George Soros gave Ivanka's husband's business a $250 million credit line in 2015 per WSJ. Soros is also an investor in Jared's business.

Thursday, September 30, 2010

Murder, rape way up in New York City, apparently unrelated to trans-fats

9/30, "Murder rising at alarming rate, sending waves of fear throughout NYC's most dangerous neighborhoods," NY Daily News, by Burke, Phillips and LeMire

"The number of people wounded or killed by gunfire is up citywide, sending waves of fear through some of New York's most dangerous neighborhoods.

  • NYPD statistics through the first nine months of the year show the number of murders has climbed

There were 341 murders at this point last year compared with 386 through Sunday, according to the most recent data available....

Rapes have increased 13.5% citywide, including a disturbing 45.1% jump in Manhattan.
During the first nine months of last year, no one reported being raped in Central Park."

  • via Lucianne.com

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Protests break out in European cities due to financial crisis


9/29, BBC, "In the Irish Republic, a man drove a cement mixer covered with anti-bank slogans into the gates of the parliament in Dublin, in an apparent protest at the country's expensive bank bail-out."...photo, protests in Madrid forced stores to close, reuters

Celebrity 'hockey stick' climate guy and his employer Penn State received at least $2.5 million in US taxpayer dollars in 2009-2010

Waiting for NY Times or Washington Post to mount a full scale investigation to keep our 'democracy safe.'...

"A scientist in the middle of the ClimateGate scandal received economic stimulus funds last June (2009).

  • As NewsBusters reported on November 28, Penn State University is investigating Professor Michael Mann, the creator of the discredited "Hockey Stick Graph," for his involvement in an international attempt to exaggerate and manipulate climate data in order to advance the myth of manmade global warming.
  • According to the conservative think tank the National Center for Public Policy Research,

Mann received $541,184 in economic stimulus funds last June to conduct climate change research.

  • With this in mind, NCPPR issued a press release Thursday asking for these funds to be returned:

In the face of rising unemployment and record-breaking deficits, policy experts at the National Center for Public Policy Research are criticizing the Obama Administration for awarding a half million dollar grant from the economic stimulus package to Penn State Professor Michael Mann, a key figure in the Climategate controversy....

The $541,184 grant is for three years and was initiated in June 2009.

Potentially adding insult to injury, Penn State received additional stimulus funds to investigate the impact of climate change last week:

A nearly $1.9 million grant from the National Science Foundation is enabling a Penn State-led group of researchers to continue studies on the potential effects of climate change on the spread of infectious diseases, such as malaria and dengue.

  • The grant is part of federal stimulus funding authorized under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

This grant appears to have nothing to do with Mann's department. However, given the high-profile the university is currently under as a result of his involvement in ClimateGate,

  • it seems absurd that any federal funds involving climate change would be going to this school while it is (was) investigating its chief proponent of this myth.

Maybe more importantly, why are economic stimulus funds being given to a university for scientific research in the first place, especially one with such political overtones?

  • As NCPPR noted in its release:

"It's no wonder that Obama's stimulus plan is failing to produce jobs. Taxpayer dollars aren't being used in the ways most likely to spur job creation. The stimulus was not sold to the public as a way to reward a loyalist in the climate change debate. Nor was the stimulus sold as a way to promote the Obama Administration's position on the global warming theory...As is often the case, political considerations corrupt the distribution of government funds," said Deneen Borelli, a fellow with the National Center's Project 21 black leadership network.

  • Despite the obviously controversial nature of this funding and its recipient, I can identify

I'm sure now that NCPPR has exposed this hypocrisy, press outlets across the fruited plain will be aggressively investigating economic stimulus grants to Mann and others involved in the ClimateGate scandal in order to inform the public about how their tax dollars are being spent.

Of course, I'm not holding my breath."

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Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Starving Californians of water behind fake compassion for the Delta Smelt

The carbon racket is perfect because trillions can be robbed while inflicting death on Americans in so many ways. The Soros wing of the Republican party aims to break the American spirit day by day, like turning the water off against California farmers. Two GOP congressmen begged legislators to turn the water back on in California (9/22/09), but Senator Feinstein likened giving water back to suffering farmers to the US being attacked at Pearl Harbor. This is the Soros way-death disguised as 'caring.' Independent and Tea Party voters know this.
"Just who are the Republicans against environmental protection? That’s the intriguing question posed by the

At first glance, REP violates in spades former California state Republican Party Chairman Gaylord Parkinson’s Eleventh Commandment, later adopted by Ronald Reagan: “Thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican.” REP implicitly and sanctimoniously defames all Republicans – or at least the vast majority who haven’t signed on to its dubious agenda.

  • REP formed in 1995 when a network of anti-development, nominally Republican activists gelled to fight the new Republican-controlled Congress’ effort at regulatory reform, including the oft-abused Endangered Species Act (ESA).

So as Contract With America Republicans tried to get a meaningful grip on the alphabet soup of laws and regulations empowering federal agencies to be impervious to sound science, cost-benefit-analysis and even common sense,

REP was helping Clinton administration EPA chief Carol M. Browner portray the newly empowered congressional Republicans

  • as pillagers of the Earth and threats to the public health.

In that landmark battle of the 104th Congress, REP actions were indistinguishable from those

  • of any radical environmental group.

The consequences can be seen today in the greens’ use of the

ESA-protected snail darter to block much-needed water from farmers in California’s Central Valley.

  • Fast-forward to the current 111th Congress, and the REP is again working against the interests of Republicans and America.

REP supported the Waxman-Markey “cap-and-trade” bill, which squeaked by in the House, 219-212. Eight REP-applauded Republicans helped Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi pass the bill, including REP honorary board members Reps. Michael N. Castle of Delaware and Mark Steven Kirk of Illinois. And what did REP say about Republicans who opposed Waxman-Markey?

  • Reps. Joe Barton of Texas, John Shimkus of Illinois and Fred Upton of Michigan were given “environmental harm demerits” for their supposed “failure to engage constructively in the committee debate about climate legislation.”
  • No word from REP on the “constructiveness” of Mrs. Pelosi inserting a
  • 300-page amendment in the bill at 3 a.m. the day of the final vote.

REP slammed Reps. Mike Pence

of Indiana, Michele Bachmann of Minnesota and John A. Boehner of Ohio “for their efforts to poison and polarize the debate on energy and climate legislation.”

  • REP doesn’t just speak ill of fellow Republicans – it demonizes them.

On the Senate side,

  • REP slammed South Carolina’s Jim DeMint for the audacity of trying to bar the Department of the Interior from reducing water allocations to the aforementioned California farmers. Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski was hit for blocking efforts to regulate carbon dioxide because of polar bears. Oklahoma’s Tom Coburn got a demerit for opposing a 2009 Obama administration land grab.

Though Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Susan Collins of Maine earned “environmental leadership credits” for supporting carbon caps, one can only imagine the insults they will get from REP because Mr. Graham single-handedly torpedoed the Kerry-Graham-Lieberman cap-and-trade bill by withdrawing his co-sponsorship, and Mrs. Collins voted to block EPA’s regulation of greenhouse gases. REP honorary board member Sen. John McCain may very well be defrocked for vocally opposing efforts to ram through cap-and-trade.

  • So it appears that any Republican who dares to oppose the radical environmentalist agenda of total government control over energy use and property
  • is a Republican Against the Environment.

Though REP members probably aren’t the same sort of hard-core Marxist-socialists who make up the radical environmental movement, they appear at the very least to be severely misguided highbrows

  • (honorary board member Theodore Roosevelt IV comes to mind)

who think the government ought to protect the natural world from the plundering plebeians – and no taxpayer/consumer expense is too great to bear and no individual freedom or constitutional principle is too sacred to sacrifice in that cause.

  • Giving REP the benefit of the doubt about Marxist-socialism, perhaps it would consider re-forming as Democrats for Freedom and Capitalism. That would solve several very obvious problems immediately, including this one:

Because environmental protection is essentially a luxury affordable only by wealthy nations,

  • as the Obamacrats impoverish America with high taxes, outlandish spending and more economy-killing regulations,

they also will wind up, ironically, hurting the very environment

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via Tom Nelson

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Monday, September 27, 2010

ObamaCare will decimate the elderly in vast cultural divide-Betsy McCaughey

Obama on teleprompter, 10/11/08 in Philadelphia, reuters.

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9/26/10, "New projections from the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid paint a stark picture of the impact of the ObamaCare law:
  • We're in for a massive redistribution of health resources.
When the projections were released this month, news reports stressed that the president's "reform" utterly fails to slow the growth of health-care spending. Every year through 2019, employers and consumers will face higher premiums than if the law hadn't passed. But worse news is how radically the Obama law spreads the health wealth around.
This accounts for the majority of those who'd gain health coverage. Amazingly, only 3 percent more people will have private insurance. President Obama pledged to reduce the number of uninsured by making health plans affordable -- but that's not how his law actually does it. Rather, it loosens Medicaid eligibility by raising the income ceiling and barring asset tests. In short, it pushes our country toward a welfare state.
  • Often, workers put up with low salaries to get good health benefits for their families. But the new law stipulates that Medicaid recipients get the same benefits that employers are required to provide workers.
That will diminish the incentive to work -- another step toward reversing welfare reform. Why stick it out on the job if the benefits are just as good in Medicaid? ObamaCare is the health component of
  • an overall move to make more people dependent on government.
In the last two years, we've seen a breathtaking expansion of food stamps, Medicaid, welfare and housing programs.
  • One in six Americans depends on them.
That's partly due to the recession -- but the Obama administration projects roughly doubling spending on these programs by 2018, even in years it predicts the economy will be booming.
  • Two fundamental American sentiments get trampled in the process:our culture of hard work and self-sufficiency and our commitment to stand by the generation that nurtured us.
To expand Medicaid, the Obama law eviscerates Medicare.

It's like robbing Peter to pay Paul, only it's robbing grandma and grandpa. The new projections show that in 2019, for example, ObamaCare cuts Medicare funding by $86.4 billion -- which works out to $1,428 less for each elderly patient that year. Baby boomers will face difficulties accessing care that seniors now get. Richard Foster, chief actuary for Medicare, has spoken with brave bluntness about the possible impact, warning that some hospitals might stop taking Medicare. Where will seniors go?
  • Figures don't lie. The projections from the Obama administration's own agency,the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, depict the truth in stark terms. Higher premiums are bad enough, but to see the older generation victimized
in order to expand a welfare culture is a total reversal of American values".

9/26/10, "Obamacare's redistribution of health," by Betsey McCaughey, NY Post, Commentary
  • Betsy McCaughey is a former New York lieutenant governor and author of "The Obama Health Law: What It Says and How to Overturn It." betsy@defendyourhealthcare.us
via Lucianne.com

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Sunday, September 26, 2010

More are likely to vote for Tea Party backed candidate than one backed by Obama-CNN

9/26, "The Tea Party is now more powerful than President Obama," UK Telegraph by Nile Gardiner

As CNN puts it:

"A solid majority of all Americans — 56 percent — say that Obama has fallen short of their expectations. As a result, the president is not in a position to help struggling Democratic candidates;

In contrast, half of all likely voters now say they are likely to choose a candidate supported by the conservative Tea Party — contributing to the GOP’s 53 to 44 percent lead when such voters are asked which party’s candidate they will choose in November.""

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Saturday, September 25, 2010

August new home sales second lowest in recorded history-AP

9/24, "Pace of new home sales second slowest on record," AP, Alan Zibel

"New homes sold at the second-slowest pace on record in August, signaling that the housing market will remain a drag on the economy....

Sales were down by 29 percent from the same month a year earlier.

  • Normally the building industry powers economic recoveries.

Each new home built creates, on average, the equivalent of three jobs for a year and generates about $90,000 in taxes, according to the National Association of Home Builders.

  • But housing has been at the center of this downturn and it shows no signs of recovering quickly.

The only time new home sales were slower was in May, when the sales pace was 282,000. That's the worst pace on records dating back to 1963. July's results had been the worst on record, but were adjusted upward.

"This is a pitiful performance but
  • it should not come as a surprise to see sales so weak,"
Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist for High Frequency Economics."...

  • via 106.5fm Mobile, Ala.

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Friday, September 24, 2010

Obama won't provide definition of a 'green job,' though we know US tax dollars funded lots of them outside the US

'Green jobs' include financial advisors, wholesale buyers, newspaper reporters, PR flaks, all to throw Americans off the track that hundreds of millions of their tax money went for nothing.
"Are you a financial adviser? You may not know it, but you've got a green job. Are you a wholesale buyer? You've got a green job, too. Or maybe you're a newspaper reporter. You, too, have a green job -- at least according to the Obama administration.

For months, Republican Sen. Charles Grassley has been pushing the administration to substantiate its claims of having created nearly 200,000 green jobs. More fundamentally, Grassley

  • has asked Labor Secretary Hilda Solis to state clearly what a green job is.
  • So far, he hasn't gotten an answer.

Now, Grassley has learned that, in lieu of a settling on a straightforward definition of a green job, the administration has adopted an extraordinarily broad description of such jobs that could include not only financial advisers, wholesale buyers, and reporters, but

  • also public relations specialists, marketing managers, and many more occupations that have
  • nothing to do with protecting the environment.

If federal money has created any of those jobs, then the administration can claim to have created a green job.

Last June, Grassley sent Solis a letter questioning an administration request for public input on the definition of a green job. Grassley dryly noted that the request came after

  • the government had already spent hundreds of millions of stimulus dollars on green jobs.

Given that the administration couldn't nail down just what a green job is, Grassley asked Solis how she determined

  • where those hundreds of millions of dollars went.
In a statement, the senator says he's a "big supporter" of green jobs. "But the government shouldn't cook the books with how it defines these jobs," he adds.
  • "Taxpayers deserve an honest accounting for the nearly half billion of their dollars being spent on this program. If the government plans to lump reporters, marketing managers, and financial analysts into its definition, then I'm afraid this is yet another area where the administration and the American people just don't see eye to eye."

For the administration, Grassley's discovery is just the latest in a long line of embarrassments on the green jobs front. First there was the controversy surrounding

  • departed green jobs czar Van Jones.

Then there was widespread skepticism about the nearly 200,000 such jobs the administration claims to have created. And then there was the unhappiness on Capitol Hill over reports that of $2.1 billion the government has granted for renewable energy jobs, like assembling wind turbines,

  • about 80 percent has gone to foreign companies. The stimulus has created some actual green jobs,
  • but they're in China.

The promotion of green jobs with stimulus money -- a marriage of the Obama administration's environmental and economic agendas -- has been a top priority for the White House since Day One. It still is. Just last month, Vice President Biden traveled to New Hampshire to tout "good-paying jobs, green jobs, jobs that can't be exported."

It sounds good. But if you look a little closer into the administration's claims, you'll find they literally don't know what they're talking about."






Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Unemployment rises in 27 states, largest number in 6 months, US overall lost 54,000 jobs

9/21, "Unemployment rises in 27 states last month (8/10), the largest number in 6 months" AP, R. S. Rugaber

"Overall, the economy lost a net total of 54,000 positions last month and the unemployment rate ticked up to 9.6 percent from 9.5 percent. Private employers added a net total of only 67,000 jobs....
  • More than half of U.S. states saw their unemployment rates rise in August, the largest number in six months, as hiring weakened across the country.

The jobless rate increased in 27 states last month, the Labor Department said Tuesday. It fell in 13 and was unchanged in 10 states and Washington, D.C.

  • That's worse than the previous month, when the rate increased in only 14 states and fell in 18. It's also the most states to see an increase since February.

The latest report offers a glimpse of a complex employment market that varies from one region to the next.

Western states, struggling with a beleaguered housing sector, are losing jobs and reporting higher unemployment rates. Northeastern states, which generally fared better throughout the downturn, are posting job gains in areas such as finance and hotels and restaurants.

California, Arizona, Nevada and Colorado shed jobs in August and their unemployment rates rose.

  • At the same time, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and New Jersey added jobs and reported lower unemployment rates.

The report comes a day after a nonprofit group of economists declared that the recession ended in June 2009, making it the longest and deepest since World War II. Still, even after 15 months of recovery, the nation's unemployment rate is a painfully high 9.6 percent.

  • That rate disguises some sharp differences.

Overall, the Northeast region's unemployment rate was unchanged in August, at 8.8 percent, the same as it was a year ago. The Western region, meanwhile, has seen its jobless rate rise to 10.8 percent from 10.5 percent a year earlier.

  • For Western states, "nothing really gets better until the housing market stabilizes," said Steve Cochrane, an economist at Moody's Analytics.

The housing market is struggling and years away from a fully recovering from the downturn. Foreclosures spiked in August and are particularly high in several Western states.

  • Nevada posted the highest foreclosure rate last month, with one in every 84 households receiving a foreclosure notice. That's 4.5 times the national average.

Nevada's unemployment rate rose to 14.4 percent,

  • a record high for the state.

Nevada has the nation's highest jobless rate. It overtook Michigan in May.

  • Florida, Arizona, California and Idaho rounded out the top five states for foreclosures.

Meanwhile, Northeastern states like Massachusetts are benefiting from job gains in finance and leisure and hospitality. Massachusetts has posted job gains for seven straight months.

  • More than half of U.S. states saw their unemployment rates rise in August,
  • the largest number in six months.

The jobless rate increased in 27 states, fell in 13 and was unchanged in 10 states and Washington, D.C. That's worse than the previous month, when the rate increased in only 14 states and fell in 18. It's also the most states to see an increase since February.

  • North Dakota posted the lowest jobless rate, 3.7 percent, followed by South Dakota at 4.5 percent and Nebraska at 4.6 percent.

Overall, the economy lost a net total of 54,000 positions last month and the unemployment rate ticked up to 9.6 percent from 9.5 percent. Private employers added a net total of only 67,000 jobs."

  • via 106.5fm, Mobile, Ala.
The entire congress, not to mention President Bush, knew the sub-prime scam was going on and either promoted it or did nothing to stop it. This should be grounds for arrest and possible imprisonment. I understand Soros and a bunch of others were involved, but congress knew. What kind of person would you have to be to knowingly destroy the work and sacrifice of a generation of middle class Americans who never took on unsound mortgages,
  • condemning them to live out their days in poverty?
This is why the Tea Party and independent voters exist. How could they not in the face of these people? ed.

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Context for Bill Maher video referencing a teen-age experience of Christine O'Donnell's now a pr stunt to get her back on his show

9/18/10, "Bill Maher's witch hunt, and the missing context for O'Donnell's remarks, including O'Donnell's response," by Michelle Malkin

"Yes, it’s tired old liberal “comedian” Bill Maher trying to get Senate GOP primary candidate Christine O’Donnell to come on his show by baiting her with a brief video clip in which she mentions having “dabbled” in “witchcraft” and hung around people who practiced it.
  • The left-wing blogs (and a few short-sighted rightie ones) are having a field day. What they all seem to have missed is the context for the discussion. The AP says the “context of what led to the comment is not clear.”

But it is if you paid close attention to the clip:


At 1:03 in the video, one of the panelists on the show

  • criticizes O’Donnell for criticizing Halloween —

Wait a minute, I love this, you’re a witch, you go ‘Halloween is bad,’ I’m not the witch, I mean wait a minute.” She responds by explaining that

she opposes witchcraft because she has had first-hand experience with what they do.

  • So, she tried it. She rejected it. And she learned from it.

Somehow, this Maher-edited clip warrants a declaration from my friend John Hinderaker at Power Line that O’Donnell’s career is “RIP.”

  • Nonsense. She has nothing to be ashamed of — except, perhaps, for going on Maher’s show so many times.

He promises to release 22 more clips until she sits down with him in front of the cameras and brags, in typical TV chauvinist fashion,

  • that he “created her” and that she “owe[s]” him.

Ignore the Hollywood attention troll. Focus on the campaign, the voters of Delaware, and the bearded Marxist opponent who’s

Update: Excellent comeback

Delaware Republican Senate nominee Christine O’Donnell responded to old clips that surfaced over the weekend where she said she had once “dabbled in witchcraft,” clarifying at a GOP picnic in Delaware Sunday,

I was in high school, how many of you didn’t hang out with questionable folks in high school? But no, There’s been no witchcraft since, if there was,


An entrenched Beltway professional politician is gone. The job was never meant to be a lifetime appointment, but congress won't enact term limits for themselves. Castle had to go for other reasons, one of which was his support of cap and trade. This is not an ideological or philosophical issue. If you read about it, you'll find it's the greatest scam perpetrated in history by crooked politicians. Someone new was needed. ed.
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Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Florida Democrat releases Republican candidate Allen West's social security number in mailer



  • Top Ron Klein, the democrat running for re-election in Florida's 22nd congressional district. Bottom, Allen West, the republican running against him.
9/21, Articles I've seen so far sound like mailers for Ron Klein, taking the opportunity of news of the social security breach to make a democrat campaign pitch. Democrats on behalf of Colonel West's opponent Ron Klein sent out a highly sensitive piece of information on a human being, an action that cannot be undone and can cause endless damage to Mr. West and his family. I'll include a link when I find an article that isn't a hit piece on Colonel West disguised as a news story. Klein photo by ap.

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Ground Zero mosque Imam says location was key selling point, cites 'where piece of wreckage fell'

The co-author of this NY Times piece, Sharaf Mowjood, is a former registered lobbyist for the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and has run media training sessions along with Imam Rauf. 9/21/10, "Ground Zero Imam's group trained NY Times Mosque reporter," Newsbusters by A. Goodman

"The building has no sign that hints at its use as a Muslim prayer space, but these modest beginnings point to a far grander vision: an Islamic center near the city’s most hallowed piece of land that would stand as one of ground zero’s more unexpected and striking neighbors.

The location was precisely a key selling point for the group of Muslims who bought the building in July. A presence so close to the World Trade Center, “where a piece of the wreckage fell,” said Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the cleric leading the project, “sends the opposite statement to what happened on 9/11.”

“We want to push back against the extremists,” added Imam Feisal, 61.

Although organizers have sought to avoid publicizing their project because they say plans are too preliminary, it has drawn early encouragement from city officials and the surrounding neighborhood.

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said through a spokesman that Imam Feisal told him of the project last September at a celebration to observe the end of Ramadan. As for whether Mr. Bloomberg supported it, the spokesman, Andrew Brent, said, “If it’s legal, the building owners have a right to do what they want.”

The mayor’s director of the Office of Immigrant Affairs, Fatima Shama, went further. “We as New York Muslims have as much of a commitment to rebuilding New York as anybody,” Ms. Shama said. Imam Feisal’s wife, Daisy Khan, serves on an advisory team for the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, and Lynn Rasic, a spokeswoman for the memorial, said, “The idea of a cultural center that strengthens ties between Muslims and people of all faiths and backgrounds is positive.”

Those who have worked with him say if anyone could pull off what many regard to be a delicate project, it would be Imam Feisal, whom they described as having built a career preaching tolerance and interfaith understanding....

On a recent Friday, worshipers in the old Burlington Coat Factory heard Imam Feisal’s call for spiritual purity during the time of the hajj, the annual pilgrimage to Mecca.

“We like Imam Feisal, the way he presents the philosophy of the true Islam that I call it,” said one of the congregants, Mohammed Abdullah, an investment banker who traveled from Washington for the service.

The location is not designated a mosque, but rather an overflow prayer space for another mosque, Al Farah at 245 West Broadway in TriBeCa, where Imam Feisal is the spiritual leader....

On Sept. 11, the store, with 80 employees, was one of 250 Burlington outlets nationwide owned by the Milstein family. That morning, recalled Stephen Milstein, the company’s former general manager and vice president, the staff was in the basement when

a piece of a plane plunged through the roof,

either from American Airlines Flight 11 crashing into the north tower at 8:46 a.m., or United Airlines Flight 175 crashing into the south tower at 9:03.

Kukiko Mitani, whose husband, Stephen Pomerantz, owned the building at the time, tried to sell it for years, at one time asking $18 million. But when the recession hit, she sold it in July to a real estate investment firm, Soho Properties, for $4.85 million in cash, records show.

One of the investors was the Cordoba Initiative, an interfaith group founded by Imam Feisal....

The patched-up roof was easily visible on a recent tour of the building, along with evidence of its sudden evacuation: food bags still in a fifth-floor staff refrigerator and, most eerily, a log sheet for the testing of the emergency alarm system that shows a sign-in signature for 9/11 but no sign-out.

Records kept by the city’s Department of Buildings show anonymous complaints for illegal construction and blocked exits at the site. Inspectors tried to check but were unable to gain access, so the complaints, though still open, were listed as “resolved” under city procedures, according to an agency spokeswoman, Carly Sullivan.

But worshipers are legally occupying the building, where retail space is offered for lease, once a week under temporary permits of assembly through December, Ms. Sullivan said."...

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Monday, September 20, 2010

BarackObama.com hate group bussed in to RightNation.com rally Sept. 18, couldn't explain what they hated but shout a 'gay' slur at Breitbart

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Organizing for America/BarackObama.com members carry 'hate' signs (OFA logo visible) and call Breitbart 'gay' after being bussed in to Saturday September 18th's RightNation rally near Chicago. Near the end of the video a woman admits to Breitbart she was there because of Organizing for America, which is also BarackObama.com.
  • Breitbart asks some of those holding 'hate' signs what in particular they object to. None of them could answer the question, and the group eventually walked away. One is heard to say Breitbart sounds 'gay' by the "way he talks."
  • For all to hear, divisive hate speech on the part of Obama ralliers.
via BigGovernment.com, via RedState.com

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Sean Hannity doubles down giving Gingrich a forum; Batchelor says Gingrich is called "Fat Elvis" and uses his power with Fox News to threaten congress

UPDATE, 1/22/12: Re: Newt Gingrich: If it's Obama or Gingrich of course I choose Gingrich. Pamela Geller describes it: "He's a son of a bitch, but he's our son of a bitch." Romney was hell bent on losing, would not bend. A carbon copy of McCain who never wanted to win, told us to shut up, that Obama would be fine. Such a person should of course not be a presidential candidate. ed.

1/21/12, "Newt Gingrich Wins. What It Means." Erick Erickson, RedState.com

"Newt Gingrich’s rise has a lot to do with Newt Gingrich’s debate performance. But it has just as much to do with a party base in revolt against its thought and party leaders in Washington, DC. The base is revolting because they swept the GOP back into relevance in Washington just under two years ago and they have been thanked
  • with contempt ever since.

Adding insult to injury, the party and thought leaders now try to foist on the base a milquetoast moderate from Massachusetts. Newt Gingrich can thank Mitt Romney and more for the second look he is getting. Base hostility will now be exacerbated by Mitt Romney’s backers now undoubtedly making a conscious effort to prop up Rick Santorum to shut down Newt Gingrich."

---------------------------

Monday, 9/20/10: Without Sean Hannity, Gingrich would long since have passed out of our awareness. Gingrich is a clown, a phony, and an aid to the left. Hannity apparently has the establishment mentality that says, I can do whatever I want, I know better than the people. I long ago stopped listening to his radio show, but accidentally heard the opening of the 5pm hour today featuring none other than Gingrich. Some people will never get it. ed.

UPDATE: John Batchelor wrote of Gingrich, the "Fat Elvis," and expanded on the topic via Mr. Batchelor's appearance on Tuesday morning's Dom Imus show.
  • Batchelor said Gingrich harasses congressional members, many of whom have no idea who he is and why he's bothering them. One or more members told Batchelor that Gingrich tells some if they don't do what he wants,
he'll go on FOX News and talk trash about them. Paraphrasing John, Gingrich uses television as a weapon. Today Gingrich the fraud is given a front page post on RedState.com (which I'm not going to link to).
  • Long live the delusional, media addicted, establishment elite who silently watched Soros ascend to the Oval Office and the destruction of America, right?
Who in their right mind would do anything but run like hell away from such people?

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Many small banks failing, TARP mainly bailed out Wall Street-Elizabeth Warren, AP

"To the list of economic woes squeezing small banks, add another one: government bailouts.

The Treasury Department's bailout program was designed with Wall Street megabanks in mind, according to a new report from a congressional watchdog. The "one-size-fits-all" program may actually be hurting small banks that are struggling to repay the money or even deliver quarterly dividend payments, the report says.

The main bank bailout program anticipated banks springing back from the crisis and raising fresh funds to repay the government, the report says.
  • That's exactly what happened to most of the big banks that took the most bailout money. Yet small banks continue to struggle, dragged down by souring loans for commercial real estate and high unemployment.
Hundreds more small banks are expected to fail by the end of next year.

The 690 small banks that took bailout money are even worse off,
  • according to a report Wednesday from the Congressional Oversight Panel, which monitors the $700 billion financial bailout.
Already, one in seven has failed to pay a quarterly dividend due to Treasury. They can't afford the payments, which will nearly double in 2013.
  • Treasury spokesman Mark Paustenbach disputed the findings, saying in a statement that the bailouts helped many of the banks "weather the storm and continue to extend credit in the economy."
But the bailouts' costs are troubling because of small banks' crucial role in lending to small businesses and supporting economic recovery,
  • said Elizabeth Warren, who chairs the panel.
The program "was not intended as a bailout for Wall Street," said Warren, who also is a professor at Harvard Law School.
  • "It was intended to support ... homeownership, retirement savings and banks across the country."
Warren said the bailout bill, known as the Trouble Asset Relief Program, did stabilize the financial system. But she said that was only one of the program's goals. She said efforts to boost lending and support consumers have been less successful.
  • "There is very little evidence to suggest that the (bailouts) led small banks to increase lending," the report says.
In the end, that could mean that the biggest banks get even bigger, the report says. Dozens or hundreds of bailed-out banks could collapse or consolidate because they can't afford their obligations to taxpayers, it says. That would leave the handful of biggest banks with an even larger share of the banking system.
  • "The result could be that 'too big to fail' banks grow even bigger," Warren said.
The Congressional Oversight Panel was created by Congress to report on whether the bailouts are meeting their goals.
  • The law also requires regular audits by the Government Accountability Office and creates a special inspector general to investigate
  • fraud and other problems. "
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Sunday, September 19, 2010

Time lapse video of 9/12/09 rally in Washington, DC

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As someone said, these people may be polite, but they are as serious as a heart attack. All that happened is they found out they'd been fooled and lied to. They're supposed to sit there the rest of their lives with this news?

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BP denied Alabama's oil spill claim, which state says will cause it to cut education funding.

No sign of the $20 billion Obama said he got from BP.
"BP Plc has turned down Alabama's claim for $148 million in lost government revenue due to the worst oil spill in U.S. history, the state's attorney general, Troy King, said on Friday.


BP denied the claim because it said there was ongoing litigation but in fact the energy giant was "playing games" with Alabama and other states on the Gulf of Mexico coast, King said in an interview.

"They are playing games in my opinion.

BP is taking advantage of the fact that states are in a budget crisis and they are doing a masterful job," King said.

"They (BP) said they wouldn't discuss it (the claim) because there is litigation.


There was no immediate comment from BP.

King's comments form part of a growing dispute over how states, individuals and businesses in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida should be compensated for losses suffered as a result of the spill.

BP has set up a $20 billion compensation fund administered by lawyer Kenneth Feinberg to handle claims but a plethora of lawsuits have also been filed against the company.

Alabama's losses stem from diminished sales, lodging and fuel tax revenues as tourists avoided the state's coast this summer because of the spill that spewed millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf between April and July.

The well is due to be finally killed this weekend.

DISPUTE

Total losses will eventually amount to much more than $148 million and, when compared with calculations other coastal states made about their own losses, Alabama's claim was inadequate, said King.

King claimed damages in August from BP in a lawsuit that will be added to the multi-district litigation that has been consolidated in federal court in New Orleans, he said.

But King's decision over the suit sparked a clash with Alabama Governor Bob Riley who disputes the need for litigation at this point as a means to rectify the state's losse

In claiming damages, "Governor Riley embarked on a process that was doomed to fail. I don't know why anybody is surprised that BP strung him along and refused to pay his claim," King said.

For his part, Riley blamed King's lawsuit for BP's decision on Thursday to turn down the claim and said that as a direct consequence

he was forced to increase proration for the education budget by 2 percent.
  • Some $116 million of the $148 million claimed was earmarked for the state's Education Trust Fund in order to prevent the need for $113 million in spending cuts, but now those cuts would take place, Riley said.
"If that lawsuit hadn't paralyzed our negotiations, we wouldn't have to make these additional cuts to education funding," said Riley in a statement."
  • "One man made a brash, reckless decision to sue BP while the state was still working to recover lost tax revenue from the company," Riley said.

    Even so, BP should have lived up to its obligation as the responsible party despite the lawsuit, said Riley, who added that while a lawsuit against BP was premature it should remain an option for possible future use." via Drudge Report



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Friday, September 17, 2010

Paris Imam creates 'mosque in a box'-BBC

"Muslims in Paris who find themselves too busy to pray have been given a new option, thanks to a Tunisian businessman.

  • Hassmem Bounachma, who is also the Imam at a large Parisian mosque, says his three-panelled

"mosque in a box" provides an ideal but convenient place for the kind of contemplation required in prayer."

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Thursday, September 16, 2010

Latest Spengler

9/14, Spengler, "It is a misperception that America is the main object of Muslim rage.
  • Most Muslim rage is directed against other Muslims.
Religious violence perpetrated by Muslims against other Muslims is a routine feature of life in Pakistan, Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Lebanon and Afghanistan. Of the 1,868 acts of religious violence listed by the Global Terrorism Database, all but a handful were conducted by Muslims on Muslims. America has done its best to suppress such violence. What if America (or Russia, or India, or China) were to incite it?
  • The Islamic world's claim on Western attention rests on its propensity to fail.
  • America has spent a trillion dollars and 5,700 lives to prop up notionally pro-American regimes in Iraq and Afghanistan, not to mention $2 billion a year to Egypt, and several hundred million each to Jordan and the Palestinian Authority, as well as smaller sums to other Muslim countries.
America will continue its efforts to stabilize fractious Islamic lands for the foreseeable future. Obama holds a personal as well as an ideological commitment to foster friendship with the Muslim world, and the Republicans will not admit that they were mistaken to commit so much blood and treasure to nation-building in Afghanistan and Iraq.
  • But America's attitude might change. Iraq may descend into civil war, especially now that the Americans have armed and trained 100,000 Sunni fighters in the so-called Sunni Awakening, Petraeus' "rent-an-Arab" strategy to contain communal violence until American troops could leave. ..."
There are so many ways in which the (mid east) region might descend into religious conflict that it is pointless to make book on the scenarios. In another location I suggested that Weapons are there to be used, and theological weapons may turn out to be some of the nastiest means of war-fighting at hand."

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Journalists step up political donations in current election cycle-OpenSecrets.org

9/14/10, "Journalists, media professionals, donating frequently to federal political candidates this election cycle," OpenSecrets.org, by M. Wilson

  • via Poynter.org/Romenesko

Health insurers seek immediate rate hikes of over 20% in Connecticut

9/15, "Health insurers are asking for immediate rate hikes of more than 20 percent in Connecticut for some plans, citing rising medical costs and federal health reform laws as reasons."...
via Drudge Report

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Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Feminine feelings key to advancing global warming agenda, white males into feelings before facts help-study

  • Merely saying one 'cares,' no matter the facts or anything else, makes one better and entitled to drown out opposing views. ed
9/15, "US women are more likely to accept climate science than men, study says," Guardian UK, posted by L. Hickman

"Men still claim they have a better understanding of global warming than women, even though women's beliefs align much more closely with the scientific consensus," he said. McCright added that the gender divide is likely to be explained by "gender socialisation": boys learn that masculinity emphasises detachment, control and mastery,

  • whereas girls develop traits of attachment, empathy and care. It's these latter qualities which McCright believes makes
  • women more likely to "feel concern about the potential dire consequences of global warming".

After analysing the Gallop data, he found:

Women express more concern about climate change than men do. A greater percentage of women than men worry about global warming a great deal (35% to 29%), believe global warming will threaten their way of life during their lifetime (37% to 28%), and believe the seriousness of global warming is underestimated in the news (35% to 28%).

The conclusions of the paper are interesting given just how "male" the climate debate can appear at times. Female voices in this arena are noteworthy, in part, because they are so rare. I suppose it could also be noted that the

  • climate debate is dominated by white, middle-class English-speakers....

One extra pause for thought in McCright's paper is provided in the final paragraph:

Perhaps, as some suggest (e.g., Smith 2001), gender is not as important for explaining environmental concern as is

  • a feminist orientation.

Somma and Tolleson-Rinehart (1997) find that individuals –

  • both women and men – who support feminist goals express greater environmental concern.

Thus, future research should prioritise the use of more refined measures of gender and perhaps examine

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via Climate Depot


Monday, September 13, 2010

Taxpayers of City of New York used to advance the global warming industry

Mayor Bloomberg compares global warming to terrorism, says it has the potential to kill everyone, 2/11/08. Bloomberg has a global warming investment company, New Energy Finance.
1. Climate Week NYC 9/20-9/26 to convene alongside UN General Assembly meeting,

"Less than seventy days before the United Nations’ climate summit in Cancun
  • New York City will once again be the epicenter of the climate action dialogue: Climate Week NY˚C
will bring together The United Nations, The City of New York, the UN Foundation, The Carbon Disclosure Project and an array of international business,"...
3. Bloomberg's global warming investment arm, New Energy Finance, is working with the UN on financial advice for global warming investments.


http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_nMLR3Feb9RM/TBbLrMSJWCI/AAAAAAAAFBI/cDuQE0Y15Oo/s1600/mayorbloombergfeb122008gothamistunglobalwarmingterror.jpg

NYC Mayor Bloomberg in clover, addressing "global warming" at the UN in 2008, photo gothamist

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I'm the daughter of a World War II Air Force pilot and outdoorsman who settled in New Jersey.