Assault on the military

[Intense]

Source for your claim that ACORN warned of the foreclosure crisis please. And can we have a legitimate source, providing actual evidence, and not some half assed oped piece published by a partisan source. Thanks.

ACORN
Separate and Unequal 2002
Predatory Lending in America
Introduction

Thats a good reference to predatory lending, not the housing crisis. Good try though. Where is Government oversight in all that has happened? Profiting from higher taxation on inflated property values or being a nonpartisan referee? Who owns the lions share of home mortgages today? Who lowered the bar on Qualifications on the buyer? What happens to housing costs and property taxes with less buyers and demand?

What was the relation between growth in Salaries and Housing cost increases over the last 30-20-10 years? Could you explain the discrepancies?

 

[Bfgrn]

Source for your claim that ACORN warned of the foreclosure crisis please. And can we have a legitimate source, providing actual evidence, and not some half assed oped piece published by a partisan source. Thanks.

ACORN
Separate and Unequal 2002
Predatory Lending in America
Introduction

Thats a good reference to predatory lending, not the housing crisis. Good try though. Where is Government oversight in all that has happened? Profiting from higher taxation on inflated property values or being a nonpartisan referee? Who owns the lions share of home mortgages today? Who lowered the bar on Qualifications on the buyer? What happens to housing costs and property taxes with less buyers and demand?

What was the relation between growth in Salaries and Housing cost increases over the last 30-20-10 years? Could you explain the discrepancies?

It's clear you didn't READ the Report...

But if I warned you to stop smoking, you'd blame me for not knowing when you contracted cancer...

 

[Intense]

ACORN
Separate and Unequal 2002
Predatory Lending in America
Introduction

Thats a good reference to predatory lending, not the housing crisis. Good try though. Where is Government oversight in all that has happened? Profiting from higher taxation on inflated property values or being a nonpartisan referee? Who owns the lions share of home mortgages today? Who lowered the bar on Qualifications on the buyer? What happens to housing costs and property taxes with less buyers and demand?

What was the relation between growth in Salaries and Housing cost increases over the last 30-20-10 years? Could you explain the discrepancies?

It's clear you didn't READ the Report...

But if I warned you to stop smoking, you'd blame me for not knowing when you contracted cancer...

I've scanned it twice now. Same Same.

Don't own until you are prepared to do it right? Hows that.

I get your point. My point is that the Government is the silent partner, who benefits in all scenarios except one. That is where we find ourselves now. Coincidence? Providence?

You haven't addressed any of my points. The actual rise in cost of housing was due to what?

What Laws enable predatory lending, and what is governments cut?

 

[MaggieMae]

The Taliban were the ruling government of Afghanistan, and were the reason that al Qaeda was able to attack us.

The Taliban would sell Al Queda out for four dollars and a stick of toothpaste.

Not really. They had that choice for a lot more in 2001. I guess you forgot.

The Taliban didn't attack us on 911. All they ever did was shelter bin Laden and his army. Before September 2001, the US government actually supported The Taliban by giving it subsidies to grow crops other than poppies.

 

[MaggieMae]

Lets start with everything related to ACORN. The Kennedy Crime family played a role in that. Education Bill and the role of the Teachers Unions.

Lets Get all of the Unions out of Government!!!!!!!!

Chappaquiddick The Story behind the Story.
[edit] The party
On July 18, 1969, Ted Kennedy attended a party on Chappaquiddick, a small island connected via ferry to the town of Edgartown on the adjoining larger island of Martha's Vineyard. The party was a reunion for a group of six women, including Kopechne, known as the "boiler-room girls",[1] who had served in his brother Robert's 1968 presidential campaign. Also present were Joseph Gargan, Ted Kennedy's cousin; Paul Markham, a school friend of Gargan's who would become United States Attorney for Massachusetts under the patronage of the Kennedys;[2] Charles Tretter, an attorney; Raymond La Rosa; and John Crimmins, Ted Kennedy's part-time driver. Kennedy was also competing in the Edgartown Yacht Club Regatta, a sailing competition which was taking place over several days.

According to his own testimony at the inquest into Kopechne's death, Kennedy left the party at "approximately 11:15 p.m." He said that when he announced that he was about to leave, Kopechne told him "that she was desirous of leaving, if I would be kind enough to drop her back at her hotel." Kennedy then requested the keys to his car from his chauffeur, Crimmins. Asked why he did not have his chauffeur drive them both, Kennedy explained that Crimmins along with some other guests "were concluding their meal, enjoying the fellowship and it didn't appear to me necessary to require him to bring me back to Edgartown".[3] Kopechne told no one that she was leaving with Kennedy, and left her purse and hotel key at the party.[4]

[edit] After the party
Christopher "Huck" Look was a deputy sheriff working as a special police officer at the Edgartown regatta dance that night. At 12:30 am he left the dance, crossed over to Chappaquiddick in the yacht club's launch, got into his parked car and drove home. He testified that between 12:30 and 12:45 am he had seen a dark car containing a man driving and a woman in the front seat approaching the intersection with Dike Road. The car had gone first onto the private Cemetery Road and stopped there. Thinking that the occupants of the car might be lost, Look had gotten out of his car and walked towards it. When he was 25 to 30 feet away, the car started backing up towards him. When Look called out to offer his help, the car took off down Dike Road in a cloud of dust.[5] Look recalled that the car's license plate began with an "L" and contained the number "7" twice, both details true of Kennedy's 1967 Oldsmobile Delmont 88.


The Dike Bridge, Martha's Vineyard, pictured here in 2008 with guardrail.According to his inquest testimony, Kennedy made a wrong turn onto Dike Road, an unlit dirt road that led to Dike Bridge (also spelled Dyke Bridge). Dike Road was unpaved, but Kennedy, driving at "approximately twenty miles an hour", took "no particular notice" of this fact, and did not realize that he was no longer headed towards the ferry landing.[6] Dike Bridge was a wooden bridge angled obliquely to the road with no guardrail. A fraction of a second before he reached the bridge, Kennedy applied his brakes; he then drove over the side of the bridge. The car plunged into tide-swept Poucha Pond (at that location a channel) and came to rest upside-down underwater. Kennedy later recalled that he was able to swim free of the vehicle, but Kopechne was not. Kennedy claimed at the inquest that he called Kopechne's name several times from the shore, then tried to swim down to reach her seven or eight times, then rested on the bank for around fifteen minutes before returning on foot to Lawrence Cottage, where the party attended by Kopechne and other "Boiler Room Girls" had occurred. Kennedy denied seeing any house with a light on during his journey back to Lawrence Cottage.[7]


"Dike House" along Dike Road.In addition to the working telephone at the Lawrence Cottage, according to one commentator, his route back to the cottage would have taken him past four houses from which he could have telephoned and summoned help; however, he did not do so.[8] The first of those houses, referred to as "Dike House", was 150 yards away from the bridge, and was occupied by Sylvia Malm and her family at the time of the incident. Malm later stated that she had left a light on at the residence when she retired for that evening.[9]

According to Kennedy's testimony, Gargan and party co-host Paul Markham then returned to the waterway with Kennedy to try to rescue Kopechne. Both of the other men also tried to dive into the water and rescue Kopechne multiple times.[1] When their efforts to rescue Kopechne failed, Kennedy testified, Gargan and Markham drove with Kennedy to the ferry landing, both insisting multiple times that the accident had to be reported to the authorities.[10] According to Markham's testimony Kennedy was sobbing and on the verge of breaking down.[11] Kennedy went on to testify that " had full intention of reporting it. And I mentioned to Gargan and Markham something like, 'You take care of the other girls; I will take care of the accident!'—that is what I said and I dove into the water".[10] Kennedy had already told Gargan and Markham not to tell the other women anything about the incident "ecause I felt strongly that if these girls were notified that an accident had taken place and Mary Jo had, in fact, drowned, that it would only be a matter of seconds before all of those girls, who were long and dear friends of Mary Jo's, would go to the scene of the accident and enter the water with, I felt, a good chance that some serious mishap might have occurred to any one of them".[12] Gargan and Markam would testify that they assumed that Kennedy was going to inform the authorities once he got back to Edgartown, and thus did not do so themselves.[2]

According to his own testimony, Kennedy swam across the 500-foot channel, back to Edgartown and returned to his hotel room, where he removed his clothes and collapsed on his bed.[12] Hearing noises, he later put on dry clothes and asked someone what the time was: it was something like 2:30 a.m., the senator recalled. He testified that, as the night went on, "I almost tossed and turned and walked around that room ... I had not given up hope all night long that, by some miracle, Mary Jo would have escaped from the car."[13]

Back at his hotel, Kennedy complained at 2:55 am to the hotel owner that he had been awoken by a noisy party.[2] By 7:30 am the next morning he was talking "casually" to the winner of the previous day's sailing race, with no indication that anything was amiss.[2] At 8 a.m., Gargan and Markham joined Kennedy at his hotel where they had a "heated conversation." According to Kennedy's testimony, the two men asked why he had not reported the accident. Kennedy responded by telling them "about my own thoughts and feelings as I swam across that channel ... that somehow when they arrived in the morning that they were going to say that Mary Jo was still alive".[13] The three men subsequently crossed back to Chappaquiddick Island on the ferry, where Kennedy made a series of phone calls from a payphone by the crossing. The phone calls were to his friends for advice and again, he did not report the accident to authorities.[2]

[edit] The body and Kennedy's statement
Earlier that morning, two amateur fishermen had seen the submerged car in the water and notified the inhabitants of the cottage nearest to the scene, who called the authorities at around 8:20 am.[14] A diver was sent down and discovered Kopechne's body at around 8:45 am.[15] The diver, John Farrar, later testified at the inquest that Kopechne's body was pressed up in the car in the spot where an air bubble would have formed. He interpreted this to mean that Kopechne had survived in the air bubble after the accident, and concluded that

Had I received a call within five to ten minutes of the accident occurring, and was able, as I was the following morning, to be at the victim's side within twenty-five minutes of receiving the call, in such event there is a strong possibility that she would have been alive on removal from the submerged car.[8]

Farrar believed that Kopechne "lived for at least two hours down there."[16]

Police checked the car's license plate and saw that it was registered to Kennedy.[1] When Kennedy, still at the pay phone by the ferry crossing, saw that the body had been discovered, he crossed back to Edgartown and went to the police station; Gargan simultaneously went to the hotel where the Boiler Room Girls were staying to inform them about the incident.[2]

At 10 am Kennedy entered the police station in Edgartown, made a couple of phone calls, then dictated a statement to his aide Paul Markham, which was then given to the police. The statement ran as follows:

On July 18, 1969, at approximately 11:15 p.m. in Chappaquiddick, Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, I was driving my car on Main Street on my way to get the ferry back to Edgartown. I was unfamiliar with the road and turned right onto Dike Road, instead of bearing hard left on Main Street. After proceeding for approximately one-half mile on Dike Road I descended a hill and came upon a narrow bridge. The car went off the side of the bridge. There was one passenger with me, one Miss Mary [Kopechne],[17] a former secretary of my brother Sen. Robert Kennedy. The car turned over and sank into the water and landed with the roof resting on the bottom. I attempted to open the door and the window of the car but have no recollection of how I got out of the car. I came to the surface and then repeatedly dove down to the car in an attempt to see if the passenger was still in the car. I was unsuccessful in the attempt. I was exhausted and in a state of shock. I recall walking back to where my friends were eating. There was a car parked in front of the cottage and I climbed into the backseat. I then asked for someone to bring me back to Edgartown. I remember walking around for a period and then going back to my hotel room. When I fully realized what had happened this morning, I immediately contacted the police.[18]

[edit] Legal proceedings
On July 25, seven days after the incident, Kennedy entered a plea of guilty to a charge of leaving the scene of an accident after causing injury. Kennedy's attorneys suggested that any jail sentence should be suspended, and the prosecutors agreed to this, citing Kennedy's age, character and prior reputation.[19] Judge James Boyle sentenced Kennedy to two months' incarceration, the statutory minimum for the offense, which he suspended. In announcing the sentence, Boyle referred to Kennedy's "unblemished record" and said that he "has already been, and will continue to be punished far beyond anything this court can impose".[20]

[edit] Kennedy's televised statement
At 7:30 pm that evening Kennedy made a lengthy prepared statement about the incident which was broadcast live by the television networks. Among other things, he said that:[21]

"only reasons of health" had prevented his wife from accompanying him to the regatta.
there was "no truth whatever to the widely circulated suspicions of immoral conduct" regarding Kennedy's and Kopechne's behavior that evening.
he "was not driving under the influence of liquor".
his conduct for the hours immediately following the accident "made no sense to [him] at all".
his doctors had informed him that he had suffered cerebral concussion and shock, but he did not seek to use his medical condition to escape responsibility for his actions.
he "regard[ed] as indefensible that fact that [he] did not report the accident to the police immediately."
instead of notifying the authorities immediately, Kennedy "requested the help of two friends, Joe Gargan and Paul Markham, and directed them to return immediately to the scene with [him] (it then being sometime after midnight) in order to undertake a new effort to dive down and locate Miss Kopechne".
"[a]ll kinds of scrambled thoughts" went through his mind after the accident, including "whether the girl might still be alive somewhere out of that immediate area," "whether some awful curse actually did hang over all the Kennedys", "whether there was some justifiable reason for [him] to doubt what had happened and to delay [his] report", and "whether somehow the awful weight of this incredible incident might in some way pass from [his] shoulders".
he was overcome "by a jumble of emotions—grief, fear, doubt, exhaustion, panic, confusion and shock".
having instructed Gargan and Markham "not to alarm Mary Jo's friends that night", Kennedy returned to the ferry with the two men, and then "suddenly jumped into the water and impulsively swam across, nearly drowning once again in the effort, returning to [his] hotel around 2 a.m. and collapsed in [his] room".
Kennedy went on to ask the people of Massachusetts to decide whether he should resign:

“If at any time, the citizens of Massachusetts should lack confidence in their Senator’s character or his ability, with or without justification, he could not in my opinion adequately perform his duties, and should not continue in office. The opportunity to work with you and serve Massachusetts has made my life worthwhile. So I ask you tonight, the people of Massachusetts, to think this through with me. In facing this decision, I seek your advice and opinion. In making it I seek your prayers. For this is a decision that I will have finally to make on my own.”[22]

He concluded by quoting a passage from his brother John F. Kennedy's book Profiles in Courage.[23]

[edit] Discovery of Kopechne's body
John Farrar, the diver who recovered Kopechne's body and captain of the Martha's Vineyard Edgarton Fire Rescue unit, asserted that Kopechne did not die from the vehicle overturn or from drowning, but rather from suffocation, based upon the posture in which he found the body and its position relative to the area of an ultimate air pocket in the overturned vehicle. Farrar also asserted that Kopechne would likely have survived had a more timely attempt at rescue been conducted.[24] Farrar located Kopechne's body in the well of the backseat of the overturned submerged car. Rigor mortis had set in and her hands were clasping the backseat and her face was turned upward.[25] Farrar testified at the Inquest:

It looked as if she were holding herself up to get a last breath of air. It was a consciously assumed position. ... She didn't drown. She died of suffocation in her own air void. It took her at least three or four hours to die. I could have had her out of that car twenty-five minutes after I got the call. But he [Ted Kennedy] didn't call.

— diver John Farrar, Inquest into the Death of Mary Jo Kopechne, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Edgartown District Court. New York: EVR Productions, 1970.
[edit] Autopsy
The medical examiner, Dr Donald Mills, was satisfied that the cause of death was accidental drowning. He signed a death certificate to that effect and released Kopechne's body to her family without ordering an autopsy.[26] Later, on September 18, District Attorney Dinis attempted to secure an exhumation of Kopechne's body in order to perform a belated autopsy,[27] citing blood found on Kopechne's skirt and in her mouth and nose "which may or may not be consistent with death by drowning".[28] The reported discovery of the blood was made when her clothes were turned over to authorities by the funeral director.[29]

A Pennsylvania court under Judge Bernard Brominski held a hearing on the request on October 20–21.[27] The request was opposed by Kopechne's parents.[27] Eventually Judge Brominski ruled against the exhumation on December 10, saying that there was "no evidence" that "anything other than drowning had caused the death of Mary Jo Kopechne".[30]

[edit] Inquest
The inquest into Kopechne's death took place in Edgartown in January 1970. At the request of Kennedy's lawyers, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ordered that it be conducted in secret.[31][32] The 763-page transcript of the inquest was released four months later.[32] Judge James A. Boyle presided at the inquest. Among Judge Boyle's conclusions in his inquest report were the following:[33]

the accident occurred "between 11:30 p.m. on July 18 and 1:00 a.m. on July 19".
"Kopechne and Kennedy did not intend to drive to the ferry slip and his turn onto Dike Road had been intentional".
"A speed of twenty miles per hour as Kennedy testified to operating the car as large as his Oldsmobile would be at least negligent and possibly reckless."
"For some reason not apparent from [Kennedy]'s testimony, he failed to exercise due care as he approached the bridge."
"There is probable cause to believe that Edward M. Kennedy operated his motor vehicle negligently ... and that such operation appears to have contributed to the death of Mary Jo Kopechne."
Under Massachusetts law Boyle, having found "probable cause" that Kennedy had committed a crime, could have issued a warrant for his arrest, but he did not do so.[34] District Attorney Dinis chose not to pursue Kennedy for manslaughter, despite Judge Boyle's conclusions.

The Kopechne family did not bring any legal action against Senator Kennedy, but they did receive a payment of $90,904 from the Senator personally and $50,000 from his insurance company.[35] The Kopechnes later explained their decision to not take legal action by saying that "We figured that people would think we were looking for blood money."[35]

[edit] Grand jury
On April 6, 1970, Dukes County grand jury assembled in special session to consider Kopechne's death. Judge Wilfred Paquet instructed the members of the grand jury that they could consider only those matters brought to their attention by the superior court, the district attorney or their own personal knowledge.[36] Citing the orders of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, Paquet told the grand jury that it could not see the evidence or Judge Boyle's report from the inquest (which at that time were still impounded).[36] District Attorney Dinis, who had attended the inquest and seen Judge Boyle's report, told the grand jury that there was not enough evidence to indict Senator Kennedy on potential charges of manslaughter, perjury or driving to endanger.[36] The grand jury called four witnesses who had not testified at the inquest: they testified for a total of 20 minutes, but no indictments were issued.[36]

[edit] Fatal accident hearing
On July 23, 1969, the Registrar of the Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles informed Senator Kennedy that his license would be suspended until a statutory hearing could be held on the accident.[37] This suspension was required by Massachusetts law in any fatal motor accident where there were no witnesses. The in camera hearing was held on May 18, 1970. It found that "operation was too fast for existing conditions" in the accident. On May 27 the Registrar informed Sen. Kennedy in a letter that "I am unable to find that the fatal accident in which a motor vehicle operated by you was involved, was without serious fault on your part", and that as a result, his driver's license was suspended for a further six months.[38]

[edit] Miscarriage
Sen. Kennedy's wife Joan Bennett Kennedy was pregnant at the time of the incident. Though confined to bed in the wake of two previous miscarriages, she attended the funeral of Kopechne and stood beside her husband in court three days later.[39] She suffered a third miscarriage shortly thereafter[40] which she blamed on the Chappaquiddick incident.[41]

[edit] Alternative theory
A BBC 'Inside Story' programme, 'Chappaquiddick', broadcast on the 25th anniversary of the death of Mary Jo Kopechne advanced a theory that Kennedy and Kopechne had gone out from the party in Kennedy's car, but that when Kennedy saw an off-duty policeman in his patrol car, he got out fearing the political consequences of being discovered by the police late at night with an attractive girl. According to the theory, Kennedy then returned to the party while Kopechne, unfamiliar both with the large car and the local area, drove the wrong way and crashed off the bridge. The programme argued this explanation would account for Kennedy's lack of concern the following morning (because he was unaware of the crash) and for forensic evidence of the injuries to Kopechne being inconsistent with her sitting in the passenger seat.[42] A similar theory was advanced by Australian writer Bob Ellis.[43]

Chappaquiddick incident - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Unless you were drunk when you posted that, you just lost any shred of credibility I might have held for you. What the FUCK does Chappaquiddick have to do with the subject of this thread? Isn't it enough that this was discussed ad nauseam for weeks on end when Ted Kennedy died?

 

[MaggieMae]

See, this is how you do it. If Obama had been president on 9/11, we wouldn't be in this hole we are in now.

You're right....we would have had the satisfaction of killing another herd of goats with 100 million dollars in cruise missiles and sitting in the hole where the WTC was, whining and bitching about how sorry we were and that the 3000 people killed deserved it.

Some advice rdean...

That's funny...that's exactly how it looks right now, eight years later. There's still a big hole and we're still whining and arguing over how it happened.

 

[Foxfyre]

The Taliban would sell Al Queda out for four dollars and a stick of toothpaste.

Not really. They had that choice for a lot more in 2001. I guess you forgot.

The Taliban didn't attack us on 911. All they ever did was shelter bin Laden and his army. Before September 2001, the US government actually supported The Taliban by giving it subsidies to grow crops other than poppies.

Yes and we helped out Iraq against Iran--recall Donald Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam--and we helped out Castro against Batista and we and France and Great Britain and Poland and several others sucked up to Adolph Hitler before war was declared. Many who were once friends and trading partners with the USA are now seen as hostile to our interests while many others who we once engaged in war are now our allies and friends. Time, history, changing leadership and ambitions will invariably change our alliances from time to time.

To say that the Taliban that was helping to shelter, train, and finance Al Qaida did not attack us on 9/11 is both correct and incorrect just as saying that the Gestapo or Hitler's SS or the people of Japan did not attack us in WWII.

 

[MaggieMae]

Source for your claim that ACORN warned of the foreclosure crisis please. And can we have a legitimate source, providing actual evidence, and not some half assed oped piece published by a partisan source. Thanks.

ACORN
Separate and Unequal 2002
Predatory Lending in America
Introduction

Thats a good reference to predatory lending, not the housing crisis. Good try though.
What do you think caused the housing crisis? Predatory lending created bad mortgage deals which were bundled and sold as "securities" and everyone wound up broke when mortgagees began to default.

Where is Government oversight in all that has happened? Profiting from higher taxation on inflated property values or being a nonpartisan referee?
Don't you mean where WAS the government when all that happened? The SEC ignored these illegal trades, and the feds under Greenspan thought the market would eventually "right" itself with no oversight. Greenspan eventually admitted he had been dead wrong, and Cox (SEC chair) said no one noticed.

Who owns the lions share of home mortgages today?
The bailed out banks who bought the bundled securities and the US taxpayer owns the bad mortgages and we're still waiting for those banks to come up with a plan as to how they intend to dispose of them.

Who lowered the bar on Qualifications on the buyer?
Initially loan qualifications were relaxed for minorities under the Clinton administration, and that program was EXPANDED by the Bush administration in 2003 to include assistance for minorities by requiring no down payment and larger subsidies for those who would not otherwise qualify for conventional mortgages.

What happens to housing costs and property taxes with less buyers and demand?
Read the papers.

What was the relation between growth in Salaries and Housing cost increases over the last 30-20-10 years? Could you explain the discrepancies?
Growth in whose salaries? Salaries in general either remained stagnant or were lower all through the last 8 years.

........

 

[MaggieMae]

Not really. They had that choice for a lot more in 2001. I guess you forgot.

The Taliban didn't attack us on 911. All they ever did was shelter bin Laden and his army. Before September 2001, the US government actually supported The Taliban by giving it subsidies to grow crops other than poppies.

Yes and we helped out Iraq against Iran--recall Donald Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam--and we helped out Castro against Batista and we and France and Great Britain and Poland and several others sucked up to Adolph Hitler before war was declared. Many who were once friends and trading partners with the USA are now seen as hostile to our interests while many others who we once engaged in war are now our allies and friends. Time, history, changing leadership and ambitions will invariably change our alliances from time to time.

To say that the Taliban that was helping to shelter, train, and finance Al Qaida did not attack us on 9/11 is both correct and incorrect just as saying that the Gestapo or Hitler's SS or the people of Japan did not attack us in WWII.

The Taliban is made up of tribes, with true tribal mentality. These are people who have yet to evolve to modernity. They are easily bribed. You can't even begin to compare them to Hitler's Germans, which were One.

 

[Smartt33]

Well it has begun. Not only is the Administration dragging its feet on accommodating recommendations of military leadership in Afghanistan, but the rape of the Defense Dept. funding has begun. So far there is nary a word of protest from our fearless leader.

And yes, I think we will be seeing additional expressions of anger on those Tea Party and Tax Protester signs in the near future.

How much longer will Americans be silent about priorities that are more and more skewed and distorted in this country?

U.S. troop funds diverted to pet projects
By Shaun Waterman
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

Senators diverted $2.6 billion in funds in a defense spending bill to pet projects largely at the expense of accounts that pay for fuel, ammunition and training for U.S. troops, including those fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to an analysis.

Among the 778 such projects, known as earmarks, packed into the bill: $25 million for a new World War II museum at the University of New Orleans and $20 million to launch an educational institute named after the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat.

While earmarks are hardly new in Washington, "in 30 years on Capitol Hill, I never saw Congress mangle the defense budget as badly as this year," said Winslow Wheeler, a former Senate staffer who worked on defense funding and oversight for both Republicans and Democrats. He is now a senior fellow at the Center for Defense Information, an independent research organization.

Sen. Tom Coburn, Oklahoma Republican, called the transfer of funds from Pentagon operations and maintenance "a disgrace."

"The Senate is putting favorable headlines back home above our men and women fighting on the front lines," he said in a statement.

MORE HERE:
U.S. troop funds diverted to pet projects - Washington Times

You will not hear an outcry from Obama because He is happy to see this happening. I tell you, He is out to sell this country out, and we are in real trouble if he is not stopped. I don't know how to stop iot, but I do know how to join forces with whomever will.

I am fed up, and I do talk it up everywhere I go.

Obama is UNAMERICAN, I don't care what others say.

 

[MaggieMae]

Returning to the OP, and OHMYGOD assertions that some small part of the defense budget will be allocated to something other than military or weapons, a little reminder that the fat lady hasn't sung yet. The bill has passed both houses and is now in conference to work out differences between the House and Senate versions. It is not a signed bill yet, and for all we know, those pesky provisions might be removed before it is.

H.R. 3326: Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2010 (GovTrack.us)

 

[MaggieMae]

You will not hear an outcry from Obama because He is happy to see this happening. I tell you, He is out to sell this country out, and we are in real trouble if he is not stopped. I don't know how to stop iot, but I do know how to join forces with whomever will.

I am fed up, and I do talk it up everywhere I go.

Obama is UNAMERICAN, I don't care what others say.

Sure.
__________________
"God loves us, not because of who we are, but because of who He is." We should love others, not because of who they are, but because of who we are.

You might want to consider amending your signature, then. ^^

 

[Intense]

ACORN
Separate and Unequal 2002
Predatory Lending in America
Introduction

Thats a good reference to predatory lending, not the housing crisis. Good try though.
What do you think caused the housing crisis? Predatory lending created bad mortgage deals which were bundled and sold as "securities" and everyone wound up broke when mortgagees began to default.

Where is Government oversight in all that has happened? Profiting from higher taxation on inflated property values or being a nonpartisan referee?
Don't you mean where WAS the government when all that happened? The SEC ignored these illegal trades, and the feds under Greenspan thought the market would eventually "right" itself with no oversight. Greenspan eventually admitted he had been dead wrong, and Cox (SEC chair) said no one noticed.

Who owns the lions share of home mortgages today?
The bailed out banks who bought the bundled securities and the US taxpayer owns the bad mortgages and we're still waiting for those banks to come up with a plan as to how they intend to dispose of them.

Who lowered the bar on Qualifications on the buyer?
Initially loan qualifications were relaxed for minorities under the Clinton administration, and that program was EXPANDED by the Bush administration in 2003 to include assistance for minorities by requiring no down payment and larger subsidies for those who would not otherwise qualify for conventional mortgages.

What happens to housing costs and property taxes with less buyers and demand?
Read the papers.

What was the relation between growth in Salaries and Housing cost increases over the last 30-20-10 years? Could you explain the discrepancies?
Growth in whose salaries? Salaries in general either remained stagnant or were lower all through the last 8 years.

........

Seems pretty true to me. Fannie and Freddie played a part in it. Loud mouths in the House and Senate defended it. They were all wrong. They now transfer the cost of their mistakes to us. They are still making the same mistakes. The fact that Property went up the way it did, way ahead of salary increases said it all Maggie. We are bailing out the Controlling Class. They Gambled, lost, and are trying to recover through us.

 

[Foxfyre]

The Taliban didn't attack us on 911. All they ever did was shelter bin Laden and his army. Before September 2001, the US government actually supported The Taliban by giving it subsidies to grow crops other than poppies.

Yes and we helped out Iraq against Iran--recall Donald Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam--and we helped out Castro against Batista and we and France and Great Britain and Poland and several others sucked up to Adolph Hitler before war was declared. Many who were once friends and trading partners with the USA are now seen as hostile to our interests while many others who we once engaged in war are now our allies and friends. Time, history, changing leadership and ambitions will invariably change our alliances from time to time.

To say that the Taliban that was helping to shelter, train, and finance Al Qaida did not attack us on 9/11 is both correct and incorrect just as saying that the Gestapo or Hitler's SS or the people of Japan did not attack us in WWII.

The Taliban is made up of tribes, with true tribal mentality. These are people who have yet to evolve to modernity. They are easily bribed. You can't even begin to compare them to Hitler's Germans, which were One.

The Taliban controlled tribal peoples of Afghanistan just as Hitler controlled and managed competing factions within Germany and Austria in order to consolidate his power. To think that the Taliban itself was not a well organized and tightly controlled central government, however, flies in the face of history. And Osama bin Laden was part of that, sanctioned by, sheltered by, and funded by that.

Under the Taliban regime, Sharia law was interpreted to ban a wide variety of activities hitherto lawful in Afghanistan: employment, education and sports for women, movies, television, videos, music, dancing, hanging pictures in homes, clapping during sports events, kite flying, and beard trimming. One Taliban list of prohibitions included:

“ pork, pig, pig oil, anything made from human hair, satellite dishes, cinematography, and equipment that produces the joy of music, pool tables, chess, masks, alcohol, tapes, computers, VCRs, television, anything that propagates sex and is full of music, wine, lobster, nail polish, firecrackers, statues, sewing catalogs, pictures, Christmas cards.[24] ”
Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: religious police
Men were required to have a beard extending farther than a fist clamped at the base of the chin. On the other hand, they had to wear their head hair short. Men were also required to wear a head covering.[25]

Possession was forbidden of depictions of living things, whether drawings, paintings or photographs, stuffed animals, and dolls.[25]

A member of the Taliban's religious police beating a woman in Kabul on 13 September 2001. The footage, which was filmed by RAWA, can be seen here.These rules were issued by the Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and Suppression of Vice (PVSV) and enforced by its "religious police," a concept thought to be borrowed from the Wahhabis. In newly conquered towns hundreds of religious police beat offenders (typically men without beards and women who were not wearing their burqas properly) with long sticks.[26]

Theft was punished by the amputation of a hand, rape and murder by public execution. Married adulterers were stoned to death. In Kabul, punishments were carried out in front of crowds in the city's former soccer stadium.
Taliban - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[bodecea]

Better the money spent here than overseas bombing brown people.

We're getting a raise too.

 

[MaggieMae]

Thats a good reference to predatory lending, not the housing crisis. Good try though.
What do you think caused the housing crisis? Predatory lending created bad mortgage deals which were bundled and sold as "securities" and everyone wound up broke when mortgagees began to default.

Where is Government oversight in all that has happened? Profiting from higher taxation on inflated property values or being a nonpartisan referee?
Don't you mean where WAS the government when all that happened? The SEC ignored these illegal trades, and the feds under Greenspan thought the market would eventually "right" itself with no oversight. Greenspan eventually admitted he had been dead wrong, and Cox (SEC chair) said no one noticed.

Who owns the lions share of home mortgages today?
The bailed out banks who bought the bundled securities and the US taxpayer owns the bad mortgages and we're still waiting for those banks to come up with a plan as to how they intend to dispose of them.

Who lowered the bar on Qualifications on the buyer?
Initially loan qualifications were relaxed for minorities under the Clinton administration, and that program was EXPANDED by the Bush administration in 2003 to include assistance for minorities by requiring no down payment and larger subsidies for those who would not otherwise qualify for conventional mortgages.

What happens to housing costs and property taxes with less buyers and demand?
Read the papers.

What was the relation between growth in Salaries and Housing cost increases over the last 30-20-10 years? Could you explain the discrepancies?
Growth in whose salaries? Salaries in general either remained stagnant or were lower all through the last 8 years.

........

Seems pretty true to me. Fannie and Freddie played a part in it. Loud mouths in the House and Senate defended it. They were all wrong. They now transfer the cost of their mistakes to us. They are still making the same mistakes. The fact that Property went up the way it did, way ahead of salary increases said it all Maggie. We are bailing out the Controlling Class. They Gambled, lost, and are trying to recover through us.

I still think that, regardless of their greed which created this mess, the major financial institutions needed the bailouts or we risked a catastrophe I can't even imagine.

BUT... Now they are quickly trying to repay those loans because they don't want new regulations which would prevent them from doing the same thing again. Those same institutions are now prepared to do business as usual, which means gigantic bonuses for fucking up the economy.

Who is stonewalling the new regulations to assure it never happens again? Where is the SEC with new rules defining how derivatives can be traded? Why isn't CONGRESS demanding answers to these questions by hauling Geitner and Bernanke before an oversight hearing?

 

[Intense]

........

Seems pretty true to me. Fannie and Freddie played a part in it. Loud mouths in the House and Senate defended it. They were all wrong. They now transfer the cost of their mistakes to us. They are still making the same mistakes. The fact that Property went up the way it did, way ahead of salary increases said it all Maggie. We are bailing out the Controlling Class. They Gambled, lost, and are trying to recover through us.

I still think that, regardless of their greed which created this mess, the major financial institutions needed the bailouts or we risked a catastrophe I can't even imagine.

BUT... Now they are quickly trying to repay those loans because they don't want new regulations which would prevent them from doing the same thing again. Those same institutions are now prepared to do business as usual, which means gigantic bonuses for fucking up the economy.

Who is stonewalling the new regulations to assure it never happens again? Where is the SEC with new rules defining how derivatives can be traded? Why isn't CONGRESS demanding answers to these questions by hauling Geitner and Bernanke before an oversight hearing?

See, I think that the catastrophe is still looming, and growing, only the Players that got burned turned it around on us. I think some very rational people have raised flags, and also given good advice. I think that when Government and Big Business Partner in the schemes, we get played, they cover up, divert attention, and rearrange some more.

Madison type Federalism would have kept Government in a true oversight position. Hamilton's Oligarchy thinking married Government to Big Business, in a way that little can be done by Government without hurting it's own interest. What would any administration do to a major GE Screw Up? Down play it like every other. This wasn't the original plan. This is what Madison and Jefferson warned us about and tried to fight, but lost.

 

[Charles Stucker]

Ted Kennedy never fleeced the people...unless HELPING people is evil, and killing people is pious...

Teddy Kennedy murdered Mary Jo Kopechne when he ran away from an accident scene like the little cowardly turd he was. His only goal was to shift blame for the accident to someone else and when that proved impossible used his political connections to insure he was never charged with any crime, not even Vehicular Manslaughter which his own statement would have been sufficient to prove.

Obama is smeared with the taint of having been the "Teddy" choice when the Democratic party primary met in 08.

 

[Foxfyre]

We were promised that if Congress and the President signed into law a stimulus package so big, there isn't one of us who can wrap our minds around that quantity of money, that jobs would be created and the recession would be soon over. It was of the utmost urgency that that be passed immediately to rescue us from depression, and the emergency made it prudent to do so despite the many pork barrel provisions and imperfections in the legislation.

We have lost hundreds of thousands of jobs every single month since the legislation was passed many months ago, the recession hangs on, it appears that much if not most of the money has gone to pay off friends and cronies of the administration, and they now tell us that most of the money won't be committed until next year. But it was an emergency.

They told us that bailout of the financial institutions was necessary to free up credit to get business and commerce moving again. The money went into those institutions who can't seem to explain what happened to much, if any of it, but credit remained frozen and the GDP remained stalled.

We were promised that if they authorized a gazillion dollars bailout of General Motors that they could head off bankruptcy that they couldn't allow to happen without bankrupting most of the country. Well the money went in, but the bankruptcy happened anyway without producing much of the dire consequences.

Would we have been better off or worse off without the stimulus package? It's hard to imagine that we would be worse off.

Would we have been better off or worse off without bailing out the financials? It's hard to imagine that we would be worse off.

Would we have been better off or worse off without the government buying General Motors? It's hard to imagine that we would be worse off.

Would we be better off or worse off if we weren't facing trillions of dollars of deficits due to these actions of Congress and the President? It's hard to imagine that we would be worse off.

Will our national defense be better off or worse off by diverting hundreds of millions of defense dollars to fund pet Congressional or Presidential projects that will not improve the lives of anybody? It's hard to imagine that we will be better off.

 

[Smartt33]

You will not hear an outcry from Obama because He is happy to see this happening. I tell you, He is out to sell this country out, and we are in real trouble if he is not stopped. I don't know how to stop iot, but I do know how to join forces with whomever will.

I am fed up, and I do talk it up everywhere I go.

Obama is UNAMERICAN, I don't care what others say.

Sure.
__________________
"God loves us, not because of who we are, but because of who He is." We should love others, not because of who they are, but because of who we are.

You might want to consider amending your signature, then. ^^

Based on my post, what is the exact reason why you think my "signature" needs to be amended?