Politics

. Op-Ed Columnist Falling Into the Chasm By PAUL KRUGMAN Published: October 24, 2010 This is what happens when you need to leap over an economic chasm but either cant or wont jump far enough, so that you only get part of the way across. If Democrats do as badly as expected in next weeks elections, pundits will rush to interpret the results as a referendum on ideology. President Obama moved too far to the left, most will say, even though his actual program a health care plan very similar to past Republican proposals, a fiscal stimulus that consisted mainly of tax cuts, help for the unemployed and aid to hard-pressed states was more conservative than his electi…

Did Meg Whitman influence the authorities not to prosecute her son for rape? Or am I being harsh on her? http://gawker.com/5669754/the-rape-accusation-against-meg-whitmans-son-that-got-hushed-up And more: http://gawker.com/5669869/what-is-wrong-with-meg-whitmans-kids A sample: Griff's legal troubles continued even after the rape accusation. Shortly after the Princeton rape incident, Griff was back home in California when he was arrested for breaking a woman's ankle during a brawl at a bar. He was released after his mother posted $25,000 in bail and the charges were eventually dismissed. A political newcomer, Meg Whitman credits her late political awakening (she did…

For all of you in the US... Do you plan to vote in the mid-term elections? I have voted in every election and primary since I turned 18, except once when I got called out of town at the last minute. There has been much talk about the enthusiasm gap this year this year between Democrats and Republicans, conservatives and liberals, whites and minorities. Commentators seem to think the enthusiasm gap will favor the Republicans. I plan to vote as I always have because I feel it is my duty as a citizen. Most people I know say they plan to vote but I must say I am surprised by some of their comments. The most surprising was from my best friend. He is gay, a Democrat, and Ca…

Due to the increased number of people viewing the politics forum, management has decided to sell tickets,giving you an appointed time when you can view the posts without having to wait until someone else has vacated the forum. This service will at first be free, but, if demand continues to increase, then a small fee may be added- except for Ralph Woods who always has line priority.

Google 2.4% Rate Shows How $60 Billion Lost to Tax Loopholes By Jesse Drucker - Oct 21, 2010 6:00 AM ET Google Inc. cut its taxes by $3.1 billion in the last three years using a technique that moves most of its foreign profits through Ireland and the Netherlands to Bermuda. Google’s income shifting -- involving strategies known to lawyers as the “Double Irish” and the “Dutch Sandwich” -- helped reduce its overseas tax rate to 2.4 percent, the lowest of the top five U.S. technology companies by market capitalization, according to regulatory filings in six countries. “It’s remarkable that Google’s effective rate is that low,” said Martin A. Sullivan, a tax economist w…

We really are a country of idiots. By only 2 percent, a recent CNN poll shows that Obama is a better President than Bush. http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/10/08/cnntime-poll-was-bush-better-president-than-obama/?iref=NS1

Arthur Levitt, Ex-SEC Chairman, SLAMS Financial Reform Bill The Huffington Post | William Alden First Posted: 10-20-10 09:10 AM | Updated: 10-20-10 09:14 AM Congress "ducked" on financial regulation, neglecting to solve the problems that caused the financial crisis, former SEC chairman Arthur Levitt said. In an interview with the Street, Levitt, who now serves as a Goldman Sachs adviser, said the Dodd-Frank financial legislation, passed in July, accomplishes very little. It has left the regulatory bodies unfocused and ineffective, and it has failed to determine specific regulatory policy, he said. "What Congress did, in effect, was they highlighted a ba…

Hopefully no one here is going to be faced with foreclosure, but there are websites designed to give free advice on how to handle it when the time comes. Banks, faced with more foreclosures than they ever anticipated, are often willing to deal, or at least delay a foreclosure if you make some good faith effort to make some of the payments. Better to get some money than to go ahead with the costly and unpredictable process of foreclosure. Here is some of the advice easily available on the internet: From foreclosurefish.com How to Delay Foreclosure for As Long As Possible July 22, 2008, 9:36 am Posted by Nick in Legal Information Rating: 5/5 The most important ele…

The Republicans gutted the US Treasury while Bush ran the country, they devastated the economy, and now they stand to be voted back into office in November. After 2 years of voting no to very good idea proposed by the Democrats, people want them to be rewarded for all that by returning them to power. I used to care about politics, but how can anyone support the corrupt machinations we see today. And, to top it off, one of the most crooked Republicans is expected to be the Speaker of the house. I take the liberty of copying this column in full since Mr. Herbert would like it read: Op-Ed Columnist That’s Where the Money Is By BOB HERBERT Published: October 5, 2010 NY …

Things are starting to get a bit silly in Canada, folks! The provincial government in Ontario (home of major cities Toronto, Ottawa, Hamilton, and London) is now asking Craigslist to cut the escort ads (as has now happened in the US) Toronto Star - Ontario asks Craigslist to stop prostitution-related ads But in a separate twist, the federal government (currently headed by the socially conservative Conservative Party) seems to have decided that strippers, escorts, and other such "morally offensive" careers should be included in the federal government's Job Bank (an online database of jobs that employers are looking to fill.) Can things get any sillier? Hold on to you…

This is the rumor. Do you think this will come to fruition? I'd love to see it and may be the way out of the mess Obama has gotten himself in.

The Untold Story of TARP Herbert M. Allison.Posted: October 3, 2010 03:12 PM TARP has become a dirty word in our nation's political discourse. Few terms elicit such anger from voters and politicians. In many ways, that's understandable. No one wanted to bail out Wall Street. No one wanted to use taxpayer dollars to rescue an industry that helped cause the worst economic crisis in a generation. It was unfair. It was appalling. But it was necessary. We had no other choice. Two years ago, we stood at the brink of an economic catastrophe. Ordinary American families were questioning whether their money was safe in banks. A growing financial panic threatened to sink our …

New Proof Wall Street Knew Its Mortgage Securities Were Subpar: Clayton Execs Testify First Posted: 09-25-10 06:56 PM | Updated: 09-25-10 09:46 PM Shahien Nasiripour shahien@huffingtonpost.com | HuffPost Reporting During a little-noticed hearing this week in Sacramento, Calif., a firm hired by Wall Street to analyze mortgages given to borrowers with poor credit, which were then packaged and sold to investors during the boom years, revealed that as much as 28 percent of those loans failed to meet basic underwriting standards -- and Wall Street knew all along. ... The full article is found in Lucky's Place, thus not reproduced here. http://www.maleescortreview.c…

For any political junkies out there, I think this is the best political website to keep track of what is going on nationally: Realclearpolitics http://www.realclearpolitics.com/ They have articles linked from many points of view from several news media. Plus they have the lastest polls on races from across the country and do averages of many polls to score each race. (Just click the poll tab near the top of the main page) It's a good place to keep track of what is happening in races not in your area that will still affect us all. As a political junkie I find myself on this site almost everyday as the mid-term elections get closer. When I was active in a trade or…

What does war do to our youth? Here's one example, where a good-looking young soldier tells about going around whacking innocent civilians in Afghanistan for the fun of it. See the video: http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/27/soldier-describes-murder-of-afghan-for-sport-in-leaked-tape/?hp

I have no words.

WILMINGTON (The Borowitz Report) – Galvanized by Republican senatorial nominee Christine O'Donnell's anti-masturbation stance, masturbators from across the state converged on Wilmington today in what some are calling the largest pro-wanking protest in American history. Carrying signs reading, "O'Donnell: Hands Off Our Masturbation," the angry masturbators clogged downtown Wilmington, stopping traffic for blocks. Harley Farger, a leading Delaware masturbator and planner of the Million Masturbators March, said it was difficult to organize masturbators "because they're used to acting alone." Mr. Farger, the executive director of the pro-monkey-spanking group MasturNation,…

300 Economists Warn Congress: Don't Kill Growth And Jobs In The Name Of Deficit Reduction First Posted: 09-16-10 01:06 PM | Updated: 09-16-10 01:27 PM Arthur Delaney arthur@huffingtonpost.com | HuffPost Reporting A small army of economists warned Congress on Thursday not to focus on deficit reduction instead of job creation or else risk a 1937-style double-dip recession. "History suggests that a tenuous recovery is no time to practice austerity," says a statement signed by more than 300 economists and policy experts. "In the Great Depression, Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal generated growth and reduced the unemployment rate from 25 percent in 1932 to less than 1…

Obama Names Elizabeth Warren To New Post Setting Up Consumer Protection Agency JIM KUHNHENN | 09/17/10 06:51 PM | AP WASHINGTON In a poke in the eye to the financial community, President Barack Obama on Friday named Elizabeth Warren, an aggressive consumer advocate and Wall Street adversary, to oversee creation of a new agency to regulate banks, lenders and credit card companies. Sidestepping a Senate confirmation fight for now Obama stopped short of nominating Warren to actually head the new Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection. Instead, his action will let the Harvard Law School professor and expert on bankruptcy move quickly to shape the bureau. Senate Rep…

http://www.cheatingways.com/world-affairs/christine-odonnells-campaign-to-stop-america%E2%80%99s-masturbation-epidemic/

The GOP reached out to embrace the Tea Party in the summer of Health Care reform and as the 'Party Of No' on anything to help the country weather the Economic collpase during the Obama adminstration. Their last supportive action on a major legislative bill as a party was Bush's TARP, highly fractured as that was. During the last two years what little that was accomplished in the Senate on major bills counted on the lone rogue GOP senator, maybe two. That does NOT put the lie to the 'Party of No' label. Now that embrace of the radical right Tea Partiers has resulted in the GOP establishment being eaten alive. No better deserved justice for the crass GOP Establihsment hy…

Last Saturday I wandered through a "tribute to 9/11 memorial classic car show" in my hick right-wing town, there was live music, and the guy on stage went into a teabagger-like rant (while trying to be coy about it) and then played a 60's protest song--with no hint of irony. And it struck me (about as hard as I'd have liked to strike him) that last Saturday marked exactly as long into Obama's presidency as we were into Bush's on 9/11. Think about that. How does Obama get all the blame for the shit he inherited, especially the economy, while to this day Bush gets no blame whatsoever for 9/11? It's now absolutely clear that the Bush administration specialized in…

Senate Republicans unveil a plan to make Bush tax cuts permanent By Lori Montgomery Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, September 15, 2010; 3:16 AM Even as they hammer Democrats for running up record budget deficits, Senate Republicans are rolling out a plan to permanently extend an array of expiring tax breaks that would deprive the Treasury of more than $4 trillion over the next decade, nearly doubling projected deficits over that period unless dramatic spending cuts are made. The measure, introduced by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) this week, would permanently extend the George W. Bush-era income tax cuts that benefit virtually every U.S. ta…