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Politics : Liberalism: Do You Agree We've Had Enough of It? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

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To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (117620) 11/14/2011 9:27:55 PM From: Hope Praytochange 2 Recommendations  Respond to of 224749   A Country Unworthy Of Its President Posted 06:52 PM ET Leadership: We're starting to grasp how hard a job the president has. It can't be easy to rule a country filled with so many soft, lazy, greedy fat cats who can't make good stuff anymore. At a business forum Saturday, President Obama complained that "we've been a little bit lazy over the last couple of decades." He apparently meant we've let foreign investment go slack, since "we aren't out there hungry, selling America and trying to attract new business into America." But this is just the latest slur against the United States uttered by its leader. In October, Obama complained that "we have lost our ambition, our imagination and our willingness to do the things that built the Golden Gate Bridge." Earlier that month he groused that the U.S. "used to have the best stuff" but doesn't anymore. In September he described America as having "gotten a little soft." And that's when he hasn't been complaining about greedy Wall Street executives who think they deserve to make a profit. But calling America lazy is going too far. First of all, foreign direct investment has more than tripled over the past two decades. So it's hardly like businesses abroad haven't noticed that the U.S. is a good place to invest. And while the president might have been too busy writing autobiographies to notice, the past two decades have shown an America that is anything but soft or lazy. Since our president doesn't seem to know about this, here's a quick review: We have invented, among many other things, an entirely new industry — the Internet — that has reshaped almost every aspect of our lives, from communication to education to medicine to commerce. Every great Internet company — Google, Amazon, Facebook, Twitter, eBay, Yahoo — has been born in the U.S. We've produced incredible breakthroughs in science, medicine and technology — everything from smartphones, DVDs, digital cameras and flat panel TVs to the mapping of the human genome and spectacular new medical technologies. In the past two decades, we've managed to add more than two additional years to our lives thanks to gains in medicine and health care. And competitive forces have produced continued efficiency gains, letting the country do more with less energy. And even before Obama arrived on the scene, the nation managed to defeat communism, mount a global war on terrorism, liberate Kuwait from Iraq and then Iraq from Saddam Hussein — the latter two in a matter of days. You'd think the president would want to boast about a country that's produced so much in so short a time. But when Obama looks out his Oval Office window, he apparently sees a nation filled on the one hand with layabouts — or, as his wife described them during his presidential run, the "uninvolved and uninformed" — and on the other with greedy, selfish millionaires and billionaires. Maybe Obama is mistaking his own experience as president for some broader trends. It's certainly true that many things have gotten worse since he took office. Unemployment is up, earnings are down. The poverty rate has climbed, the dollar has fallen. Gas prices are way up but housing prices are way down. And the economic recovery, which started a mere five months after Obama was sworn in, has been the most anemic since the Great Depression. But despite Obama's endless efforts to shift blame, the fault for these trends lies not with the American people or the actions of his predecessors. It lies with Obama's own wrongheaded efforts that have vastly expanded the size and intrusiveness of government, weighed the country down with massive debt and threatened ever higher taxes. Americans don't need lectures from their president about how soft, selfish or shiftless they've become. We need only to relieve the country of his policies.

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (117620) 11/15/2011 8:46:32 AM From: Hope Praytochange 2 Recommendations  Respond to of 224749   Timing Questions Emerge on MF Global Cash Article Stock Quotes Comments (16) more in Markets | Find New $LINKTEXTFIND$ » Email Print Save ? More smaller Larger By AARON LUCCHETTI And SCOTT PATTERSON Hundreds of millions of dollars might have gone missing from customer accounts at MF Global Holdings Ltd. as far back as four days before the securities firm filed for bankruptcy protection, people familiar with the situation said Monday. The possibility of a shortfall in customer funds on Oct. 27 suggests problems might have emerged sooner than MF Global officials initially indicated to regulators and exchange operator CME Group Inc. More Corzine Aide in Spotlight MF Global Clients Accuse JPM of Overreach Topics: MF Global As the firm was fighting to survive a customer exodus during the week before its Oct. 31 bankruptcy filing, MF Global officials didn't indicate there were any deficits in customer accounts, according to people familiar with the matter. On Oct. 28, MF Global officials reported to CME Group that the customer funds at the firm were in good shape, according to people familiar with the matter. Just hours before the bankruptcy filing, though, MF Global executives told regulators they believed a shortfall had somehow occurred, possibly starting on Oct. 27 or Oct. 28, these people said. Customer funds were found to be short by about $200 million on Oct. 27, according to people familiar with the matter. Details of the disclosure haven't been previously reported. As regulators investigate the company's collapse and search for the missing money, estimated at about $600 million, the timing of the shortfall could be crucial. If regulators had known sooner about the missing money, they might have intervened faster or differently. Instead, they were left with a bigger mess after MF Global tumbled into bankruptcy. The CFTC also is examining whether hundreds of millions of dollars in customer accounts were transferred at MF Global during the week that began Oct. 24. The transfers weren't recorded in the firm's general ledger reviewed by exchange officials, according to the agency. "We're still trying to assess how far this goes back," Thomas Smith, a Commodity Futures Trading Commission official involved in the MF Global probe, said in a staff briefing with the Senate's agriculture and banking committees Monday. A spokesman for MF Global said last week that the firm is cooperating with regulators and the bankruptcy trustee trying to find the missing money. Mr. Smith said a failure to record the transactions in the general ledger is one reason regulators have had trouble finding the missing funds. The CFTC is attempting to trace the movement of the funds, including wire transfers of funds to several banks. The CFTC believes the money could still be inside MF Global, though it thinks that is a remote possibility, according to people familiar with the agency's thinking. Enlarge Image Close Associated Press Funds in customer accounts may have gone missing earlier than reported by MF Global, led by then-CEO Jon Corzine. The CFTC said it discovered the activity in its review of MF Global's records since the bankruptcy filing. Typically, such moves are reflected in the general ledger. People familiar with the company's thinking say the general ledger reflected customer transfers in the early part of the week. It still isn't clear why the customer-account shortfall occurred. During its final days, MF Global was dealing with a torrent of requests from customers trying to get their money back. That put pressure on the firm to sell assets quickly, and the firm wasn't able to make trades quickly enough for cash to arrive. MF Global officials have complained that banks the firm worked with prevented MF Global from having full access to the status of firm accounts and customers' accounts in the days leading up to the bankruptcy. At the same time, downgrades from credit-rating firms compounded MF Global's need for cash. Officials at the firm have said they notified regulators as soon as they knew about a shortfall in customer accounts. Meanwhile, customers' trading margin that remains frozen within MF Global cannot be pulled out and will soon be liquidated, according to the trustee overseeing the process. Exchanges led by CME Group already arranged for the transfer of about $1.5 billion of the estimated $5.6 billion in customer funds held in the U.S. by MF Global, representing about 60% of the collateral posted against outstanding trades. The remainder of the $2.5 billion lodged against trades at CME markets cannot be transferred, according to a statement from trustee James Giddens, who directed clearinghouse operators to liquidate the remainder in an orderly fashion but not necessarily immediately. The decision is another blow to clients who traded through MF Global and have been stuck without the cash and collateral used to do business on U.S. exchanges. A spokesman for the trustee has said that clients who held cash on deposit with the firm—who have had none of the funds freed up so far—are likely to have to file claims for the money in the bankruptcy process. Also Monday, one newly formed coalition of customers pushed back against J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., charging that the bank was trying to unfairly claim their assets in the court tussle over MF Global's remains. A spokeswoman for the bank declined to comment Monday.

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (117620) 11/15/2011 2:37:51 PM From: locogringo 3 Recommendations  Respond to of 224749   The correct answer is All of the above. Sorry, kenny_troll, but you blew another one. The REAL journalists have been laughing at that CNN rube and kiss@$$ for several days now. That clown was BEYOND pathetic, and reminded me of your best bud, ComradeClown Paul V. Goldberg on CNNer's Softball to Obama: 'Most Ridiculous Question I Have Ever Heard' Read more: newsbusters.org

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (117620) 11/15/2011 3:58:52 PM From: lorne 3 Recommendations  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 224749   ken....Do you and your kind need complete destruction of America's society if you are to reach your agendas goal of socialist/commie/marxist rule for America. How do you suppose you would have faired as a lawyer under socialist/commie/marxist rule in America?? Your idol supports this stuff, have to assume you do as well? Massive chaos, gridlock to be unleashed on NYC 'Menu' includes shutting down Wall Street, subways, bridges November 14, 2011 By Aaron Klein wnd.com NEW YORK – Watch out New York City. The Occupy anti-capitalist movement is preparing to serve a three-course meal of so-called direct action that apparently includes the blocking of subways and bridges as well as shutting down the stock market. The attempt to cause mass chaos, slated for Thursday, is tied to the Tides Center, the George Soros-financed group that funds far-left causes. Tides grantees have been helping to direct Occupy from the onset of the anti-Wall Street movement. Occupy Wall Street is currently holding "Direct Action Preparation and Training" courses today and tomorrow in downtown Manhattan to gear up for Thursday's round of riots. The Occupy site announces: "Action Preparation & Training for November 17th, November 30th and Beyond." "Red Army: The Radical Network that must be defeated to save America" exposes the extremists behind Occupy Wall Street The training plan states it aims to "build affinity team, train to do actions and civil disobediences, meet new allies and friends and have some fun with us." The Take the Square website, a partner of Occupy, has posted Thursday's agenda, outlining the radical plan as a three course meal of chaos. "Breakfast," slated for 7 a.m. Eastern, aims to "shut down Wall Street." The site says: "It's time we put an end to Wall Street's reign of terror and begin building an economy that works for all. We will gather in Liberty Square at 7 a.m., before the ring of the Trading Floor Bell, to prepare to confront Wall Street with the stories of people on the frontlines of economic injustice. There, before the Stock Exchange, we will exchange stories rather than stocks." "Lunch," scheduled for 3 p.m. Eastern, is titled "Occupy the subways." "We will start by Occupying Our Blocks! Then throughout the five boroughs, we will gather at 16 central subway hubs and take our own stories to the trains, using the 'People's Mic,'" the site states. "Dinner," slated for 5 p.m. Eastern, seeks to block bridges. Continues the site: "At 5 p.m., tens of thousands of people will gather at Foley Square (just across from City Hall) in solidarity with laborers demanding jobs to rebuild this country's infrastructure and economy. A gospel choir and a marching band will also be performing. "Afterwards we will march to our bridges. Let's make it as musical a march as possible – bring your songs, your voice, your spirit." As WND was first to report, the tactic of blocking bridges, already used by Occupy Wall Street to hold up the Brooklyn Bridge last month, was institutionalized by Stephen Lerner, a controversial anti-capitalist SEIU organizer. Lerner has visited the White House four times. His former boss, Andy Stern, SEIU's recently retired president, was the most frequent White House visitor in 2009, according to presidential visitor logs. Obama himself once trained SEIU in the 1990s. The SEIU and other major unions, including the AFL-CIO and the Laborers' International Union of North America, already announced they will partner with Occupy Wall Street for Thursday's protests. Soros center ties to Thursday's scheduled chaos Official resources for Thursday's event provided in the Occupy site include several manuals from the Ruckus Society, which trains radical activists in "direct action" techniques. Ruckus helped to spark the 1999 World Trade Organization protests in Seattle that turned violent. The Ruckus manuals provided at the Occupy site are titled "Blockading for Beginners," "Anonymous Riot Guide," "50 Crucial Points for Nonviolent Struggle," "Define White Supremacy," "Imperialism the 2-Faced Monster," "Uncle Sam the Pusher Man" and the Communist Party-connected National Lawyers Guild's "Legal Observer Manual." Ruckus is also listed as a "friend and partner" of Thursday's scheduled Occupy Days of Action. Ruckus is funded by the Tides Center, which has been involved in Occupy since the movement's onset. Another grantee of Tides is the Adbusters magazine, which is reported to have come up with the Occupy Wall Street idea after Arab Spring protests toppled governments in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia. The Adbusters website serves as a central hub for Occupy's planning. MoveOn.org, which has joined Occupy, is funded by Tides Fenton Communications, an extremist-led outfit that crafts the public relations strategy of Tides grantees, has come under newfound scrutiny after WND published a series of exposés tying it to Occupy Wall Street. One of its senior employees represented the anti-Wall Street march past millionaires' homes in New York last month.

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (117620) 11/15/2011 3:59:23 PM From: lorne 1 Recommendation  Respond to of 224749   Tide turns against Occupy Wall Street Occupy Wall Street protesters in several US cities faced mounting pressure from police to abandon their encampments, as the tide appeared to be turning against the movement. By Nick Allen, Los Angeles 13 Nov 2011 telegraph.co.uk The Occupy protests are now nearly two months old, having begun in New York's financial district on Sept 17 as a demonstration against income inequality and corporate greed. This weekend however officials across the country urged an end to gatherings and camps were cleared in Salt Lake City, Utah and Denver, Colorado. In Portland, Oregon thousands of people gathered in two adjacent city parks in an overnight stand off with police. The city's mayor Sam Adams had ordered a camp there to be shut down by midnight Saturday, citing unhealthy conditions and the camp's attraction of drug users and thieves. There had been four non-fatal drug overdoses in recent weeks.. But early on Sunday 3,000 people converged on the area and protest organisers said that would make it difficult for police to carry out an eviction. Occupy Portland spokesman Jordan LeDoux said: "We're going to sit-in and force them to arrest us." Portland police spokesman Robert King said it was a legal violation to remain in the park after midnight, adding: "We'll take action that's appropriate." In Salt Lake City police arrested 19 people at the weekend when protesters refused to leave their camp in a park. Around 150 people had been living there for weeks. City officials had rescinded permits for the group to stay shortly after a man was found dead inside a tent, in what police said was a drug related death. The city's police chief Chris Burbank said they could "no longer tolerate" the camping on the streets. In Denver officers also removed illegally pitched tents and arrested several people, while in St Louis 27 people were arrested for curfew violations. Eviction notices were also issued in Oakland, California, where demands for protesters to leave have increased since a man was shot and killed in a fight near the camp on Thursday. Police said they do not know if those involved in the gunfight were associated with the Occupy Oakland movement, but protesters said there was no connection. On the same day as that death a 35-year-old military veteran apparently shot himself at an Occupy camp in Burlington, Vermont.

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (117620) 11/15/2011 4:05:31 PM From: lorne 3 Recommendations  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 224749   ken...So did the democrat kagan lie...was she under oath...don't really matter though she IS a democrat so this honesty stuff does not apply to democrats? Health case raises recusal questions for Kagan, Thomas By Stephen Dinan -The Washington Times Monday, November 14, 2011 washingtontimes.com The Supreme Court’s announcement Monday that it will hear challenges to President Obama’s health care law put a spotlight on Justice Elena Kagan, who worked in the administration while the law was being written and, conservatives argue, helped craft its legal defense. “Before the Supreme Court case is heard, we need to know if Justice Elena Kagan helped the Obama administration prepare its defense for Obamacare when she was solicitor general. The Justice Department must answer serious questions about whether Justice Kagan has an inherent conflict of interest, which would demand that she recuse herself from the Obamacare case,” said Rep. John Fleming, Louisiana Republican. At the same time, liberal groups and Democrats in Congress have been pushing for months for Justice Clarence Thomas to recuse himself, citing his wife’s stated opposition to the law as an indication that he cannot rule impartially. At stake in the case is the fate of the president’s massive health care overhaul, which passed Congress on the strength of Democratic votes last year and has a checkered record in lower courts. The case likely will be argued next spring. Although the justices could recuse themselves at any time, legal analysts doubt it will happen. James Sample, a law professor at Hofstra University School of Law who studies recusal issues, said the outside groups’ calls are misplaced. James Sample, a law professor at Hofstra University School of Law who studies recusal issues, said the outside groups’ calls are misplaced. “I am generally one of the most pro-recusal scholars you can find, and yet I think in this instance those who are trying to argue for the recusal of Justice Kagan and Justice Thomas alike are opportunists who are trying to use a mechanism that just doesn’t fit,” he said. The standard for recusal is whether a judge’s or justice’s impartiality can be reasonably questioned. Mr. Sample said Justice Thomas‘ judicial approach is well-known and it’s unlikely that his wife’s associations would influence him in this case. As for Justice Kagan, he said her “extraordinarily limited exposure to the health care policy when she was in government service is, I think, just a nonissue.” Justice Kagan was solicitor general at the time the health care legislation was signed in March 2010, and when states sued to block it. During her confirmation process last year, Republican senators asked Justice Kagan whether she would recuse herself. She replied that she had no role in crafting the government’s response to the lawsuits. She said she attended a meeting where the cases were discussed, but that she wasn’t involved in the government’s filings. Outside groups have obtained documents that they say show Justice Kagan was enthusiastic about the law’s enactment during her time as solicitor general. The Judicial Crisis Network, a conservative group, argues in a white paper that the Justice Department is withholding other documents under the deliberation exemption to the Freedom of Information Act — which the Judicial Crisis Network said signals that she was involved in those deliberations. House Republicans on the Judiciary Committee tried to obtain additional documents, but a committee aide said the Justice Department on Friday declined to turn them over. Hans A. von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative group, said the incentive for Justice Kagan to stay on the case may be great.

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (117620) 11/16/2011 10:03:48 AM From: locogringo 3 Recommendations  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 224749   What Change Looks Like Under Obama Speaking to a crowd in Hawaii, President Obama contrasted his uplifting, high-minded campaign with the “narrow, cramped vision of an America where everybody is left to fend for themselves.” (That would be the Republican vision). Obama went on to say this: “That was what the campaign was about — the belief that the more Americans succeed, the more America succeeds. We knew it wouldn’t come easy, we knew it wasn’t going to come quickly, but three years later, because of what you did in 2008, we’ve already started to see what change looks like.” Since the president raised the issue himself, why don’t we sketch out what “change looks like” under the stewardship of Obama. Some of the highlights: * A misery index that is at a 28-year high. *America’s credit rating downgraded for the first time in American history. * A standard of living for Americans that has fallen further and more steeply over the past three years than at any time since the government began recording it five decades ago. * An unemployment rate that now stands at 9.0 percent. October marks the 33rd consecutive month in which the unemployment rate was above the 8 percent level that the Obama administration said it would not exceed as a result of his stimulus program. And 28 out of the last 30 months has seen unemployment at 9.0 percent or above — the longest stretch of high unemployment since the Great Depression?. * Obama is now on track to have the worst jobs record of any president in the modern era. * The share of the eligible population holding a job has reached its lowest level since July 1983. * Chronic unemployment is worse than the Great Depression. * Almost 26 million are either unemployed, marginally attached to the labor force, or involuntarily working part-time – a number experts say is unprecedented. * A smaller share of 16-19 year-olds are working than at any time since records began to be kept in 1948. * Black unemployment is at its highest level in 27 years, with black youth unemployment now closing in on 50 percent. * The rate of economic growth under Obama has been only slightly higher than the 1930s, the decade of the Great Depression. * Federal spending as a percent of GDP, the budget deficit as a percent of GDP, and the federal debt as a percent of GDP have all reached their highest level since World War II?. * Confidence among U.S. consumers has plunged to the lowest level in more than 30 years. * The housing market has recently entered a double dip and the crisis is now worse than the Great Depression. Home values are worth one-third less than they were five years ago. And the home ownership rate is the lowest since 1965. * The number of people in the U.S. who are in poverty has seen a record increase on President Obama’s watch, with the ranks of working-age poor approaching 1960s levels that led to the national war on poverty. * A record number of Americans now rely on the federal government’s food stamps program. * Government dependency, defined as the percentage of persons receiving one or more federal benefit payments, is the highest in American history. * The share of Americans without health coverage is just a shade under 50 million people, the largest in more than two decades. commentarymagazine.com

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