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2011
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April
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- Weekend Newsbites: Sat. & Sun., April 30 & May 1, ...
- Barker's Newsbites: Friday, April 29, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Thursday, April 28, 2011
- The NYT Never Ceases To Amaze
- Barker's Newsbites: Wednesday, April 27, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Tuesday, April 26, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Monday, April 25, 2011
- Weekend Newsbites: Sat. & Sun., April 23 & 24, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Friday, April 22, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Thursday, April 21, 2011
- Gang, I'm Not A Happy Camper
- Barker's Newsbites: Wednesday, April 20, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Tuesday, April 19, 2011
- Sarah Palin Sure Sounds Smart To Me!
- Barker's Newsbites: Monday, April 18, 2011
- Weekend Newsbites: Sat, & Sun., April 16 & 17, 2011
- Does Anyone Still Watch C.S.I. - The Original... L...
- Senate Vote Tally re: HR 1426 - The Budget "Compro...
- Barker's Newsbites: Friday, April 15, 2011
- HR 1473 - The Budget "Compromise"
- Barker's Newsbites: Thursday, April 14, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Wednesday, April 13, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Tuesday, April 12, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Monday, April 11, 2011
- Calling Rush Limbaugh - Rush Hudson Limbaugh III
- I Feel Betrayed By John Boehner and Nan Hayworth
- Weekend Newsbites: Sat. & Sun., April 9 & 10, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Friday, April 8, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Thursday, April 7, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Wednesday, April 6, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Tuesday, April 5, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Monday, April 4, 2011
- Weekend Newsbites: Sat. & Sun., April 2 & 3, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Friday, April 1, 2011
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April
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About Me
- William R. Barker
- Pearl River, NY High School Class of '81; Northeastern University, Boston, MA Class of '87.
12 comments:
http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/04/17/afghanistan.attack/?hpt=T2
Five troops killed in a suicide bombing this weekend at a military base in eastern Afghanistan were members of the U.S. Army's 101st Airborne Division, a senior U.S. military official said Sunday.
* ANOTHER FIVE...
(*SIGH*)
On March 29, the same Army division lost six troops in a series of firefights in eastern Afghanistan.
* 5 + 6 = 11
On Saturday, a suicide bomber wearing an Afghan military uniform struck, killing the five, at a military base, Forward Operating Base Gamberi, in eastern Afghanistan's Laghman Province.
* WHAT A FUCKING WASTE.
In February and March of this year, insurgent attacks on civilians increased 330% compared to the same period last year, the official said.
In February and March 2010, insurgents injured or killed 82 civilians; this year, the total for those two months was 353 civilians.
* SO... FOLKS... ASIDE FROM THE NUMBER OF OUR OWN COUNTRYMEN BEING KILLED IN A SENSELESS WAR, HOW DO YOU THINK WE'RE DOING... DOES IT SOUND LIKE WE'RE "WINNING" TO YOU?
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/apr/17/afghanistan-death-squad-killings-fail-get-media-po/
Reports of a U.S. “death squad” in Afghanistan, complete with the publication of gory photographs, have failed to attract the intense political or media attention afforded a previous war scandal - the mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib.
* NOW I WONDER WHY...? (*SMIRK*) (*SNICKER*)
In 2004, CBS News broadcast an array of photographs showing American jail guards abusing Iraqi detainees. The most famous: a forced pyramid of naked, humiliated prisoners. The depictions touched off an avalanche of media coverage. In Congress, liberals called for the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. Democrats launched inquiries and held a string of well-covered hearings.
* THAT WAS THEN; THIS IS NOW. HOPE... CHANGE... HOPE... CHANGE...
In recent months...[t]he Army charged five soldiers with murder in the deaths of Afghan civilians in what amounted to a “death squad.” The German magazine Der Spiegel published several digital photos of soldiers posing with the dead last month.
* ONE OF THE SOLDERS HAS ALREADY BEEN CONVICTED!
Yet the U.S. media have given relatively little coverage, and no one in Congress has called for Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates to quit, planned hearings or raised questions at budget hearings. The reason the mainstream media have barely touched the story, [many] say, is because it happened under President Obama, not George W. Bush.
* Umm... YA THINK...?!?!
“I think any assignment editor would think a story about soldiers murdering people is a bigger story than soldiers putting prisoners in a naked pyramid,” said Tim Graham, an analyst at the Media Research Center, which seeks to expose...liberal press bias. “When you reverse those, what you’re seeing is political opportunism.”
The Senate Armed Services Committee has no plans to investigate the case or hold hearings, a spokesman said... Sen. Carl Levin, Michigan Democrat and committee chairman, led several inquiries into Bush administration policies, including Abu Ghraib, detainee interrogations and intelligence collection on Iraq. Mr. Levin issued reports that harshly criticized Bush officials and held public hearings.
A spokesman for the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism said he was only faintly aware of the Afghanistan story and thus declined to comment on how the media have covered it.
(*SNORT*)
http://www.cnbc.com/id/42637280
Saudi Arabia's oil minister said on Sunday the kingdom had slashed output by 800,000 barrels per day in March due to oversupply, sending the strongest signal yet that OPEC will not act to quell soaring prices.
* SO LET'S GET THIS STRAIGHT, MY FRIENDS. ACCORDING TO THE SAUDIS THERE'S OVERSUPPLY. I PAID $3.63 A GALLON - IN JERSEY - YESTERDAY... AND THERE'S OVER-SUPPLY. I PAID $3.63 A GALLON - IN JERSEY - YESTERDAY AND THE SAUDIS SLASHED OUTPUT IN MARCH DUE TO OVER-SUPPLY.
* WHERE'S SECRETARY OF STATE CLINTON...??? IS THIS SAUDI ACTION IN THE U.S. NATIONAL INTEREST?
(*SMIRK*)
* FOLKS... LIKE I'VE BEEN TELLING YOU ALL ALONG, OBAMA WANTS OIL PRICES TO BE WHERE THEY ARE.
http://money.cnn.com/2011/04/18/news/economy/us_credit_rating_outlook_lowered/index.htm
Standard & Poor's lowered its outlook for the nation's long-term debt Monday...to "negative" from "stable"...
* THE AGE OF OBAMA CONTINUES...
The outlook means that there is a one-in-three likelihood that it could lower the long-term rating on the United States within two years, S&P said.
* YOU KNOW ALL THAT DEBT OBAMA AND THE DEMS FOISTED UPON US...? YOU KNOW THE INTEREST PAYMENTS WE'RE ALREADY MAKING ON THAT DEBT...? GUESS WHAT HAPPENS IF (WHEN) OUR DEBT RATING GETS LOWERED...
(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)
* AND, NO, FOLKS... BOEHNER'S INABILITY TO GET REAL CUTS HASN'T HELPED!
President Obama unveiled a proposal last week to cut $4 trillion from the deficits over 12 years by enacting a mix of spending cuts and tax increases.
* FOLKS... (*SIGH*)... BESIDES THE FACT THAT OBAMA UNVEILED NO SPECIFIC LEGISLATIVE PROPOSALS, RE-READ THE ABOVE SENTENCE A FEW TIMES. (*PAUSE*) NOTE: "...CUT $4 TRILLION FROM THE DEFICITS OVER 12 YEARS..."
* FOLKS... DEFICITS AREN'T BEING ELIMINATED UNDER OBAMA'S "PLAN." DEBT ISN'T BEING PAID OFF! UNDER OBAMA'S "PLAN" WE'LL CONTINUE TO DEFICIT SPEND EVERY YEAR OVER THE NEXT 12 YEARS (PLUS...) ADDING ADDITIONAL DEBT TO THE EXISTING NATIONAL DEBT EACH YEAR...!
Republicans have proposed a competing plan to lower the long-term debt by $4.4 trillion over ten years, in part by shrinking Medicaid and Medicare.
* AGAIN, FOLKS... (*SIGH*)... NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT ENDING DEFICIT SPENDING. NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT PAYING OFF DEBT!
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704621304576267113524583554.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop
Consider the Internal Revenue Service's income tax statistics for 2008, the latest year for which data are available.
The top 1% of taxpayers - those with salaries, dividends and capital gains roughly above about $380,000 - paid 38% of taxes.
[A]ssume that tax policy confiscated all the taxable income of all the "millionaires and billionaires"... [We're talking] about $938 billion...
[Less than a trillion dollars] is sand on the beach amid the $4 trillion White House budget, a $1.65 trillion deficit, and spending at 25% as a share of the economy...
* NEXT...
Say we take it up to the top 10%, or everyone with income over $114,000, including joint filers. (Remember, the top 10% already pay 69% of all total income taxes...)
The IRS data are broken down at $100,000, yet [even cofiscating] all income above that level throws up only $3.4 trillion [in government revenue.]
* FOLKS... WE'D STILL HAVE A FRIGG'N DEFICIT...! THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT COULD SIMPLY CONFISCATED ALL INCOME ABOVE $100,000 AND THIS STILL WOULDN'T BE ENOUGH TO PAY FOR OBAMA'S SPENDING...!!!
* OH... AND BY THE WAY... (ANOTHER TRIVIAL PURSUIT STAT)...
[T]he top 5% [of income earners in America] pay more [in federal income taxes] than all of the other 95%.
* SO MUCH FOR THE RICH NOT PAYING THEIR FAIR SHARE...
* FOLKS... I URGE YOU TO READ THE FULL PIECE. IT'S TITLED "WHERE THE TAX MONEY IS"
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/nato-runs-short-on-some-munitions-in-libya/2011/04/15/AF3O7ElD_story.html?hpid=z1
Less than a month into the Libyan conflict, NATO is running short of precision bombs...
(*SNORT*)
European arsenals of laser-guided bombs, the NATO weapon of choice in the Libyan campaign, have been quickly depleted, officials said. Although the United States has significant stockpiles, its munitions do not fit on the British- and French-made planes that have flown the bulk of the missions.
* THANK GOD FOR SMALL FAVORS! WE PAID FOR OUR MUNITIONS! LET THE EUROPEANS PAY FOR THEIRS!
The United States still conducts about 25% of the overall sorties over Libya, largely intelligence, jamming and refueling missions.
* AND HOW MUCH IS THAT COSTING US...?
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and other have called on Obama to redeploy U.S. AC-130 gunships, which are considered more effective over populated areas.
* I... HATE... JOHN... MCCAIN...!!!
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0411/53342.html
President Barack Obama is planning to ignore language in the 2011 spending package that would ban several top White House advisory posts.
* TRANSLATION: PRESIDENT OBAMA IS PLANNING TO DELIBERATELY BREAK THE LAW HE'S SWORN TO UPHOLD AND DARE CONGRESS AND THE COURTS TO DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT. THIS IS A PATTERN OF HIS.
House Republicans tacked on language to the contentious spending bill to cut the salaries for four so-called czars - policy advisers appointed to assist the president on health care, climate change, autos and manufacturing, and urban affairs.
* AGAIN... TRANSLATION: THE CONGRESS PASSED THE BILL. DOESN'T MATTER WHOSE IDEA THE LANGUAGE WAS. THE BILL WAS PASSED WITH THE LANGUAGE IN IT. THE PRESIDENT THEN SIGNED THE LAW.
* IT'S VERY FRUSTRATING TO WATCH AS POLITICO DOES THEIR BEST TO SIDESTEP THIS BASIC REALITY.
But in a signing statement issued Friday, Obama said he's not obligated to comply.
* REMEMBER CANDIDATE OBAMA - AND THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY - TAKING THE POSITION THAT PRESIDENTIAL SIGNING STATEMENT HAVE NO CONSTITUTIONAL VALIDITY? WELL... THAT WAS OBAMA'S POSITION BEFORE HE BECAME PRESIDENT!
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/04/18/obama_2008_bush_used_signing_statements_to_accumulate_more_power.html
* JUST WATCH THE VIDEO.
* OBAMA IS A SERIAL HYPOCRITE... AND A SERIAL LIAR.
http://www.exim.gov/pressrelease.cfm/31FCC63B-95C6-BE96-BFACF12DD5C9C502/
The Board of Directors of the Export-Import Bank of the United States today voted to grant preliminary approval for a $2.84 billion direct loan/loan guarantee to Colombia's RefinerÃa de Cartagena S.A. (Reficar).
* AND ON AND ON AND ON IT GOES...
The Reficar transaction is subject to Congressional notification, with a final vote anticipated approximately 35 days following the expiration of the notification period. If it receives final Board approval it would be the second largest transaction ever approved by the Bank.
* LET'S SEE WHAT CONGRESS DOES. MY GUESS? THEY'LL APPROVE.
Ex-Im Bank is an independent federal agency that helps create and maintain U.S. jobs by...
* LOANING BILLIONS AND BILLIONS OF DOLLARS TO FOREIGN GOVERNMENTS...
(*SIGH*)
* FOLKS... READ THE PRESS RELEASE. PAY CLOSE ATTENTION TO ALL THE SELF-CONGRATULATORY SMOKE AND MIRRORS. WHY IS THE U.S. GOVERNMENT IN COMPETITION WITH U.S. BANKS? IF THERE'S PROFIT TO BE MADE, WHY WOULDN'T U.S. BANKS BE MAKING THE LOANS? BETTER QUESTION, WHY AREN'T WE SUPPORTING THE BUILDING OF NEW REFINERIES HERE IN AMERICA?
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/569371/201104151858/From-1st-World-To-3rd-World-.aspx
President Obama says Republicans, if they get their way, will turn the U.S. into a "Third World" nation.
Has he looked recently at the course he's set us on?
As psychologists say, it sounds like projection to us.
(*CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)
Consider for a moment these trends [during the Age of Obama]:
Real earnings have fallen for five straight months, and are down 1% since the end of last year.
According to John Williams of the Shadow Government Statistics website, if we measure consumer prices the way we did before 1992, inflation is now running at 10% a year.
* AND THE COMMODITY INFLATION HASN'T REALLY KICKED IN YET!
The U.S. has added $6 trillion to its debt under Obama... Three years ago, the U.S. had $7.9 trillion in debt. Today, we have $14 trillion [plus].
The U.S. dollar has fallen so much and foreign nations have so little confidence in our ability to run our fiscal affairs that the "BRIC" nations - the mostly fast-growing former Third World nations of Brazil, Russia, India and China - are talking about replacing the U.S. dollar in foreign trade with the Chinese yuan.
Just 45.4% of Americans had jobs last year, the lowest since 1983, according to census data crunched by USA Today. Among men, just 66.8% had work last year, the lowest ever.
Obama touts the "recovery" that supposedly began in June of 2009, but a look at the data show that last year's real private sector GDP was in fact still down 1.1% from its peak in 2007...
In 1920, Argentina was one of the five richest countries on Earth. Then it followed policies similar to Obama's... (*SIGH*)... [Argentina] crashed, burned and never really recovered.
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/569355/201104151846/Still-Awaiting-Serious-Debate-On-Debt-Cuts.aspx
In the Great Budget Debate, Democrats and Republicans are closer than you might think. Neither is proposing a balanced budget soon...
(*SHRUG*)
[T]he public seems largely clueless about the problem's enormity.
* THE AUTHOR (ROBERT J. SAMUELSON) COULD HAVE JUST STOPPED TYPING AFTER THE WORD "CLUELESS."
In 2021, the Congressional Budget Office reckons that even after a full economic recovery...
* HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! (*WIPING TEARS OF MIRTH OUT OF MY EYES*)
...the remaining deficit will equal almost 5% of gross domestic product. In today's dollars, that's $750 billion.
* TWO KEY WORDS: 1) REMAINING; 2) DEFICIT
We won't make much progress until (a) Democrats concede that spending control requires genuine cuts in Social Security and Medicare, which now total $1.3 trillion annually and represent 35% of federal outlays; and (b) Republicans acknowledge that, after significant spending cuts, tax increases will be needed to balance the budget.
* AND I'M ALL IN FAVOR OF TAX INCREASES - SPECIFICALLY TAX INCREASES UPON THE ALMOST 50% OF FAMILIES WHICH TODAY - THANKS TO LOOPHOLES - PAY ZERO INCOME TAXES!
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-real-housewives-of-wall-street-look-whos-cashing-in-on-the-bailout-20110411?print=true
* EVERY AMERICAN SHOULD READ THIS ARTICLE!
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