fall in love again for an Obama exemption?
Posted by: Zebulon Thranter9685 || 04/09/2011 9:05 Comments || Top||

#2  Perhaps some other Person of Color?
Posted by: Bobby || 04/09/2011 9:13 Comments || Top||

#3  This will just mean bigger headlines and more coverage when she changes her mind closer to the election. It gives the illusion of non partisanship and thus credibility at a time when Obamas ratings are so low her comments dont hurt him much.

It is also an attempt to reach out to fans she lost by her endorsement in the hopes they give her new channel a try because initial ratings on a new channel are gonna be critical to it's survival.
Posted by: Rjschwarz || 04/09/2011 9:31 Comments || Top||

#4  "For 2012, much has changed for Oprah," the source told Pop Eater. "She now has her own cable channel called OWN that has been struggling to find an audience -- she isn't going to do anything to alienate them."

Barack Obama: Box Office Poison!!
Posted by: tu3031 || 04/09/2011 10:04 Comments || Top||

#5  ...will not be publicly endorsing President Barack Obama...

But, there will be gobs of money from her coming his way.
Posted by: DarthVader || 04/09/2011 10:28 Comments || Top||

#6  No worries. Bill and Melinda will come through with the cash once again.
Posted by: Besoeker || 04/09/2011 10:39 Comments || Top||

#7  "her own cable channel called OWN that has been struggling to find an audience"

Wossa matta? I thought she was a goddess in her own right and had a built-in audience of followers.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 04/09/2011 12:51 Comments || Top||

#8  ..the grease from the transaxle is messing with her 'do or doe.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 04/09/2011 13:04 Comments || Top||

#9  I dunno ... she's a pretty shrewd marketer of her own brand, and I think she knows she really karked it with the conservative part of her core audience - a lot of whom were white - by going all gooey for the One ... especially now that he's tanking faster than the Titanic. I imagine she is distancing herself as fast as possible from the wreckage.
Posted by: Sgt. Mom || 04/09/2011 17:07 Comments || Top||


NY state senators clash during Muslim hearings
Posted by: ryuge || 04/09/2011 03:42 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Congress Strikes a Budget Deal, Averts Shutdown
Congressional leaders, with barely an hour to go before a federal government, announced late Friday night they had reached a deal to fund the government through the end of the fiscal year.

House Speaker John Boehner, speaking briefly to reporters after talks had concluded, said the plan was to pass one last short-term spending resolution Friday night to buy lawmakers the time needed to prepare and pass the final budget bill.
While I am glad our armed forces do not go without pay, my first question is "Who blinked"?
Posted by: DarthVader || 04/09/2011 00:19 || Comments || Link || [6 views] Top|| File under:

#1  So IIUC, IOW the Fed is $$$ good = solvent? until next Thursday or shortly afterward???

* ION RUSSIA TODAY > [US] CONGRESS, PRESIDENT [Bammer] WOULD BE PAID DURING US GOVT. SHUTDOWN.

Oh yeah, Amers + Netters/Bloggers are complaining.

Becuz iff there's one thing that US Govtcritters whom had officially raised US Debt to just over 100% of US GDP + climbing - YOU KNOW, "NEAR/APPROACHING INSOLVENCY" - need is another Pay Raise, regular full Paycheck while lessor US Govt.workers don't.

versus

* NEWS KERALA > REAGAN-ERA LAWYER DRAFTS OBAMA IMPEACHMENT OVER LIBYA INTERVENTION. Ex-USDOJ Official Bruce Fein, whom argues that POTUS Bammer has...

> MOCKED the Rule of Law in America???
> ENDANGERED THE VERY EXISTENCE OF THE REPUBLIC
[iff not the Nation]???
> PERPETRATED "HIGH CRIMES + MISDEMEANORS" warranting Impeachment???
> IFF THE BAMMER CAN NULL OR BYPASS "WAR POWERS ACT" AUTHORITY, THEN WHY NOT FOR US CONGRESSIONAL BUDGETING-N-SPENDING???

Oh my.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 04/09/2011 1:14 Comments || Top||

#2  Indeed, oh my. Wish our president wasn't such a used car salesman.
Posted by: Fi || 04/09/2011 1:16 Comments || Top||

#3  It only passed because Obama was holding the troops hostage.
Posted by: retired LEO || 04/09/2011 2:01 Comments || Top||

#4  I promise you the "Commander In Chief" did nothing at all to support our Soldiers.
I bet someone who cares gave this little man another week to figure out his position.

This President sucks ass.
Posted by: newc || 04/09/2011 4:01 Comments || Top||

#5  Who blinked?

There was enough on the table that it appears both sides can claim the other blinked. %78 billion in cuts from Obama's request, 40 billion in real cuts. DC can't fund abortions, but Planned Praenthood continues to get % from feds for contributions to donks. Let the spinning begin. It will be like this till the TEA Party takes over or the markets collapse.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 04/09/2011 4:57 Comments || Top||

#6  I heard zero said he was NOT going to pass another resolution.

So I'll take it as a defeat for the Used Car Saleman.
Posted by: Bobby || 04/09/2011 9:11 Comments || Top||

#7  This wasn't a resolution, a continuing resolution. It was the budget for the year we are over half finished with.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 04/09/2011 9:26 Comments || Top||

#8  While I am glad our armed forces do not go without pay, my first question is "Who blinked"? Posted by DarthVader

Their Leave and Earnings statements (which were prepared 4 days ago) HAVE been decremented. Time will tell if they are corrected by payday and the funds are deposited.

A simple Presidential Executive Order could have prevented this. I guess this means no Christmas basketball tour to Bagram Air Base is planned.
Posted by: Besoeker || 04/09/2011 10:36 Comments || Top||

#9  Drama queens.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 04/09/2011 12:23 Comments || Top||

#10  ...to pass one last short-term spending resolution Friday night to buy lawmakers the time needed to prepare and pass the final budget bill.
Posted by: Willy || 04/09/2011 13:22 Comments || Top||

#11  Their Leave and Earnings statements (which were prepared 4 days ago) HAVE been decremented.

Maybe. If so, then it will be corrected on the following month's LES. They really don't want to handle 500,000 applications for correction of military records.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 04/09/2011 17:35 Comments || Top||

#12  DFAS is one of the worst government bureaucratic nightmares. They will screw up Soldier pay for fun.
I would fire them all if I could and higher a decent paymaster. Maybe Intuit?
Posted by: newc || 04/09/2011 19:24 Comments || Top||

#13  I had a friend who was "killed off" by DFAS three times. His wife found the first notice of retirement pay termination due to death rather humorous. The next two notices over a 3 year period were not as funny. They took months to correct.
Posted by: Besoeker || 04/09/2011 19:46 Comments || Top||

#14  DFAS is a major headless chicken running. They use an ancient DOS program for payroll and leave requests. It can't track some kinds of leave and we still must use paper records for that. The program is *not* user friendly. Even long-standing employees have trouble inputting leave requests correctly.

The worst part is that timecards must be filled out and submitted to DFAS before the actual end of the pay period. There are only a couple of days to fix the inevitable changes and mistakes before pay goes out. Private businesses have the sense to run paychecks one pay cycle behind so they have to time to absorb changes, check figures and fix mistakes.

Even a few days' shutdown would have thrown a huge monkey wrench into this system. It would take a while to straighten it all out.
Posted by: Fed Peon || 04/09/2011 21:10 Comments || Top||

#15  Thank you, Fed Peon. That is useful, if disturbing, information.
Posted by: trailing wife || 04/09/2011 21:56 Comments || Top||

#16  Unfortunately, to replace such programs the process degenerates into a graft pit with influences demanding perfection [and still not getting it] rather than simply mod an existing system that covers a 100 percent of old needs and 70 percent of new requirements. Instead of what needs to be done, it devolves into gold plating and unending extension with each new 'idea'. Fortunately, life and death killed that bureaucratic mentality in getting combat stuff to the troops in the field these last few years. You think they could do the same back in the rear with the administrators. Nah.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 04/09/2011 22:23 Comments || Top||



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Meet the Mods
In no particular order...
Steve White
Seafarious
tu3031
badanov
sherry
ryuge
GolfBravoUSMC
Bright Pebbles
trailing wife
Gloria
Fred
Besoeker
Glenmore
Frank G
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Two weeks of WOT
Sat 2011-04-09
  22 Syrian protesters killed, hundreds wounded
Fri 2011-04-08
  Gulf states expect Yemen's Saleh to quit: Qatari PM
Thu 2011-04-07
  Rebels push back toward Brega
Wed 2011-04-06
  Gaddafi troops force retreat towards Ajdabiya
Tue 2011-04-05
  Suicide kabooms kill 30 at Pakistani shrine
Mon 2011-04-04
  Gaddafi in Tripoli, crushes officers revolt
Sun 2011-04-03
  Rebels claim Brega
Sat 2011-04-02
  Deputy emir of Caucasus Emirate killed in Russian raid
Fri 2011-04-01
  Two UN staff beheaded and eight others murdered in protest against U.S. pastor who burnt Koran
Thu 2011-03-31
  Obama 'orders covert help for Libya rebels'
Wed 2011-03-30
  Libyan Foreign Minister quits, arrives in UK
Tue 2011-03-29
  Yemeni regime loses grip on four provinces
Mon 2011-03-28
  Rebels push towards Sirte
Sun 2011-03-27
  Libyan rebels say forces reach oil town of Brega
Sat 2011-03-26
  Libyan Rebels Reclaim Ajdabiya


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