Month: April 2011

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Barack Obama Domestic Policies House of Representatives Medicare Paul Ryan Republican United States Wisconsin

Call Paul Ryan And Ask Him, “What Were You Thinking!?”

Paul Ryan, the unfortunate scapegoat for the congressional Republicans, is getting it from all sides. Even some of his fellow Republicans in the House of Representatives who voted for his budget, are now turning their backs on Ryan’s plan. But why would they do that? He’s such a nice looking young man!

Well, at least that’s what the voice on the commercial below says, “Paul Ryan looks like a nice young man.” The voice then continues on, talking about some of the facts of The Ryan Plan, like ending medicare and giving even more money to the rich. And at the end of the ad, the elderly sounding voice advise all to call the congressman and ask him, “What were you thinking?”

 

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Politics United States

Limbaugh Misleads His Sheeple On Effects Of Not Raising The Debt Limit

The brainiac that is Rush Limbaugh has figured out the whole raising the debt ceiling thing, and according to Mr. Limbaugh, not raising the debt ceiling means nothing, except that “we wont be able to borrow any more.” Here’s The Brain at work, while talking to a caller to his radio show;

LIMBAUGH: Here’s the point, it’s a scare tactic. It really isn’t possible, there is always money coming in. The government can count on tax revenue from any number of sources and activities, there will always be money coming in. They can always print money. This default business is a straw dog, it’s a straw man they’re throwing out there to you. You want to know what the actual manifestations of an official default would be —

CALLER: Yeah, absolutely. Because, I mean, just looking in recent history, we were listening to the media and they’re talking about how bad a government shutdown would be —

LIMBAUGH: It just — all it means is we won’t be able to borrow anymore. That’s all it means. All it means is we have to live within our means.

CALLER: Well I don’t think that would be too bad then.

LIMBAUGH: No, it’s not. You know, the whole business — I shocked a lot of people yesterday when I said not raising the debt limit is an option.

Of course, that’s just Limbaugh’s view, shared by his immediate audience. But what are the facts of not raising the debt ceiling?

The United States has always carried a federal debt and there are two basic types of debtors. Debt held by the public and those held by other governments. Raising the debt ceiling allows the United States to pay its bills to these two entities, thus, maintaining its triple-A ratings worldwide. Just like not paying your credit card directly affects your abilities to get further credit and eventually lowering your credit ratings, causing potentially adverse effects in the future, the same is true for the United States.

While Limbaugh is partly right–that the Federal government would always have money coming in through tax revenue–this revenue would not be able to sustain the obligations of the government, especially since the we presently have a deficit, hell-o!

According to the Congressional Research Service, “the federal government would need to rely solely on incoming revenues to finance obligations. If this occurred during a period when the federal government was running a deficit, the dollar amount of newly incurred federal obligations would continually exceed the dollar amount of newly incoming revenues.”

So this is not the time to rely solely on tax revenues to pay the federal debt. It is frankly, unrealistic to be expected to pay your bills with money you don’t have. Treasury however, have some other tricks up their sleeves to avoid reaching the debt limit, and have successfully employed these tricks in previous years, 1985, 1995-1996, 2002 and 2003. Some of those tricks included;

To delay issuing new short-term government securities to the Civil Service Retirement and Disability Trust Fund, the Social Security Trust Funds, and several smaller trust funds. In particular, new Treasury obligations could not be issued to the trust funds because doing so would have exceeded the debt limit. Treasury took the additional step of “disinvesting” the Civil Service Retirement and Disability Trust Fund, the Social Security Trust Funds, and several smaller trust funds by redeeming some trust fund securities earlier than usual.

Again, our economic situation now does not allow for the Treasury to take these steps, so raising the debt ceiling is the only other option.

But if we were to follow Rush’s misinformed blabbering, and the debt ceiling is not raised, the United States could not pay its bills.

Potential Economic and Financial Effects

In addition to the potential impact on federal programs and activities if the debt limit is not increased, there may also be economic and financial consequences. A 1979 GAO report described the consequences of failing to increase the debt ceiling. GAO said the government had never defaulted on any of its securities, because cash has been available to pay interest and redeem them upon maturity or demand. Further, GAO said a default on the securities could have adverse effects on the economy, the public welfare, and the government’s ability to market future securities.

It is difficult to perceive all the adverse effects that a government default for even a short time would have on the economy and the public welfare. It is generally recognized that a default would preclude the government from honoring all of its obligations to pay for such things as employees’ salaries and wages; social security benefits, civil service retirement, and other benefits from trust funds; contractual services and supplies, and maturing securities…. At a minimum, however, the government could be subject to additional claim.

Source: The Congressional Research Service

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Barack Obama Birthers Donald Trump Easter

Reverend Graham Buys Into The Birther Lie On Easter Sunday

On Easter Sunday, a day when Christians from all denominations come together to celebrate the day Jesus rose from the dead, Reverend Franklin Graham was on television continuing to foster a lie that has been debunked by numerous reputable news organizations – and that is that President Obama has somehow deceived the American people by not supplying his birth certificate.

“He can solve this whole birth certificate issue pretty quickly. I was born in a hospital in Asheville, North Carolina. And I know that my records are there, you can probably go and find out what room my mother was in when I was born. I don’t know why he can’t produce that. It’s an issue it looks like he can answer pretty quickly.”

But what would we expect on our Easter Sunday? Graham is a Republican who praise the likes of “The Donald” and claims that “the more you listen to him, the more you say to yourself, ‘you know maybe the guy’s right’, and Sarah Palin, his recent travel partner to Haiti is too.

What’s shocking is the silence of the host, Christiane Amanpour. Amanpour, the host of ABC’s This Week with Christiane Amanpour has gained the reputation of a reporter who reports the facts. Why she allowed this baseless accusation to go unchallenged on her show is questionable.

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Barack Obama Birthers CNN Donald Trump Hawaii Money bag United States

Trump To Reveal Some “Interesting Things” About The Guy In The White House

The Donald recently told NBC that he has his very own investigators in Hawaii, and their sole purpose is to find out the truth about President Obama’s place of birth. “I have people that have been studying it and they cannot believe what they’re finding,” Trump told NBC.

On Thursday, about a month after making the claim to NBC, Donald Trump was interviewed by CNN and when asked to comment on what his investigators found, all The Donald would say was, “We’re looking into it very, very strongly. At a certain point in time I’ll be revealing some interesting things,” Trump said on CNN’s American Morning.

So naturally, the speculations began on what these “interesting things” could be.

That the president played a lot of basketball growing up? Probably! That’s pretty interesting!

Was it that he took some drugs as a young man? We’d bet that’s it. We’re glad Trump is doing the country this tremendous public service. The news media has never looked into finding any details about Obama’s life, and it’s about time we learned a thing or two about his past.

According to our source close to Trump (a cartoon sack of gold coins with a dollar sign on it), President Obama may in fact be a black man, and his middle name probably starts with the letter “H.” Very interesting things.

Some people may think journalists have been following leads on Obama’s background for years. But that’s just not the case. For example, do we know how old Obama is? No. He’s probably in his mid-eighties, but it’s hard to tell, because the media doesn’t bother to look into these things.

Thanks to The Donald, for organizing this group of  “investigators” who will show and tell us what these “interesting things” are. We cannot wait to know who this guy in the White House really is.

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Paul Ryan Planned Parenthood Politics Republican United States Wisconsin

The So-Called Media Only Covers Right Wing Issues

We’ve been saying it forever. Despite what the Conservatives and Republicans want you to believe, there is no such thing as  “left winged media.”

The truth is, there is a right winged media, and just about all it covers is everything the Right does. Remember the town hall meetings of 2009? Remember the Teaparty rallies and marches on Washington? And remember the handful of individuals – 5 people to be exact – who gathered in front of Harry Reid’s office to protest Planned Parenthood and to call for a government shutdown? Yes, even those 5 people got massive media coverage.

Now, remember the hundreds of thousands that showed up in Wisconsin – on a daily basis? No? You can’t recall because the media totally drowned out those marches and protests. How about the time when constituents began questioning the Republican’s votes on the Paul Ryan’s budget plan? Right, you can’t recall those town halls because the main stream media is not covering it.

Rachel Maddow has more in the video below;

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Donald Trump Featured Republican Party (United States)

Donald Trump Won’t Waste His Time With Voting In Primaries

And why should he? He’s The Donald for crying out loud! He don’t need to vote in no stinkin’ primary! That’s a waste of his time, and quite frankly, his money. We are talking about the Trump here… There’s casinos to bankrupt, there’s hairspray to buy. Why waste time voting in a primary?!?

According to th New York Board of Elections, the last vote The Donald had cast in a primary election was back in 1989, some 22 years ago. But now, the Republican Presidential wanna-be candidate would like for you, all of you, to drive, walk, or push your ride  to the polls in 2012 and cast your ballots for him.

The report originally appeared on NY1, a television station in New York. After it aired, The Donald did what The Donald does best – lied again.

“You’re going to pay a big price because you’re wrong,” he told the NY1. “I have records that I voted and so does the Board of Elections … I signed in at every election.”

I don’t know about you, but I may have my own casinos to bankrupt on the day The Donald’s name appears on a ballot.

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Barack Obama Birthers Donald Trump

Robert DeNiro Defends Obama, Disses The Donald

“It’s like a big hustle,” De Niro said of The Donald’s birthers act. “It’s like being a car salesman. Don’t go out there and say things unless you can back them up.”

That was Robert DeNiro’s response to what Donald Trump is doing with the birther issue. DeNiro was giving an onstage interview with NBC News anchor Brian Williams at the Tribeca Film Festival on Saturday. Mr. DeNiro continued;

“I won’t mention names, but there are certain people on the news in the last couple of weeks—what they’re doing is crazy. They’re making statements about people that they don’t even back up. Go get the facts before you start saying things about people.”

Brian Williams wanted to make sure Mr. DeNiro was in fact talking about The Donald, so Williams asked, “Any of those people have shows on my network on Sunday night?”— clearly talking about Celebrity Apprentice. the reality show hosted by The Donald – to which Mr. DeNiro responded;

“Yes! It’s like a big hustle. It’s like being a car salesman. Don’t go out there and say things unless you can back them up. How dare you? It’s awful. Just go out there and speak and say these terrible things?… It’s crazy.”

Williams then asked about DeNiro’s feeling to what was happening in the political arena, to which Mr. DeNiro offered his defence of President Obama, saying;

“I think of the possibility of the government being shut down and I say, ‘How did we get to this point?’ …I know Obama was trying to bridge the gap. His intentions are really good. Maybe some things are not as good as we all would like but his intentions are good. A lot of these guys—their intentions are not even good. They’re just playing a game and they’re playing with people’s lives.”

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Democratic

Why Blacks Left The Republican Party

 Simply put: Because the party that was once crucial in the emancipation of African Americans, has turned into one that promotes hate, lies, and intolerance.

During the 1860’s, when Lincoln was President, the Republican party was considered the liberal party that was against slavery. Blacks mostly voted Republican after the Civil War and through the early part of the 20th century, not surprisingly, since Lincoln was Republican and the white  segregationist politicians who governed Southern states in those days were Democrats who didn’t want anything to do with Blacks. From then on Blacks continued to stick with the party that promoted their causes in the United States.

The tide began to turn much later when Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt got 71 percent of the black vote for president in 1936 after meeting with black leaders to push for specific programs that helped regain the grounds lost, due to four centuries of servitude in the United State. Then Harry Truman grabbed 77 percent of the black vote in 1948, thanks to his issuing an order of desegregation to the armed services and an executive order setting up regulations against racial bias in federal employment.

John F. Kennedy used the civil rights movement to define the Democratic party as a liberal party for decades to come. Kennedy began pushing for the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964 and after he was killed,  Lyndon B. Johnson pushed it through.

Johnson then got 94 percent of the black vote that year, then, a record for any presidential election. The following year he signed the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Ever since, no Republican presidential candidate has gotten more than 15 percent of the black vote.

Members of the  Black GOP like to harp on the fact that Martin Luther King Jr. was a Republican. But on April 4, 1968 Reverend Dr. King, at 39, was shot and killed in Memphis Tennessee, while supporting striking sanitation workers. You could best believe that today, Dr. King would be considered–just as he was in the 60’s thru the changing attitude of the Republican Party–as a dangerous troublemaker by the GOP. Today, King would have joined the ranks of union protesters in Wisconsin and other states whose Republican governors look to dismantle union bargaining rights across the country.

Democrats have done a lot more for blacks in the last 50 years or so, while Republicans have been behind every kind of intolerance, not just racism but sexism, homophobia, nativism…you name it.

African-Americans have a unique history in America not shared by any other race. To say that we have no choice and no voice in how we draw our party lines and choose our political candidates just shows how much you don’t know of our history here. Surely those who have criticized the need for  government sponsored programs, assistance, and services–created in the 60’s –as “handouts” and “special favors” are now beginning to see just how much we all have benefited from a Democratic government in the face of a Republican party that seeks to take all from the ‘haves-nots’ to give to the ‘haves’.

The majority of Blacks in America have made the consensual choice to vote as Democrats. And that will continue to be the our choice as long as that party serves our causes.

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Politics United States

Obama: Don’t Subsidize Yesterday’s Energy, Invest In Tomorrow’s

Instead of subsidizing yesterday’s energy sources, we need to invest in tomorrow’s. We need to invest in clean, renewable energy. In the long-term, that’s the answer. That’s the key to helping families at the pump and reducing our dependence on foreign oil.

That was the message from President Obama, as he delivered his weekly message. The President acknowledged the politics that’s involved in higher energy costs, saying;

Whenever gas prices shoot up, like clock work we see politicians racing to the camera waving three-point plans for $2.00 gas. You see people trying to grab headlines to score a few points. The truth is, there are no silver bullets that can bring down gas prices right away, but there are a few things we could do. This includes safe and responsible production of oil at home, which we are pursuing.

And the President mentioned his request to the Attorney General to launch a task force whose job will be “rooting out cases of fraud or manipulation in the oil markets that might affect gas prices, including any illegal activities by traders or speculators.” The President called again for an end the $4 billion dollars in subsidies the oil companies presently get.

He then continued his call for a sensible approach to reducing the deficit.

Both Democrats and Republicans believe we need to reduce the deficit. That’s where we agree. The question we’re debating is how we do it. I’ve proposed a balanced approach that cuts spending while still investing in things like education and clean energy that are so critical to creating jobs and opportunities for the middle class. It’s a simple idea: we need to live within our means while at the same time investing in our future.

That’s why I disagree so strongly with a proposal in Congress that cuts our investments in clean energy by 70 percent. Yes, we have to get rid of wasteful spending—and make no mistake, we’re going through every line of the budget scouring for savings. But we can do that without sacrificing our future. We can do that while still investing in the technologies that will create jobs and allow the United States to lead the world in new industries. That’s how we’ll not only reduce the deficit, but also lower our dependence on foreign oil, grow the economy, and leave for our children a safer planet. And that’s what our mission has to be.

A sensible approach to a very complicated problem.

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Politics right winged United States United States Environmental Protection Agency

On Earth Day, More “Christians” Attack Environmentalists

Let’s look at the meaning of the word Environmentalist. According to the dictionary, an environmentalist is any person who advocates or works to protect the air,water, animals, plants, and other natural resources from  pollution or its effects.

Now, let’s see what the Bible says about Environmentalists and the protecting of our environment. There are many other scripture verses that remind us that God not only created the Earth, but also calls on us to protect it.

Psalms 104: 25-30 – There is the sea, vast and spacious, teeming with creatures beyond number— living things both large and small. There the ships go to and fro, and the leviathan, which you formed to frolic there. These all look to you to give them their food at the proper time. When you give it to them, they gather it up; when you open your hand, they are satisfied with good things. When you hide your face, they are terrified; when you take away their breath, they die and return to the dust. When you send your Spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the earth.

This verse clearly asks us to be good stewards of the environment. It tells us that all living things, both large and small depend on us for protection, for with that protection, we “renew the face of the earth.”

Now, enter the far right winged “Christian” conservative. For some strange reason, these people believe any attempt to protect the environment from pollution is non-Christian.

See their video below.

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Politics Republican

After Robbing The Middle Class, Republicans Want Us To Donate Cash

The short-sighted freshmen Republican congressmen were so blinded by the euphoria of robbing the middle class and giving to the rich, they forgot that they would need these same middle class Americans to donate more money for their re-election campaigns. Now, the reality is becoming very apparent – you can’t squeeze blood from a rock.

The New York Times reports;

Figures released by the Federal Election Commission last week showed that Mr. West raised more than $433,000 in the first quarter of the year, ranking third among all freshman Republicans. And he has already spent much of that, mostly on direct-mail fund-raising and other expenses. During the same reporting period in the 2010 campaign, Mr. West raised just over $839,000.

Two Democrats challenging Mr. West for the 2012 election, Patrick Murphy, a businessman, and Lois J. Frankel, a former mayor of West Palm Beach, did fairly well in the first quarter of 2011, raising $352,000 and $250,000 respectively.

Mr. West is one of more than two dozen Republican freshmen facing tough re-election battles in Congressional districts that lean Democratic or were won by President Obama in 2008. Others include Michael G. Grimm and Nan Hayworth of New York, Robert Hurt of Virginia, Patrick Meehan of Pennsylvania, David Schweikert of Arizona and Steve Stivers of Ohio.

Mr. Grimm, Ms. Hayworth and Mr. Meehan all raised less in this reporting period than they did a year ago.

But have no fear freshmen, the conservative-leaning Supreme Court has made it possible for corporations to donate an unlimited amount of money to you. Who needs the darn, pesky middle-class when a corporation can buy your election?

No wonder you’re so concerned about giving back to these corporations. So the vicious cycle continues…

 

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Ed Schultz fails Featured michael steele MSNBC rachel maddow Republican United States

Michael Steele Fails To Convince Former Republicans That G.O.P Cares

I’m usually not a big fan of Ed Shultz. I know his passion for the issues, but there are times when he allows his passion to take over the debate and, in my opinion, losing focus of the bigger picture.  So for that reason, 10PM is usually the time I switch from MSNBC.

But last night, Rachel Maddow’s lead into The Ed Show made me keep the remote control at a distance. She promised that his show was going to be different, something I should not miss. Rachel was right. Last night, Ed Shultz earned his money.

Mr. Shultz had Michael Steele – the former RNC Chairman – on the show and asked some very pointed questions. Like, why haven’t Republicans done anything about the jobs situation like they promised the American people in the 2010 midterm campaigns? Of course, Steele tried to stick to his talking points, but Ed kept his cool and insisted on answers to his questions.

But the moment in the show that really brought it home for me, was when Ed introduced two Republicans citizens, one a fireman and the other a cop, who felt that the Republican party has, as they put it, “left us behind.” And listening to Michael Steele trying to calm these former Republicans and bring them back into the fold was well worth the show. Pure comedy! Trying to explain verbatim would not do the show any justice, so without further ado, watch what happened below.

You won’t be disappointed.

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