|
Banned
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Elphaba
The fear campaign is underway again and is likely meant to convince the American people that Bush's Iraq strategy is necessary. Bush has been giving speeches recently of foiled terror plots that turn out to be as unlikely as the one Host posted above.
It's time to remind everyone that the Democrats are weak on terrorism.
|
Quote:
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/...ecy.php?page=1
<b>White House officials had debate before deciding to call visitor records confidential</b>
The Associated Press
Published: June 1, 2007
.....The government's court filings show that the Bush White House focused on the issue in the months before Election Day 2004.
Discussions moved into high gear when the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal prompted news organizations and private groups to demand that the administration turn over Secret Service records of visitors to the White House complex and the vice president's residence.
There was precedent for the demands.
During the Clinton administration, Republican-controlled congressional committees obtained Secret Service visitor logs while conducting investigations of the president and first lady.
Christopher Lehane, a former special assistant counsel to President Bill Clinton and press secretary to then-Vice President Al Gore, points out the political implications of the Bush administration campaign to close off access to the records.
"The question it raises is 'what are these guys hiding?'" said Lehane, now a Democratic consultant. "They can live with it because they've only got a year or so left, but it doesn't do a lot for public confidence in open government." ..
|
In addition to the concern that the Bushvolk are doing this to control us and to consolidate their own still accumulating authority over us, is the spending being wasted on a phony "war on terror",
Quote:
http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/...9025_db016.htm
APRIL 27, 2006
NEWS ANALYSIS
By Christopher Palmeri
....Pickens claims to have produced returns in excess of 2,000%. Perhaps not coincidentally, he has emerged as one of the most vocal cheerleaders for energy prices. His current prognostication as oil hovers around $72 a barrel: "It will hit $80 before it hits $60."
"BLOOD, GUTS, AND FEATHERS." Pickens says his central message to oil investors and consumers is that the industry is simply not capable of producing more than 85 million barrels per day. Global demand is preciously close to that at 84 million and by the end of the year it should top 85 million. "Blood, guts, and feathers -- that's all you got," he says. "Everything is squeezed as much as it can be squeezed."
He doesn't believe analysts who say there is a "terrorism premium" built into the price of oil. "Who assigns that?" he asks. "To me, it's just the market. That's what people are willing to pay.".....
|
Quote:
http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t...cid=1116826355
Published: 04/06/2007 12:00 AM
Dollar fades as reserve currency
By Babu Das Augustine, Banking Editor
.....In the context of the continuing slide of the dollar, S&P said Kuwait's decision to abandon its dollar peg would have a positive impact on the country's inflation. "The extent to which the re-pegging of the dinar will reduce inflationary pressures in Kuwait over the long-term will depend, in part, upon the composition of the new basket, and thus on the extent to which the dinar is de-linked from the continued slide of the dollar going forward," said Luc Marchand, credit analyst at Standard & Poor's Ratings Services.
Currently, one-third of countries that peg their currency in one form or another use the euro as their anchor currency. Last year, dollar-denominated foreign exchange reserves comprised almost two-thirds of total world holdings of official foreign exchange reserves; euro-denominated reserves comprised one-fourth of the total whereas yen- and sterling-denominated reserves together comprised only 7 per cent.
In private transactions too, the euro has surpassed the dollar as the most important currency of issue for international bonds and notes.
|
Quote:
http://www.columbusdispatch.com/disp...2_RL6T89U.html
Canadian currency gaining on U.S. dollar
Sunday, June 3, 2007 6:30 AM
By Charmaine Noronha
Associated Press
TORONTO -- The Canadian dollar breached 94 U.S. cents for the first time in 30 years last week and analysts are speculating it will be worth as much as the struggling U.S. greenback by year's end.
Known as the loonie because of the loon pictured on the one-dollar coin, the Canadian dollar closed at 94.22 cents in Friday trading -- the highest it has been since July 1977.
It hit a low of 61.79 cents on Jan. 21, 2002.....
|
vs. real looming crisis that have the potential to actually affect "our way of life", and the "sell out" by the press:
Quote:
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2006/07...y1784553.shtml
July 7, 2006
The Plot Against America
"TUNNEL BOMB PLOT" trumpeted the New York Daily News this morning on its cover, the words printed in big bold white letters against a black background. Jihadists, said the paper, had a "serious" plot to flood lower Manhattan by bombing the Holland Tunnel, "to drown the Financial District as New Orleans was by Hurricane Katrina."
Frightening? Sure. "Serious?" Well, the jury is still out. The "largely aspirational" plot never went beyond e-mails, there was no credible link to Al Qaeda, and there was no specific mention of the Holland Tunnel, just the mass transit system more generally; additionally, sources say "no one in the United States ever took part in the Internet conversations and…no one ever purchased any explosives or scouted the transit system."
The plot as the Daily News conceived it seemed <B>absurd enough that one would have thought it would have given editors pause – how does one flood lower Manhattan via the Holland Tunnel, seeing as the island is above the level of the river?</B> But that didn't stop the paper from rushing its inaccurate story into print and trumpeting it with BIG BOLD LETTERS, and it didn't stop other news organizations from turning the alleged plot into a huge story. That's no surprise, of course. When people speak of bias in the press, they tend to talk abut political bias, but the more serious bias is towards sensationalism, which tends to sell better. (It's safe to say the Daily News moved a few more copies this morning than usual.)....
|
Quote:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/...n1747715.shtml
Major Terror Ring Or 'Al Qaeda Lite'?
Andrew Cohen Is Skeptical About Arrests In Miami Terror Plot
June 23, 2006
(CBS) Attorney Andrew Cohen analyzes legal issues for CBS News and CBSNews.com.
The same people who told us that Zacarias Moussaoui was the 20th hijacker and that Jose Padilla was building a radiological bomb now are telling us that they've foiled a legitimate terror plot to take down the Sears Tower in Chicago. Maybe yes. Maybe no. I'll wait for the trial to decide.
In the meantime, please forgive me my skepticism amid all the triumphant trumpets of glee and satisfaction. This administration has on too many occasions promised much more than it ultimately would and could deliver when it comes to these terror cases.
The federal indictment Friday of seven Miami men is extraordinary for what it does not contain. It does not contain allegations that the men ever met with a genuine al Qaeda operative — just an informant playing the role for the government. It does not contain allegations that the men ever purchased any munitions or went anywhere near Chicago to case the building. It does not contain allegations that the men had any sort of a specific plan or detailed plot to take down the Sears Tower. The indictment is only 11 pages long. Read it yourself and decide whether the feds have broken up al Qaeda Lite or just the Gang that Couldn't Shoot Straight. .....
|
Are these two (described below) Bush sycophants, "reporting on the resignation of Bush's chief sycophant, really a current Newseek "reporter" and the former white house "reporter" for Time magazine?
Quote:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwa...len/index.html
Saturday June 2, 2007 07:13 EST
Mike Allen, consummate Beltway "journalist"
The Politico's "Chief Political Correspondent" <b>Mike Allen (until recently Time's White House Correspondent")</b> has a characteristically hard-hitting, insightful <a href="http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0607/4275.html">new article</a> on Rove protegee Dan Bartlett and his departure from the White House. The 1,150-word article relies upon an impressive constellation of four different sources -- Bartlett, Bartlett's lawyer, Bartlett friend and former Bush aide Michael Gerson, and George W. Bush. The headline -- "Bush's 'truth-teller' leaving president's side" -- may actually be the least obsequious aspect of the article.
Even someone hired to serve as Bartlett's publicist would be embarrassed to churn out something this adoring and one-sided. But not Mike Allen, who very well may be the single most obedient, right-wing-power-worshipping reporter in Washington, a distinction for which there is a crowded and heated competition.
This is what we learn from Allen's article this morning: Bartlett was "an uncomfortable truth-teller in the system" who was "willing to tell the president hard truths" (Gerson). Bartlett was one who "could take the heat that sometimes resulted from the boss's decisions," and he "made an 'immeasurable' contribution and [the President] and first lady Laura Bush will miss him" (Bush). He was "a voice for calm, balance, reasoned discourse" and he is seen "not just having good press judgment, but good judgment, period" (Gerson). ......
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwa...ems/index.html
Sunday June 3, 2007 08:07 EST
Various items
(1) Relating to yesterday's post regarding Mike Allen's worshipful and one-sided profile of the departing Dan Bartlett, Newsweek's Richard <a href="http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/02/21/wolffe/index.html">"the-press-here-does-a-fantastic-job"</a> Wolffe was on Countdown Friday night echoing, with an almost mournful tone, Allen's tribute to Bartlett.
Bartlett, said Wolffe, is "the son [Bush] never had"; was "trusted, valued, and appreciated"; and -- most of all -- was known for pushing the President to be more candid and forthcoming, especially regarding Iraq. Listening to Wolffe (and Allen), Bartlett is a Paragon of Truth and Valor, bravely standing up to George W. Bush and demanding candor when few others would or could.
Thankfully, immediately following Wolffe's tribute to the core Goodness of Dan Bartlett was <a href="http://authorsontour.net/Clients/moore,_jim.htm">James Moore</a>, author of Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential. Moore proceeded, in very blunt terms, to swat down the script of adoration adopted by Beltway journalists about Bartlett, <h3>explaining that one doesn't stay with George Bush for 13 years by telling him that he's wrong,</h3> but rather, by becoming a loyal member of his "coterie of sycophants." Moore also reported on just some of the very controversial conduct engaged in by Bartlett, including his role in having Bush's National Guard records "scrubbed," which people like Allen and Wolffe don't think is worth mentioning.
<a href="http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/06/02/wanking-dan-bartlett/">C&L has the video of both segments here</a>, and it is worth watching to observe how fond Beltway journalists are of Bush operatives like Bartlett, and how flagrantly they ignore facts about Bartlett which conflict with the homage they pay to him.
As a side note, it is always so striking how these Beltway pundits -- who are held out as such sophisticated and insightful observers of the political scene -- are so driven by basic group think, almost always reading from the same script of conventional wisdom, spouting the same cliches on almost every topic. Bartlett was the truth teller, the one who bravely stood up to Bush and demanded greater candor. I doubt you will hear a single Beltway pundit deviate meaningfully from that script.
That highlights another point made often though particularly visible here. Beltway journalists these days develop friendship with, and obvious admiration for, White House press operatives like Bartlett. They depend on people like Bartlett for their stories, and are eager to be selected as the ones to go forth and convey the White House line (which, in special cases, gives them coveted "exclusives" and "scoops").
<b>So when the Allens and Wolffes hear Dan Bartlett say something, the idea that he is lying would never occur to them.</b> Sure, he might be (at worst) innocuously "spinning" like everyone in Washington does, but Dan Bartlett is an honorable, great guy. He doesn't lie, and hence they view White House statements as credible, rather than viewing them with the skepticism that is the hallmark of good journalism. Just listen to what Allen and Wolffe said about Bartlett. Is there an iota of adversarial sentiment in any of it?.....
|
Soooooooooooo....that's how it's done....the real threat is the spending power of the US dollar rapidly diminishing while Bush/Cheney terrorize us into distraction, turn the DOJ into a vote suppression organ, and work to make themselves unaccountable under FOIA, and under the law...they will determine when an "emergency" occurs, and what "rights" we get to keep....
...and all of it takes place as the conservative incessantly complain about the "liberal bias" of the press, that long ago traded away actual news reporting and analysis.....for what they believe is access to "insiders" like....Dan Bartlett ! |