B'Man's Revolt
Archive for July 2008
Trent Lott: Mississippi Scumbag
Matt at ThinkProgress posted this morning regarding the ex-Mississippi Snetor Trent Lott. Anyone who reads here knows that I tagged that lying piece of shit long before he left the Senate for the corrupt ashole he is. This just helps to bolster that case.
Lott accused of encouraging witnesses to give false information
Former Mississippi senator Trent Lott, who left Congress last year to become a lobbyist, is alleged to have “urged witnesses to give false information in a Hurricane Katrina lawsuit.” In a sworn deposition last week, an attorney for State Farm Fire & Casualty Cos. asked Lott’s nephew, Zach Scruggs, who had represented the former senator after his house was destroyed by Katrina, if it had been his “custom and habit in prosecuting litigation to have Senator Lott contact and encourage witnesses to give false information?” “I invoke my Fifth Amendment rights in response to that question,” replied Scruggs.
Hell, Scruggs, just do what Karl Rove does, ignore everything and refuse to answer.
I hope that the piece of shit, Lott, goes down like he should have many years ago. Couldn’t happen to a more bogus sumbitch.
America’s Financial Collapse: How Close Are We?
Have you noticed all the bad financial news the government and Big Business have been releasing on Friday afternoons? You ever wonder why this happens on Fridays and hardly is heard about by Monday, when people get back into the swing of work and everyday life (except for us bloggers).
I don’t know about you, but have you been duped into believing that all is well for America and our financial system? I have been in a slumber, but like a fly buzzing my ears and nose, I can’t fully go to sleep. It just keeps nagging the piss out of me until I do something about it. I keep reading stuff on the blogs, but the MSM barely mentions it. Bush comes out and calls things ‘rough patches’, smirks and explains to all us idiots that everything is ‘sound’ and ‘good’.
I have been warning of what I expect to be very difficult times ahead. For months I have shared my views and linked to many others who know something more about the subject (like Michael Witney’s article, “Thar She Blows: The Last Hurrah for the Banking System“):
Something has gone terribly wrong with the economy, but no one knows what it is? In the last three months bank credit has shrunk faster than any time since 1948. The banks aren’t lending and people aren’t borrowing; that’s a lethal combo. When credit-creation slows, the economy falters, unemployment rises and the misery index soars. That’s why Bush will have to mail out more stimulus checks whether he wants to or not; his back is against the wall. He’ll try to make it look like the economy is still breathing on its own and just needs a spell on the respirator before resuming its normal activities. But Bush is wrong; we’ve reached Peak credit and the blood-transfusions won’t work anymore. The vital signs have shut down and rigamortis is already setting in. Our goose is cooked.
The blogosphere seems aware of something impending and my Bro RawDawgBuffalo has some very keen insight into finances… but from a slightly different perspective than this white boy’s.
I dunno about Dawg, but I feel like all of this is purposeful, meaning that it appears that what is happening right before our eyes (bank and mortgage company bailouts, lending virtually stopped, record home foreclosures/losses, and bank closings… all the first indication of major inflation). This will culminate in a financial shutdown when our Federal Reserve pumps more worthless paper (called dollars) out and foreign investment selling off the dollar bringing about our total collapse.
As Mr Witney puts it, this will come about in these ways:
MORE BANK RUNS
On Friday, after the market had closed, the FDIC shut down two more banks, First Heritage Bank and First National Bank. Two weeks earlier, regulators seized Indymac Bancorp following a run by depositors. The FDIC now operates like a stealth paramilitary unit, deploying its shock troops on the weekends to do their dirty work out of the public eye and at times when it will least effect the stock market…
Bank runs are a direct hit on the foundation of the free market system. Unchecked, the tremors can ripple through the entire society and trigger violent political upheaval, even revolution. The public may not grasp their significance, but everyone in Washington is paying attention. They take it seriously, very seriously. It is a sign that the system is disintegrating and it may be irreversible….
SABER-RATTLING AT THE FDIC
An article in the San Francisco Business Times said that the FDIC is worried about the reporting on Internet blogs. They’d rather keep banking system’s troubles out of the news. The publicity just further undermines the publics confidence and spreads fear. Sheila Bair, chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., summed it up like this after the run on Indymac:
“The blogs were a bit out of control. We’re very mindful of the media coverage and blogs in controlling misinformation. All I can say is were going to continue to stay on top of it. The misinformation that came out over the weekend fed a lot of depositors’ fears.”…
…Bloggers aren’t the problem; the problem is a system that’s collapsing from decades of abusive credit expansion creation and insufficient capital. Now everyone is going to pay for the excesses of the few.
As the bank-runs increase, the FDIC will be forced to admit the truth, that they don’t have the resources to deal with a problem this big. Currently, the FDIC has only $53 billion in reserves to guarantee $4 trillion in total bank deposits. The entire system has a mere $267 billion cash in the vaults. What a shabby way to run a banking system. Where’s the money going to come from when depositors start withdrawing their savings? How will the FDIC deal with the ongoing deleveraging in the market which is forcing more and more investors move into cash?
No one knows. All we get is more prevaricating; more smoke and mirrors, Bush assures us that “Our capital markets are functioning efficiently and effectively.” Nonsense. The markets are cratering and the banks are toast. A blind man can see it….
…when the Fed runs out of US Treasuries, they’ll have to rev-up the printing presses and monetize the debt. That’ll be doomsday for the dollar. When foreign central banks see the greenbacks a-gushing like the blood from a harpooned whale; they’ll have to sell off their dollar stockpiles and take the loss. That will trigger a period of hyper-inflation in the US. Everyone will pay for the excesses of the few.
Am I just some redneck with little financial background or training spouting off conspiracy theorist bullshit? Seems to me that I am looking at the very same world you are. If you don’t see it, I agree… one of us is full of shit. But I believe the problems are as evident as the nose on your face. But we are hardly hearing a thing about it.
The Audacity of Impeachment
I am sick to death of people who claim that Bush has either done no wrong (these are idiotic maniacs) or that Bush has made a few mistakes (these are likely Republican water-carriers who feel they must protect their party from the most horrendous evils) or even the very few that say “I don’t know.”
The ones who need their asses whipped most are those who feel like it should be done, but would either be a waste of time or a detriment to the Democratic party. I have zero patience for these people because they show their true self when it comes to the Constitution and the rule of law. It isn’t about even stopping this criminal cabal, for they are willing to allow anything to happen without even a cursory investigation. I have lost a friend over this very point (and the attitude that my view of Constitutionality is unimportant and tin-foil hattish).
But the fact is that an impeachment, according to ‘The People’ would be a slam-dunk and a sure way to insure even more Democratic seats in congress next election. For as the republicans in office continue to back the Maniac-in-Chief, they will lose most of their constituency. Not only will it bolster Democratic wins, but it may be the end of the GOP (I am not saying that is entirely a good thing).
Michael Collins has a post up with this graphic showing the point from MSNBC and Zobgy polls, representing the difference a few years (and corrupt, illegal and maniacal assaults on our liberties and Constitution) makes.
How to Get a Job By Shooting Up a Church
David Swanson (who became somewhat of a hero to me when he co-founded AfterDowningStreet.org) wonders out loud what I have asked many times… how can you think that I, a liberal, am bad or wrong for this country, if you are experiencing and seeing the same shit I see and I want the same things you want?
Brainwashing, plain and simple.
How to Get a Job By Shooting Up a Church
Imagine being so angry that you couldn’t find a job that you were able to decide, as a man in Tennessee just did, that the way to solve your problems was to attack liberals – the people who support (albeit ineffectively) workers’ rights, union rights, and fair trade, who oppose NAFTA, oppose tax breaks for shipping jobs overseas, support investing in job creation at home rather than wars abroad, and want to tax corporations and the super-rich rather than small businesses and working people.
And imagine deciding that the way to attack the people who stand for everything that might help you is to go shoot up a bunch of men, women, and children. And then imagine telling those damn liberals: “You see, you were wrong at least about gun policies, because if angry desperate people who believe everything they hear on the radio weren’t allowed to get mad and go buy guns I never could have shot up your children’s play! And why are you showing a dumb play about poor kids, anyway? You never put on plays about people like me, potential billionaires down on their luck who’ve been threatened by Muslim terorists and mistreated by blacks and gays and women and liberals!”
And imagine the Associated Press report completely playing along with your delusion, and writing:
“Although individual Unitarian churches can vary dramatically in outlooks, most congregations retain a deep commitment to social justice, which has led many to embrace liberal stances on the ordination of women, civil rights and gay rights.”
What if labor rights had been mentioned?
And then imagine that the Knoxville News Sentinel gives your heros credit for deranging your mind and filling you up with bizarrely misdirected rage:
“Inside the house, officers found ‘Liberalism is a Mental Health Disorder’ by radio talk show host Michael Savage, ‘Let Freedom Ring’ by talk show host Sean Hannity, and ‘The O’Reilly Factor,’ by television talk show host Bill O’Reilly.”
And what if you were then given decades behind bars, without ever a word of thanks from your heros, to think about what in the world you might have been thinking? What would your advice end up being for others in the same sort of trouble you were in?
I like to think you’d eventually recommend selling your radio and television and spending some time talking to real people.
Speaking as a liberal who supports a sustainable full-employment economy with guaranteed education, income, and health care, I’m sorry that we have failed you and so many others so drastically, in fact failed so badly that you don’t even have the slightest idea who we are. I suspect that if you knew us you would find us to have goals you approve of but to be grotesquely and despicably timid, hesitant, and easily compromised in how we go about trying to accomplish anything. And you’d be right.
We’ll tell your story, for a week or so, both as an example of the effect of hatemongering propaganda and as an example of desperate economic stress and lack of community. But will we DO anything to improve those situations? I seriously doubt it. This is an election year, after all.
what is a billion?
How many zeros in a billion?
The next time you hear a politician use the
word ‘billion’ in a casual manner, think about
whether you want the ‘politicians’ spending
YOUR tax money.
A billion is a difficult number to comprehend,
but one advertising agency did a good job of
putting that figure into some perspective in
one of it’s releases.
A.
A billion seconds ago it was 1959.
B.
A billion minutes ago Jesus was alive.
C.
A billion hours ago our ancestors were
living in the Stone Age.
D.
A billion days ago no-one walked on the earth on two feet.
E.
A billion dollars ago was only
8 hours and 20 minutes,
at the rate our government
is spending it.
While this thought is still fresh in our brain…
let’s take a look at New Orleans …
It’s amazing what you can learn with some simple division.
Louisiana Senator,
Mary Landrieu (D)
is presently asking Congress for
250 BILLION DOLLARS
to rebuild New Orleans . Interesting number…
what does it mean?
A.
Well… if you are one of the 484,674 residents of New Orleans
(every man, woman, and child)
you each get $516,528.
B.
Or… if you have one of the 188,251 homes in
New Orleans , your home gets $1,329,787.
C.
Or… if you are a family of four…
your family gets $2,066,012.
Washington, D. C
< HELLO! >
Are all your calculators broken??
Accounts Receivable Tax
Building Permit Tax
CDL License Tax
Cigarette Tax
Corporate Income Tax
Dog License Tax
Federal Income Tax
Federal Unemployment Tax (FUTA)
Fishing License Tax
Food License Tax
Fuel Permit Tax
Gasoline Tax
Hunting License Tax
Inheritance Tax
Inventory Tax
IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax)
IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
Liquor Tax
Luxury Tax
Marriage License Tax
Medicare Tax
Property Tax
Real Estate Tax
Service charge taxes
Social Security Tax
Road Usage Tax (Truckers)
Sales Taxes
Recreational Vehicle Tax
School Tax
State Income Tax
State Unemployment Tax (SUTA)
Telephone Federal Excise Tax
Telephone Federal Universal Service Fee Tax
Telephone Federal, State and Local Surcharge Tax
Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge Tax
Telephone Recurring and Non-recurring Charges Tax
Telephone State and Local Tax
Telephone Usage Charge Tax
Utility Tax
Vehicle License Registration Tax
Vehicle Sales Tax
Watercraft Registration Tax
Well Permit Tax
Workers Compensation Tax
STILL THINK THIS IS FUNNY?
Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago…
and our nation was the most prosperous in the world.
We had absolutely no national debt…
We had the largest middle class in the world…
and Mom stayed home to raise the kids.
What happened?
Can you spell ‘politicians!’
And I still have to
press ’1′
for English.
What the heck happened?????
B’Man’s Hypocrite Watch: The Washington Post and Corporate Media, in General
B’Man: What does it represent when Americans, gullible to their own doom, listen to those who have been so very wrong about pretty much everything… to those who have supported and abetted this cabal ruling our country… but accuse other nations of the same blatant misgivings their own cronyistic sycophants are engaged in? Glenn Greenwald points out such an instance regarding Russia’s president and his ‘abuse’ of the rule of law. This particular example is laid out by Glenn. My point is broader than that, but I borrow a few listed examples (with the links Glenn shared) to show that this idea permeates our entire nation… not just the Big Media. Many people have come to think that the opinion of 300Million people should out-weigh the opinion of 9.5 Billion others. We are superior in military and technology (losing the advantage in technology fast). But in our brainwashed minds, we insist that our desires and opinions should over-rule others.
The Washington Post editorial page’s latest rule of law sermon
Diehl is writing on the same Editorial Page which, for the last five years, has boisterously cheered on the American invasion and occupation of Iraq — one of the most egregious violations of international law of the last decade, at least. It’s the same Editorial Page that has repeatedly urged that lawbreaking telecoms should be relieved of the obligation to go to court and should be immunized from any consequences, decreeing that they were “acting as patriotic corporate citizens” when breaking our privacy laws for years. It’s an Editorial Page that never ceases its support for those who threaten Iran with a military attack — threats which (not that anyone really cares) happen to be violations of the conventions of international law which the Post depicts itself as upholding (UN Charter: “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force . . . “).
And just two days ago, the Post’s Editorial Page explicitly advocated that new so-called “specialized national security courts” be created in the U.S. to empower the President to imprison people — even for life — without having to charge them with any crime, including in those circumstances where (due to a lack of evidence) no such charges could possibly be brought against such individuals:
The president must have the legal flexibility to detain those against whom there is credible, actionable intelligence but not enough evidence to bring charges.
This is who, on a weekly basis, singles out other Governments for lectures on the sanctity of the rule of law, human rights, and the need to abide by international conventions. It’s certainly possible to argue that we shouldn’t be constrained by petty and bothersome things like international law and even domestic law when it comes to having the President protect us all. That, more or less, has been the animating principle which our political establishment (and certainly the Post Editorial Page) has embraced to justify the conduct of our own Government during the last seven years.
But you can’t simultaneously espouse that view for yourself and then expect that your sermons to the rest of the world about the sanctity of international conventions and the rule of law will be treated with anything other than scornful indifference. Yet somehow, people like Jackson Diehl — Fred Hiatt’s deputy — continue to believe they’re in a position to condemn other countries’ disregard for such principles.
What we’ve done over the last seven years — at least much of it — isn’t a secret. It’s worthwhile to state frequently in clear, dispassionate terms what our country has done. Our Government has kidnapped people off the street and from their homes and sent them to places like Syria to be tortured for months (including completely innocent people) and then invoked National Security claims to bar them from holding our Government accountable in a court of law. We’ve disappeared others into secret prisons beyond even the reach of the Red Cross, or encaged them in a lawless black hole on a Cuban island. We’ve tortured them, sometimes to death, even with the knowledge that many were innocent. We attacked and completely demolished another country that couldn’t attack us even if it wanted to. And our President openly declared that he has the power to break our laws, spy on U.S. citizens with no warrants, and indefinitely imprison even our own citizens with no process of any kind. Those are all just facts that aren’t really subject to dispute or debate.
Worst of all, having done all of that — not for weeks or months following the 9/11 attacks, but for years, still — we’ve collectively decided, without much turmoil or debate, that it should all be forgiven, that none of it should be punished or even investigated, that it’s best just to keep these crimes concealed and, when accidentally disclosed, to immunize the criminals. And all of that is being done right out in the open, so that our formal human rights reports are self-evident, almost laughable, farces, and even countries like Zimbabwe, when their governments want to engage in tyrannical acts, can and do rationally point to the U.S. as the leading example which they’re following.
Whether this country or that one is “worse” than the U.S. in these areas is irrelevant to the point (though, on that topic, one might compare Diehl’s complaints about Russia’s interference in oil disputes to the Bush administration’s “War on Terror” conduct). Regardless of who is “worse,” it is truly baffling that our political establishment still thinks it can anoint itself arbiters on the rule of law and human rights.
How can a member of an Editorial Page which has endorsed some of the most grotesque abuses and violations of law within their own country — and which continues to believe that those responsible should be protected and immunized — possibly continue to parade around as some sort of crusaders for those principles when it comes to others? Who is the target audience that they think they are successfully fooling with that charade? What mental process allows a person like Jackson Diehl or Fred Hiatt to declare that their own Government is exempt from the rule of law and the most basic international norms yet still believe they are in a position to condemn other governments for insufficient regard for the rule of law and human rights?
Alabama Politics Have Gone To The Dogs
The Montgomery Advisor explains that Fairhope, AL finally has something to truly ‘hope’ for… a new ‘breed’ of politician, Wille Bean Roscoe P. Coltrane:
Labrador late in ‘run’ for mayor
FAIRHOPE — One of the candidates in the race to become Fairhope’s next mayor is considerably more hairy than the rest. He also has twice as many legs and a constantly wagging tail.
Wille also has some high-falutin’ supporters:
Some of his supporters say all the politicking, name-dropping and sign-maneuvering in the seven-man Fairhope mayoral race is wearing on them weeks ahead of the Aug. 26 election.
“I think he polishes up the field,” said Vince Kilborn, 66, of Fairhope. “We need new blood.”
Kilborn, former Gov. Don Siegelman’s chief attorney in his ongoing criminal corruption case, added about the dog: “He doesn’t have any skeletons in his closet. He’s eaten them all.”
And if you believe such a thing is unprecidented, there have been two other dogs elected as mayor… a black Lab named Junior Cochran and a mutt named Goofy Borneman.
In Wille’s case, some think he should do like Senator Obama and go national, fast:
Julie Ford, a volunteer at The Haven, Fairhope’s no-kill animal shelter, said Willie Bean is setting his sights too low.
“I think he should run for president,”…
URGENT: need your help – Impeachment Petition Deadline Midnight Wednesday
Dear Friends,
Because of your vigilance and support for democracy, last Friday was a day of singular importance in Washington. The House Judiciary Committee met to discuss the Bush Administration’s abuse of executive power and for the first time the case for Impeachment was discussed in front of a Congressional committee, in depth, at length and with authority.
Twenty members of the Judiciary Committee attended the six hour hearing, during which twelve witnesses, including myself and four members of Congress testified. In this hearing I called for the Impeachment of the President for misrepresenting a case for war.
This week I will present members of Congress with Impeachment petitions submitted by those of you who have signed the on-line impeachment form.
I need your help. In the next few days we must redouble our efforts to get more signatures on the online petition at kucinich.us. I’m asking each of you to please contact at least ten of your friends to go to www.Kucinich.us now and sign the Impeachment petition that will be delivered by me. Wednesday night is the deadline.
Please send out an email to all your friends and family, post this link, http://kucinich.us to your blogs and make this effort count as this is the only petition that I will deliver.
Dennis
Look What We & Our Kids Get!!
White House Predicts $482 Billion Deficit
Washington Post AP
WASHINGTON — The White House predicted Monday that President Bush would leave a record $482 billion deficit to his successor, a sobering turnabout in the nation’s fiscal condition from 2001, when Mr. Bush took office after three consecutive years of budget surpluses.
Federal Budget (US)The worst may be yet to come. The deficit announced by Jim Nussle, the White House budget director, does not reflect the full cost of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, the potential $50 billion cost of another economic stimulus package, or the possibility of steeper losses in tax revenues if individual income or corporate profits decline.
The new deficit numbers also do not account for any drains on the national treasury that might result from further declines in the housing market.
The White House forecast was prepared before passage of the huge housing assistance package that Mr. Bush has promised to sign. That legislation would put taxpayer money at risk in numerous ways, especially if housing prices continue to decline.
Mr. Nussle predicted Monday that the deficit would more than double in the current 2008 fiscal year — to $389 billion, from $162 billion in 2007 — before shooting up to $482 billion in the 2009 fiscal year, which begins in about two months.
The deficit projected for 2009 would be the largest in absolute terms, easily surpassing the record of $413 billion in 2004. The White House and many economists prefer to measure the deficit as a share of the economy. The projected 2009 deficit would be 3.3 percent of the economy. That is the largest share since 2004, but well below the percentages recorded in the 1980s and early 1990s. In 1983, the deficit was 6 percent of the overall economy.
The bleak outlook for the budget will crimp the ability of the next president to carry out ambitious spending plans. And it adds to fiscal pressures that were already building because of the growth of Medicare and Social Security.
Senator John McCain of Arizona, the presumptive Republican presidential nomination, said the new report showed “the dire fiscal condition of the federal government.”
“There is no more striking reminder of the need to reverse the profligate spending that has characterized this administration’s fiscal policy,” Mr. McCain said.
Jason Furman, the economic policy director for the campaign of Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, the presumptive Democratic nominee, said Mr. Obama would cut wasteful spending, close corporate tax loopholes and roll back tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, “while making health care affordable and putting a middle-class tax cut in the pocket of 95 percent of workers and their families.”
Mr. Furman said Mr. McCain was “proposing to continue the same Bush economic policies that put our economy on this dangerous path.”
The new estimate of the 2009 deficit was $74 billion higher than Mr. Bush and Mr. Nussle had predicted in the president’s budget just six months ago.
Mr. Nussle said the deterioration of the fiscal outlook resulted from “a softening of the economy,” and a reduction in anticipated revenue. He attacked Congressional Democrats, saying they had allowed spending to grow out of control.
Representative John M. Spratt Jr., Democrat of South Carolina and chairman of the House Budget Committee, said the new deficit figures confirmed “the dismal legacy of the Bush administration.”
“Under its policies,” Mr. Spratt said, “the largest surpluses in history have been converted into the largest deficits in history.”
The recently passed housing bill authorizes the Treasury Department to spend virtually unlimited amounts to rescue the nation’s two mortgage finance giants, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, should they be at risk of collapse. The Congressional Budget Office estimated the new rescue authority could add a total of $25 billion to the deficit in the next two years.
The budget office said there was a better than even chance the rescue authority would not be used, so there would be no cost. On the other hand, it said there was a 5 percent chance that one or both of the mortgage giants would need such assistance to cover as-yet-unrecognized losses greater than $100 billion.
Robert L. Bixby, executive director of the Concord Coalition, a nonpartisan budget watchdog group, said of the federal commitment: “It may not cost anything. But if it costs a little bit, it may begin to cost a lot. You start to deal with market psychology here. It all adds up to a pretty scary picture.”
On Monday, the Bush administration announced a new program that could reduce some of taxpayers’ huge exposure to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and, at the same time, reduce the dominance of the companies.
Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. said that four of the nation’s largest banks had endorsed an administration effort to create a new market in a financial instrument that could be used to finance mortgages. The instrument, known as covered bonds, could provide a new source of cash for lending institutions.
When Mr. Bush took office, he predicted that federal debt held by the public — the amount borrowed by the government to pay for past deficits — would shrink to just 8 percent of the gross domestic product in 2009. He now estimates that it will amount to 40 percent.
Senator Kent Conrad, Democrat of North Dakota and chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, said, “President Bush will be remembered as the most fiscally irresponsible president in our nation’s history.”
Mr. Nussle bristled when asked about the Democrats’ suggestion that Mr. Bush had transformed a surplus into deficit.
“There is much more to the book than the first page and the last page,” Mr. Nussle said. “There are many, many pages and chapters in between. Democrats seem to have not read all of them.”
Mr. Nussle asserted that Mr. Bush had inherited a recession and had to make up for years of inadequate spending on the military, intelligence and homeland security under President Bill Clinton.
The new White House report also includes these predictions:
¶Total federal revenues will decline slightly from 2007 to 2008.
¶In 2008 and in each of the next three years, corporate income tax collections will be lower than the amount collected in 2007.
¶Federal spending will increase nearly 8 percent this year and then 6.5 percent in 2009. In 2009, federal spending will be equivalent to 21.1 percent of the economy, the largest share since 1993.
The White House now predicts that the economy will grow 1.6 percent this year, after accounting for inflation, compared with its estimate of 2.7 percent in February. The estimate of growth for 2009 was also lowered, to 2.2 percent, from 3 percent.
Edward P. Lazear, chairman of the president’s Council of Economic Advisers, pointed to oil prices as a culprit. “Every time oil prices go up, it takes off some growth from our economy,” Mr. Lazear said.
Spending on some domestic programs — like veterans’ medical care, unemployment benefits and food and nutrition assistance — is growing faster than in the comparable period last year.
Another factor adding to the deficit is the distribution of tax rebates to individuals under the economic stimulus package signed into law by Mr. Bush in February. About $79 billion has been paid out through June.
Let’s Dance Some More
The BPA – Toe Jam Featuring David Byrne & Dizzee Rascal
Where Do You Buy Your Shit?
New Linens-N-Shit Opens
MACON, GA—Linens-N-Shit, the nation’s largest retailer of bedsheets, tablecloths, and a wide assortment of other shit, will open its new location Tuesday morning at the Macon Mall.
“We are excited to open our first store in the Macon area, and we encourage shoppers to arrive early and check out all of our great linens and shit,” said Robert Barlow, the company’s senior vice president. “We’re proud to offer the local community the best selection of the name-brand shit you want at the prices you love.”
“We’ve got all sorts of shit,” Barlow added. “Bath shit, kitchen shit, shit for the bedroom, seasonal shit, and all the other shit you could possibly imagine, plus linens.”
The store is scheduled to open its doors at 6 a.m. The first 100 customers will receive a bunch of free shit.
The 55,000-square-foot facility features 12 full-service checkout lanes and six express lanes, four kiosks to register shit for important events, and dozens of aisles stacked floor to ceiling with an estimated 650 tons of shit. Kenneth Resch, manager of the Macon store, said that if customers cannot find shit in the right color or size, the shit they need can be located in heaping piles of overstock shit in the Linens-N-Shit warehouse.
“Anything not available at our retail location can easily be purchased from our online store at linensnshit.com,” Resch said. “We’ve got a crapload of shit there.”
Resch, who oversaw the hiring process for the store’s 120 full-time and part-time employees, praised his staff’s friendly and helpful service, as well as its willingness to sort through enormous bins of shit in order to match the right shit to the customer’s needs.
Customers who got a sneak peek at the new store during its silent opening Friday evening were impressed.
“Look at all this great shit!” said Macon resident Joy Anderson, who claims she usually spends an average of $500 a month on linens and other shit. “Whenever we wanted to buy a ton of shit before, we had to go all the way out to the Galleria Mall in Centerville. But now we’ve got all the shit we need right here.”
Although a sluggish market has forced many large-format retailers to scale back their operations and even close locations, Linens-N-Shit insists that the economy will not prevent the store from providing the consumer with superior quality linens, storage and organizational shit, framed crap, and some foreign-made designer bullshit.
“We’ve always had a simple strategy of selling shit and linens to people, and we don’t intend to stop now,” CEO Henry Considine said. “This company has weathered both the credit crisis and the housing-market crash, because no matter how bad the economy gets, consumers will always continue to buy shit.”
In response to the overwhelmingly positive reaction to Linens-N-Shit stores, the company plans to sell excess shit as well as irregular or slightly imperfect crap at their new Shit-N-Shit factory outlets.
Accused church shooter threatened to kill wife, himself : TVUU church shooting : Knoxville News Sentinel
Monster: Who Really Killed the Knoxville Unitarians?
I’d say that Unitarians were God’s thoughtful people, but they make no particular claims about God. In some parts of the country that takes real courage.
My first wife and I joined a Unitarian church in suburban DC and raised our kids there. She and I were from different religious backgrounds – in a way, I was from different religious backgrounds, raised in Judaism but with Catholic and Southern Baptist relatives. We both practiced Buddhist meditation (and found others there that did the same.)
Unitarians tend to be intellectual, verbal, literate, thoughtful, and from a variety of backgrounds. Some are atheist, some are agnostic, others believe in God in a variety of Eastern and Western forms. Some would describe themselves as “ethically Christian,” although others would not – and it is not an exclusively Christian group. The running joke among Unitarians was that the name “Jesus” is only heard when someone falls down the stairs, and that the only sacrament is the black coffee brewed after services.
The Unitarian Universalist (or UU) denomination is the product of a merger between Unitarianism and Universalism, two centuries-old Christian denominations. Unitarianism was founded on the belief that the Trinity was illogical and that there could only be one divinity. Universalists believed that God was too merciful to condemn anyone to an eternity in hell, and that even the most evil person would get out of there eventually (after fifty thousand years or so). Eventually they merged and abandoned all dogma. (You can read the Knoxville church’s website for a summary of beliefs.)
When my work sent me to Hungary, I arrived in the only nation on earth that ever had a Unitarian state (during the reign of King John Sigismund, who decreed religious tolerance in 1568). Ralph Waldo Emerson is the closest thing to a saint that UU’s have. An ordained minister in the church, his Harvard Divinity School address was revolutionary in its day.
Emerson rejected all claims of the supernatural in the Bible. He said that miracles were “monster,” in the original meaning of that word as “against nature.” In a characteristically striking turn of phrase, he said they were “not one with the blowing clover and the falling rain.” Emerson was telling us that the beauty of the manifest world should be enough.
Is it worth killing a person for believing that?
My current (and future) wife and I were married by the Rev. Forrest Church at All Souls Unitarian in Manhattan. (Dr. Church is now teaching us how to face death.) When at several points in my career jobs came up in the Deep South, I always checked to see if there was a Unitarian Church nearby. One of those job possibilities, which I chose not to pursue, was in Knoxville.
Jim Adkisson of Powell, Tennessee was the man with his finger on the trigger. He had mental health problems, and a hard and bitter life. He apparently left a letter explaining that he hated the church for its liberal beliefs and opinions. And the church had a sign outside indicating it welcomed gays and lesbians.
Who really killed those Unitarians? Was it the preachers who spread hatred and intolerance? The politicians who court and flatter them instead of condemning their hate speech? The media machine that attacks liberals, calls them “traitors” and suggests you speak to them “with a baseball bat”? The economic system that batters people like Jim Adkinson until they snap, then tells them their real enemies are gays and liberals and secular humanists?
If you ask me, it was all of the above.
You killed them, Pat Robertson. You killed them, Pastor Hagee. You killed them, Ann Coulter. You killed them, Dick Morris and Sean Hannity and the rest of you at Fox News.
The shooting began while the children of the church were putting on a musical based on “Annie.” One broad-shouldered church member blocked the bullets from hitting other people, and died. You don’t need to believe in dogma to be a hero. Remember that song from “Annie”? It probably got on your nerves like it got on mine. “The sun’ll come out tomorrow.”
The sun coming out. That’s natural. It’s one with the blowing clover and the falling rain. But a man driven insane, then programmed by society to kill people just because they’re loving and tolerant?
That’s monster.
RJ Eskow blogs:
A Night Light
The Sentinel Effect: Healthcare Blog
Future-While-U-Wait
RJ Eskow at the Huffington Post
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