I got another update from Erick at Redstate this morning and boy is that guy frustrated with his beloved GOP. He’s all upset this morning with the Georgia GOP and is suggesting that the Georgia Republican representatives of note should be beheaded all at once.

In 2002, Republicans took over the Georgia State Senate and Governor’s Mansion for the first time since the Civil War.

In 2004, the GOP took over the State House of Representatives.

In 2006, the GOP completed its take over of the State of Georgia, capturing the Lt. Governor’s seat, the Secretary of State’s Office, and solidifying its hold on the legislature.

In 2008, when the GOP was crumbling everywhere, it was a banner Republican year in Georgia.

In 2010, the Republicans might be annihilated from the State of Georgia. They would deserve it.

A Lt. Governor caught with his pants down, a Speaker of the House who tried to commit suicide, and a host of potential leaders waiting in the wings all with adultery problems – the GOP deserves destruction in Georgia if it does not clean its own house immediately.

Put simply, while breaking out the guillotine to chop off Speaker Glenn Richardson’s head, the Georgia Republican Party needs to line up Mark Burkhalter, Ben Harbin, Casey Cagle, and a few others behind him. Do it all at one time.

Cleaning up all the blood at once will be far cheaper in the long run.

The timeline is quite telling to me. It appears that this little changeover could be directly correlated with the Georgians beginning to see that these two parties are both shams. Erick knows this but gets paid to continue the divide and to foster as many far right religious fanatical freaks, as possible, no matter how far removed from anything Christ would have.

You know, its one thing to use the figurative language of beheading, but Erick is pretty close to stepping across the figurative line. But no worries, Erick Erickson is only as dangerous as his rhetoric. Anyone knows that. He is nothing more than a shill for the most ravenous fools in politics, so the vast majority pay him no mind whatsoever. But it is an amazing thing for such a God fearing man as he to suggest, isn’t it?

But, this little outburst is important for another reason. It shows the frustration that these idiots have with their dying America-killing brand.

And die it should. Quick.

But don’t stop with Georgia or even the reTHUGlican party. As far as I am concerned, Erick and all you other red meaters out there, take out the demoRATS at the same time so the real America-nurturing citizens can bring sanity back to our country. For the fact is that you fucking nutbags and the ObamaManiacs are a detriment to this country and if anyone needs their figurative heads cut off, let’s get all you nutcases at one time.

I need to point out that had Erick pitched a fit for all the other corrupt, immoral and criminal reTHUGlicans that have been highlighted for their behavior just in the past 3 years, Erick would have very few people to support (his Party would have already died from its immorality). So, this little outcry means little when the man keeps his mouth shut the majority of time in complicit coverup of his coffers and those he must protect.

So, this group is a prime example of Ass-Kissing Sycophants from the “other” party (just so you understand that I don’t only grind my ax towards the faux liberals out there). It is this fake, citizen-brainwashing two party system that needs to go. Not just one or the other party. They are but one Corporatist owned party that do the bidding of Big Money. Period.

The sooner you get that thru your skulls, the better.

Till then, let’s give thanks.

Either Al “I’m serial” Gore has finally nailed down the manbearpig in the Colorado hills, or…  he has finally seen that the Man-Made Global-Warming scam isn’t what it was cracked up to be.  Personally, I reckon it’s the latter.  Whatever the reason for his cancellation, it does seem suspect, especially after all that personal involvement.

Gore cancels climate conference event

The Washington Post, December 3, 2009

Former Vice President Al Gore on Thursday abruptly canceled a Dec. 16 personal appearance that was to be staged during the United Nations’ Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, which begins next week.

As described in The Washington Times’ Inside the Beltway column Tuesday, the multimedia public event to promote Mr. Gore’s new book, “Our Choice,” included $1,209 VIP tickets that granted the holder a photo opportunity with Mr. Gore and a “light snack.”

Berlingkse Media, a Danish group coordinating ticket sales and publicity for the event, said that “great annoyance” was a factor in the cancellation, along with unforeseen changes in Mr. Gore’s program for the climate summit. The decision affected 3,000 ticket holders.

“We have had a clear-cut agreement, and it is unusual with great disappointment that we have to announce that Al Gore cancels. We had a huge expectation for the event. . . . We do not yet know the detailed reasons for the cancellation,” said Lisbeth Knudsen, CEO of Berlingske Media, in a statement posted by the company.

The ClimateDepot,com, an online news aggregator that tracks global-warming news reports, referred to the situation as “Nopenhagen,” and evidence that popular momentum for the Copenhagen conference “is fading.”

There are a few floor shows taking place stateside as well.

Pajamas Media founder Roger L. Simon and independent filmmaker Lionel Chetwynd — both members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and Oscar nominees — have called on the academy to rescind Mr. Gore’s Oscars in light of the Climategate revelations.

“In the history of the academy, not to my knowledge has an Oscar ever been rescinded. I think they should rescind this one,” Mr. Simon said Thursday.

News that British and American scientists had manipulated global warming statistics to suit their agenda was made public two weeks ago after their personal e-mails were posted on the Internet.

The film version of Mr. Gore’s book “An Inconvenient Truth” won two Oscars in 2007 — for Best Documentary Feature and Best Original Song.

I doubt this will make too much difference to the Bastards that Be who have invested so much into this project for it’ll take more than Al “I’m serial” Gore not turning up to stop their conquest for power.

Don’t you just love that new, expensive Afghan “Final Push” strategy? And that we are still in Iraq shitting money down that hole while Big Oil reaps the benefits? And that we are building 7 bases in Columbia? That our budget equals about ONE HALF of the WORLD’S military spending? And that we pour money into other countries and their military in amounts unfathomable, especially in our economic circumstances?

Yet, we have “representatives” at every level of government that are implementing cuts to the citizenry’s needs and will not even mention the details of the questions outlined above. We already heard about California paying tax refunds in IOU’s and cutting back on their health care coverage of children. But now it is hitting everywhere, especially close to home.

Tennessee congress has cut off new applicants to CoverKids:

Tennessee suspends enrollment in children’s low-income health care plan

By Tom Eley
3 December 2009

This week, a particularly graphic example of this came from Tennessee, where it has been announced that the state’s health insurance plan for children from low-income families, CoverKids, will no longer accept new applicants. The Tennessee legislature has not appropriated enough money for the program to meet rising demand, even though state spending is matched 3-to-1 by the federal government through the Children’s Health Insurance Program, or CHIP. State officials have so far refused to tap into the CoverKids program’s own “rainy day fund,” saying this would be fiscally irresponsible.

In addition, Tennessee will also no longer accept applicants for its health coverage for low-income adults, CoverTN, which is jointly funded by employers, employees, and the state.

In the twelve months ending in October, 110,000 Tennesseans lost their health coverage, mostly as a result of layoffs. Over 10 percent of the workforce is unemployed. And Tennessee’s decision to refuse further low-income applicants also coincides with the ending of a short-term COBRA aid program, by which the federal government contributed about two thirds of the cost of insurance plans so laid off workers could maintain their employer-based plans.

CoverKids complements the state’s Medicaid program, TennCare, which helps to provide coverage primarily for the extremely poor and disabled.

“This is a scary place for babies if CoverKids is gone,” Sandra Neely of Spring Hill told the Tennessean. Neely used TennCare to help her three-year-old granddaughter save an injured tooth. With CoverKids no longer accepting applicants, the family may be without insurance if they earn more money.

“Without CoverKids, there will be no insurance out there for children who are on the borderline of poverty, for the people in the middle who work but don’t have or can’t afford insurance,” Neely said.

“In the midst of an economic crisis putting so many middle-class families on the brink, our state’s policy decisions push them over,” Michele Johnson of the Tennessee Justice Center said to the Tennessean. “The citizens of this state will be paying for these cuts in fiscal and human terms for decades.”

Tennessee faces a $1.5 billion deficit in its $29 billion budget. In freezing out new CHIP applicants it follows California, which rejected new applications between June and September.

These cuts expose once again the reactionary character of President Obama’s proposed health care overhaul, which will call on the states to provide expanded Medicaid coverage without providing further federal funding. As unemployment increases and the COBRA coverage extension ends, the solvency of the states’ Medicaid, CHIP, and other low-income health coverage plans is in increasing doubt…

And it isn’t just Tennessee, my fine southern friends:

…

• The Georgia legislature may convene in early January to enact an additional $400 million in cuts, its Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Jack Hill said on December 1. The state has already cut $3 billion from its budget in the past year, with Governor Sonny Perdue recently putting in place $900 million in cuts that included three-day furloughs of teachers and state workers. More furloughs and layoffs are anticipated to meet the new deficit.

• The Missouri Department of Transportation said Tuesday it will lay off 100 workers and transfer the savings toward its contribution to workers’ retirement plans, which has an unfunded liability of $1.6 billion.

• On Tuesday North Carolina Governor Beverly Perdue told reporters that the state’s Medicaid program is already $150 million over budget for the first quarter of the current fiscal year, largely due to unemployment.

• Kentucky will attempt to save $20 million this year by cutting educational funding for preschool programs and curriculum for gifted students.

• A cost-cutting commission in Louisiana said this week that government agencies should seek to reduce the state workforce by 15,000 over three years through layoffs and attrition.

• Mississippi took in $25 million less than it had projected for November, Governor Haley Barbour’s office announced on Tuesday. It is $136.6 million short of projections for the first five months of its fiscal year. A new round of cuts is expected within days.

So, my dear redneck brethren, how can you justify in your mind spending all this money on people EVERYWHERE else in the world and we cut off the most helpless and needy among us?

Gotta “balance the budget”, but not reign in a dime of foreign military payouts that amount to well over 1/2 of the US’s budget and 1/2 of the military spending of the world?

Priorities, anyone?

Click to enlarge

Maybe its two birds in a pod. Nonetheless, they are identical when it comes to the Empire.

I tend to call these kind of people, “Damned Liars” (h/t BrassCheckTV):

New President, Same Old Scam

We’re heading to Afghanistan, why?

Because of Al-Queda?

Intelligence estimates are there are 100 Al-Queda fighters left in Afghanistan…and my guess is they’re in pretty rough shape.

So we need 30,000 troops to deal with that?

This is a bonanza for somebody – but not for Afghanistan or Americans.

Watch for the coming war surtax…

Hey, someone’s got to pay for this.

OK. I will admit that Mr Obama isn’t a total liar. My friend Tengrain points out that the one thing Obama did keep his promise about was his strategy to send more troops to Afghanistan. My bad. I guess the peace prize is deserved, afterall.

Don’t know if this is bullshit or the beginning of the onslaught of chains improvements the European Council promised us.  Hang on, I don’t even remember the promises made.  Something about a smoother-running, world-beating European Powerhouse capable of standing up to Russia and competing with the Chinese, correct?

Firstly, a smoother-running organisation so the Bastards that Be can bypass Democratic Process and enact law after law at the bequest of no-one apart from themselves is no benefit to me personally.  Don’t know whether to scream or just buy some lubricant to be comfortable for the next State-sponsoered shafting.

Secondly, a world-beating organisation where the Corruptibles are more interested in playing one-upmanship against one another than uniting in common cause, the recent slagging match between the Heads of States confirms the pettiness of the political participants in this charade.

And finally, a European Powerhouse?  Russia and China have soft dictatorships, if this is the ideal the European Council wish to copy, so much for diversity.

EU inheritance law shake-up could leave British property owners homeless

Daily Mail, 3rd December 2009

British citizens could have their homes snatched from them on the orders of a European court under a new Brussels power grab.

Plans for an EU shake-up of inheritance law will leave homeowners vulnerable to the potential loss of their property if it was ever owned by someone with relatives abroad.

Most European countries force citizens to leave a proportion of their estate to certain relatives, known as ‘forced heirs’.

Under ‘clawback’ procedures outlawed in England forced heirs can undo property sales up to 30 years earlier if the deceased did not make adequate provision for his relatives in their will.

That means the relatives in France, Germany or Spain could stake a claim to property which has since been purchased by someone else in Britain.

Experts have warned that British citizens could lose their homes or be forced to pay hundreds of thousands of pounds to the foreign relatives of previous owners.

And the new Europe-wide laws could drive up the cost of buying a house because people would be forced to buy insurance to prevent them losing out if they fall foul of future land grab claims.

At the moment properties and land are always distributed according to English law.

A proposed EU regulation, which the Ministry of Justice is considering signing up to, would mean that legal cases affecting British properties would be heard in the country where the deceased was ‘habitually resident’.

That would leave British courts powerless to overturn rulings made by courts elsewhere in Europe, where 12 countries have clawback rules.

Justice Secretary Jack Straw has just closed a month long consultation on whether to sign up to the new rules.

But even an independent expert commissioned to look at the plans by the Ministry of Justice has written a report slamming the proposals.

Prof Roderick Paisley of the University of Aberdeen warned that if the regulation is introduced the possibility of clawback would undermine property rights in the UK.

‘The Regulation would force courts in the UK to recognise clawback under the law of other Member States in relation to cross-border successions,’ he wrote.

‘The difficulty with this is that gifts made validly under domestic law, which people expect to be subject to domestic law, could be invalidated by foreign courts. This would represent an interference with UK property law.’

He warned that ‘considerable cost’ would be added to buying a home. ‘In many cases a solicitor will feel obliged to obtain a legal opinion from an experienced foreign lawyer.

‘Alternatively, a practice may develop of taking out an insurance based title indemnity policy for each transaction.’

Shadow Justice Secretary, Dominic Grieve said: ‘It beggars belief that Ministers are considering signing up to rules which would create such uncertainty in the property
market and could even see British families lose their homes as a result of legal cases overseas involving people they have never known and in which they might not be represented.

‘The Government’s own advisers say that this rule could “blight” properties and add considerable costs to moving home, so we should not hesitate to reject it.’

A Ministry of Justice spokesman said: ‘The Government supports the principle of simplification of succession laws in the EU.

‘Whilst we welcome their publication, we are aware there are some potentially problematical issues within the EU Commission’s proposals and we are now considering and consulting on those and indeed the whole proposal.

‘The whole proposal will now be negotiated amongst all EU Members and the European Parliament. The consultation closed yesterday. The Government’s response will be published in due course.’

So most European Nations force their inhabitants to leave a portion of their estate to the State, and in the interests of harmonization of European Law, our very own Ministry of Justice hasn’t ruled it out.  Another reason to opt out of the Superstate.  Bad enough giving taxes away when alive, and if the Gov’t continues to rob the dead, I’m eating, drinking and all my savings.

Michael Hudson, author of “Global Fracture“,  “Super Imperialism“, and many excellent articles and papers on the state of finance and economics in America (one of my favorites regarding the subject of how we lost our manufacturing base to pursue a Finance Capitalism is found here… written in 1998).

He was interviewed by Bonnie Faulkner of KPFA’s “Guns and Butter” on April 15, 2009 was rebroadcast on Nov 25 and is one of those interviews that truly teaches both a history lesson on finance (how it has been manipulated many times over the centuries) and how it relates to the Empire we now find ourselves in (no matter what Mr Obama says differently). I featured Mr Hudson in a post last year entitled Once In a Century Rip-off. In that RealNews interview, he explains how the bailout was nothing more than another Elitist’s thievery.

But my point in that particular post was more towards the rednecks like me who have been bamboozled for so long that they can’t even recognize a bad flea market salesman:

The Bail-Out is a Rip-off. Period.

Every time someone I talk to says we “need to do something”, I ask “why?”

Why do the poorest Americans need to bail out the richest? When they say something, I ask, how much money do you have saved or in retirement? This usually is enough to shut them up.

This entire scheme is so obviously a rip-off, on its face, yet Americans are still scared to death by Bush (the ultimate ‘boy who cried wolf’). What the hell is wrong with you, rednecks? This redneck didn’t fall off the turnip truck yesterday and I know when a rip flea market salesman is bullshittin’ me, and Bush is the worst ever. He uses the same schtick over and over.

Fool me once, then…uhh… errr… can’t be fooled again.

B’Man: Sept 8, 2008

I don’t think I was wrong in that estimation, do you?

Since this subject is Mr Hudson’s expertise, I wanted to share this interview with you in case you missed it. I downloaded this for posterity, since the KPFA’s archives are only good for a couple of weeks. But please visit them to listen at the Guns and Butter link above (or here) or simply press the play button below.

Financial Barbarians at the Gate

“The Financial Barbarians at the Gate” with financial economist and historian, Dr. Michael Hudson. Europe; worsening financial situation and indebtedness; the history of banking and the criminalization of the banking system; tax policy; real estate asset inflation; US imperialism via the monetary system; neoliberal/neofeudal economics; classical political economy; finance capital breaking away from industrial capital; the financial crisis leading to a political crisis; similarities with the Roman Republic; what measures labor should take.

… said the ever-astute Michael Moore on Larry King Live according to an article at Raw Story (h/t PrisonPlanet).

“I hate to be even saying these things,” Moore told King in conclusion, “because I honestly think Barack Obama is a good and decent man. He has a good heart. I believe he’s a man of peace. … I don’t think there’s any evil or dark place in his heart that’s where this is coming from. I just think that he’s listened to the generals. He’s taken bad advice.”

And as the capitalist film maker cried and pleaded with Barack Obama to not send even more troops to the money pit called Afghanistan, he was quick to add, “I feel very bad for him.”

Michael Moore,

Decent men of peace with good hearts would not bomb innocent people with drones. Would not cover up for the war crimes of his predecessor. Would not first condemn, then proceed with indefinite detention. Would not continue tribunals to avoid the justice of due process. Would not allow the corporate ravaging of our tax money. Would not protect telecom companies from their illegal activities. Would not lie about lobbyists in his administration. If there isn’t a dark place in his cold heart, then he is a damned stupid man.

Did you ever actually believe that this man was going to do anything other than what he always said he would do? Fight the good war?

I don’t believe you. I believe you have an ulterior motive. I believe you are doing a wide stance ‘cover thy ass’ for your asinine insistence that America vote for this Corporatist war mongering maniac and for your wimping out on your fight against two party politics. You pussed out, man. Sane people know this.

There are plenty of us sane ones who are aware of your flip-flop and how much influence you had in this election.

You should be ashamed for your lack of principle and should admit your mistake, make amends by stopping this defense of this man and turn back to fighting AGAINST the two party, corporatist sham. This little interview does little to make up for your horrendous errors. Tears or not.

Being a Sarf Londoner I know more than enough about marijuana to know for a fact that of course it can cause problems for individuals but for 90% of the smokers I know show signs of psychosis.  Also, in the amount of time since it has been illegal, the medical profession, especially the psychiatric doctors, have been inventing new personality disorders daily so of course every condition has been inflated.

Most people who smoke dope know what they’re doing, hold down jobs and raise a family.  Most of all, they are the least likely to be involved in violence.  The ones that do are the small minority who are most probably suffering stress in other areas of their lives so compensate by getting stoned.  Or they are arseholes with or without the dope.

The following is a bullshit story, simply as it is from some Gov’t funded group, and unless they wish to end up unemployed, have to come out with this sort of crap.

Skunk cannabis smokers seven times more likely to suffer from psychosis

Ultra-potent skunk cannabis is seven times more likely to trigger psychotic illnesses such as schizophrenia than traditional hash, a study has warned.

The research, by the highly-respected Institute of Psychiatry in London, will deepen concerns over the safety of cannabis amid political controversy over its criminal status.

Dr Marta Di Forti, who led the research, said: ‘Our study is the first to demonstrate the risk of psychosis is much greater among frequent cannabis users, especially among those using skunk, rather than among occasional users of traditional hash.

‘Psychosis was associated with more frequent and longer use of cannabis. Our most striking finding is that patients with a first episode of psychosis preferentially used high-potency cannabis preparations of the skunk variety.’

Skunk contains high levels of the psychoactive ingredient delta-9 tetrahydrocannabinol, known as THC, which can trigger psychotic symptoms.

In South-East London, where the study was carried out, the THC content of hash is less than 4 per cent but in skunk it is 18 per cent.

In the past two years skunk has come to dominate the cannabis market, with its price dropping to under £5 a gram.

Some experts believe skunk is so potent it should be treated differently from other types of cannabis and put on a par with Class A drugs such as cocaine and Ecstasy.

Last month Professor David Nutt was forced to step down as chairman of the Government’s Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs after criticising the decision to push cannabis back into the more serious Class B after a period of downgrading.

Its downgrading from B to C had been increasingly controversial as concern grew over its effects.

The sacking of Professor Nutt, who claimed the drug was less harmful than alcohol and tobacco, caused a revolt among members of the advisory council with several resigning.

The number of under-25s smoking cannabis was almost one in five last year, even though use has been falling since 2001.

This latest study, published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, involved 280 patients aged 18 to 65 attending a South London hospital with a first episode of psychosis, compared with 174 healthy people.

Those with psychosis were twice as likely to have used cannabis for longer than five years, and more than six times likely to take it every day.

Significantly cannabis users who smoked skunk were 6.8 times more at risk of being treated for a psychosis than those who took hash.

Other studies show hash users are at double the risk of suffering psychosis compared with those who never use the drug.

Marjorie Wallace, chief executive of the mental health charity SANE, said: ‘Those of us on the front line, including psychiatrists, police and families, know that skunk cannabis can be particularly dangerous for the significant minority of people vulnerable to mental illness.

‘We need to give out an uncompromising warning about the specific links between skunk and mental illness.’

Drug charity Turning Point welcomed the findings. Spokesman Harry Walker said: ‘We now have confirmation of what many suspected and it is important that we act on these findings.’

Total bullshit.  I could go into what is wrong with this bt by bit but what is the point, the Government are clearly not after the truth.  The Thinking Policeman had a blogpost titled ‘Drug Legalisation’ from Lex Ferenda on the 11 November, so a while back.  I wouldn’t bother reading it as he argues “more of the same” which clearly hasn’t gone to plan some of the comments that follow it are gold and definitely worth the read.  I posted my own there and seeing as it is a blogposts length thought I’d include it below:

When you say drugs, surely you’ll admit each has their own pros and cons. You speak that prohibition never worked, well, NuGov has ensured we’re the most spied on Nation in the world, and seeing as we’re an island, well, it’ll be pretty easy to impose a ban in today’s Britain. To enforce it however would be a different matter seeing how easy it is to ferment nearly anything into alcohol, even if it does smell of perfume (although I would miss my JD). And even when caught probably result in a hefty fine instead of clink. Or even worse, mean a lot more people end up blind.

My main point is people (and it’s more like 10-15% who use dope UK wide) who smoke dope are generally peaceful and law-abiding people (although with the amount of laws about now, staying legal is getting harder by the day).

You see all the WORST case scenarios as you are a copper, so would not have experienced the joys of dope at summer BBQs when everyone is chilled out enjoying the sun with no trouble whatsoever, and most definitely never smoked a sly one on the way home from a stressful day at the office bringing yourself to relieve the tension instead of unleashing it on your loved ones for playing their noise too loudly. You don’t get massive call outs to mass brawls involving dopers, damn, most are too stoned to be bothered. Sure there are dickheads out there but even without the dope they’re trouble.

As you can tell, I’m pro-weed, although I stopped smoking daily donkeys ago. Like everything, it is moderation more than anything else. Drink 10 pints everyday before noon for a year and see your personality change, so that is the problem. Most addictions can cause a person problems. Just like laws, seems to be a new one everyday.

I have been arrested and processed for possession twice and what a waste of time that was for all concerned. Cautioned me twice but only after they ‘tagged’ me onto the database. And thus the beginning of my resentment towards the Boys in Blue (although has mellowed over the ageing years although seems to be flaring once more at the lack of action on oh so many things important to the Nation, not the Government).

And I reckon the ONLY reason they won’t legalize marijuana is because the wouldn’t be able to tax it. Unlike money, this does grow on trees (well, of sorts) so people would just grow and swap their own stash cutting out the taxman and NuGov wouldn’t want that. Plus, most people wouldn’t need prescription drugs for stress as a few space cakes and life becomes more than bearable. Better than all those nasty side-effects from Big Pharma, like suicidal tendencies.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for hanging smack, crack and meth dealers and more importantly, importers whoever they may be. Funny how there is never a drought on though, no matter how many interceptions are made.

Worse of all though is the “education” they sprout. Tell a teenager not to do something and what usually happens? They do it. Instead of all the scare stories, just give basic facts, especially drill in the importance of fitness and kids wouldn’t be inclined to risk themselves.

Just like every other ban, it only plays into the hands of organized criminals and corrupt officials who love being in charge of Big Budgets and of course need justification. Worst yet, with our open door policy, drugs is the least of Britain’s worries.

I don’t know much about the Police structure, although people call eachother “Guv” a lot, reason why I didn’t comment on that post. Drugs on the other hand, well, I live in Peckham so know more than I’d like to.

So yes, I would decriminalize dope.  Yes, I reckon a reason it won’t be is because it cannot be taxed to the extent alcohol, cigarettes or other commodities can.  I also reckon that Big Pharma won’t touch it as they cannot patent it, so instead demean its medicinal properties in favour of their own priced concoctions.  There is an interesting story involving US President Nixon and his own drug advisors, who advised against the inclusion of marijuana into an upcoming Drug Act, which he ignored.  And the sole purpose of why he ignored the advice was simply so he could arrest the peace protesting hippies who generally smoked the weed at their sit-ins.  The reaction to this was Prisons got full and became Big Business, meaning another reaction, the need for more business.

And so the merry-go-round continues.

Finally, yes, highly addictive and soul-destroying narcotics should be tighten to the point where those who partake are given thorough treatment and those that peddled the filth should receive harsher penalties.  I’ve seen too many junkies in my time to know that when you go crack, you don’t come back.  Not the same anyways.  Education shouldn’t be about punishment but about the REAL destruction and the REAL misery it causes.  People don’t get high off petrol here as we know that it is a toxic.  Teach that aftermath of such actions.

With the Ganja, it’s no contest.  How can you make a plant illegal?  I’ve got hay fever but I don’t trample on all the flowers that irritate me, for that would just spoil other peoples’ enjoyment of nature, I tolerate it.  Where is the tolerance towards me and my enjoyment of nature?

Apologies for the loony topic but this is one of the longest running scams the Corruptibles have got and I’d like to nip the Greenery Question in the bud as it only distracts from the REAL personality disorders brought on by addictions that really cause harm to others, conditions such as megalomania, egomaniac and quite simple, mad-as-a-hatter-psychotic-bastards hell-bent on control no matter what the cost sort-of-people.

The Big Money Facebook 50 is a ranking of the brands that are currently making the best use of Facebook. Various metrics—including fan numbers, page growth, frequency of updates, creativity as determined by a panel of judges, and fan engagement—were factored into each page’s score and ultimate rank on the list.

Efforts run the gamut, from asking simple questions to polling fans to publishing contests and applications on their pages. And regardless of how established these brands were before they hit Facebook, the takeaway is that active engagement and participation on your page are a must to increase brand presence and grow your fan base.

Quangos, never has there ever been a need for these monstrosities until NuGov saw their potential in circumnavigating the political process.  Set-up an important sounding organisation, add words like “Royal”, “Scientific” and “Academy” to it, have them warn NuGov of impending doom and NuGov then has another reason to raid our collective piggy bank.

So of course NuGov provides 90%+ of these Quangos’ finance, NuGov needs them more than the opposition or the electorate.  That I was sure about.  What I didn’t know was that there are over a thousand of the buggers.

New research reveals 90 per cent of government work is completed by Britain’s 1,152 quangos

Daily Mail, 2nd December 2009

Up to 90 per cent of the work of government is now conducted by Britain’s quango state.

Startling new research suggests that once-great Whitehall departments have been reduced to little more than policy-making ‘hubs’ which distribute taxpayers’ money to unaccountable arms-length public bodies.

Ministers are accused of creating a plethora of new bodies so they are ’seen to be acting’ in the event of a crisis.

So many quangos – quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisations – have proliferated that there is no clear picture of how many there are or how much they cost.

The Government says there are around 800. But a comprehensive survey by the Taxpayers’ Alliance campaign group has identified 1,152.

The frightening evidence of their growing power has come from Professor Matthew Flinders, an expert on government at Sheffield University.

He said their proliferation meant the British state was increasingly ‘walking without order’ – meaning there is widespread political confusion about the number and status of public bodies.

‘The delegation of power to quangos is not a bad thing as such but not when they are allowed to grow willy nilly, some of them spawning new bodies of their own’ he said.

‘The issue is how to control these tentacles of the state – the monster has so many legs you don’t know if it’s walking forwards or backwards.

‘Some departments like the Department of Culture, Media and Sport are just hubs; a small policy-making core that distributes money to arms-length bodies.

‘The financial crisis is really putting pressure on public services because they know they are going to have to deliver more for less. This will lead to a focus on efficiency.

‘For many years the structure of public bodies has become confused, with a lot of bodies with overlapping functions. No one really knows how many bodies there are.

‘This financial pressure has forced both Labour and the Conservatives to say there could be significant cost savings that can be made by a drastic reduction in the number of arms-length bodies that we have.

‘We haven’t had a review since 1979.’

Professor Flinders said new quangos were often set up by ministers to create an impression of action in the event of a crisis.

The cockle pickers disaster, for instance, led to a new public body – the Gangmasters Licensing Authority – while the death of schoolchildren on a school trip mean a new organisation was set up to regulate adventure sports.

While some were doing important work, it could just as effectively be carried out by the relevant government department, he said.

The Tories have cited the elections watchdog, the Electoral Commission, which does work that used to be carried out by the Home Office.

India’s Election Commission oversees state elections of areas the size of European countries every year, and a General Election of over one billion people every five years.

Its budget is £2.5 million, one tenth that of Britain’s Electoral Commission, and it oversees elections involving 16 times as many voters.

The Government department with the most quangos is the Department of Health, with 72.

However, the department to lavish most money on quangos last year was the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills, which directed over £21 billion to its 23 bodies, £11 billion of which went to the Learning and Skills council, and £7 billion to the Higher Education Funding Council for England.

Critics say a number of bodies – including British Waterways, the Carbon Trust and School Food Trust – should be subject to immediate spending cuts as Britain struggles to rein in an unprecedented £175bn budget deficit.

Shadow Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude said: ‘Too many state actions, services and decisions are carried out by unaccountable organisations who don’t have to answer the public. This has a corrosive effect on public trust.

‘We are committed to reduce the number of quangos. If something needs to be done by the state it should be done by a body which is democratically accountable unless one of David Cameron’s three tests applies – it performs a highly technical function, is required to be transparent or impartial.’

Anyone still wondering why we’re so screwed?  It isn’t the benefit cheats we need to tackle, it is the bloated ‘Club’ called Politics.  Our entire establishment needs to go on a Country-catering-version of fat-fighters or pay-off-your-mortgage-in-a-year type shows.  Preferably both.  Either that or the poxy jungles in Australia.  I know a group of gators who would love to have dinner with them*.

* I know it’s an old pun but it’s late and I’m shattered.

As early as the time of Socrates, people have identified money as a corruptive influence in politics, specifically in democracies.  Elections now cost double and triple what they used to, which means more and more of our Senators’ and Representatives’ time is spent dialing for dollars.  The average member of the House of Representatives will want to raise and spend over a million dollars (that’s $1,000,000) to insure victory on Election Day.  In a competitive race, it can be much, much more than that.

So why do we subject our leaders to this grueling and wasteful misuse of their precious time and energy? And why are we surprised when Big Money holds more sway than the Common Good and Reasoned Argument? Ultimately, we get the government we deserve- because we force our politicians to raise money this way, and so we shouldn’t be surprised when campaign “donors” think that their “donations” mean that they should get special favors or special access.  More than ever, voters feel dissillusioned and cynical about government and feel disconnected from their leaders. (And can you blame them?)

So what is the answer? Why not allow those who represent us to circumvent this whole process?  One piece of legislation designed to do this is the Fair Elections Now Act.

What is the Fair Election Now Act? This bi-partisan bill was introduced by Senators Dick Durbin (IL) and Arlen Specter (PA) in the Senate, and by Representatives John Larson (D- CT) and Walter Jones, Jr. (R- NC)  in the House of Representatives. It will provide public funding for office seeking political candidates who qualify, in addition to small private donations up to $100 dollars. Also, all qualifying candidates get a reduction rate on media fees for campaigning purposes, as well as media vouchers that they can exchange for cash if they prefer.

This bill will provide an equal playing field for political candidates, as money differences will play less of a role in the campaign, and therefore provide lesser-known candidates a more fair chance to compete in political races. Public Funding has already been successfully tested in several states, and it can hopefully achieve the same success on a federal level.

Who will qualify for Public Funding? The amount of public funding that each individual candidate receives will depend on the office they are seeking or holding, but each candidate must first qualify by raising a set amount of small donations. For example, House Members running for office must receive 1,500 contributions from their state, and $50,000 altogether. All candidates must therefore prove that they have the ability to raise money for their campaign and thereby demonstrating their competitive ability in the race before they can receive public funding.

Why you should support this bill and how to help get this bill passed! Simple: the status quo is broken. Everyone understands that lobbyists and corporate institutions (PACs, bundlers, etc)  benefit from the current system where big money buys big access.

Voters will first and foremost benefit, because they can be sure their Representatives are ONLY representing them, and basing their votes on what is best for their constituents, not what makes their donors happy.  Furthermore, we will have a fair and wide range of politically qualified candidates to choose from in each election– areas that have enacted public financing, such as Maine and Arizona, have seen a more diverse group of candidates run, resulting in representation that looks more like the population.

The candidates themselves will also benefit, because they can focus more on policies that their constituents favor and their political message instead of constantly raising money for their campaign. In addition, the main contributions are increasingly coming from big donors that come with strings attached. With the Fair Election Now Act, the people have the chance to take back the power of democracy and away from corporate interests!

It is the responsibility of each citizen to ensure our freedom and democracy,and YOU can help the pass this bill for the sake of those crucial values. If you are interested in supporting this bill, you can take one easy step and click here to sign up for a petition. For more detailed information about the bill, please click here.

You can also call your member of Congress and ask them to co-sponser this bipartisan piece of legislation.  Click here to get contact info for who represents you.  As of now, six members of the Texas Congressional Delegation have signed on as co-sponsors of the bill.  If you’re lucky enough to be represented by one of them, call their offices and express your thanks for standing up to Big Money interests.

Gene Green (Houston)

Sheila Jackson-Lee (Houston)

Eddie Bernice Johnson (Dallas)

Solomon Ortiz (Corpus Christi)

Silvestre Reyes (El Paso)

Lloyd Doggett (Austin)

By Harrison

Came across a brilliant little piece regarding the World Famous Rothschild Brand in an Indy article from 2004 written by Paul Vallely.  Has some great background on the Dynasty that has featured so heavily in our History of blood, work and tears, keeping Governments in debt since the 1700’s.

“The Rothschild story: A golden era ends for a secretive dynasty”

The news that the bankers Rothschild are to withdraw from the gold market, in which they have been a major player for two centuries, has been hailed as the end of an era.

In one sense, of course, it is. This was the company that smuggled gold coins across the English Channel to finance the Duke of Wellington’s advance through France to his final triumph at Waterloo over Napoleon (who, it turned out, had also borrowed money from the Rothschilds).

But in another way it marks out the continuation of an even older tradition – the ability of the family which has founded one of the world’s largest private banking dynasties to sustain their secretive fortune, which industry insiders count not in billions but in trillions, and keep it within the family.

Secrecy has been a hallmark of the Rothschilds from the outset. Mayer Amschel Rothschild, the son of an itinerant money lender and goldsmith who settled in the Jewish ghetto in Frankfurt-am-Main in 1744, specialised not just in clever accounting practices but also kept secret books and subterranean vaults which he ensured were never the privy of auditor, lawyer or taxman.

As the paterfamilias became more successful he despatched four of his five sons to different European capitals to take advantage of the rise of capitalism and the growth of international trade. Nathan he sent to London, James to Paris, Saloman to Vienna, and Carl to Naples, keeping the eldest, Amschel, at home with him in Prussia. Of these the two most important proved to be London and Paris, where the two main branches of the family developed a friendly rivalry, with the English branch developing the edge in business and the French in philanthropy, the arts and winemaking. But then in 1996 Amschel Rothschild, a 41-year-old man who had lived in the flamboyant style of many of his ancestors, hanged himself in a Paris hotel room. He was the Rothschild who had been groomed to take over as head of the English arm of the dynasty.

So when the bank’s chairman Sir Evelyn de Rothschild retired earlier this year the succession passed to the French side of the family. Baron David de Rothschild, who had been running the family’s Paris-based bank, inherited.

None of the Rothschild enterprises have been banks in the sense as understood by the man or woman in the street. What Mayer Rothschild founded in the 1760s was a business which grew from the humble beginning of selling rare coins to becoming the prime moneylender to greedy and spendthrift governments across Europe. One German contemporary quipped that Mayer was “the pride of Israel … before whose money box kings and emperors humbly bow”. And the novelist Thackeray said of Nathan that he was “not king of the Jews, but the Jew of the kings”. The brothers financed both sides in the Napoleonic wars and in the Austro-Prussian war too.

It has long been supposed that Nathan increased the family fortune 20-fold by speculating on the outcome of the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. The Rothschilds had a network of agents throughout Europe who, using fast boats, coded letters and carrier pigeons, got information to the family ahead of official sources. Victor Rothschild, third baron and former chairman of the London bank, N M Rothschild, always maintained that Nathan had made a killing by encouraging rumours that Wellington had lost when he knew he had won, though the historian Niall Ferguson in his magisterial history of the family recently disputed that.

Certainly, for all the family motto of Concordia, Integritas, Industria (Unity, Integrity, Industry), Nathan’s ability to depress stock prices by using the network of agents to spread rumours, true or false, and then buy the stock up after people panicked, was legendary.

More significant, however, was that in the process the Rothschilds created the world of banking as we know it today. Nathan operated principally as an underwriter and speculator in the early 19th-century bond market. He and his brothers invented, or at any rate popularised, the government bond, which allowed investors, big and small, to buy bits of the debts of sovereign states by purchasing fixed-interest bearer bonds.

Governments liked this because they could use them to raise colossal sums of money. Investors liked them because they could be traded – at prices that fluctuated in relation to the performance of the issuing government – and shrewd investors could make big sums. It brought investment in railways, the industrial revolution and ventures like the Suez Canal. The Rothschilds got a cut of everything.

It was a new kind of power. “I care not what puppet is placed upon the throne of England to rule the Empire on which the sun never sets. The man who controls Britain’s money supply controls the British Empire, and I control the British money supply,” Nathan said. The family developed a lack of awe for the powerful and important. A pompous aristocrat one day called on Nathan who was head down at his desk. Without looking up, the banker said: “Take a chair.” His caller, affronted, said: “You are speaking to the Prince of Thurn and Taxis.” To which Rothschild replied: “Take two chairs.” At one point he even rescued the Bank of England after a run on gold caused the collapse of 145 banks. In 1885 he was given the hereditary title of Baron Rothschild.

Many of the distinct characteristics of the family can be traced back to the will of the founder Mayer Rothschild. It stipulated that no public inventory should be made of his estate; that key positions in the House of Rothschild were to be held by family members; that the eldest son should inherit unless the rest agreed otherwise; that the family was to intermarry with first and second cousins to keep the fortune together; that anyone disputing these terms would be struck from the will. And that all this should apply in perpetuity.

In part this was about preserving not just their Jewish identity but a self-conscious position as role models for their poorer co-religionists. The Rothschilds expended much effort and money pressing for Jewish emancipation and equality across the continent.

Their Jewish solidarity was not heterogeneous. In 1938 Nathan’s great-great-grandson, Victor, shocked an audience by saying that in spite of “the slow murder of 600,000 people” on the continent “we probably all agree that there is something unsatisfactory in refugees encroaching on the privacy of our country, even for relatively short periods of time.” And the family split over the question of the dream of a Jewish homeland, with some members supporting the first Zionist settlement in Palestine and the Balfour declaration and others opposing it on the grounds that it would encourage anti-Semites to question the existing national identities of assimilated Jews around the rest of the world. None of which has allayed the wild fears of anti-Semites who throughout the 20th century branded the Rothschilds as part of a Jewish plot to take over the world.

The world has changed around the Rothschilds. At one point Nathan Rothschild was the richest man in Britain and probably in the world. In today’s terms he was wealthier than Bill Gates. But they never gained the foothold in America they needed. The world became corporate. Private banking got left behind.

Still, the family has moved down only from fabulously rich to enormously wealthy. And they adjusted to the times. They made billions in the 1980s from Margaret Thatcher’s privatisations of state-owned industries on which they advised. In France after their bank was nationalised by the Socialist president Francois Mitterrand they slowly built a new business which, under Baron David de Rothschild, has risen to the top ranks of the merger and acquisition league tables. They have pulled out of retail fund management – into which they went with much fanfare only three years back – and now they are pulling out of oil and gold in favour of the higher-margin areas of private banking and wealth management.

Do not spend too many tears. In 1997 the family’s Swiss holding company increased its profits by 66 per cent. The firm is not called Rothschild Continuation for nothing.

Mayer Amschel Rothschild (1743-1812), Founder of the family business

• Mayer, orphaned at the age of 12, was forced to make his own living with the help of the good name of his father in Frankfurt. He carved out a self-taught career as a dealer in coins and medals, branching out into state loans and trade in general commodities. He established the family name by placing a Roman eagle on a red shield (Rothschild in German) over the door of his counting house.

• Mayer established one of the Rothschild firm’s principles: to settle for less profit to ensure long-term business ties. A brisk market in English textiles prompted him to send one of five sons, Nathan, to England.

Jacob, 4th Baron Rothschild (b. 1936), Head of the English side of the family

• Chairman of NM Rothschild before resigning in 1980 to run Rothschild Investment Trust. He chaired the National Heritage Memorial Fund, handing out £1.2bn of lottery grants. He restored Waddesdon Manor, right, the family pile, and chairs Yad Hanadiv, the family foundation in Israel, which donated the Knesset and Supreme Court to the state

David de Rothschild (b. 1942), Head of the French family

• The head of the French family, David de Rothschild has escaped two catastrophes in France: he was born in New York after the Luftwaffe seized the family home in Paris and his mother fled from Nazi Europe; and, in 1981, President Mitterrand nationalised the French financial empire, Banque Rothschild. David and his cousins started afresh with PO Gestion, renamed PO Banque and thenRothschild & Cie Banque.

Seven Generations and two Centuries of Banking

• 1760s The orphaned Mayer Amschel Rothschild starts a coins and medals business in Frankfurt
• 1789 Mayer appointed an agent to William IX of Hanau
• 1798 Mayer’s son Nathan leaves Frankfurt to become a textile and general merchant in Manchester
• 1812 Nathan’s brother James establishes a banking house in Paris
• 1815 The English branch of the Rothschilds supply gold to the Duke of Wellington’s campaign at Waterloo
• 1820 Nathan’s brother settles in Vienna; his brother Carl starts a business in Naples
• 1836 Nathan dies
• 1840 NM Rothschild and Sons becomes one of the Bank of England’s bullion brokers
• 1850s Great houses are built. Bordeaux vineyards of Mouton and Lafite are acquired
• 1875 Lionel de Rothschild raises finance for British stake in the Suez Canal
• 1887 Rothschilds funds the creation of the diamond dealers De Beers
• 1901 With no male heirs, the Frankfurt dynasty comes to an end
• 1919 NM Rothschild & Sons chair new daily fixing of the gold price
• 1926 The company finances the spread of the London Underground
• 1929 Beginning of difficult years for family. Wall Street crash; rise of Nazi Europe
• 1960s Rothschilds look to US; start of Rothschild Inc
• 1981 France nationalises the highly successful Paris House but the family refuses defeat and starts new business.
• 1985 Rothschilds advises on British Gas privatisation

You’ve got to give it to Mayer, he was one smart bastard of a man.  Domination of the Nations is the goal of the Owners of Earth Plc, and I doubt the Rothschild’s Dynasty is alone in that goal but has certainly been a major player.

I bring up the Rothschilds’ as the present one has been making large donations to the Conservatives (again) and there has been rumours of tolls on motorways or some sort of road pricing GPS model of charging per mile, and of course the Rothschilds’ will have their cut.

There is no such thing as a free lunch, especially a multi-million £££ lunch.

everything's fine

See here the official Woods family christmas portrait.

Gillette’s nightmare: is the Fed next?

LEFT: after Henry’s handball incident RIGHT: before the handball incident

Gillette pays a hell of a lot of money to these 3 guys to appear in publicity shots. But things are going wrong. First it was Henry and his handball, see how Gillette has now removed the football from his left hand. Now it is Tiger Woods and a strange car accident. Will the golf club go? And what is going to happen with Federer? Betcha Gillette’s executives are starting to sweat. to be continued…

Joell stays goin in! Wow! This time he goes in over Game’s latest single “Big Money” .. And of course he does his thang!

Yaowwaaaaaaaa

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Think what you will of Mr Bugliosi (and I can’t see how one cannot respect his win percentage, at the very least), but this is simple logical deduction. Anyone in their right mind can see something amiss… worthy of real investigations and prosecutions. It is only the very most gullibly ignorant or ideologically entrenched in protection of the criminals that deny it.

h/t AfterDowningStreet

As I have done before, I receive regular articles from Manufacturing & Technology News and wanted to post the article with my observations. To me, this simply points out that Corporatism rules this country and that those who are in control of corporations don’t give a single rat’s ass about the American workers or their well being (at least from their job perspective).

Corporations are anti-worker. Corporations are entities set up with one goal in mind: making the most profit for their share holders as possible. Period. They do this off of the backs of labor and always have.

So, when I read such stuff as Mr Farr writes (and Richard notes) like blaming government for the current fiasco, I have lived the last 30+ years watching corporations take off towards those “best cost countries” (aka cheapest labor and overhead possible). His blame is hollow when he and his ilk are just as responsible for this mess as any government official ever alive. And both parties are complicit.

I have been calling on Emerson Electric companies for 20+ years. I have actually sold Emerson Electric owned product and know first hand how cheap they are and how they run in to the ground any entity they buy up. So, Mr Farr, excuse me as I call your Bullshit for what it is… Bullshit.

Emerson Electric Votes With Its Feet, Saying The Goverment Is Destoying American Manufacturing

By Richard McCormack
richard@manufacturingnews.com

One of the country’s most important industrial companies says the United States is not a good place to manufacture and it will continue moving its assets offshore.

The federal government is “doing everything in [its] manpower [and] capability to destroy U.S. manufacturing,” says David Farr, chairman and CEO of Emerson Electric Co., in a presentation at the Baird 2009 Industrial Conference in Chicago Ill., on Nov. 11. In comments reported by Bloomberg, Farr added that companies will continue adding jobs in China and India because they are “places where people want the products and where the governments welcome you to actually do something. I am not going to hire anybody in the United States. I’m moving. They are doing everything possible to destroy jobs.”

In his Powerpoint presentation available on the Emerson Electric Web site, Farr notes that the federal government is damaging prospects for U.S. economic growth with a $1.41 trillion federal deficit (10 percent of GDP); $12 trillion in government debt that will grow to $20 trillion in 10 years; a policy of printing money; a “non-targeted $800-billion stimulus”; bailouts for Wall Street and the automobile companies; the prospect for cap and trade legislation; a “government takeover” of health care to the tune of more than $1 trillion; increasing taxes and regulations; and a “lack of U.S. $ support” for manufacturing. The global stimulus “soon will fade,” says Farr.

What does it mean for a company like Emerson? “We continue to increase our international and emerging market presence,” says Farr. The company has increased its emerging market sales by 19 percentage points over the past 10 years, from 13 percent of total sales in 1999 to 32 percent in 2009. It is now generating 55 percent of its sales from overseas operations, a figure that will grow to 60 percent by 2014, with 40 percent of total sales coming from emerging markets.

“Emerson’s investment in emerging markets is continuing to pay off with sales growth,” say Farr. In 1999, the company generated $12.4 billion in annual sales from mature markets and $1.9 billion from emerging markets. By 2009, sales from mature markets grew to $14.2 billion, while sales from emerging markets more than tripled to $6.7 billion.

The company projects sales from mature markets in 2014 of between $16 billion and $17 billion, while emerging market sales will reach almost $12 billion.

Between 1999 and 2009 “73 percent of growth is from emerging markets!” Farr exclaims. “More than 60 percent of our growth is expected to come from emerging markets over the next five years so Emerson will continue to invest in these key markets.”

In 2001, the company had 21 percent of its 360 manufacturing facilities located in “best cost countries.” Today, Emerson has 250 manufacturing locations and 36 percent of them are in “best cost countries.” That percentage is going to increase to more than 40 percent.

Emerson is following the money. Infrastructure investment in the United States now accounts for 21 percent of the global total of $12 trillion, down from 27 percent in 2004. Asia Pacific’s share of global infrastructure investment has increased from 18 percent of the global total in 2004 to 27 percent in 2009. That number is expected to continue going up — to 31 percent of global investment in 2014 and 37 percent in 2019.

The current recession has been destructive and the United States will have a hard time recovering, says Farr. U.S. job losses of 7.3 million to date are only slightly less than the total of the last four recessions combined (8 million). The current downturn is having a big impact on Emerson and its employees. The company has reduced its headcount by 15 percent. It has closed 55 facilities and has incurred $540 million in restructure expenses.

The 2001 recession was also tough on the company. It reduced its headcount by 14 percent, closed 75 facilities and incurred $437 million in restructuring expenses. “But the world did not change much,” says the Emerson CEO. With the current recession, “there will be some fundamental changes going forward.”

The company reported sales for its 2009 fiscal year ending in September of $21 billion, down from $25 billion in 2008 and $22 billion in 2007. It had an operating profit of $3.2 billion in 2009 (15 percent of sales).

I will say this. At least now we will see the true spirit of the Corporate Controllers of this country. What you, as a poor redneck just trying to make ends meet needs to know, these jobs will NEVER come back. The vast majority of jobs that have folded up (either for good or to move overseas to those “best cost countries”) are NEVER going to come back to the USA. If you had a decent paying job making parts for an American automotive company… sorry, your job is gone FOREVER. If you were lucky enough to move to an Asian automotive company, get ready to see your wages decrease (or NEVER increase to accommodate inflation). And when it gets bad enough, watch as these jobs disappear, as well.

We used to think that China was the “best cost country”, but I read recently that Mexico is now.

You think that is going to help your chances keeping a good job as these corporations (who ONLY care about the profits) move out even more over the next two years?

It is a snow ball rolling down hill and I see it growing and growing.

BTW: My comment on the article:

Comment: Mr Farr’s comments have a ring of BS to them. I have called on Emerson Plants for almost 20 years and have watched as they took every advantage of “best cost countries”, with NEVER a thought of the American worker in mind. This moving away was happening long ago and the fact is that government and Corporations are BOTH instrumental in this fiasco. Corporations control our government. This is so evident that surely there is no argument. So, Mr Farr, I see this as just another way for you to fulfill your obligations to make as much profit for your shareholders as you can. But do not think for a second that you can start this crap and think that everyone will believe it. Emerson Corp is set to make money… with or without Americans. I say you take your entire shebang elsewhere, then.

The MIC (Military Industrial Complex or Big Military) is in full tilt. They are growing in terms of money spent and control they have in the world.

But even worse is the fact that as normal industrial output is stifled and jobs are forever lost, we have the military to take their place, right? Just like the other night at the Veterans Day Parade and the young father whose son just joined the Air Force simply because he could not find work or afford college: we are being forced into service (one way or the other) of the military, instead of items we can use and consume for peaceful purposes.

But, if you ever took time to study history, you would find that previous Empires died the same death while the citizens were being told the same lies. The Roman Empire was over-extended and became too militaristic and could not support the behemoth it grew in to (much of its purpose, too, was to control the earth’s resources).

I have always questioned the replacement jobs that military produces for the manufacturing sector and whether or not it is sustainable. It, of course, is not, but it is a seeming light at the end of the tunnel for poor, young, rednecks and minorities. Nothing could be further from the truth, as is displayed by the fact that we have privatized much of our military and it costs us far more to do what we could do by necessity, if we were truly attacked (and we have not been attacked by any of the people we now occupy).

Read the full story at Washington’s Blog, but it has been confirmed that Defense Spending Creates Fewer Jobs Than Other Types Of Spending:

The table first shows in column 1 the data on the total number of jobs created by $1 billion in spending for alternative end uses. As we see, defense spending creates 8,555 total jobs with $1 billion in spending. This is the fewest number of jobs of any of the alternative uses that we present. Thus, personal consumption generates 10,779 jobs, 26.2 percent more than defense, health care generates 12,883 jobs, education generates 17,687, mass transit is at 19,795, and construction for weatherization/infrastructure is 12,804. From this list we see that with two of the categories, education and mass transit, the total number of jobs created with $1 billion in spending is more than twice as many as with defense.

So how do you like the idea that your country has strong-armed us into being its military slaves while, at the same time, indiscriminately killing and occupying innocent others?

Every seasoned investor knows the old adage of “big money is smart money”. One of the best ways to see if the “smart money” is beginning to flow back into the stock market is by looking at a chart of the CBOE volatility index or “VIX” versus the S&P 500 Index. The VIX index measures the amount of fear in the market. It moves inversely proportional to the S&P 500 Index. If the S&P 500 Index is falling, the VIX index should be rising (since investors get more fearful as the market falls). If the S&P 500 Index is rising, the VIX index should be falling (since investors get less fearful as the market rises). The most powerful use of VIX occurs when positive divergences develop between it and the S&P 500 Index, as in November 2008 and again in March 2009. In the chart below, notice how VIX  fails to make new highs as the S&P 500 Index reaches new lows in November 2008 and again in March 2009. This shows that the smart money was beginning to flow back into stocks as early as last November.

S&P 500 Index vs CBOE Volatility Index

Of course she didn’t. But she did call me and was sorry that I was unable to join in on the town hall conference call (some of the latest and greatest technology available).

Congressman Blackburn Msg

Wow, what a chipper woman. It might help had you not called my FAX line, for goodness sake. I am sure I would be interested in asking you about those 71 that will die in our district simply due to the lack of health insurance. Rep Grayson mentioned them in this series of videos starting with the following:

And speaking of which, I’d like to share the list that Chris Kromm of Facing South (written by Sue Sturgis)  sent me that shows the numbers per congressman of folks in the south that will die due to lack of health insurance. I’m sure you can shrug this off just like Jesus did:

• Alabama District 1, Joe Bonner: 114 dead
• Alabama District 3, Mike Rogers: 88 dead
• Alabama District 4, Robert Aderholt: 114 dead
• Alabama District 6, Spencer Bachus: 69 dead
• Arkansas District 3, John Boozman: 151 dead
• Florida District 1, Jeff Miller: 130 dead
• Florida District 4, Ander Crenshaw: 116 dead
• Florida District 5, Ginny Brown-Waite: 200 dead
• Florida District 6, Cliff Stearns: 152 dead
• Florida District 7, John Mica: 143 dead
• Florida District 9, Gus Bilirakis: 129 dead
• Florida District 10, Bill Young: 138 dead
• Florida District 12, Adam Putnam: 133 dead
• Florida District 13, Vern Buchanan: 160 dead
• Florida District 14, Connie Mack: 159 dead
• Florida District 15, Bill Posey: 152 dead
• Florida District 16, Thomas Rooney: 165 dead
• Florida District 18, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen: 199 dead
• Florida District 21, Lincoln Diaz-Balart: 195 dead
• Florida District 25, Mario Diaz-Balart: 195 dead
• Georgia District 1, Jack Kingston: 123 dead
• Georgia District 3, Lynn Westmoreland: 102 dead
• Georgia District 6, Tom Price: 100 dead
• Georgia District 7, John Linder: 156 dead
• Georgia District 9, Nathan Deal: 159 dead
• Georgia District 10, Paul Broun: 120 dead
• Georgia District 11, Phil Gingrey: 113 dead
• Kentucky District 1, Ed Whitfield: 113 dead
• Kentucky District 2, Brett Guthrie: 102 dead
• Kentucky District 4, Geoff Davis: 83 dead
• Kentucky District 5, Harold Rogers: 130 dead
• Louisiana District 1, Steve Scalise: 111 dead
• Louisiana District 2, Joseph Cao: 98 dead
• Louisiana District 4, John Fleming: [garbled on video]
• Louisiana District 5, Rodney Alexander: 132 dead
• Louisiana District 6, Bill Cassidy: 105 dead
• Louisiana District 7, Charles Boustany: 112 dead
• Mississippi District 3, Gregg Harper: 117 dead
• North Carolina District 3, Walter Jones: 100 dead
• North Carolina District 5, Virginia Foxx: 97 dead
• North Carolina District 6, Howard Coble: 103 dead
• North Carolina District 9, Sue Myrick: 82 dead
• North Carolina District 10, Patrick McHenry: 101 dead
• South Carolina District 1, Henry Brown: 157 dead
• South Carolina District 2. Joe Wilson: 118 dead
• South Carolina District 3, Gresham Barrett: 112 dead
• South Carolina District 4, Bob Inglis: 133 dead
• Tennessee District 1, Phil Roe: 110 dead
• Tennessee District 2, John Duncan: 85 dead
• Tennessee District 3, Zach Wamp: 94 dead
• Tennessee District 7, Marsha Blackburn: 71 dead
• Texas District 1, Louie Gohmert: 155 dead
• Texas District 2, Ted Poe: 126 dead
• Texas District 3, Sam Johnson, 144 dead
• Texas District 4, Ralph Hall: 134 dead
• Texas District 5, Jeb Hensarling: 151 dead
• Texas District 6, Joe Barton: 136 dead
• Texas District 7, John Culberson: 103 dead
• Texas District 8, Kevin Brady: 132 dead
• Texas District 10, Mike McCaul: 127 dead
• Texas District 11, Michael Conaway: 164 dead
• Texas District 12, Kay Granger: 156 dead
• Texas District 13, Mack Thornberry: 144 dead
• Texas District 14, Ron Paul: 146 dead
• Texas District 19, Randy Neugebauer: 132 dead
• Texas District 21, Lamar Smith: 119 dead
• Texas District 22, Pete Olson: 150 dead
• Texas District 24, Kenny Marchant: 138 dead
• Texas District 26, Michael Burgess: 162 dead
• Texas District 31, John Carter: 124 dead
• Texas District 32, Pete Sessions: 209 dead
• Virginia District 1, Robert Whitman: 68 dead
• Virginia District 4, Randy Forbes: 93 dead
• Virginia District 6, Bob Goodlatte: 99 dead
• Virginia District 7, Eric Cantor: 76 dead
• Virginia District 10, Frank Wolf: 81 dead
• West Virginia District 2, Shelly Moore Capito: 102 dead

I dunno bout you, but that seems like a lot of dead folk. I’m sure they are all dead beats, anyway, right?

At least we won’t starve to death (h/t A Tiny Revolution):

Nearly half of all U.S. children and 90 percent of black youngsters will be on food stamps at some point during childhood.

“The current recession is likely to generate for children in the United States the greatest level of material deprivation that we will see in our professional lifetimes,” Stanford pediatrician Dr. Paul Wise wrote.

The analysis is in line with other recent research suggesting that more than 40 percent of U.S. children will live in poverty or near-poverty by age 17.

Right. Just more dead beats, huh?

Originally found here.

I wrote about Taiwan here with a breakdown of how their system is implemented and who and what it covers and for how much. Today, I received a letter from my friend Doctor Sutherland, who is the TN Chair of PNHP. He expressed delight in the fact that our calls this week must have made a difference, because the Wiener Amendment is again going to be voted on (probably Saturday):

Politics are unpredictable! The Weiner amendment for Single-Payer is now back on the floor of the House thanks to calls, emails and faxes sent to the Congressional leaders this past week.
This is our last big push to get true health care reform passed this year. Please call your Congressperson tomorrow and flood their switchboard with our voices to pass Single-Payer. The public is confused and tired of the way the Congress has tried to cobble more of the same dysfunction on our broken system- give them a simple and efficient plan to vote on to get true health care reform now.
Push for “Improved and Expanded Medicare for All”! Send this out to all your colleagues and families and friends.

Health care is a human right.

I have been to this man’s house and spent time with him. He is wealthy and has a very renowned practice in Memphis. He could keep his mouth shut because he and his wife are set for life. But just like many of the other Doctors that are ready to fight for Universal Healthcare, even to the extent of going to jail for it, I believe he sees the injustices and wants change. There isn’t a dubious rationale that I can imagine and I have a great deal of respect for him and his views. He went farther to add Ida Hellander’s letter to members and activists:

Dear PNHP Board and Activists,

Quick update and “last call” for lobbying your Representative to support Medicare for All!

The latest news from Capital Hill is that there could be a vote on the Weiner amendment for single payer as soon as this Friday, although it may not come up until Saturday.  The House is expected to vote on the Democrats’ bill at 6 p.m. Saturday.  The Kucinich amendment did not make it into the final bill, and is dead.

Last minute calls to encourage your Representative to vote “yes” on the Weiner amendment for single payer are encouraged.  The Congressional Switchboard number is (202) 224-3121.

As Harvard health economist William Hsiao told the New York Times yesterday “you can have universal coverage and good quality health care while still managing to control costs. But you have to have a single-payer system to do it.”

In solidarity,

 

Ida Hellander

Its not too late to make a difference. Call.

But, also read detail about a system that was implemented in Taiwan and how, who and why they did it in this fashion (remembering that we, America, is the only industrialized wealthy nation IN THE WORLD that doesn’t implement something similar.

Health Care Abroad: Taiwan

By Anne Underwood
New York Times
Prescriptions blog
Nov. 3, 2009

William Hsiao is a professor of economics at the Harvard School of Public Health and co-author of the 2004 book “Getting Health Reform Right.” He served as a health care adviser to the Taiwan government in the 1990s, when officials decided to reform that country’s health care system and to introduce universal coverage. He spoke with Anne Underwood, a freelance writer.

Q. Taiwan instituted universal insurance in 1995. What was the health care system like before?

A. Only a portion of the people were insured, including civil servants, employees of large firms and farmers. The military had its own system of coverage. But 45 percent of the population did not have insurance, and they faced financial barriers to access to health care. President Lee Teng-hui felt strongly that he wanted to do something concrete and visible for all the citizens. He thought of introducing national health insurance to touch the lives of all the people. There was a sense in Taiwan that health care is needed by everyone and a country has to assure everyone equal access.

Q. How did you become involved in the health care reform process?

A. The government initially appointed four Taiwanese professors to lead a task force of technical experts. But the four professors all had different ideas. It was like a wagon drawn by four horses, with each going in a different direction and nobody driving. After a year of this, government officials realized there was a problem. In addition, they wanted someone who understood health systems and health care abroad and what lessons other countries could offer to Taiwan. The domestic experts did not have much international experience.

I was invited to a three-day workshop, where they tested me. At the end, I was put in charge of the task force of four professors and 16 other technical experts. It turned out to be a big advantage that I’m not Taiwanese and had no aspirations of getting a job in Taiwan. At the end of the day, our recommendations and findings were perceived as more objective and free of self-interest.

Q. What was your assignment as head of this task force?

A. We had to design a national health insurance plan for Taiwan, based on international experience. Government officials wanted to understand how other advanced countries fund and organize health care and learn from their successes and failures, so I made a study of the systems in six high-income countries – the United States, the U.K., Germany, France, Canada, Singapore and Japan.

Q. And what was your conclusion at the end of this study?

A. We adopted a single-payer system along the Canadian lines. I did not invent it. I’m just in the transfer-of-knowledge business.

Q. Why did you choose the Canadian model?

A. Canada has a single-payer system with universal insurance coverage. It offers people free choice of doctors and hospitals, and it has competition on the delivery side between public and private hospitals. The quality of health services is very high, and people were very satisfied with the system from the 1980s through the mid-1990s.

Unfortunately, in the early-to-mid 1990s, Canada went through a severe recession for four or five years. The budget became very tight. The government underfunded national health insurance, which led to long waiting lines for elective surgery, MRIs and so forth. But when Canada adequately financed its N.H.I., it was a very good system.

Q. In Taiwan, can people choose any doctor or hospital they want?

A. Yes, any provider. Americans talk about choice. But in fact, insurance plans in this country restrict what providers you can go to. Canada gives its citizens more choice of providers. So does Germany. So does England. So does Taiwan.

Q. How comprehensive is the coverage?

A. It covers prevention, primary care and hospitalization, among other things.

Q. I‘ve read that it also covers Chinese massage, acupuncture, traditional herbal medicine, mental health care, dental, vision and long-term care.

A. Yes, these services are covered. We tried to design a benefit package that would give people what they value. For many Taiwanese, that includes traditional Chinese medicine. Though Chinese medicine is not 100 percent proven to be medically effective, people believe in it. And some therapies have been proven effective. For example, when acupuncture is given in certain spots, it stimulates the brain to release opiates.

Q. The Taiwanese system also covers home care.

A. You need home care by visiting nurses for people who are chronically ill or bedridden. It’s not rocket science to recognize this. Some people argue that the patients should pay for home care themselves. But if people have to pay out of pocket, they might not ask for visiting nurse services and their illnesses may get much worse. Then they will need to be hospitalized.

Q. Is the system very expensive?

A. Expensive is a relative term. Taiwan spends 6 percent of G.D.P. on health care, compared to 16 percent in the United States.

Q. How much do people have to pay?

A. If you’re employed, your employer pays 60 percent of your premium. The employee pays 30 percent, and the government subsidizes 10 percent. The government fully subsidizes the premiums for the poor and gives partial subsidies to veterans, the self-employed and farmers.

Q. How much is the typical premium?

A. The total insurance premium for employed workers is 4.6 percent of wages. That’s much lower than in the United States, where the average is between 12 and 20 percent of wages for those who are covered by their employers.

Q. Are there co-pays, too?

A. Yes. The task force felt that service should not be totally free or else people might waste services. For example, we studied what happened in Taiwan when some insurance policies gave prescription drugs free to everyone. One-third of the drugs dispensed were never taken but thrown away. You can imagine, if you have free office visits, some people will say, “I have this little ache. I’ll go see the doctor because it’s free.” We wanted to moderate this waste.

Q. How high are co-pays?

A. The charge is $2 for a visit to a clinic and about $4 to a hospital outpatient department. The co-pay for hospitalization is now 10 percent for the first 30 days and 20 percent for the days beyond 30 days. For prescriptions, it’s 20 percent of the cost of the drug, but capped at $6 for each prescription. Taiwan also sets a ceiling on the total co-pays, so patients won’t face bankruptcy.

Q. How long did it take to implement this program?

A. Less than a year. Mr. Lee pushed through the legislation in four to five months, because an election was coming. Then he asked for the new system to be implemented six months after that – and they did it.

Q. What percent of the population is now insured?

A. Within the first year, Taiwan managed to insure 95 percent of the population. That increased that by another percent or so each year, until they reached 98 percent. They had trouble with that last 2 percent, because some were living overseas and others were homeless. The government literally sent people to find the homeless under bridges and enroll them. Now they have close to 99 percent enrollment.

Q. Has this translated into better life expectancy or lower complication rates from major diseases?

A. There is evidence of positive health results for select diseases, like cardiovascular disease and kidney failure. But overall, it’s really difficult to say that national health insurance has improved the aggregate health status, because mortality and life expectancy are crude measurements, not precise enough to pick up the impact of more health care. That said, life expectancy is improving, and mortality is dropping. And everyone now has access to good health care.

Q. What does the system do particularly well?

A. In addition to covering everyone, it has a uniform system of electronic health records. Every patient has a Smart Card. When you go in for services, the physician puts the card into his computer. You give him the code to access your records, which are all stored on the card – what medications you’ve taken, what tests, along with the results, the last time you saw another physician. With a single, unified electronic system, it improves treatment and it also vastly reduces claims processing. Hospitals and doctors get paid in a week or two. It’s a paperless system. That’s why it keeps administrative costs down to 2.3 percent of the total premium. In the United States, it’s more than 10 percent.

Taiwan was also able to control health-expenditure increases very well in the early years. Unfortunately, now that the government budget is tight, it is overdoing it.

Q. What are the system’s weaknesses?

A. In the legislative process, compromises had to be made. First, the president yielded on payment reform, so Taiwan kept its fee-for-service payment system. Unfortunately, that encourages doctors and hospitals to give more treatment in order to boost their income.

Second, the Taiwanese system doesn’t have a systematic way to monitor and improve quality of care.

Third, in the legislative process, they rejected a provision to adjust the premium automatically when the national health system depletes its reserves. In every country, health care costs are increasing faster than wages. When that happens, the premium has to go up. But that provision wasn’t incorporated into the law. As a result, the system is running a deficit. National health insurance tries to cut the fees for hospital and physician services. But eventually these fee reductions will adversely affect the quality of health care.

Q. What’s the most important lesson that Americans can learn from the Taiwanese example?

A. You can have universal coverage and good quality health care while still managing to control costs. But you have to have a single-payer system to do it.

Originally found here.

RED album…sometime next year…

               So the last joint was the street single, this is the actual single. Umm…..ok. I guess. I hope Jayceon doesn’t plan on doing numbers like that little nigga with the dreads with this as his single. This is the clean version. Cool and Dre on the beat.

Game-Big Money | Link courtesy of 2db