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Another great example of “good intentions” run amok.
This is a special report ran by a local news station in my area. The clip is about 9 minutes long, but it provides a good example of how throwing money at the problem does squat.
Conspiracy theroists have once again hit the virtual street corners of cyberspace peddeling the latest conspiracy theory involving Rev. Wright’s appearence in front of the National Press Club. And as expected, folks are lining up to spend some of their common sense in exchange for a quick fix.
WAS REV. WRIGHT PRESS CONF A CLINTON CONSPIRACY?: Questions raised after organizer is exposed as a Hillary supporter.
EURweb.com
A hot topic among Barack Obama supporters on the Internet and black radio is the political affiliation of the woman who organized Monday’s National Press Club event featuring Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
Whether or not one believes Rev. Wright’s statements about AIDS possibly being government-created to kill minorities, or that America’s actions around the world led directly to the 9/11 attacks, there’s no doubt that the comments did more damage than good to Obama’s campaign.
Turns out Rev. Wright’s appearance was organized by Barbara Reynolds, a former editorial board member at USA Today and staunch supporter of Obama’s Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton.
“I don’t know if Reynolds’ eagerness to help Wright stage a disastrous news conference with the national media was a way of trying to help Clinton, but it’s safe to say she didn’t see any conflict between promoting Wright and supporting Clinton,” wrote columnist Errol Louis of the New York Daily News.
On a blog linked to her Web site - www.reynoldsnews.com - Reynolds said in a February post: “My vote for Hillary in the Maryland primary was my way of saying thank you” to Clinton and her husband for the successes of Bill Clinton’s presidency.
The same post criticized Obama’s “Audacity of Hope” theme: “Hope by definition is not based on facts,” wrote Reynolds. “It is an emotional expectation. Things hoped for may or may not come. But help based on experience trumps hope every time.” (more…)
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Now, here are two OTHER points that have been left out of this story–
1 - Press Club Chief Disputes Notion That Wright Appearance Was Scheduled to Hurt Obama (foxnews.com) The president of the National Press Club is disputing suggestions that the woman who facilitated Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr.’s speaking engagement Monday did so out of a desire to hurt Barack Obama politically.
A New York Daily News columnist wrote Tuesday that club member Barbara Reynolds, who as head of the speaker’s committee was the club’s point person for Wright’s appearance, is actually a Hillary Clinton supporter. The opinion piece raised the possibility that Reynolds had ulterior motives in bringing Wright to Washington since the pastor “couldn’t have done more damage to Barack Obama’s campaign if he had tried.”
But National Press Club President Sylvia Smith said she doubts politics had anything to do with it.
“I can’t imagine that it would have been (to hurt Obama),” she said. “That would be a pretty convoluted conspiracy theory.”
Smith said Reynolds actually suggested inviting Wright as a speaker two years ago, but that the club declined since he “wasn’t newsworthy.”
She said she thinks somebody other than Reynolds suggested inviting Wright this time around, and that Reynolds was only assigned as point person because she has connections with Wright and his Trinity United Church of Christ. She stressed that Reynolds was not the deciding factor in the invitation, and that Wright was brought in because he was making news. (more…)
2 - Wright’s “performance” (as Obama put it) was not limited to his appearence at the National Press Club. He also made many of the same comments in front of the NAACP chapter in Detroit where he was an INVITED guest. And let’s not forget his appearance in with Bill Moyers where although he was milder in tone, he still accused Obama of saying what he says to score political points.
All in the same weekend.
I guess Moyers and the NAACP were in on the grand scheme as well
D.C. anti-gang effort: Call them ‘crews’
By David C. Lipscomb
washingtontimes.com
When is a gang not a gang? When it’s based in the District.
D.C. officials insist on describing groups of young males as “crews,” rather than gangs, even when they are held responsible for violent acts such as the wave of killings in the city last weekend. But police officials in other cities say the distinction is counterproductive.
“The very first step in dealing with gangs is denial,” said Capt. Charles Bloom of the Philadelphia Police Department. “Then you get to the point that you can’t deny it any more.”
D.C. police, lawmakers and community activists say the groups are not gangs because their members are mostly teens who band together for personal protection. That, they say, distinguished them from conventional gangs, which are created for a criminal enterprise such as drug dealing.
Capt. Bloom said Philadelphia quit trying to make such distinctions two years ago. Although they once described such bands as “loose groups,” they now use the term “gang-related” for any group that engages in criminal violence. (more…)
*Ever since Destiny Child’s song “Bootylicious”, some folks STILL can’t break the habit of placing -licious at the end of anything. It has gotten old and frankly, some folks are too old to be using it in the first place.
*One of my biggest gripes about “unique business opportunities” that are pyramid-based is that you hear from folks who for years would not have given you the time of day. Now all of a sudden we need to “catch up”.
*Americans have been talking about race for years. Now all of a sudden we need to have a REAL discussion on race.
Grrrrrrrr!
See what happens when you don’t own a Prius?
Global warming set to fan HIV
news.com.au
CLIMATE change is the latest threat to the world’s growing HIV epidemic, say Australian experts who warn of the “grim” outlook in the fight against the infectious disease.
A leading professor of health and human rights, Daniel Tarantola, has cautioned that global warming will indirectly make citizens of developing countries even more vulnerable to death and severe ill health from HIV/AIDS.
“It was clear soon after the emergence of the HIV epidemic that discrimination, gender inequality and lack of access to essential services have made some populations more vulnerable than others,” said Prof Tarantola, of the University of NSW.
Those problems had not gone away, he said, and today extra threats were lurking on the horizon “as the global economic situation deteriorates, food scarcity worsens and climate change begins to affect those who were already dependent on survival economies”.
“Climate change will trigger a chain of events which is likely to increase the stress on society and result in higher vulnerability to diseases including HIV,” said Prof Tarantola, due to address an HIV forum in Sydney tonight.
[…]
“Climate change will lead to food scarcity and poorer nutrition, putting people with perilous immune systems at more risk of dying of HIV, as well as contracting and transmitting new and unusual infections,” Prof Cooper said. (more…)
All the “green” rhetoric has really increased in the last couple of weeks.
I am down with taking care of the environment, but sheesh! Do we have to hear about it at every turn?
While it may be easy to lay most of the blame on greedy marketing firms, I don’t see folks who legitimately preach the green gospel not trying to stop it.
Random articles from around the net–
Alternative fuels aren’t solving Phoenix’s air-pollution problem, and it’s doubtful that they will anytime soon
By Ray Stern
phoenixnewtimes.com
A few years ago, the city of Phoenix owned about 1,400 light trucks and cars that can run on compressed natural gas as part of its effort to reduce dependence on gasoline and help clean the air. Now it has cut back to 1,073 such vehicles. And over the next several years, the city will shed most — if not all — of its remaining light-duty natural-gas vehicles.
For now, the replacements burn standard gasoline.
As the fleet shrinks, much of the decade-old $13 million in infrastructure for these vehicles will slowly be rendered useless. Burly compressors for the natural gas and maintenance equipment will be sold off.
The trend is affecting government fleets all over the Valley, as well as private vehicles. A look at the state Motor Vehicle Division’s license plate statistics shows that the number of alternative-fuel vehicles in the state — in spite of the so-called green movement — is going down.
[…]
Eight years ago, Arizona showed the rest of the country just how ludicrous alternative-fuel subsidies could get. The state promised to pay residents about half of the cost of a new vehicle (most were SUVs loaded with options) if the buyer converted the vehicle to run partly on natural gas or propane. The vehicle didn’t actually have to use the fuel, mind you. Many buyers installed only a token four-gallon natural-gas tank to get the subsidy, with no intention (or any practical way) of actually using the fuel.
People even got some vehicles for free.
A flat subsidy of $30,000 was paid for heavier pickup trucks, like Ford F-450s, even though, without options, the trucks retailed for less than $30,000. One loophole allowed buyers to collect the subsidy and immediately sell the vehicles out of state for profit. Another failed to effectively limit how many people could get a subsidy.
Accountants had mistakenly informed state lawmakers that the program would cost the state $10 million at most. But by the time Arizona lawmakers killed the program in late 2000, qualified state residents had applied for about $800 million in subsidies. (more…)
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While Sarah Fenske (also a writer for the Phoenix New Times) does believe in the premise of man-created global warming, she is at least willing to be honest about the whole green wave in her piece “We’re all destroying the earth, and buying an organic handbag ain’t gonna help“.
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Britons tired of green issues news
AOL News
Many Britons are suffering from “eco-fatigue”, with more than a quarter tired of the attention green issues are receiving, according to a new survey.
An ICM report for the Ideal Home Show also found nearly a quarter of people (23%) admitted they were bored of “eco news” and nearly a fifth (18%) exaggerated their environmental behaviour because it is fashionable.
>>(Hahahahah! This is EXACTLY why I do not believe most polls that suggest Americans overwhelmingly are fully converted on this issue.)<<
Back to the article
While more than half (57%) believed a difference could be made to the environment if everyone did their bit, nearly four fifths of those questioned (78%) think not everybody is making the effort.
But people rated their own green performance quite highly, with 83% saying they acted in an environmentally friendly way, the research found. (more…)
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Walking away from your current mortgage because you know it is about to reset (or already has) and getting a BIGGER house with a smaller mortgage payment.
Notice the hand (I mean, paw).
Some things I found over the net this morning
Back in 2007-
The May 13 This Week opened with a pre-taped interview of Obama conducted by Stephanopoulos. The relevant portion of the roundtable panel, with Cokie Roberts and George Will in addition to Donaldson and Stephanopoulos, in which Donaldson referred back to the interview:
Sam Donaldson: “You raised something, let’s just put on the table: He’s an African-American. Is the country ready? Well, I think it is. And he said he thinks it is. He said he thinks he’ll lose some votes because of that, and so the question is what does the word ’some’ mean? In critical elections, not just in the South, it may mean something.”
Cokie Roberts: “Well sure. And it could be huge. But I think the fact that we’re having this conversation is just wonderful. I mean, the idea that we are at this point in 2007, if you had told us that 40 years ago when we were having all the civil rights debates that we would be talking very seriously about a black man being President of the United States in 2008, we would not have believed it.”
George Stephanopoulos: “Maybe I’m wrong, maybe I’m naive, but Sam I guess I think that anyone who’s not going to vote for Barack Obama because he is black isn’t going to vote [Roberts says at this instant “Democratic”] for a Democrat anyway. And I wonder if there are as many people who will vote for him-”
George Will: “More.”
Stephanopoulos: “That’s the question.”
Will: “The place where Barack Obama really helps is in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, right outside Philadelphia.”
Stephanopoulos: “Exactly.”
Will: “Moderate, mainstream swing district where it makes people feel good.”
Donaldson: “You already made him the nominee.”
Stephanopoulos: “Not yet Sam.”
Donaldson: “But I’m talking about the race for the nomination. Now, many states have crossovers I understand, but the states in which you have to be a Democrat in order to vote in the Democratic primary, that’s where- [talked over.]” (source)
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Why Even Hardened Racists Will Vote for Barack Obama
In the Electoral Marketplace, He Had to Pass the Halle Berry Test (source)
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On McCain’s visit to New Orleans
McCain distances self from Bush in New Orleans
Dan Nowicki
The Arizona Republic
NEW ORLEANS - John McCain on Thursday directly confronted what many perceive as one of President Bush’s most monumental failures: the bungled federal government response to Hurricane Katrina.
In doing so, McCain, the not-yet-official Republican presidential nominee, hopes to convince Americans, especially Black, Hispanic and working-class White voters, that he doesn’t represent a continuation of the unpopular Bush administration.
“Never again will a disaster of this nature be handled in the terrible and disgraceful way that it was handled,” McCain said after taking a four-block walk to survey recovery efforts still under way in New Orleans’ devastated Lower 9th Ward. “Never again.”
[…]
After the walk, McCain heaped criticism on Bush, the sluggish federal bureaucracy and Congress, which earmarked money for often-trivial pet lawmaker priorities while ignoring critically needed infrastructure improvements. “Unqualified people” headed the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which became symbolic for government ineptitude after its much-criticized response to the storm’s catastrophic flooding, he said. They totally misread “the dimensions of the disaster,” McCain added.
“History will judge this president as they have earlier presidents, but it’s clear that this was an unacceptable scenario and one that would never happen again,” McCain said.
The senator also vowed to protect New Orleans from future Category 5 hurricanes, seeming to give little regard to costs.
>>And of course Democrats cranked up the wayback machine by bringing up a bunch of bills he voted against. Some of it is overreaching in their effort to label him a double-talker (which btw I do agree with the assertion), but this particular item, IMO is right on the money.
2006: McCain Voted Against Making FEMA an Independent Agency. McCain voted against the Clinton amendment (No. 4563) that would remove the Federal Emergency Management Agency from the Department of Homeland Security and establish it as an independent, Cabinet-level agency. It would require the agency’s head to have significant expertise in the area of emergency preparedness and response. [H.R. 5441, S.V. 193, 7/11/06, failed 32-66]
This has been FEMA’s problem from jump–going all the way back to the Northridge earthquake back in 1994.
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Maya Angelo’s open letter in support of Hillary Clinton
I just happened to see this in Google this afternoon–
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Google Image Labeler
How does it work?
You’ll be randomly paired with a partner who’s online and using the feature. Over a two-minute period, you and your partner will:
* View the same set of images.* Provide as many labels as possible to describe each image you see.
* Receive points when your label matches your partner’s label. The number of points will depend on how specific your label is.
* See more images until time runs out.
After time expires, you can explore the images you’ve seen and the websites where those images were found. And we’ll show you the points you’ve earned throughout the session.
What do you need to participate?
Just an interest in helping Google improve the relevance of image search for users like yourself. If you log in to your Google account, we will keep track of your points for you. You may also enter a nickname, but we do not require either a nickname or a login to use Google Image Labeler.
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I prefer cash.
