Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Barker's Newsbites: Tuesday, December 14, 2010


Newsbites are BACK...!
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10 comments:

William R. Barker said...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/13/AR2010121305198_5.html?sid=ST2010121305455

On Friday morning, [Richard Holbrooke, President Obama's chief envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan,] was taken to George Washington University Hospital after he became flushed and suffered chest pains during a meeting with [Secretary of State Hillary] Clinton.

He underwent a 21-hour operation that ended on Saturday to repair his aorta.

As Mr. Holbrooke was sedated for surgery, family members said, his final words were to his Pakistani surgeon: "You've got to stop this war in Afghanistan."

[Ambassador Holbrooke] died Monday in Washington of complications from surgery to repair a torn aorta.

* HOLBROOKE WAS RIGHT... WE NEED TO GET OUT OF AFGHANISTAN. BOMB THE BASTARDS FROM AFAR AS CIRCUMSTANCES DEMAND. SEND IN SPECIAL FORCES WHEN NECESSARY. BUT NATION BUILDING...? OVER A HUNDRED THOUSAND AMERICAN TROOPS...? IT'S INSANITY.

December 14, 2010 at 9:20 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.nbcchicago.com/blogs/ward-room/Rahm-Emanuel-Claimed-Part-Year-Residency-in-09.html?dr

When Rahm Emanuel originally filed his 2009 Illinois tax return, he indicated he was only a “part-year resident’’ of the state that year, since he had moved to Washington D.C. to serve as President Obama’s chief of staff.

But after he decided to return to Chicago to run for mayor this fall - and after several people challenged whether he was eligible to run based on the fact that he hadn’t lived in the city for a full-year prior to the Feb. 2 election - he filed an amended return, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

* WAIT FOR IT... WAIT FOR IT...

“The original return’s statements regarding part-year residency were not accurate,” Emanuel and his wife wrote in a return filed Nov. 24. “The amended returns make clear that we were full-year residents of Illinois in 2009. ... We are also full-year residents of Illinois in 2010.”

* UNFRIGG'NBELIEVEABLE, HUH?! OBVIOUSLY RAHM EMANUEL WAS NO MORE A RESIDENT OF ILLINOIS IN '09 AND THIS YEAR THAN THE OBAMA'S WERE. THE MAN HAS NOW BLATANTLY PERJURED HIMSELF ON A TAX RETURN! RATHER THAN CAMPAIGNING FOR MAYOR OF CHICAGO, EMANUEL SHOULD CLEARLY BE UNDER INDICTMENT AWAITING TRIAL, CONVICTION, AND ULTIMATELY JAIL!

Attorney Burt Odelson, who is leading the charge to knock Emanuel off the ballot, said Saturday night that the fact that Emanuel filed the “non-resident and part-year resident’’ tax return shows even he acknowledged - at least initially - he wasn’t a resident in the last half of 2009 or for most of 2010 before he moved back to the state recently.

* FOLKS... THE MAN HAD RENTED OUT HIS ILLINOIS HOME...!!! HE WAS LIVING FULL TIME IN WASHINGTON D.C. - OBVIOUSLY - WHILE SERVING AS PRESIDENT OBAMA'S CHIEF OF STAFF!

On the original Illinois [tax] return, in response to the question, “Were you, or your spouse ... a full-year resident of Illinois during the tax year?’’ Emanuel checked “No.’’ He said he lived in the state only until June 30, 2009.

December 14, 2010 at 9:30 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/2010-12-14-column14_ST_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip

* AN OP-ED BY MITT ROMNEY

President Obama's tax compromise with congressional Republicans...reduces payroll taxes, extends unemployment benefits and keeps current tax rates intact. So far, so good.

* NO. NOT "SO GOOD." I'M ABSOLUTELY 100% OPPOSED TO EXTENDING UNEMPLOYMENT WELFARE YET AGAIN.

* AS TO KEEPING THE CURRENT TAX RATES INTACT... THE PROBLEM ISN'T SO MUCH THE RATES PER SE; THE PROBLEM IS THE TAX CODE ITSELF. WE MUST REFORM OUR BLOATED AND OFTEN COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE TAX CODE SO AS TO REMOVE LOOPHOLES, SIMPLIFY AND MAKE TRANSPARENT TAX REQUIREMENTS, AND ENSURE THAT ALL AMERICANS HAVE AT LEAST SOME SKIN IN THE GAME - NO MORE EXEMPTING ALMOST HALF THE POPULATION FROM FEDERAL INCOME TAXES!

The deal keeps current tax rates from rising to pre-Bush era levels for two years. But in 2013, unless Congress acts again, rates will increase dramatically.

* INSANITY! FORGET THIS "BUSH TAX CUTS" NONSENSE. THE TAX RATES ON THE BOOKS TODAY *ARE* THE TAX RATES. PERIOD! IF IN JANUARY TAXES GO UP... THAT MEANS TAXES HAVE GONE UP! IF THEY REMAIN AS THEY ARE TODAY, NOTHING HAS CHANGED. THE TAX CODE AS OF NOW *IS* THE TAX CODE. THERE SHOULD BE NO "EXPIRATION." IF CONGRESS WANTS TO RAISE TAXES THAN HAVE THEM DO SO NORMALLY! THIS IS ALL ONE BIG SCAM TO EVADE RESPONSIBILITY.

Of course, delay now is better than an immediate tax hike. But because the extension is only temporary, a large portion of the investment and job growth that characteristically accompanies low taxes will be lost. When entrepreneurs and employers make decisions to start or expand an enterprise, uncertainty about tax rates translates directly into a reduced propensity to invest and to hire. With only a two-year extension, investors know that before their returns are realized, tax rates may be jacked up to the levels favored by President Obama.

[This so-called "compromise"] will also add to the deficit.

In many cases, lowering taxes can actually increase government revenues. If new businesses, new investments and new hiring are spurred by the prospects of better after-tax returns, the taxes paid by these new or growing businesses and employees can more than make up for the lower rates of taxation. But once again, because the tax deal is temporary, a large portion of this beneficent effect is missing. What some are calling a grand compromise is not grand at all, except in its price tag. The total package will cost nearly $1 trillion, resulting in substantial new borrowing at a time when we are already drowning in red ink.

Part of the tax deal is a temporary reduction in payroll taxes.

* INSANITY...!!! OBAMA IS SIMPLY RUNNING UP THE FEDERAL DEBT! THIS IS CRAZY...!!! (AND IT'S INFLATIONARY AS WELL!)

For those without jobs, the tax compromise extends unemployment benefits for 13 months.

* NO! NO! NO! OBAMA, THE DEMOCRATS, AND THEIR RINO ENABLERS ARE CREATING A WELFARE STATE...!!!

The indisputable fact is that unemployment benefits, despite a web of regulations, actually serve to discourage some individuals from taking jobs, especially when the benefits extend across years.

* DUH...!!!

In spending $56.5 billion to extend benefits, the deal is sacrificing the bedrock Republican principle that new expenditures be paid for with offsetting budget cuts.

* IT APPEARS GOOD OL' MITT (*GNASHING MY TEETH*) WANTS IT BOTH WAYS. I HAVE NO IDEA WHETHER HE'D VOTE FOR OR AGAINST THE EXTENSION WERE HE A MEMBER OF CONGRESS. (*SHRUG*)

* UNDERSTAND, FOLKS... MITT ROMNEY IS AS SLIPPERY AND UNPRINCIPLED AS THEY COME.

December 14, 2010 at 9:54 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.cnbc.com/id/40641123

Moody's warned Monday that it could move a step closer to cutting the U.S. AAA [investment] rating if President Obama's tax and unemployment benefit package becomes law.

(*SIGH*)

* SERIOUSLY, FOLKS... I'M NOT KIDDING WHEN I POSIT THAT OBAMA IS DELIBERATELY MOVING TO HURT OUR NATION ON A NUMBER OF FRONTS.

The plan agreed to by President Obama and "Republican" leaders last week could push up debt levels, increasing the likelihood of a negative outlook on the United States rating in the coming two years, the ratings agency said.

* FOLKS... ANYTIME OBAMA AND MITCH MCCONNELL ARE ON THE SAME PAGE... (*SIGH*)... LOOK OUT!

* IN A SENSE MCCONNELL AND HIS ILK ARE WORSE THAN OBAMA. AT LEAST OBAMA IS AN IDEOLOGUE WHO SINCERELY BELIEVES THAT A CAPITALISTIC, CONSTITUTIONALIST AMERICA IS NOT IN THE BEST INTEREST OF THE PLANET. MEN (AND WOMEN) LIKE MITCH MCCONNELL... (*SIGH*)... IT'S ALL ABOUT POWER FOR THEM - PERSONAL POWER TO SERVE PERSONAL ENDS.

[A] loss of [our] top AAA rating [will] reduce the appeal of U.S. Treasuries..."From a credit perspective, the negative effects on government finance are likely to outweigh the positive effects of higher economic growth," Moody's analyst Steven Hess said in a report sent late on Sunday.

If the bill becomes law, it will "adversely affect the federal government budget deficit and debt level," Moody's said.

(*GNASHING MY TEETH*)

Moody's estimates the cost of the funding the proposed tax bill, along with unemployment benefits and other policy measures, may be between $700 and $900 billion...

(*POUNDING MY FIST ON THE DESK AGAIN AND AGAIN*)

December 14, 2010 at 10:06 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=40423

A [short time] ago, CNSNews' Penny Starr reignited the culture war with an arresting story about the staid old museum that began thus: "The federally funded National Portrait Gallery, one of the museums of the Smithsonian Institution, is currently showing an exhibition that features images of an ant-covered Jesus, male genitalia, naked brothers kissing, men in chains, Ellen DeGeneres grabbing her breasts and a painting the Smithsonian itself describes in the show's catalog as 'homoerotic.'"

Film of the crucifix with ants crawling on Jesus is from "A Fire in My Belly," a video by [the late] David Wojnarowicz... The rest of the four-minute video...portrays "the bloody mouth of a man being sewn shut ... a man undressing a man's genitals, a bowl of blood and mummified humans."

* THESE PEOPLE ARE SICK BASTARDS...

[In reaction to the adverse publicity,"] the [publicly owned and funded] portrait gallery pulled the video.

"The Censors Arrive," said the [Washington] Post. [T]he ants-on-Jesus image, 11 seconds long, is no big deal said the Post.

* HMM... SEEMS THAT "SICK" IS GOING AROUND!

To Post art critic Blake Gopnik, the "show about gay sex" at the gallery is "courageous" and "full of wonderful art." [His review...] "it was a rave."

As for the gallery's pulling of "A Fire in My Belly," Gopnik wrote that the NPG curators "come off as cowards."

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

Down the hall from the "Hide/Seek" homoerotic art and gay sex show is the Steven Spielberg-George Lucas collection of paintings by Norman Rockwell, which they loaned to the gallery.

While Gopnik raved about the [homoerotic art], the Rockwell paintings, so beloved of flyover country, are just the kind of bourgeois schlock art that truly repulses him. Writes Gopnik: "Norman Rockwell would get the boot (from the National Portrait Gallery) if I believed in pulling everything that I'm offended by. I can't stand the view of America that (Rockwell) represents, which I believe insults a huge number of the non-mainstream folks."

(*KOO-KOO...KOO-KOO...KOO-KOO*)

* FOLKS... YA GOTTA UNDERSTAND WHO THE LEFT ARE! THEY'RE A BUNCH OF NUTS! THEY HATE US... THEY HATE OUR VALUES.

* I MEAN, SERIOUSLY... WHO IN THEIR RIGHT MIND DOESN'T LOVE NORMAL ROCKWELL?

December 14, 2010 at 7:43 PM
William R. Barker said...

* TWO-PARTER... (Part 1 of 2)

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=40574

* OP-ED BY PATRICK J. BUCHANAN

For those who have read about or vaguely remember the stolid British tribe of Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain and the Blitz, which held out in its "finest hour," last week brought a disgusting sight. Mobs in Parliament Square set fire to the statue of 19th century statesman Lord Palmerston and urinated on the statue of Winston Churchill. [Meanwhile,] Charlie Gilmour, son of Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour, was swinging by a rope from the Cenotaph that memorializes the 700,000 British dead of the Great War.

At night, hundreds of these anarchists peeled off to appear on Regent Street as the Rolls-Royce carrying the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall, Camilla Parker-Bowles, entered. The Rolls was pounded with boots, bottles, sticks, fists and paintballs, as the mob howled "Tory scum!" and "Off with their heads!" A sign was pushed through an open window into Camilla's side. So precarious was the situation, Charles' security detail was close to drawing guns to protect the first in line to the throne.

What was the mob protesting? Tuition increases for students who pay less for college than the parents of American students.

Across the Irish Sea...the government's budget to meet the demands of the European Union for a bailout of Ireland passed in the Dail by just five votes, 82-77. This is "the budget of a puppet government ... doing what they have been told to do by the IMF, the EU Commission and the European Central Bank," said Michael Noonan, the probable finance minister in a new government after coming elections.

Irish rage at having to suffer to save Europe's bondholders of Irish banks, the anarchy in England, riots in France to protest a rise in the retirement age to 62, the violence that wracked Greece, the precarious condition of Portugal and Spain, the anger of Germans at having to bail out their profligate EU partners, raise the question: Can Europe's welfare states be downsized without violence surging, governments falling and populists coming to power who will default on debts rather than force the masses that elected them to suffer to save the bank investors? Can European democracy deal with the gathering storm?

* To be continued...

December 14, 2010 at 7:44 PM
William R. Barker said...

* CONTINUING... (Part 2 of 2)

This weekend the New York Times reported on affluent Nassau County on Long Island: "Now, with its bonds suddenly downgraded and a state oversight agency preparing to seize its checkbook and credit cards, Nassau is on the verge of a full-fledged fiscal crisis." California, Illinois, New Jersey and New York are facing historic deficits, as the stimulus money that enabled them to survive 2009 and 2010 runs out. Illinois is facing a shortfall of $15 billion, a third of the state budget. California is being compared to Spain. A default by either could do to the credit rating of states what a default by Italy or Spain would do to the European Monetary Union.

[Under Obama and the lame duck still Democrat-controlled Congress] the U.S. government is moving again in a direction opposite of where the people voted to go on Nov. 2. The deficit is not shrinking, but growing. Even before the Barack Obama tax "compromise" - price tag $857 billion - the 2011 deficit is surging.

In November alone, the U.S. government spent $150.4 billion more than it took in.

For the first two months of FY 2011, which began Oct. 1, the feds spent $585.7 billion and took in $294.9 billion, a deficit for just one-sixth of the fiscal year of $290.8 billion.

Spending is approaching 200% of revenue. Obama's deficit for the first quarter of 2011 alone will be the same size as the largest annual deficit George W. Bush ever ran.

Michael Fereli of JPMorgan Chase projects the 2011 deficit at $1.5 trillion, after $1.4 trillion in 2009 and $1.3 trillion in 2010.

* HOW DO YOU LIKE THE HOPE AND CHANGE...???

After Obama's tax deal was announced, U.S. government bond prices tanked.

U.S. cities and states and the U.S. government, as well as the governments of Europe, are facing a crisis of confidence. Can their elected politicians reassure investors who bought their bonds in good faith that those bonds are still worth what they cost?

We may be entering a crisis...

December 14, 2010 at 7:45 PM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=556625&p=1

* OP-ED WRITTEN BY MS. PHYLLIS SCHLAFLY

The global warming prophets and propagandists, who enjoy living in style on other people's money, gathered last month in the plush resort of Cancun, Mexico, where January temperatures usually hover around 80 degrees. God must have a sense of humor because Cancun was hit by its coldest temperature in a hundred years.

(*SNORT*) (*CHUCKLE*)

This 16th annual conference of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), called COP 16 (Conference of the Parties 16), attracted some 20,000 delegates from 194 countries. It had little to do with any science about climate change and everything to do with trying to get the United States and other industrialized nations to redistribute their wealth to the poorer nations under the supervision of eager United Nations bureaucrats.

(*NOD*)

The main cause of poverty in other countries is the lack of enough energy. We should be increasing the use of energy rather than expanding government powers to restrict energy.

Tell your newly elected members of Congress that we reject all COP 16 demands as well as the insulting proposition that our successful economic system caused the world's poverty. If poor countries want to be rich, the way to go is to follow our American model for success, freedom and prosperity.

(*CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)

December 14, 2010 at 7:45 PM
William R. Barker said...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704694004576019944121568506.html?mod=WSJ_hp_MIDDLETopStories

The U.S. Air Force is blocking its personnel from using work computers to view the websites of the New York Times and other major publications that have posted secret material obtained by WikiLeaks, people familiar with the matter say.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

Air Force users who try to view the websites of the New York Times, Britain's Guardian, Spain's El Pais, France's Le Monde or German magazine Der Spiegel instead get a page that says, "ACCESS DENIED: Internet Usage is Logged & Monitored" according to a screen shot reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. The notice warns that anyone who accesses unauthorized sites from military computers could be punished.

(*STILL SHAKING MY HEAD*)

The move was ordered by the 24th Air Force, commanded by Major Gen. Richard E. Webber...

* SHITCAN THIS A--HOLE. PERIOD.

The Army, Navy and Marines aren't blocking the sites, and the Defense Department hasn't told the services to do so, according to spokespeople for the services and the Pentagon.

* THANK GOD; AT LEAST THE WHOLE DAMN MILITARY HASN'T GONE CRAZY...!

December 14, 2010 at 7:46 PM
William R. Barker said...

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/22/20101214/tpl-uk-italy-protests-d1a0d5d.html

[In Italy on Tuesday, Leftist radicals] set fire to cars, threw paint and smoke bombs at the parliament [building] and clashed with riot police in Rome's worst violence for years after Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi survived a confidence vote. Skip related content

Via del Corso, the main street stretching through the historic centre, near Berlusconi's office and home to some of the capital's smartest shops, was a battle scene of smoke, teargas and bloodied faces. Smoke rose from the Pincio Hill above the famed Spanish Steps as protesters set fire to private cars, overturned heavy trash bins and prevented fire crews from putting out the flames. At least 50 people were injured, including several policemen, and more than 40 protesters were detained, police said.

The protesters were mostly students but also included workers and immigrants.

* YOU THINK IT CAN'T HAPPEN HERE, FOLKS? IT CAN. (IT HAS HAPPENED HERE BEFORE!)

Shops were forced to close as protesters, many of them wearing ski masks, overturned tables of sidewalk restaurants, flower vases and parked motorcycles. The protesters smashed bank windows, destroyed several cash machines and threw chairs and tables at police vehicles.

In the past several weeks, students have been protesting throughout Italy against austerity measures and university reforms planned by the centre-right government, matching similar demonstrations in other countries, including Britain.

* AGAIN, FOLKS, THIS IS THE LOGICAL CONCLUSION TO FAILED SOCIALIST POLICIES. IF IT CAN HAPPEN IN LONDON... IT CAN HAPPEN HERE.

Students also blocked Palermo airport in Sicily and briefly occupied the stock market building in Milan.

December 14, 2010 at 7:46 PM

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