This blog is mainly about the spectacular train wreck at The Sacramento Bee and its parent company, the McClatchy Company. But I also post about current events, the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, politics, anything else that grabs my attention. Take a look around this blog, hope you enjoy it.
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Saturday August 22 -- Got news or an update?
If you have news or an update, leave it in comments. . . .
55 comments:
Anonymous
said...
How about the item on the "A.P." that stated that the publisher of the St. Petersburg Times was resigning so that they could "streamline" their management team.
Sure would like to know how much that resignation cost them. I seem to remember a McClatchy V.P. getting approximately $700,000 to keep her mouth shut when she "resigned".
The "streamlining" part of the paper's announcement is pretty funny --
"Marty Petty, publisher of the St. Petersburg Times and executive vice president of Times Publishing Co., will leave the company after nine years of running business operations, she and editor, CEO and chairman Paul Tash announced Wednesday.
"In letters to the staff, both executives characterized her departure as a streamlining move...."
Obama To Hike 10-Year Deficit to $9Trillion (Reuters)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration will raise its 10-year budget deficit projection to roughly $9 trillion from $7.108 trillion in a report next week, a senior administration official told Reuters on Friday.
"The new forecasts are based on new data that reflect how severe the economic downturn was in the late fall of last year and the winter of this year," said the official, who is familiar with the plans.
"Our budget projections are now in line with the spring and summer projections that the Congressional Budget Office put out."
The CBO said in June that deficits between 2010 and 2019 would total $9.1 trillion. The official said the 2010-2019 cumulative deficit projection replaces the administration's previous estimate of $7.108 trillion.
Obama won't visit Kennedy during vacation (Politico)
President Barack Obama will not visit with an ailing Sen. Edward Kennedy during Obama’s weeklong vacation on Martha’s Vineyard, a Kennedy aide said Friday.
Speculation about a possible Obama visit with the Massachusetts senator surfaced last week when Boston papers reported that the Secret Service had been at the Kennedy compound. But a Kennedy aide said in an email Friday that an Obama-Kennedy visit is not going to happen.
Useful idiots like Letterman think it’s great to negotiate with the Taliban, but not with Americans protesting the sovietization of their medical system.
Robert Gibbs says "wee weed up" means when "people get overly nervous over something that still has a long way to go." He added "bed wetting" would be the more "consumer friendly term."
Malaysian model, mother to be caned for drinking beer in public CNN.com
A Malaysian model, who is set to become the first woman in the Southeast Asian country to be caned for drinking alcohol in public, wants her punishment carried out in public.
Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno said Thursday that if the intent of the Islamic, or Shariah, court that sentenced her was to set an example for other Muslims, then the flogging should take place in the open.
NYTimes Puts American Lives at Risk, Again (The Weekly Standard)
The New York Times reveals the awful truth about the secret air war against high value al Qaeda targets in Pakistan -- the drones are being armed by evil government contractors.
And while the paper felt comfortable suppressing any news of the capture and confinement of one of its own reporters earlier this year, it shows no compunction in revealing the secret location of the base from which these drones are launched:
The C.I.A. has for several years operated Predator drones out of a remote base in Shamsi, Pakistan, but has secretly added a second site at an air base in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, several current and former government and company officials said.
The existence of the Predator base in Jalalabad has not previously been reported.
What possible value does this information have to readers of the New York Times that would justify the increased risk to the military personnel and contractors that man that base?
California's Unemployment Rate Hits Record High [11.9%] LATimes
The rate jumped unexpectedly in July to 11.9% even as the national rate declined.
The state lost a net 35,800 jobs last month, shedding more jobs than any other state, the U.S. Labor Department said today. It has lost 760,000 jobs over the last year.
California is tied with Oregon for the fourth-highest unemployment rate in the nation, behind Michigan, Rhode Island and Nevada. June's unemployment rate of 11.6% had set a post- World War II record. (ALL DEM RUN STATES)
In this Washington, no outreached hand goes unmangled. Seeing an opening, conservatives have rushed in.
They have started Operation Master and Slaves of Deception — cooking up scary, outlandish claims about the plan and feeding them to a desperate base, eager to believe the worst about the man they loathe the most, President Obama.
Conservatives are now on fertile ground. Still enraged by the ignominy of having been trounced, they are most likely feeling marginalized, ignored and afraid. For them, it has been less about clarifying health care reform and more about a clarion call to resistance.
NBC Universal isn’t just showing its love for Obama on the news airwaves:
If you’re a fan of all things Obama, NBC Universal’s online store has no fewer than 29 options for your buying pleasure -- from a shirt with the president’s picture proclaiming “YES WE DID"...to both of his books...to a special inauguration DVD...to a refrigerator magnet of the first couple.
And don’t forget the Barack Obama Action Figure -- yours for $15, plus tax.
You can buy them online -- or at NBC Universal’s retail store in New York.
The items are promoted with pro-Obama lingo:
“Bring reform to your refrigerator. Or at least keep company with the President while you’re at work, with the Barack Obama Magnet,” one item description reads.
“From Yes We Can to Yes We Did! Celebrate Barack Obama’s historic victory with the new ‘Yes We Did’ Unisex T-Shirt,” reads another.
Charles Grassley, the Republican senator from Iowa, told one town hall meeting that people “have every right to fear” that health care reform could lead to a “government program that determines if you’re going to pull the plug on grandma.” Grassley has been in the Senate for 28 years, and chaired the Senate Special Committee on Aging. Yet he seems never to have noticed that if forced to choose between slaughtering a pen full of cute puppies and irritating the senior voters, every single elected official in Washington would grab a hatchet and dive for the dogs.
Republicans are united, but that shouldn't be confused with victory. Republicans stood together against Social Security and Medicare, and when those programs proved popular, opposing them left a residue of distrust for the GOP. President Obama has pushed his bipartisan shtik about as far as it will go, and if Republican recalcitrance means the Democrats have to go it alone on health care, Obama should embrace the new reality and cry all the way to the signing ceremony.
Black Panther Who Threatened Voters In Philly Is a Credentialed Dem Poll Watcher Poll watchers...
King Samir Shabazz (L) and Jerry Jackson (R), both of Philadelphia pose for their photo above. Jerry Jackson is a certified democratic poll worker.
One of the Black Panthers who intimidated voters on election day is a certified democratic poll watcher.
No wonder Eric Holder dropped the case.
John Fund reported at The Wall Street Journal:
When none of the defendants filed any response to the complaint or appeared in federal district court in Philadelphia to answer the suit, it appeared almost certain Justice would have prevailed by default.
Instead, the department in May suddenly allowed the party and two of the three defendants to walk away. Against the third defendant, Minister King Samir Shabazz, it sought only an injunction barring him from displaying a weapon within 100 feet of a Philadelphia polling place for the next three years—action that's already illegal under existing law.
There was outrage over the decision among Congressional Republicans, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division—especially after it was learned one of the defendants who walked was Jerry Jackson, a member of Philadelphia's 14th Ward Democratic Committee and a credentialed poll watcher for the Democratic Party last Election Day.
UPDATE: He's already been reinstated as a poll watcher.
"Mr. Jackson's MySpace page still lists one of his main 'general interests' as 'Killing Crakkkas.' Four days after the Justice Department dropped the complaint against Mr. Jackson, he again was named an official election poll watcher for the Democratic primary in Philadelphia's municipal election. How convenient."
PATERSON WHINES: 'RACISM!' PLAYS THE 'BIAS' CARD (NY Post)
ALBANY -- Gov. Paterson has played the race card.
The state's first black governor yesterday blamed his political woes -- and those of President Obama -- on a white-dominated media that he accused of taking part in an "orchestrated" attack campaign.
"We're not in the post-racial period," Paterson said in a freewheeling interview on the liberal talk-radio station WWRL. "My feeling is it's being orchestrated, it's a game, and people who pay attention know that."
"We don't have the kind of forces in the community that we had before, in other words, our black media outlets," the Democratic governor continued.
"Even our own reporters from our own community buy the public line, which is, 'We're going to get rid of David Paterson.' "
Paterson cited critical stories about his late-night partying at a Chelsea nightclub on the eve of a painful budget announcement as proof of the media's bias.
"The next victim on the list -- and you see it coming -- is President Barack Obama, who did nothing more than try to reform a health-care system . . . only because he's trying to make change," Paterson said.
DESPERATE MEASURES: NOW IT'S RACIST TO CRITICIZE O? (NY Post)
WHAT if America tran scended race, and Barack Obama wasn't invited?
The question comes to mind as cries of racism grow ever louder from Obama's supporters.
No one should be surprised. Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly, liberal Democrats have to accuse their opponents of racism. Indeed, somewhat to their credit, fighting racism -- alas, even where it doesn't exist -- is one reason they became liberal Democrats in the first place.
And that's the great irony of the Obama presidency. It was Obama's supporters who hinted, teased, promised or prophesied that Obama would help America "transcend race." But now, it is they who shrink from their own promised land.
After all, it was not Obama's detractors who immediately fell into the comfortable groove of racial grievance and familiar "narratives" when Henry Louis Gates insisted that a police instructor in racial sensitivity had to be a racist. That was Obama and his choir of heralds.
From day one, Obama's supporters have tirelessly cultivated the idea that anything inconvenient to the first black president just might be terribly, terribly racist.
I don't think President Obama will stop his freefall for a while for a variety of reasons, but most telling is that the proposed medicines are worse than the raging disease.
He is losing large slices of independents, moderate Republicans, and conservative Democrats who fear his polarizing attempts to transform America. At precisely the same time, his left-wing base is hectoring him to get even more self-destructively statist — as if proposed record tax hikes, corporate and bank takeovers, socialized medicine, cap and trade, race/class/gender agenda appointments, serial apologies abroad, and a $2 trillion annual deficit just didn't cut it.
Worse still, his base is now arguing for him to get more partisan, get meaner, get angrier, and get more fired up — also at precisely the time that polls suggest he is falling for already doing just that — and losing his once bipartisan, no-more-red/no-more-blue-state supposed transcendence.
In truth, as partisans tell Obama to get nasty, his rhetoric the last 90 days has already been exclusively polarizing. The administration and its supporters have ridiculed tea-parties, town-hallers, Republican skepticism about deficits, etc. — evoking everything from Brooks Brothers to the Nazis, from being un-Christian to now getting "wee-weed up."
Already, at eight months, the president is at a Clinton 1995 gut-check moment, but seems to have preferred instead the self-righteous, contrite, and hectoring Jimmy Carter solution.
Could Twitter Destroy Hollywood's Marketing Magic? (Advertising Age)
Did you see Michael Sragow's article "Twitter Effect rattles Hollywood" in the Baltimore Sun? Sragow's thesis is neatly laid out in the first paragraph:
"Although word of mouth could always make or break a movie, it usually took days to affect the box office. But the rise of social networking tools such as Twitter might be narrowing that time frame to hours. And that has Hollywood on edge."
Now keep in mind that, as Sragow goes on to note, "Movietickets.com recently ran a home-page poll in which 88% of the voting sample said Twitter had no effect on them." Of course, that means that a little more than 1 in 10 polled moviegoers are using Twitter as something of a movie recommendation -- or non-recommendation -- engine;
pretty remarkable when you consider how new and nichey Twitter still is.
Poor Cindy Sheehan: It’s Not Easy Being a Has-Been
Pajamas Media ^ Pam Meister Just a few years back, she was the media’s darling. Cindy Sheehan, mother of a soldier slain in Iraq, led the anti-war charge against George W. Bush. Egged on by the mainstream media and left-wing activists eager to put a “face” to their cause, she camped out in front of Bush’s ranch in Crawford, Texas. The entire situation became a media circus, with Sheehan at its epicenter. We saw her getting her hair cut at “Camp Casey,” saw her visiting her son’s grave with media flunkies in tow, and watched her get up close and personal with Hugo Chávez. Feted...
Tribune Co. to sell Cubs, Wrigley Field, Deal includes 25% stake in Comcast SportsNet Chicago AP
Tribune Co. has reached a long-awaited definitive agreement to sell the Chicago Cubs and Wrigley Field to the billionaire Ricketts family.
The announcement came Friday, nearly 2 1/2 years after the marquee baseball franchise and historic ballpark were put up for sale. Tribune said it is selling all but a 5 percent stake, for about $845 million.
The Ricketts family founded online brokerage TD Ameritrade Holding Corp. and was led in the Cubs bid by Chicago investment banker Tom Ricketts, the son of company founder Joe Ricketts.
Movie Times Next to Disappear from Print Editions? ANOTHER REVENUE STREAM WEE-WEED AWAY?
KANSAS CITY, Mo. Filmgoers who have long turned to the local newspaper to find theaters and show times for movies may have to start looking elsewhere as theater chains rethink the value of paper and ink in a digital age.
The top two U.S. chains, Regal Entertainment Group and AMC Entertainment Inc., have begun in recent months to reduce or eliminate the small-type listings showing the start times for movies at individual theaters.
Theaters typically must pay newspapers to print that information.
Looking to cut costs, the theater chains are instead directing consumers to their Internet sites or third-party sites, like Fandango, Moviefone or Flixster, which offer those listings for free and make money from the fees they charge for selling advance tickets to movies. Many of those sites also feature film reviews and movie trailers.
The effort may be gaining some traction, as U.S. Internet traffic to AMC's Web site rose 21 percent in July compared with a year ago, according to comScore Inc., while visits to Regal's Web site were up 18 percent.
Other Metrics, Besides Nielsen, Show Recent Declines in NYTimes.com Uniques (Editor and Publisher)
NEW YORK An unsettling trend may be occurring at NYTimes.com -- monthly uniques have been going down year-over-year for the past several months.
The decline initially registered back in April, a first at least since E&P began tracking monthly Web stats for the top 30 newspapers since November 2007 on a year-over-year basis.
The top 30 list is provided by Nielsen Online (E&P is owned by the same parent company). However, to provide more context, E&P decided to pull data from others including comScore and Quantcast to see if the trend line also ran south there. It did.
The New York Times is disputing the numbers, a spokesperson for the company said, citing that it is inconsistent with internal data. Indeed, there are many reasons for swings in data, including news events.
'St. Louis Post-Dispatch' Trims Advertising, Newsroom Staffs (Editor and Publisher)
ST. LOUIS, Mo. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch says it is cutting 14 full-time and four part-time jobs.
The newspaper, the largest of the 50 dailies owned by Davenport, Iowa-based Lee Enterprises, announced the cuts on Friday.
Twelve of the layoffs are in advertising, two in operations and four in the newsroom. The newsroom cuts involve news researchers and a photo assistant.
Publisher Kevin Mowbray says he is hopeful the worst of the recession has passed. (HE KNOWS MELANIE SILL)
Obama and the Democrats don’t care how much we pay at the pump, they ride in our planes, on our dime, and sneer at us all the while. This is how the elite liberals think it should be, and enough dumb and blind voters agreed. *** “George Soros, a major contributor to the Democratic Party, is also a major investor in the Brazilian oil company”
White House says 'drill, baby, drill' - in Brazil One News Now ^ An energy analyst says he cannot understand why the Obama administration is borrowing money to lend money to Brazil so it can conduct oil drilling off its eastern coast, yet will not support oil drilling in American waters. The Wall Street Journal reports that the Obama administration has agreed to lend $2 billion to Brazil's state-owned oil company, Petrobras, to finance oil exploration off the country's coast near Rio de Janeiro. The U.S. Export-Import Bank has issued a "preliminary commitment" of $2 billion to Petrobras, but may loan more. Earlier this month, a Brazilian official said the U.S. could provide up to $10 billion for the drilling project. via FreeRepublic
Daily Presidential Tracking Poll (8/22: -10; only 29% strongly approve
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Saturday shows that 29% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President.
Thirty-nine percent (39%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -10 This is the first time since July 31 that the President’s Approval Index has fallen to negative double digits
Sixty percent (60%) of liberal voters Strongly Approve while 68% of conservatives Strongly Disapprove. This creates a challenge for the President since there are roughly twice as many conservative voters as liberals.
Among those who consider themselves politically moderate, 37% Strongly Approve while 18% Strongly Disapprove.
CA is a dying state, with all the natural resources they have, they cannot sustain themselves. After ruining CA, the liberals are leaving CA, and infesting other states. States that are declining in debt and regulations brought to them by the footloose ex-CA liberals: Oregon, Washington, Colorado, Montana, Arizona, just for starters. === -Catching Up to Mexico - Illegal immigration is depleting California's human capital- National Review (print) by Alex Alexiev
California's financial unraveling has prompted a long-overdue debate about taxes, regulation, and government spending, but the state's media and government continue to ignore what could be an even greater problem: the irreparable damage to California's human capital that nearly 30 years of unrestrained illegal immigration has achieved.
Clear message from B Hussein O --- CAIR Thanks President Obama for Ramadan Message
PRNewswire-USNewswire The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) today offered Ramadan greetings to American Muslims and thanked President Obama for a videotaped message marking the month-long fast and acknowledging Muslim community service efforts. VIDEO: President Obama's Ramadan Message. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euANTSzrvso SEE ALSO: Transcript
Nevada's high unemployment rate is basically illegals and anchor kids being laid off in the hotel/casino industry and the state's housing collapse. They flocked there and found low-paying jobs when times were good. Now the casinos are empty and you can't sell a house much less build one.
Trying to Keep Obama and Congress Accountable - Lawsuit probes into Freddie and Fannie payouts.
WND WorldNetDaily Obama in his three complete years in the Senate was the second largest recipient of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae campaign contributions, behind only Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., the powerful chairman of the Senate banking committee.
Singing: California Here I ‘flee‘, Leaving a blue state so shity… === California's Unemployment Rate Hits Record High [11.9%] LATimes ^ |
California's unemployment rate hits record high- The rate jumped unexpectedly in July to 11.9% even as the national rate declined. By Alana Semuels California's unemployment rate took an unexpected leap in July, reaching a new high of 11.9% and bucking a trend that saw the national rate drop over the same period. The state lost a net 35,800 jobs last month, shedding more jobs than any other state, the U.S. Labor Department said today. It has lost 760,000 jobs over the last year.
**California is tied with Oregon for the fourth-highest unemployment rate in the nation, behind Michigan, Rhode Island and Nevada. June's unemployment rate of 11.6% had set a post- World War II record.**
Thank-you, Fox News. Thank you for reporting the news other networks ignore. Thanks for not condescending to the great unwashed by informing us how we should think on a given subject.
Thank-you for not adopting the patronizing, elitist attitudes that have become de rigueur on most other networks. Thank-you for recognizing that Americans have the right to information from both sides of the aisle and are fully capable of making up their own minds on issues, given enough facts.
Thanks, Fox, for actually questioning the incessant spin coming from Camp Obama. No one else is. If not for your reporting, most Americans would still be unaware of the depth of 'change' our president is proposing. Even though the old media succeeded in getting Obama elected, thanks to you, Americans are finally being given access to information they should have had before they voted. Better late than never.
Thank-you, Fox, for caring more about journalism than about access to self-anointed elites, and cocktail party invites from the inside the beltway crowd. You have succeeded without giving in to the politically correct crowd. That's no mean feat. You have decided to play by the old, traditional rules instead of the oh, so fashionable, new improved ones the progressives have adopted. Very cool, guys. I know how hard it is these days to march to your own drummer instead of aligning yourself with the majority.
Thank you, FNC, for daring to veer from the decades old template by airing Glenn Beck during the news hour. And thank-you, Glenn, for providing information no-one else dares to report. You're the man, Glenn. The fact that you drive the left crazy means you're doing something right.
Las Vegas jobless rate hits all-time high of 13.1 percent (reviewjournal.com)
Nevada's unemployment rose to 12.5 percent in July, while joblessness in especially hard-hit Las Vegas surged to 13.1 percent. It’s the highest jobless rate both statewide and locally since the state began tracking data in 1976.
No “green shoots” for Nevada.
As economists and policymakers nationwide hover over the tender little economic tendrils that herald recovery from recession, Nevada’s economy looks as barren as the Mojave Desert.
As a trickle of data points to the national downturn’s end, Nevada’s economy continues its descent. Joblessness in the Silver State jumped to 12.5 percent in July, while unemployment in hard-hit Las Vegas leapt to 13.1 percent. Both state and local unemployment scored their highest levels in 33 years of tracking, the state Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation said today.
Nevada’s jobless rate was more than double its level in July 2008, when 6.6 percent of the state’s residents were out of work. In Las Vegas, unemployment was at 6.8 percent in July 2008.
Glenn Beck is hitting Obama and his socialist minions hard. Whenever the leftist media tries to destroy Beck, or others, you well know someone has hit a nerve that pains the corrupted ones out of their insane minds. Limbaugh, Hannity, Fox News, Sarah Palin, and now Beck. An Obama czar used his radical group and underhanded thuggery tactics to cost Beck his sponsors. How can Obama keep such a man on his czarist payroll? Easy, they are all cheats and crooks, one more thug fits right in,IMO.
The White House releases this news on the weekend. Taxpayers are paying to receive this Government E-mail propaganda, and through the nose no doubt.
Fox News Exclusive: White House Confirms Using Private Firm to Send E-Mails August 22, 2009 at 12:45 pm Fox News Dateline: Washington, DC Fox News: The revelation comes after the White House acknowledged this week that people were receiving unsolicited e-mails from the administration about health care reform and suggested the problem was with third-party groups that placed the recipients' names on the distribution list. More @ http://www.breitbart.tv/
MW's right-wingers are showing their true colors again as homophobes. Way to go: Continue to alienate groups of voters. You'll be out of power for another two decades.
MW's right-wingers are showing their true colors again as homophobes.
Proud of it fudge packer. If there is a group that any party doesn't need it would be
A) The criminal element and
B)People who think those looking for the next great thing to stick up their butt have anything constructive to contribute to society short of fertilizer.
Meanwhile, in Brazil, India, China, Japan, and much of continental Europe the recession has ended. In the second quarter this year, both the French and German economies grew by 0.3 percent, while the U.S. economy shrank by 1 percent. How can that be? Unlike America, France and Germany had no government stimulus worth speaking of, the Germans declining to go the Obama route on the quaint grounds that they couldn’t afford it.
They did not invest in the critical signage-in-front-of-holes-in-the-road sector. And yet their recession has gone away. Of the world’s biggest economies, only the U.S., Britain, and Italy are still contracting. All three are big stimulators, though Gordon Brown and Silvio Berlusconi can’t compete with Obama’s $800 billion porkapalooza. The president has borrowed more money to spend to less effect than anybody on the planet.
55 comments:
How about the item on the "A.P." that stated that the publisher of the St. Petersburg Times was resigning so that they could "streamline" their management team.
Sure would like to know how much that resignation cost them. I seem to remember a McClatchy V.P. getting approximately $700,000 to keep her mouth shut when she "resigned".
Friday Newsdump: Deficit Projections Upped By $1.9 Trillion
(The Business Insider)
Earlier this week it came out that this year's deficit numbers would be reduced by about $262 billion.
But bad news long term. The Obama administration is upping its 10-year deficit forecast to $9 trillion from $7.9 trillion over the next two years.
And of course they waited until end-of-market on Friday to do it, though we can't blame them for that.
Michael Steele to Obama: “You’ve got the votes Mr. President. Pass the bill.”
Michael Steele, during an interview yesterday in Arkansas, called President Obama out.
"You want it done, pass the bill. But they know it's poisonous. They know the American people will not tolerate it."
The Dems finally have the Congressional / White House tiger by the tail.
The question is, will they be able to keep control of it, or will it eat them?
The "streamlining" part of the paper's announcement is pretty funny --
"Marty Petty, publisher of the St. Petersburg Times and executive vice president of Times Publishing Co., will leave the company after nine years of running business operations, she and editor, CEO and chairman Paul Tash announced Wednesday.
"In letters to the staff, both executives characterized her departure as a streamlining move...."
God I miss the Carter days.
Obama To Hike 10-Year Deficit to $9Trillion (Reuters)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration will raise its 10-year budget deficit projection to roughly $9 trillion from $7.108 trillion in a report next week, a senior administration official told Reuters on Friday.
"The new forecasts are based on new data that reflect how severe the economic downturn was in the late fall of last year and the winter of this year," said the official, who is familiar with the plans.
"Our budget projections are now in line with the spring and summer projections that the Congressional Budget Office put out."
The CBO said in June that deficits between 2010 and 2019 would total $9.1 trillion. The official said the 2010-2019 cumulative deficit projection replaces the administration's previous estimate of $7.108 trillion.
Obama won't visit Kennedy during vacation (Politico)
President Barack Obama will not visit with an ailing Sen. Edward Kennedy during Obama’s weeklong vacation on Martha’s Vineyard, a Kennedy aide said Friday.
Speculation about a possible Obama visit with the Massachusetts senator surfaced last week when Boston papers reported that the Secret Service had been at the Kennedy compound. But a Kennedy aide said in an email Friday that an Obama-Kennedy visit is not going to happen.
Poll: Americans Losing Faith in Obama (AOL)
Do you believe President Barack Obama will make the right decisions for the country?
No 78%
Yes 22%
Total Votes: 297,304
Overall, how would you rate Obama as president?
Poor 66%
Fair 15%
Good 10%
Excellent 9%
Total Votes: 294,575
David Letterman’s latest publicity stunt: You’re the Taliban
So, here’s what The Perv of Late Night CBS Comedy said last night:
“You know about the Taliban? Over here, we call them ‘healthcare protesters.’”
Useful idiots like Letterman think it’s great to negotiate with the Taliban, but not with Americans protesting the sovietization of their medical system.
Gibbs Says "Wee Weed Up" Means "Bed Wetting" (Real Clear Politics)
Robert Gibbs says "wee weed up" means when "people get overly nervous over something that still has a long way to go." He added "bed wetting" would be the more "consumer friendly term."
Where's your sense of humor? Lighten up.
For Class of 2009, Degree Doesn’t Mean A Job MSNBC
Labor statistics for July showed that 15.3 percent of Americans ages 20 to 24 were unemployed, up a tenth of a percentage point from June.
That’s compared to the overall jobless rate of 9.4 percent.
Malaysian model, mother to be caned for drinking beer in public
CNN.com
A Malaysian model, who is set to become the first woman in the Southeast Asian country to be caned for drinking alcohol in public, wants her punishment carried out in public.
Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno said Thursday that if the intent of the Islamic, or Shariah, court that sentenced her was to set an example for other Muslims, then the flogging should take place in the open.
"Let's be transparent about it," she said.
NYTimes Puts American Lives at Risk, Again (The Weekly Standard)
The New York Times reveals the awful truth about the secret air war against high value al Qaeda targets in Pakistan -- the drones are being armed by evil government contractors.
And while the paper felt comfortable suppressing any news of the capture and confinement of one of its own reporters earlier this year, it shows no compunction in revealing the secret location of the base from which these drones are launched:
The C.I.A. has for several years operated Predator drones out of a remote base in Shamsi, Pakistan, but has secretly added a second site at an air base in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, several current and former government and company officials said.
The existence of the Predator base in Jalalabad has not previously been reported.
What possible value does this information have to readers of the New York Times that would justify the increased risk to the military personnel and contractors that man that base?
California's Unemployment Rate Hits Record High [11.9%]
LATimes
The rate jumped unexpectedly in July to 11.9% even as the national rate declined.
The state lost a net 35,800 jobs last month, shedding more jobs than any other state, the U.S. Labor Department said today. It has lost 760,000 jobs over the last year.
California is tied with Oregon for the fourth-highest unemployment rate in the nation, behind Michigan, Rhode Island and Nevada. June's unemployment rate of 11.6% had set a post- World War II record. (ALL DEM RUN STATES)
High Unemployment States:
California- Extremely liberal with socialist elements throughout
Oregon- Not to be out down by its neighbor to the south, a communist state
Michigan- every solution to bad economics- regulate, tax, spend.
Run by Dems for 50 years.
Rhode Island- People's Republic of RI.
Nevada- Has abandon its libertarian way for liberalism.
Masters and slaves of deception
In this Washington, no outreached hand goes unmangled. Seeing an opening, conservatives have rushed in.
They have started Operation Master and Slaves of Deception — cooking up scary, outlandish claims about the plan and feeding them to a desperate base, eager to believe the worst about the man they loathe the most, President Obama.
Conservatives are now on fertile ground. Still enraged by the ignominy of having been trounced, they are most likely feeling marginalized, ignored and afraid. For them, it has been less about clarifying health care reform and more about a clarion call to resistance.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/22/
opinion/22blow.html
NBC Online Store Offers 29 Pro-Obama Items
NBC Universal isn’t just showing its love for Obama on the news airwaves:
If you’re a fan of all things Obama, NBC Universal’s online store has no fewer than 29 options for your buying pleasure -- from a shirt with the president’s picture proclaiming “YES WE DID"...to both of his books...to a special inauguration DVD...to a refrigerator magnet of the first couple.
And don’t forget the Barack Obama Action Figure -- yours for $15, plus tax.
You can buy them online -- or at NBC Universal’s retail store in New York.
The items are promoted with pro-Obama lingo:
“Bring reform to your refrigerator. Or at least keep company with the President while you’re at work, with the Barack Obama Magnet,” one item description reads.
“From Yes We Can to Yes We Did! Celebrate Barack Obama’s historic victory with the new ‘Yes We Did’ Unisex T-Shirt,” reads another.
Charles Grassley, the Republican senator from Iowa, told one town hall meeting that people “have every right to fear” that health care reform could lead to a “government program that determines if you’re going to pull the plug on grandma.” Grassley has been in the Senate for 28 years, and chaired the Senate Special Committee on Aging. Yet he seems never to have noticed that if forced to choose between slaughtering a pen full of cute puppies and irritating the senior voters, every single elected official in Washington would grab a hatchet and dive for the dogs.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/22/
opinion/22collins.html
...NBC Online Store Offers 29 Pro-Obama Items...
So what?
Time to get in the ring
Republicans are united, but that shouldn't be confused with victory. Republicans stood together against Social Security and Medicare, and when those programs proved popular, opposing them left a residue of distrust for the GOP. President Obama has pushed his bipartisan shtik about as far as it will go, and if Republican recalcitrance means the Democrats have to go it alone on health care, Obama should embrace the new reality and cry all the way to the signing ceremony.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/213173
Black Panther Who Threatened Voters In Philly Is a Credentialed Dem Poll Watcher Poll watchers...
King Samir Shabazz (L) and Jerry Jackson (R), both of Philadelphia pose for their photo above. Jerry Jackson is a certified democratic poll worker.
One of the Black Panthers who intimidated voters on election day is a certified democratic poll watcher.
No wonder Eric Holder dropped the case.
John Fund reported at The Wall Street Journal:
When none of the defendants filed any response to the complaint or appeared in federal district court in Philadelphia to answer the suit, it appeared almost certain Justice would have prevailed by default.
Instead, the department in May suddenly allowed the party and two of the three defendants to walk away. Against the third defendant, Minister King Samir Shabazz, it sought only an injunction barring him from displaying a weapon within 100 feet of a Philadelphia polling place for the next three years—action that's already illegal under existing law.
There was outrage over the decision among Congressional Republicans, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division—especially after it was learned one of the defendants who walked was Jerry Jackson, a member of Philadelphia's 14th Ward Democratic Committee and a credentialed poll watcher for the Democratic Party last Election Day.
UPDATE: He's already been reinstated as a poll watcher.
"Mr. Jackson's MySpace page still lists one of his main 'general interests' as 'Killing Crakkkas.' Four days after the Justice Department dropped the complaint against Mr. Jackson, he again was named an official election poll watcher for the Democratic primary in Philadelphia's municipal election. How convenient."
PATERSON WHINES: 'RACISM!' PLAYS THE 'BIAS' CARD (NY Post)
ALBANY -- Gov. Paterson has played the race card.
The state's first black governor yesterday blamed his political woes -- and those of President Obama -- on a white-dominated media that he accused of taking part in an "orchestrated" attack campaign.
"We're not in the post-racial period," Paterson said in a freewheeling interview on the liberal talk-radio station WWRL. "My feeling is it's being orchestrated, it's a game, and people who pay attention know that."
"We don't have the kind of forces in the community that we had before, in other words, our black media outlets," the Democratic governor continued.
"Even our own reporters from our own community buy the public line, which is, 'We're going to get rid of David Paterson.' "
Paterson cited critical stories about his late-night partying at a Chelsea nightclub on the eve of a painful budget announcement as proof of the media's bias.
"The next victim on the list -- and you see it coming -- is President Barack Obama, who did nothing more than try to reform a health-care system . . . only because he's trying to make change," Paterson said.
DESPERATE MEASURES: NOW IT'S RACIST TO CRITICIZE O? (NY Post)
WHAT if America tran scended race, and Barack Obama wasn't invited?
The question comes to mind as cries of racism grow ever louder from Obama's supporters.
No one should be surprised. Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly, liberal Democrats have to accuse their opponents of racism. Indeed, somewhat to their credit, fighting racism -- alas, even where it doesn't exist -- is one reason they became liberal Democrats in the first place.
And that's the great irony of the Obama presidency. It was Obama's supporters who hinted, teased, promised or prophesied that Obama would help America "transcend race." But now, it is they who shrink from their own promised land.
After all, it was not Obama's detractors who immediately fell into the comfortable groove of racial grievance and familiar "narratives" when Henry Louis Gates insisted that a police instructor in racial sensitivity had to be a racist. That was Obama and his choir of heralds.
From day one, Obama's supporters have tirelessly cultivated the idea that anything inconvenient to the first black president just might be terribly, terribly racist.
Victor Davis Hanson: Stop Digging?
I don't think President Obama will stop his freefall for a while for a variety of reasons, but most telling is that the proposed medicines are worse than the raging disease.
He is losing large slices of independents, moderate Republicans, and conservative Democrats who fear his polarizing attempts to transform America. At precisely the same time, his left-wing base is hectoring him to get even more self-destructively statist — as if proposed record tax hikes, corporate and bank takeovers, socialized medicine, cap and trade, race/class/gender agenda appointments, serial apologies abroad, and a $2 trillion annual deficit just didn't cut it.
Worse still, his base is now arguing for him to get more partisan, get meaner, get angrier, and get more fired up — also at precisely the time that polls suggest he is falling for already doing just that — and losing his once bipartisan, no-more-red/no-more-blue-state supposed transcendence.
In truth, as partisans tell Obama to get nasty, his rhetoric the last 90 days has already been exclusively polarizing. The administration and its supporters have ridiculed tea-parties, town-hallers, Republican skepticism about deficits, etc. — evoking everything from Brooks Brothers to the Nazis, from being un-Christian to now getting "wee-weed up."
Already, at eight months, the president is at a Clinton 1995 gut-check moment, but seems to have preferred instead the self-righteous, contrite, and hectoring Jimmy Carter solution.
Could Twitter Destroy Hollywood's Marketing Magic? (Advertising Age)
Did you see Michael Sragow's article "Twitter Effect rattles Hollywood" in the Baltimore Sun? Sragow's thesis is neatly laid out in the first paragraph:
"Although word of mouth could always make or break a movie, it usually took days to affect the box office. But the rise of social networking tools such as Twitter might be narrowing that time frame to hours. And that has Hollywood on edge."
Now keep in mind that, as Sragow goes on to note, "Movietickets.com recently ran a home-page poll in which 88% of the voting sample said Twitter had no effect on them." Of course, that means that a little more than 1 in 10 polled moviegoers are using Twitter as something of a movie recommendation -- or non-recommendation -- engine;
pretty remarkable when you consider how new and nichey Twitter still is.
Poor Cindy Sheehan: It’s Not Easy Being a Has-Been
Pajamas Media ^ Pam Meister
Just a few years back, she was the media’s darling. Cindy Sheehan, mother of a soldier slain in Iraq, led the anti-war charge against George W. Bush. Egged on by the mainstream media and left-wing activists eager to put a “face” to their cause, she camped out in front of Bush’s ranch in Crawford, Texas. The entire situation became a media circus, with Sheehan at its epicenter. We saw her getting her hair cut at “Camp Casey,” saw her visiting her son’s grave with media flunkies in tow, and watched her get up close and personal with Hugo Chávez. Feted...
Tribune Co. to sell Cubs, Wrigley Field, Deal includes 25% stake in Comcast SportsNet Chicago AP
Tribune Co. has reached a long-awaited definitive agreement to sell the Chicago Cubs and Wrigley Field to the billionaire Ricketts family.
The announcement came Friday, nearly 2 1/2 years after the marquee baseball franchise and historic ballpark were put up for sale. Tribune said it is selling all but a 5 percent stake, for about $845 million.
The Ricketts family founded online brokerage TD Ameritrade Holding Corp. and was led in the Cubs bid by Chicago investment banker Tom Ricketts, the son of company founder Joe Ricketts.
Movie Times Next to Disappear from Print Editions? ANOTHER REVENUE STREAM WEE-WEED AWAY?
KANSAS CITY, Mo. Filmgoers who have long turned to the local newspaper to find theaters and show times for movies may have to start looking elsewhere as theater chains rethink the value of paper and ink in a digital age.
The top two U.S. chains, Regal Entertainment Group and AMC Entertainment Inc., have begun in recent months to reduce or eliminate the small-type listings showing the start times for movies at individual theaters.
Theaters typically must pay newspapers to print that information.
Looking to cut costs, the theater chains are instead directing consumers to their Internet sites or third-party sites, like Fandango, Moviefone or Flixster, which offer those listings for free and make money from the fees they charge for selling advance tickets to movies. Many of those sites also feature film reviews and movie trailers.
The effort may be gaining some traction, as U.S. Internet traffic to AMC's Web site rose 21 percent in July compared with a year ago, according to comScore Inc., while visits to Regal's Web site were up 18 percent.
Other Metrics, Besides Nielsen, Show Recent Declines in NYTimes.com Uniques (Editor and Publisher)
NEW YORK An unsettling trend may be occurring at NYTimes.com -- monthly uniques have been going down year-over-year for the past several months.
The decline initially registered back in April, a first at least since E&P began tracking monthly Web stats for the top 30 newspapers since November 2007 on a year-over-year basis.
The top 30 list is provided by Nielsen Online (E&P is owned by the same parent company). However, to provide more context, E&P decided to pull data from others including comScore and Quantcast to see if the trend line also ran south there. It did.
The New York Times is disputing the numbers, a spokesperson for the company said, citing that it is inconsistent with internal data. Indeed, there are many reasons for swings in data, including news events.
'St. Louis Post-Dispatch' Trims Advertising, Newsroom Staffs (Editor and Publisher)
ST. LOUIS, Mo. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch says it is cutting 14 full-time and four part-time jobs.
The newspaper, the largest of the 50 dailies owned by Davenport, Iowa-based Lee Enterprises, announced the cuts on Friday.
Twelve of the layoffs are in advertising, two in operations and four in the newsroom. The newsroom cuts involve news researchers and a photo assistant.
Publisher Kevin Mowbray says he is hopeful the worst of the recession has passed. (HE KNOWS MELANIE SILL)
Obama and the Democrats don’t care how much we pay at the pump, they ride in our planes, on our dime, and sneer at us all the while. This is how the elite liberals think it should be, and enough dumb and blind voters agreed.
***
“George Soros, a major contributor to the Democratic Party, is also a major investor in the Brazilian oil company”
White House says 'drill, baby, drill' - in Brazil
One News Now ^
An energy analyst says he cannot understand why the Obama administration is borrowing money to lend money to Brazil so it can conduct oil drilling off its eastern coast, yet will not support oil drilling in American waters.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the Obama administration has agreed to lend $2 billion to Brazil's state-owned oil company, Petrobras, to finance oil exploration off the country's coast near Rio de Janeiro. The U.S. Export-Import Bank has issued a "preliminary commitment" of $2 billion to Petrobras, but may loan more. Earlier this month, a Brazilian official said the U.S. could provide up to $10 billion for the drilling project.
via FreeRepublic
Daily Presidential Tracking Poll (8/22: -10; only 29% strongly approve
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Saturday shows that 29% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President.
Thirty-nine percent (39%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -10 This is the first time since July 31 that the President’s Approval Index has fallen to negative double digits
Sixty percent (60%) of liberal voters Strongly Approve while 68% of conservatives Strongly Disapprove. This creates a challenge for the President since there are roughly twice as many conservative voters as liberals.
Among those who consider themselves politically moderate, 37% Strongly Approve while 18% Strongly Disapprove.
CA is a dying state, with all the natural resources they have, they cannot sustain themselves. After ruining CA, the liberals are leaving CA, and infesting other states. States that are declining in debt and regulations brought to them by the footloose ex-CA liberals: Oregon, Washington, Colorado, Montana, Arizona, just for starters.
===
-Catching Up to Mexico - Illegal immigration is depleting California's human capital-
National Review (print)
by Alex Alexiev
California's financial unraveling has prompted a long-overdue debate about taxes, regulation, and government spending, but the state's media and government continue to ignore what could be an even greater problem: the irreparable damage to California's human capital that nearly 30 years of unrestrained illegal immigration has achieved.
Clear message from B Hussein O
---
CAIR Thanks President Obama for Ramadan Message
PRNewswire-USNewswire
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) today offered Ramadan greetings to American Muslims and thanked President Obama for a videotaped message marking the month-long fast and acknowledging Muslim community service efforts.
VIDEO: President Obama's Ramadan Message. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euANTSzrvso
SEE ALSO: Transcript
Nevada's high unemployment rate is basically illegals and anchor kids being laid off in the hotel/casino industry and the state's housing collapse. They flocked there and found low-paying jobs when times were good. Now the casinos are empty and you can't sell a house much less build one.
Reality Check: Bill O'Reilly on a cable channel has more viewers each night than major network "superstar" David Letterman. So stick it Letterman!
Trying to Keep Obama and Congress Accountable - Lawsuit probes into Freddie and Fannie payouts.
WND WorldNetDaily
Obama in his three complete years in the Senate was the second largest recipient of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae campaign contributions, behind only Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., the powerful chairman of the Senate banking committee.
Singing: California Here I ‘flee‘, Leaving a blue state so shity…
===
California's Unemployment Rate Hits Record High [11.9%]
LATimes ^ |
California's unemployment rate hits record high- The rate jumped unexpectedly in July to 11.9% even as the national rate declined.
By Alana Semuels
California's unemployment rate took an unexpected leap in July, reaching a new high of 11.9% and bucking a trend that saw the national rate drop over the same period.
The state lost a net 35,800 jobs last month, shedding more jobs than any other state, the U.S. Labor Department said today. It has lost 760,000 jobs over the last year.
**California is tied with Oregon for the fourth-highest unemployment rate in the nation, behind Michigan, Rhode Island and Nevada. June's unemployment rate of 11.6% had set a post- World War II record.**
Thank-You, Fox News (Flopping Aces)
Thank-you, Fox News. Thank you for reporting the news other networks ignore. Thanks for not condescending to the great unwashed by informing us how we should think on a given subject.
Thank-you for not adopting the patronizing, elitist attitudes that have become de rigueur on most other networks. Thank-you for recognizing that Americans have the right to information from both sides of the aisle and are fully capable of making up their own minds on issues, given enough facts.
Thanks, Fox, for actually questioning the incessant spin coming from Camp Obama. No one else is. If not for your reporting, most Americans would still be unaware of the depth of 'change' our president is proposing. Even though the old media succeeded in getting Obama elected, thanks to you, Americans are finally being given access to information they should have had before they voted. Better late than never.
Thank-you, Fox, for caring more about journalism than about access to self-anointed elites, and cocktail party invites from the inside the beltway crowd. You have succeeded without giving in to the politically correct crowd. That's no mean feat. You have decided to play by the old, traditional rules instead of the oh, so fashionable, new improved ones the progressives have adopted. Very cool, guys. I know how hard it is these days to march to your own drummer instead of aligning yourself with the majority.
Thank you, FNC, for daring to veer from the decades old template by airing Glenn Beck during the news hour. And thank-you, Glenn, for providing information no-one else dares to report. You're the man, Glenn. The fact that you drive the left crazy means you're doing something right.
“Why not close a bank started illegally by FDR.”
I saw this comment, what is this about, anyone know?
Las Vegas jobless rate hits all-time high of 13.1 percent
(reviewjournal.com)
Nevada's unemployment rose to 12.5 percent in July, while joblessness in especially hard-hit Las Vegas surged to 13.1 percent. It’s the highest jobless rate both statewide and locally since the state began tracking data in 1976.
No “green shoots” for Nevada.
As economists and policymakers nationwide hover over the tender little economic tendrils that herald recovery from recession, Nevada’s economy looks as barren as the Mojave Desert.
As a trickle of data points to the national downturn’s end, Nevada’s economy continues its descent. Joblessness in the Silver State jumped to 12.5 percent in July, while unemployment in hard-hit Las Vegas leapt to 13.1 percent. Both state and local unemployment scored their highest levels in 33 years of tracking, the state Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation said today.
Nevada’s jobless rate was more than double its level in July 2008, when 6.6 percent of the state’s residents were out of work. In Las Vegas, unemployment was at 6.8 percent in July 2008.
Bumper Sticker:
Honk if you’re Paying
My mortgage
Glenn Beck is hitting Obama and his socialist minions hard. Whenever the leftist media tries to destroy Beck, or others, you well know someone has hit a nerve that pains the corrupted ones out of their insane minds. Limbaugh, Hannity, Fox News, Sarah Palin, and now Beck. An Obama czar used his radical group and underhanded thuggery tactics to cost Beck his sponsors. How can Obama keep such a man on his czarist payroll? Easy, they are all cheats and crooks, one more thug fits right in,IMO.
The White House releases this news on the weekend. Taxpayers are paying to receive this Government
E-mail propaganda, and through the nose no doubt.
Fox News Exclusive: White House Confirms Using Private Firm to Send E-Mails
August 22, 2009 at 12:45 pm
Fox News
Dateline: Washington, DC
Fox News: The revelation comes after the White House acknowledged this week that people were receiving unsolicited e-mails from the administration about health care reform and suggested the problem was with third-party groups that placed the recipients' names on the distribution list.
More @ http://www.breitbart.tv/
...Thanks, Fox News, for not condescending to the great unwashed by informing us how we should think on a given subject...
LMAO! Faux: We distort; you decide.
LMAO! Faux: We distort; you decide.
How original! Which gay site did you copy this from?
Don't any gays watch Faux?
Not the Flames that parrot each others pet names and buzz words like Faux News.
Don't ask me why. Too busy stalking little boys to come up with anything original?
Gays watch Rachel Maddow on MSNBC. Oh wait, her ratings are too low to attract any segment of the population. Eight people watch every night.
MW's right-wingers are showing their true colors again as homophobes. Way to go: Continue to alienate groups of voters. You'll be out of power for another two decades.
MW's right-wingers are showing their true colors again as homophobes.
Proud of it fudge packer. If there is a group that any party doesn't need it would be
A) The criminal element and
B)People who think those looking for the next great thing to stick up their butt have anything constructive to contribute to society short of fertilizer.
Why the Stimulus Flopped
NRO
Meanwhile, in Brazil, India, China, Japan, and much of continental Europe the recession has ended. In the second quarter this year, both the French and German economies grew by 0.3 percent, while the U.S. economy shrank by 1 percent. How can that be? Unlike America, France and Germany had no government stimulus worth speaking of, the Germans declining to go the Obama route on the quaint grounds that they couldn’t afford it.
They did not invest in the critical signage-in-front-of-holes-in-the-road sector. And yet their recession has gone away. Of the world’s biggest economies, only the U.S., Britain, and Italy are still contracting. All three are big stimulators, though Gordon Brown and Silvio Berlusconi can’t compete with Obama’s $800 billion porkapalooza. The president has borrowed more money to spend to less effect than anybody on the planet.
And don’t forget the Barack Obama Action Figure -- yours for $15, plus tax.
The Republican version comes with a Mojo and needles to stick in it!
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