Saturday, July 9, 2011

Weekend Newsbites: Sat. & Sun., July 9 & 10, 2011


If it's summer, chances are... I'm knee deep in the water somewhere...
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7 comments:

William R. Barker said...

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/08/us-usa-states-jobs-idUSTRE76768Q20110708

U.S. state and local governments cut thousands of jobs in June, pushing their payrolls down to the lowest in five years, according to Labor Department data released on Friday, and analysts do not expect the losses to end any time soon.

* AND SOME PEOPLE SAY I NEVER SHARE GOOD NEWS...!

(*SINCERE CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*) (*WHISTLING*) (*STAMPING MY FEET*) (*CHEERING*)

* LET'S HOPE THAT ONCE OBAMA IS GONE AND THE ECONOMY IS GIVEN A CHANCE TO RECOVER THIS PARTICULAR "DOWNWARD" TREND CONTINUES!

July 9, 2011 at 9:18 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://insidetv.ew.com/2011/07/08/tnt-dallas/

* MORE GOOD NEWS...!!!

It’s official: TNT is bringing back Dallas, and with original series stars Larry Hagman, Patrick Duffy and Linda Gray.

The 1980s hit will get a modern makeover on the cable network, which just gave its new version of Dallas a 10-episode series order...

* YEE-HAA...!!!

July 9, 2011 at 9:20 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/jul/8/feds-deficit-streak-record-33rd-straight-month/

The federal government notched its 33rd straight month in the red in June, extending its record deficit streak to three times the previous low-water mark, according to preliminary estimates Friday from the CBO.

* NOT GOOD...

The government has run a deficit for 33 straight months, dating back to October 2008, when then-President George W. Bush and Congress began to grapple with the financial crisis.

* HMM... LET'S SEE... WHO WAS RUNNING THE HOUSE IN OCTOBER 2008? NANCY PELOSI... CORRECT? AND WHO WAS RUNNING THE SENATE? HARRY REID.

* AND WHO WERE RUNNING THE HOUSE AND SENATE IN OCTOBER 2007... ACTUALLY STARTING FROM JANUARY 2007...?

* NOPE. NOT GIVING BUSH A PASS. JUST REMINDING FOLKS THAT THE SHIT HIT THE FAN AFTER ALMOST TWO YEARS OF THE DEMS CONTROLLING CONGRESS. COINCIDENCE...?

(*SMIRK*)

[W]ith three months to go still in fiscal year 2011, the government has racked up $973 billion in total deficits, a pace which is slightly better than 2010, when the government had just crossed the $1 trillion mark at this point.

(*RUEFUL CHUCKLE*) THANK GOD FOR SMALL FAVORS, HUH!

* I KNOW OBAMA IS IN THE WHITE HOUSE. I KNOW HARRY REID AND THE DEMS CONTROL THE SENATE. BUT REPUBLICANS SIMPLY NEED TO DO BETTER. IT'S THAT SIMPLE.

CBO analysts said interest on the debt accounts for an ever-increasing share of spending: $31 billion in June alone, and $202 billion for the first nine months of the fiscal year, which is 18% higher than 2010.

* WHICH TO A SANE, RATIONAL INDIVIDUAL OF AT LEAST AVERAGE INTELLIGENCE WOULD SEEM TO SUGGEST THAT ADDING NEW DEBT ON TOP OF BAD DEBT IS A BAD IDEA...!!!

* DR. NAN HAYWORTH (R-NY-19)... ARE YOU READING THIS...?!?! BAD IDEA! BAD!!!

July 9, 2011 at 9:40 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303365804576433912638811714.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_AboveLEFTTop

The ethanol lobby has filched taxpayers for so long that it's only natural that the Senate's move this week toward rationalizing the industry's subsidies would be described as a "momentous shift away from federal assistance," as the Des Moines Register put it. But please don't believe that the government is about to "drastically cut the financial support" for corn ethanol, as another newspaper reported.

It's delightful that the ethanol lobby has lost for once in Washington. Really it is. But the industry will still enjoy a mandate that consumers buy its product every time they pull up to the pump. The 2007 energy bill requires the sale of 36 billion gallons of biofuels by 2022. Meanwhile, both the Renewable Fuels Association and Iowa Corn Growers Association came out cautiously in favor of the Senate deal. And might there be a reason that Iowa Senators Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin are also in favor? Just asking.

Under the compromise brokered by Minnesota Democrat Amy Klobuchar and South Dakota Republican John Thune, both farm-state Senators, the 45-cent per gallon tax credit for blending ethanol into gas would expire this month. On paper it was supposed to end for good in December, though until recently no one took that seriously, so this counts as progress. California's Dianne Feinstein, who was also in on the talks, succeeded in striking the import tariff - 54 cents a gallon - on foreign ethanol.

Assuming the deal clears the House, about two-thirds of the $2 billion the government would have otherwise spent will instead be applied to the deficit. The $668 million balance will flow into new industrial policy programs, such as the special pumps and tanks necessary for filling stations to sell higher ethanol-gas concentrations and even more support for noncorn cellulosic fuels, which still aren't close to commercial-scale development despite years of promises and subsidies.

* WHICH BRINGS US BACK TO:

Meanwhile, both the Renewable Fuels Association and Iowa Corn Growers Association came out cautiously in favor of the Senate deal. And might there be a reason that Iowa Senators Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin are also in favor? Just asking.

* ANSWER:

Their obvious political calculation is that the $668 million gratuity the Senators felt they owed this ward of the state will become as inviolable as the tariff and blenders credit were until now, and grow over time.

July 9, 2011 at 12:03 PM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/10/world/asia/10intel.html?_r=2&hp

The Obama administration is suspending and, in some cases, canceling hundreds of millions of dollars of aid to the Pakistani military, in a move to chasten Pakistan for expelling American military trainers and to press its army to fight militants more effectively.

(*SINCERE AND HEARTFELT CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)

* GOOD MOVE, MR. PRESIDENT!

(HEY... WHEN HE DESERVES IT HE GETS IT!)

Altogether, about $800 million in military aid and equipment, or over one-third of the more than $2 billion in annual American security assistance to Pakistan, could be affected, three senior United States officials said.

* HEY... IF THAT'S WHAT IT TAKES. (I'LL BELIEVE IT WHEN IT HAPPENS - WHEN IT'S A DONE DEAL.)

* HEY... FOLKS... YOU KNOW MY TAKE; I'D HAVE BEEN OUTTA THERE A LONG TIME AGO! WHILE I CHEER OBAMA'S PRESENT MOVE, LET'S NOT LOSE SIGHT OF THE FACT THAT HE'S BEEN INSTRUMENTAL IN KEEPING THE MONEY PIPELINE GOING TO PAKISTAN UP TILL NOW.

“When it comes to our military aid,” Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told a Senate committee last month “we are not prepared to continue providing that at the pace we were providing it unless and until we see certain steps taken.”

* SEE WHAT I'M SAYING, FOLKS? "WE" vs. "WE." (*SHRUG*)

The cutoffs do not affect any immediate deliveries of military sales to Pakistan, like F-16 fighter jets, or nonmilitary aid, the officials said.

(*TAP-TAP-TAP*)

There is growing opposition on Capitol Hill to sending security assistance to Pakistan. Last week, the Republican-controlled House approved a Pentagon budget bill that limits the Defense Department from spending more than 25 percent of its projected $1.1 billion budget for training and equipping Pakistani troops next year, unless the secretaries of defense and state submit a report to Congress showing how the money will be spent to combat insurgencies.

* AHH... SO OBAMA IS ACTUALLY FOLLOWING IN THE PATH REPUBLICANS HAVE BEEN TREKKING!

July 9, 2011 at 7:21 PM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/boehner-abandons-efforts-to-reach-comprehensive-debt-reduction-deal/2011/07/09/gIQARUJ55H_print.html

On the eve of a critical White House summit on the debt issue, [Speaker of the House John] Boehner told [President] Obama that their plan to “go big,” in the Speaker’s words, and forge a compromise that would save more than $4 trillion over the next decade, was crumbling under Obama’s insistence on significant new tax revenue.

* THERE'S THAT "OVER THE NEXT DECADE BULLSHIT... (*GRITTING MY TEETH*)

[N]egotiators [are now] re-examining a less-ambitious framework - aimed at saving roughly $2.4 trillion over the next decade - that had been under discussion between Vice President Biden and a bipartisan group of lawmakers.

* AGAIN, FOLKS... "OVER THE NEXT DECADE..."

* I TRULY SEE NO VIABLE SOLUTION OTHER THAN VIOLENCE. THE CURRENT "NEGOTIATORS" MUST BE... DEALT WITH.

Unless Congress acts to raise the $14.3 trillion legal limit on the debt, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has said that the government will begin to default on its obligations after Aug. 2.

* WHICH AS WE ALL KNOW IS A BALDFACED LIE.

The Biden framework, which he crafted with key Republicans, including House Majority Leader Eric I. Cantor, includes cuts to federal agency budgets and more modest changes to government health programs.

It would not tackle the rising cost of Social Security.

* NO... OF COURSE NOT... NEVERMIND THAT SOCIAL SECURITY HAS BEEN UNDERWATER - TAKING IN LESS THAN IT PAYS OUT - SINCE LAST YEAR.

* SERIOUSLY, FOLKS... SHORT OF TARGETED VIOLENCE... WHAT OTHER VIABLE SOLUTION TO ANY OF YOU SEE HERE?

Negotiators had managed to reach tentative agreement on only about $1.5 trillion in savings, according to aides in both parties - short of the $2.4 trillion Boehner is demanding in exchange for an increase in the debt ceiling that would pay the nation's bills through spring 2013.

* NOTICE HOW THE WASHINGTON TIMES FAILS TO NOTE THAT THIS PROPOSED $1.5 TRILLION DOLLAR "CUT" IS TOO BE PUT INTO EFFECT OVER TEN YEARS; NOT HOW THEY THROW "SPRING 2013" INTO THE PARAGRAPH IN THE HOPE OF FOOLING READERS INTO THINKING WHAT'S BEING DISCUSSED IS CUTTING $1.5 TRILLION FROM NOW THRU SPRING 2013...?!?! THESE PEOPLE ARE DISGUSTING. THE MEDIA IS TOTALLY IN THE TANK FOR OBAMA AND THE WELFARE STATE.

July 10, 2011 at 2:07 PM
William R. Barker said...

http://news.yahoo.com/us-defence-chief-iraq-surprise-visit-152728095.html

U.S. Defence Secretary Leon Panetta arrived in Baghdad on Sunday to urge Iraqi leaders to act against Iran-backed Shiite militias, as another American soldier was killed in the south of the country.

* TOO BAD IT WASN'T PANETTA WHO WAS KILLED. TOO BAD IT WASN'T BARAK HUSSEIN OBAMA OR HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON WHO WAS KILLED. HEY... SHITHEADS... DID OR DID NOT CLINTON AND OBAMA TELL US - LAST YEAR - THAT THE IRAQ WAR WAS OVER AND THAT OUR COMBAT FORCES HAD BEEN WITHDRAWN? AM I IMAGINING THIS...?!?!

Three American soldiers have been killed so far this month, after June was the deadliest month in three years for US troops, with 14 killed.

* AGAIN... I PRAY TO GOD THAT OBAMA IS SHOT DOWN LIKE A DOG BEFORE ANOTHER BRAVE U.S. SOLDIER IS KILLED IN IRAQ.

A U.S. military statement said a soldier was killed in southern Iraq on Sunday, but gave no other details.

* NO... OF COURSE NOT. (BTW... DID OBAMA PLAY ANY GOLF THIS WEEKEND...?)

About 46,000 US troops remain in Iraq, down from a high of 170,000 after the 2003 US-led invasion.

* BUT SUPPOSEDLY THEY'RE NOT "COMBAT" TROOPS. SO WHAT ARE THEY... BESIDES TARGETS AND VICTIMS THAT IS?

They are scheduled to leave in less than six months unless a deal is reached between Baghdad and Washington.

* OH... A DEAL.

* HEY FOLKS... REMEMBER CANDIDATE OBAMA'S PROMISES? REMEMBER SENATOR OBAMA'S SPEECHES? THIS SON OF A BITCH IS A LYING BASTARD AND HIS POLICIES ARE GETTING AMERICANS KILLED!

Panetta said the United States was open to a request by Iraq on a troop extension.

* OH WE ARE, ARE WE...?!?! AGAIN, FOLKS... OBAMA IS A LYING PIECE OF SHIT AND THAT'S ALL THERE IS TO IT.

Panetta is the latest top U.S. official to arrive in Iraq, asking officials to accept a contingent of American troops beyond 2011.

* SO LET ME GET THIS STRAIGHT: WE'RE BEGGING THEM TO "ALLOW" US TO KEEP OUR TROOPS IN HARMS WAY? DO I HAVE THAT CORRECT? (RHETORICAL QUESTION - THE ANSWER IS "YES!")

Panetta said he would also press Iraqi leaders to speedily appoint defence and interior ministers, posts which remain vacant because of political bickering, despite the formation of a unity government last December.

* FUCK BUSH. FUCK OBAMA. FUCK IRAQ.

July 10, 2011 at 8:35 PM

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