News analysis, even good ones, are stumped by Donald Trump's running for President. Speculating if he is just in there for attention, to elevate the Trump brand or what?
The answer is a lot simpler, Money.
Although Wisconsin's Governor Walker is one of the most transparently legally bribed politician, giving the Koch Brothers millions in tax cuts for a few hundred thousand in campaign contributions and giving the Builder Association's president's son a $80,000 a year job for $100,000 in campaign contributions, most US politicians accept legal bribes they just cover their tracks better.
Bribing a politician has a tremendous return on investment, a few thousand dollars can get someone a few million in government contracts and tax breaks. Someone like Donald Trump is already doing this but even he has to go through some lobbyists to get access.
By running for President he can start his own PAC and meet with lots of politicians, so in the future he can avoid the middle man. That is how the Koch Brothers did it.
The Donald's new business venture is an old one, get free taxpayer money by legally bribing politicians. It's easy money and Trump has always looked to get easy money.
That being said, he is doing some good while running. By appealing to the nuttiest section of the GOP the Birther/Teabaggers he is shining a light on them and their “ideas”, turning off people that have an IQ greater than a glass of water from their “cause”.
With all the negative advertising about taxes and the deficit it’s hard to get the truth to be heard but here is what the dems have done in the last two years on that front:
Obama and the democratic congress have reduced the deficit by the largest amount in history, taking it from $1.4 trillion to $1.2 trillion. The Republicans have offered no realistic plan to reduce the deficit.
Obama and the democratic congress passed the largest middle-class tax cut in history.
As far as other accomplishments that they are taking flack for:
The auto bailout:
GM was ready to fail and through a domino effect of having their suppliers go under the entire American auto industry could fail, Ford would have likely gone under, Toyota, Nissan, and Honda would have had to move most if not all of their operations out of the US. The ripple effect would turned the Great Recession into the Greatest Recession.
Today GM is profitable and even though they still have troubles and they aren’t likely dominate the auto market like they used to they are reopening factories and the US auto market is recovering.
Healthcare:
While far from perfect the healthcare bill stopped the worst abuses of the insurance companies and will cut the deficit by $138 billion. More importantly it will save the healthcare industry from pricing themselves out of reach for the majority of Americans leading it to destroy itself through demand destruction.
Alternative Energy:
This has been the biggest secret program ever undertaken in plain sight. G.W. Bush launched an alternative energy program for America, and like most of the things that Bush cared about he did it in the most backassward way possible. He offered huge tax breaks for investing in alternative energy. This plan did help start up some research into new ways of producing energy. When the economic crashed and burned all those new companies and the research they did would have been lost. Obama used grants and guaranteed loans to get them back on their feet making them some of the safest investments in this economy. Between the government investment and private sector investment research into alternative energy has became an Apollo mission scale program that will have positive returns for generations. This has led to America reducing the amount of oil used even as the economy grows. Alternative Energy has the potential to keep the half trillion dollars a year we send to hostile nations for oil back here in America.
Private Sector Jobs:
As much as the GOP says they want the private sector to take care of jobs, they are down right lousy at doing that. In the last two years Obama and the Democrats plans have lead to more private sector jobs than the entire 8 years that Bush was in office.
Tomorrow the choice is fairly clear, we can keep the Democrats who have actually produced results in power, or we can turn the congress over to the Republicans, who even though I disagree with most of their ideas have the virtue of never getting anything positive for this nation done.
It’s the favorite tactic of the right-wing, find a popular figure with progressive leaning and claim they are attacking you, it doesn’t matter if it’s true or not. Thursday, Rand Paul used this tactic with me.
"I've never really favored any change in the Civil Rights Act," Paul said. "They seem to have unleashed some of the loony left (liberals) on me." Laura Ingraham’s Radio Show.
Well, Rand I write for the blog “Lefty Loony Liberals” which you claim was unleashed on you. It’s true that I’ve written about the how the Rightwing has been taken over by crybabies and whiners so I can see how you would think that was about you, but get over yourself in the Kentucky Primaries you came in third as far the amount of votes received. You came in lower in vote count than Lt. Dan who in his attempt to explain the importance of family values told everyone that he and his 18-year-old girlfriend had been in a committed relationship “for years”.
Yes, Rand you lost in the vote count to an admitted pedophile. So I can see how you think you’re only shot at election is to claim that you are being oppressed by me and that I make you look stupid, but trust me I can claim no credit for that.
What makes you look stupid is your views on government. That a private company can do what ever the hell it feels like, Discriminate against people, poison their customers, release billions of tons of oil into the gulf, kill their employees all that is fine and the government should stay out of it.
After your dismal showing in the polls clearly showed you were out of touch with Kentucky voters, I was willing to stand aside and watch you crash and burn in your campaign. Quite frankly you weren’t worth my time. But when you go on a national radio show (that until the national media picked up on because you mentioned the site “Lefty Loony Liberals” most people thought had been canceled) and use the name of a site I write for to get airtime I have to get involved.
So since you have gone on the national media clearly asking for my opinion I will give it to you. When you first started running I thought you were a loon, but at least a loon with principles. I thought that at least you would stick to guns and not bow to pressure like every other politician. But instead when you said something bone-headed, not only did you bow to pressure you immediately blamed me for your caving in.
I can see if you are sent to Washington you will immediately abandon your principles and blame whatever person your paranoid fantasies come up with. This time it was me that you thought was to blame for your bone-head statements, who knows who it will be next.
Kentucky is looking replace the Senator that thinks that, “little green doctors” are after him. We don’t need to replace him with a Senator who will abandon any principle because in his paranoid fantasies he thinks a real person has been unleashed on him.
So say anything you want about me, my readers, unlike your 10 followers who try to disrupt demonstrations, know the difference between fantasy and reality.
In this series of posts I will highlight the Senators that voted against this amendment:
S.AMDT.2588 AMENDMENT PURPOSE: To prohibit the use of funds for any Federal contract with Halliburton Company, KBR, Inc., any of their subsidiaries or affiliates, or any other contracting party if such contractor or a subcontractor at any tier under such contract requires that employees or independent contractors sign mandatory arbitration clauses regarding certain claims.
This amendment is to hold Halliburton liable if they actively try to stop one of their employees from reporting if they are gang raped. Its pretty cut and dry if you voted for this amendment you are against gang rape, if you voted against it you believe gang rape is part of a normal work environment.
The first Senator that I will highlight in this series is Georgia’s Johnny Isakson.
Isakson was originally a pro-choice Republican when he ran for Congress, and served as a moderate Republican.
When he ran for Senate in 2004 he shifted sharply to the right, and became anti-abortion, anti-gay rights, and pro-gun.
Although he claims to be fiscally conservative he championed the F-22 Raptor, a combat jet that can’t go into combat and is sensitive to rain and its duties can be carried out for a fraction of the cost by the F-35.
He originally proposed adding the “living will” provision into Medicaid so seniors could make end of life decisions with their doctors before they are too ill to make that decision. He did call Sarah Palin out when she called it a “Death Panel”.
However he then bowed down to the Palin-bots when they went after him and started calling his own proposal “Death Panels”.
On immigration he was formerly sane and even helped write the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007 a bill while not perfect did work to reduce illegal immigration and not just use immigrates as scapegoats. When he was criticized that it offered “Amnesty” he did an about face and voted against the bill.
With his this record and his vote in support of workplace gang rape it’s easy to see exactly what type of politician Isakson is. A man who knows right from wrong but has no problem voting for what he believes is wrong in response to the political winds.
If re-elected he will most certainly cave into the most extreme of the tea-baggers. So if you live in Georgia ask yourself this question before you vote. If Johnny Isakson won’t stand up for what he believes, Why would he stand up for his constituents?
If you would like to contact Senator Isakson and ask him why he supports gang-rape, or why he is fond of attacking his own proposals, you can contact him here: Senator Isakson Contact Page.
According to Jack Hayford's Van Nuys, California Church on The Way, demons specialize in “particular sins, geographic locations, objects or age groups” and can take over even the most devote Christians.
Imagine getting the short straw in getting a job in your specialty, “man I studied my whole life to specialize in high school girl lesbianism in LA, and I’ve been assigned Tax Evasion in Utah.”
“Oh, bummer dude.”
The concept is so silly I don’t know where to begin.
I love getting comments, especially from people who link to website. So when Tony commented that he liked me sharing information in my Post “Stuff I’ve missed” where I covered everything from the Falcon I space launch to Sarah Palin’s quitting as Governor of Alaska, I naturally wondered two things.
Which issue inspired the comment, and who Tony was. So I looked at the link they left. London Escorts (barely suitable for work aka: BSFW). No nudity but if you’re flying out to England with the company credit card and your boss sees you pulling up that site, accounting might take a very close look at your expense account.
The site didn’t have a picture of a Tony so I assumed it’s an alias and picked this picture to represent the mysterious Tony:
Then I got wondering which issue would Escorts in London be most concerned with?
Space Travel?
That would be interesting, SpaceX says they should be able to offer trips into Low Earth Orbit for $40 million on their Falcon 9 heavy. If I had $40 million laying around an Escort Service that would let me join the 100 mile high club would be the way to go. Sex in zero gee sound fantastic.
Community College Funding?
I suppose an English Lass might be interested in the US college funding system, if only to get a smug laugh. From what I understand, University on England is state funded with only charges for voluntary programs like gym.
Healthcare Reform
I know people in England are following our healthcare debate if only because their healthcare system is mentioned all the time in the debate.
Here is what everyone needs to know about the difference between English Healthcare and American Healthcare. The English Healthcare model is considered one of the worst nationally run Healthcare systems and it ranks nearly twenty countries ahead of us as far as service.
The English also spend a lot less per capita on healthcare than the US.
And their Auto Insurance is a lot cheaper.
Sarah Palin
Sarah Palin was a savior to the Democratic Party. A key battleground demographic in the last few elections being White Woman.
Younger Woman were overwhelmingly Democratic until they had kids, then the fear mongering of the Republicans played on their protective instincts.
When Sarah Palin took the national stage no mother wanted her to be a role model for their daughter. So moms across the country turned Democratic.
However, I’m not sure that English Escorts would care that 27% of Americans like the bubble-headed twitter quitter.
Maybe they need someone to point to and say, “Hey at least I used my looks to do something better than be a national laughing stock.”
That last line is not sarcastic, any job dealing with customers is tough and I respect the work that Escorts and other women in the sex industry do.
So Tony, next time you stop by could you clear up which topic you were interested in.
It’s been a few days since I posted as I have been dealing with Bank of America trying to get my house out of foreclosure.
I’ve racked up a total of 6 hours on the phone with them trying to get them to answer 3 very simple questions. 1) Why didn’t they fulfill their obligations under the Mortgage Agreement? 2) Why are they lying to me? 3) Why are they breaking the law?
For some reason they don’t seem to want to answer these questions. They just keep passing me off to someone else. Their lawyer is supposed to call me maybe she can answer my questions.
But enough about those evil scum-sucking bastards.
Great News:
Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX)'s Falcon I successfully launched a satellite into orbit. http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090714/sc_nm/us_space_business;_ylt=Aj0DwK8Vtrb3h5xDsTDzr0QPLBIF;_ylu=X3oDMTJra203ZXJkBGFzc2V0Ay9ubS8yMDA5MDcxNC9
Even though the Falcon I isn’t technologically superior to the Atlas V it does offer a competing way to get objects into space. At $8 million per ½ ton flight it is the cheapest way to get into space.
Also SpaceX can start making these expendable rocket launches on a semi-routine basis freeing up resources for their work on the Falcon 9 and Falcon 9 heavy. These are the rockets that SpaceX hopes to use to take over the servicing of the ISS after the Shuttle is discontinued.
If the Falcon 9 is successful it will free up NASA to work on the Orion/Constellation Project and return humans to Moon.
Hopefully NASA can contract out all their Low Earth Orbit duties to private companies like SpaceX and turn their energies back to what they are good at pushing the envelope of space technology and expand the human frontier.
Bad News:
The International Space Station the massive spacecraft that is as big as a football field, cost $100 billion to build and is a key component to many private space companies long term plans, is scheduled to be scrapped in 2016.
It took over a decade to build the thing and now it’s going to be junked in less than half that time. That doesn’t make much sense to me.
Finally a good proposal to get some long-term benefit out of the Great Depression 2.0.
With unemployment nearing 10% it is damn near impossible for someone fresh out of high school to get a job. Let’s face it if you were the manager of a restaurant and you had two applicants for a waiter. One fresh out of high school with no work experience and one former Securities Broker who ran a multi-million company who would you hire?
By sending as many high school graduates through community college as possible right now it will ease the demand for entry level jobs giving the vastly over qualified workers a way to survive until the economy picks back up.
In 2 years when these students come out of college with their Associates Degrees, America will have better skilled workforce that can seriously compete with other nations.
It’s a solution that gives both short term relief and long term benefit.
Bad News:
This proposal doesn’t do anything to fix the Educational/Banking Complex that has turned into a vampire sucking the benefits of higher education out of the average American worker.
Nothing is being done about the fact that the Higher Education System rewards banks that default graduates on their student loans, even if the graduate is paying back the loan as promised.
Good News:
Healthcare reform with a public option, which 72% of Americans want, is moving forward.
Bad News:
7 Democrats, Max Baucus, Ben Nelson, Kent Conrad, Mary Landrieu, Dianne Feinstein, Jeff Bingaman, and Blanche Lincoln, are gladly taking some of the $1.4 million a day that Insurance companies are using to fight the public option.
The stupidest argument against the public option (you are welcome to disagree as there are a lot of stupid arguments against it) is that if people making more than $500,000 a year are taxed 1% to cover the cost they will take their ball and leave the country.
Oh no, What will America do without the people who gave us invaluable products like Default Credit Swaps, and Sub-prime Mortgage Backed Securities?
Good News:
Sarah Palin resigned as Governor so she can help candidates that share her lunatic vision for America. Now we have a quick way to Identify the wackos.
Everyone is talking about how much single payer healthcare will cost, but very few people, at least in the mainstream media have mentioned how much it would save the average American.
Believe it or not you probably do have a form of health insurance, it just doesn’t cover you, it covers other people.
This insurance is your auto insurance.
The largest part of a typical auto liability policy is covering someone else’s healthcare costs. The reason is if you lose control of your car and hit someone, it isn’t fair that they should have to pay the medical bills for your mistake.
Naturally (if you aren’t a totally cold-hearted person) you would want to see them made whole and that’s why you have insurance in the first place, that and of course because the state forces you to.
You also have medical insurance for yourself and the passengers in your car, it is filed under PIP, Personal Injury Protection, or just Personal Medical.
PIP is necessary under our current Medical System even if you have regular health insurance because if you get into an accident and need to be taken to the emergency room and the police have to call your insurance company and find out which hospital they will pay for and the ER doctors have to find out what procedures are covered and what ones aren’t, your odds of dieing would shoot up significantly.
To cut through this red tape Auto Insurance Companies have PIP so that the Ambulance ride, the Emergency Room visit and all the things to keep you from dieing immediately are covered. The amount of minimum coverage varies by state.
If single payer healthcare became reality in the US, PIP and Personal Medical would become totally unnecessary, as the Ambulance ride and the Emergency Room visit would be free.
In my case, that would save me $77.23 every six months.
The second place it would save is in the BI, or Bodily Injury, part of my insurance. Under a single payer plan this part of my insurance would be significantly reduced but not completely eliminated.
The Bodily Injury portion of auto insurance covers the other person’s medical bills, pain and suffering, and lost wages.
Even under a single payer system you will have to pay the family the lost wages if you kill someone and you’ll be responsible for someone’s pain and suffering but the biggest part of Bodily Injury is the other person’s medical expenses. You can expect those costs to go down about the same amount as the PIP.
The third place on you insurance bill that you will save is on your uninsured/underinsured Motorist coverage. The uninsured motorist coverage covers your medical bills if someone with no insurance (or a hit and run) injures you. Obviously under a single payer system these bills wouldn’t exist.
After getting rid of all these medical costs from your insurance all that is left is coverage for pain and suffering, lost wages and property damage. So you could be looking at a savings of 60% on you auto insurance.
As well as lowering your Auto Insurance, your employer would save on workers comp, the vast majority of that is for medical bills. If you’re a homeowner your homeowners insurance would go down as most of your liability coverage is for medical bills as well as all of your guest medical coverage.
Taken altogether a single payer healthcare plan will save the vast majority of Americans a great deal on the non-healthcare insurance they are already carrying.
Last night I watched Beavis and Butt-Head do America. Back in 1996 when it was made the Portrayal of the total incompetence of the ATF was laughable. The idea of the ATF and FBI doing an all out manhunt for Beavis and Butt-Head with the result being little more than giving all of Beavis and Butt-Head’s neighbors “full cavity searches” was so unrealistic it was funny.
Now, 13 years later the actions of the AFT in the film seem like a plausible scenario for the Department of Homeland Security.
Having Robert Stack being the lead agent who thought the only way to get information from people: suspects, witnesses, associates, etc. was to use full cavity searches doesn’t seem so out of place now that we have Cheney making the rounds on the news saying how having CIA agents have sex with teenage boys was the only way to keep the country safe.
Labeling two teenage boys as the most dangerous men in America seems a little less absurd after Homeland Security spent millions to round up a home grown terrorist cell, were during an interview the leader of the cell pointed to head and said, “We aren’t just acting Physically…”. Or how the CIA uncovered a plot to fly an airplane into the Sands Resort in Las Vegas only to find out it was a clip from “Con Air”.
When the Department of Homeland Security is restructured, and it needs to be I hope it uses Tommy Lee Jones’s portrayal of the US Marshals in Fugitive, who used all the powers within the law to find their man as a model rather than Robert Stack’s portrayal of the ATF.
Then I got wondering which issue would Escorts in London be most concerned with?
