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Democracy for America personal blog for Annilow
Don't send me no stinkin' stimulus rebate...
I like money as well as the next guy. But I don’t see the point of spending a ton of non existent money to press the bureaucratic machine into service to send us all a little pittance of more nonexistent money. Actually I DO see the point. The point is, if they send us all a little something in our envelopes right before the November elections, we will be kind to them at that time. That is, we will put the same old, tired old, lobbyist friendly, business as usual, kiss up to big Pharma, intellectually lazy, integrity challenged, bunch of lazy sons and daughters of privilege back to the swamp that is Washington, DC.
You see, these folks are trying to hold on to jobs. Perhaps you personally have had experience with this; I certainly have. We want to hold on to our jobs because our jobs, however stinky and distasteful, produce a paycheck. Not only do they produce paychecks, they produce bennies! Long vacations! EXCELLENT health and dental and hospitalization insurance. Probably pensions. And 401Ks. Who wouldn’t want a job like that!
Well, I say, I don’t want no stinkin’ stimulus rebate born of their desire to soothe me back to sleep in my recliner to watch American Idol and Dancing with the Stars. I don’t want no stinkin’ stimulus rebate to put my grandnieces and nephews even further into debt long after I’m gone.
No. No stimulus package.
You know what I want?
A new Congressperson! Two new Senators! A brand new group of people who DON’T know the ropes in the Washington, DC swamp, so they can’t do the same old tired shenanigans to get themselves rich while we fritter away what little money we have on gas and grocery prices, outrageous insurance premiums, pitiful return on meager investments thanks to cut after cut in interest rates. So I say
NO to the stinkin’ stimulus package.
YES to new Congress people.
VOTE NO INCUMBENT IN NOVEMBER!!
Howard and the DNC rules are first (team Billary, trying to break the rules by seating the MI and FL delegates, are last).
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080127/ap_on_el_pr/obama_kennedy_4
Kennedy to endorse Obama, officials say
By CHARLES BABINGTON, Associated Press Writer
8 minutes ago
MACON, Ga. - Democratic Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts will endorse Senate colleague Barack Obama for president, party officials confirmed Sunday.
The endorsement will be announced Monday in Washington
...
An official close to the senator said the announcement will be made during an Obama campaign rally at American University, where he will be joined by Sen. Kennedy and his niece, Caroline Kennedy, who also has endorsed Obama.
...
Caroline ...
"I have never had a president who inspired me the way people tell me that my father inspired them," she wrote. "But for the first time, I believe I have found the man who could be that president — not just for me, but for a new generation of Americans."
at the bottom of the last thread...
If HC wants to win, she will have to get Bubba a playmate to get him out of the limelight.
The only way the delegates from Michigan and Florida should be seated at the convention is by making them all undecided delegates. I would like Howard to tell them to stay home because they deliberately violated the primary rules. However, a way to mitigate this and let both populous states participate in the process is make all the delegates free agents.
By CAROLINE KENNEDYPublished: January 27, 2008
OVER the years, I’ve been deeply moved by the people who’ve told me they wished they could feel inspired and hopeful about America the way people did when my father was president. This sense is even more profound today. That is why I am supporting a presidential candidate in the Democratic primaries, Barack Obama.
My reasons are patriotic, political and personal, and the three are intertwined. All my life, people have told me that my father changed their lives, that they got involved in public service or politics because he asked them to. And the generation he inspired has passed that spirit on to its children. I meet young people who were born long after John F. Kennedy was president, yet who ask me how to live out his ideals.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/27/opinion/27kennedy.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin
If HC wants to win, she will have to get Bubba a playmate to get him out of the limelight.
Comments like this are just about as low as the ones about Obama's color and religion. Stick to the issues and the records because the rest is just regurgitated garbage implanted in simple minds by professional propagandists.
Well, my governor Deval Patrick and my two U.S. Senators Kerry and Kennedy have endorsed Obama.
Now, I just got to work on my US Congressman Barney Frank to switch from supporting team Billary to Obama instead.
(South Shore, Cape and the Islands US Congressman William Delahunt, the first MA rep to speak up against the war in Iraq, is supporting Obama.)
Thankful and I watched Heath Eiden's Grassroots movie in Burlington VT today. www.thegrassrootsmovie.com
My report on it is over on Howard Empowered:
Just posted and it popped in as post 4. Sheesh! Should have included the time, which is now 4:22pm eastern. I hope this glitch gets fixed soon.
However, a way to mitigate this and let both populous states participate in the process is make all the delegates free agents.
That would make them Uberdelegates who could also sell their votes to the highest bidder.
4:24pm, EST
May I suggest...
It could help chronological comprehension on the blog if folks post the time at the TOP of their message. Thanks.
Mccain on CSPAN with Lieberman....................pretty scary stuff he is saying...amazing this is America....................
4:33 PM EST change is in the air:
http://www.charleston.net/news/2008/jan/27/blowoutobama_wins_nearly_all_demographic28866/
Obama wins in nearly all demographicsBy Robert Behre (Contact)The Post and CourierSunday, January 27, 2008...Obama's rout was across the board. Not only did he win 44 of the state's 46 counties, but he captured virtually every demographic, including women, men and young, middle-aged and elderly voters, all this according to CNN exit poll data....
Obama's success came partly because his historic stature as the first black frontrunner for the U.S. presidency resonated with the state's black residents, who were expected to make up half of Saturday's Democratic electorate.
But it also came because he eschewed the state's traditional black political establishment — an establishment that leaned heavily toward Clinton — and built his own grassroots machine.
...
"I think irrespective of how this campaign comes out, I don't think this country will ever be the same," U.S. House Majority Whip James Clyburn, D-S.C., predicted during a recent visit to Charleston.
...
4:35 PM ET
This was in my email from Charlie Chamberlain - I felt guilty about griping about the blog so much so I kicked in $25. I hope they spend a bit of it on fixing the blog. In the meantime there's also action to take. Let's stop telecom immunity.
Dear Ann,
I need your help to turn up the heat. Senators Clinton and Obama must lead America forward instead of protecting President Bush and his friends at AT&T and Verizon. This critical vote is scheduled for Monday at 4:30 pm.
Please take a moment right now and contact MSNBC's Keith Olbermann, one of the strongest media voices in opposition to President Bush's reckless abuses of power, and ask him to cover the telecom fight tomorrow.
Tell Keith how you feel, send him the link to the NYTimes ad, and ask him to interview Jim live before the vote Monday night.
Here's the ad link:
www.DemocracyforAmerica.com/ProveIt
Here's Olbermann's contact email:
countdown@msnbc.com
President Bush and Vice President Cheney are counting on the media silence to let Republicans win. They both know this is the American people's last chance to hold the Bush administration accountable for warrantless wiretapping of innocent Americans.
Keith Olbermann and MSNBC could help Jim shine a national spotlight on this incredibly important issue and turn up the heat on our Democratic leaders to stand up, fight the Bush administration, and win.
Please send your email to Keith right now.
When you're done, please contribute to DFA to help offset the cost of our New York Times media buy. Your $20 right now helps to fund our aggressive actions in support of progressive values:
www.DemocracyforAmerica.com/SupportAction
I sent this message to you today because you are one of our more active members. I know I can depend on you to take action.
Thank you for everything you do.
-Charles
*****************************************************
'one of our more active members' LOL prolly one of the more vocal members :~)
There's a headline on Yahoo says Hill will campaign in FL:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080127/ap_o...
Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton said Sunday she will go to Florida to assure Democrats that "their voices are heard" and to underscore her commitment to seeing the state's delegation seated at the national convention.
For the Clintons, the "(D)" after the name now stands for DESPERATE.
1:50 pm left coast
this in my email
**********************
I need your help to turn up the heat. Senators Clinton and Obama must lead America forward instead of protecting President Bush and his friends at AT&T and Verizon. This critical vote is scheduled for Monday at 4:30 pm.
Please take a moment right now and contact MSNBC's Keith Olbermann, one of the strongest media voices in opposition to President Bush's reckless abuses of power, and ask him to cover the telecom fight tomorrow.
Tell Keith how you feel, send him the link to the NYTimes ad, and ask him to interview Jim live before the vote Monday night.
Here's the ad link:
www.DemocracyforAmerica.com/ProveIt
Here's Olbermann's contact email:
countdown@msnbc.com
President Bush and Vice President Cheney are counting on the media silence to let Republicans win. They both know this is the American people's last chance to hold the Bush administration accountable for warrantless wiretapping of innocent Americans.
Keith Olbermann and MSNBC could help Jim shine a national spotlight on this incredibly important issue and turn up the heat on our Democratic leaders to stand up, fight the Bush administration, and win.
Please send your email to Keith right now.
When you're done, please contribute to DFA to help offset the cost of our New York Times media buy. Your $20 right now helps to fund our aggressive actions in support of progressive values:
www.DemocracyforAmerica.com/SupportAction
If Hillary campaigns in Florida should be stripped of all the delegates she has won so far.
3:53 CST
1:55 pm
I just wrote to Keith; I called my senators Friday and will call again tomorrow. Smith is prolly a lost cause, but I'll threaten to throw him out on his patootie again...in a nice way of course. :-)
audrey wrote "I don't remember Ted Kennedy endorsing Howard. I appreciate Ted when he votes progressive, but he is DLC all the way."
This is a news blast of epic proportions. Still, to be accurate, it's necessary to believe that Kennedy will endorse Clinton, a DLC officer, rather than Obama, who is unaffiliated with the organization.
5:05 EST
I do not the source of this discussion about the financial crisis.
At least five distinct regulatory failures led to the current crisis.
* Regulatory Failure Number One: Failure to Manage the U.S. Trade Deficit. The housing bubble (as well as the surge in leveraged buyouts of publicly traded companies ("private equity")) was fueled by cheap credit -- low interest rates. One reason for the cheap credit was an influx of capital into the United States from China. China's capital surplus was the mirror image of the U.S. trade deficit -- U.S. corporations were sending lots of dollars to China in exchange for the cheap stuff sold to U.S. consumers.
*Regulatory Failure Number Two: Failure to Intervene to Pop the Housing Bubble. Along with an influx of capital, Federal Reserve policy kept interest rates very low. There were good reasons for the Fed Policy, but that did not mean the Fed was helpless to prevent the housing bubble. As economists Dean Baker and Mark Weisbrot of the Center for Economic and Policy Research insisted at the time, Federal Reserve Chair Alan Greenspan simply by identifying the bubble -- and adjusting public perception of the future of the housing market -- could have prevented or at least contained the bubble. He declined, and even denied the existence of a bubble.
*Regulatory Failure Number Three: Financial Deregulation and Unchecked Financial "Innovation." A key reason that mortgages were made available so widely and with such little review of recipients' qualifications was a shift in which institutions hold the mortgages. Traditionally, banks made mortgages and held them. In the new era, banks and non-bank mortgage lenders made loans, but then sold the loans to others. Investment banks packaged lots of mortgage loans into "Collateralized Debt Obligations" (CDOs) and then sold them on Wall Street, with a promise of a steady stream of revenue from interest payments. These operations were pretty much unregulated. Despite the supposed sophistication of the investors involved, no one took account of how shoddy the loans were or -- more fundamentally -- the certainty that huge numbers would go bad if and when the housing bubble popped.
*Regulatory Failure Number Four: Private Regulatory Failure. It was the job of ratings agencies (like Standard and Poor's, and Moody's) to assess the CDOs and give investors guidance on how risky they were. They failed totally, likely in part because they wanted to maintain good relations with the investment banks issuing the CDOs.
* Regulatory Failure Number Five: No Controls Over Predatory Lenders. The toxic stew of financial deregulation and the housing bubble created the circumstances in which aggressive lenders were nearly certain to abuse vulnerable borrowers. The terms of your loan don't matter, they effectively purred to borrowers, so long as the value of your house is going up. Lenders duped borrowers into conditions they could not possibly satisfy, making the current rash of foreclosures on subprime loans inevitable. Effective regulation of lending practices could have prevented the abusive loans, but none was to be found.
Robert Reich again...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/012608...
[snip]
So the first questions is will the stimulus be targeted to them or will it be frittered away in tax breaks for the upper-middle class and for investors. Secondly, the money has to be in people's pockets right away, not eight or nine months from now in the form of a tax rebate from the IRS. The only surefire way to do that is to reduce withholding in payroll taxes, since 80 percent of Americans pay more in payroll tax than they do in income tax. Thirdly, the money has to be enough to change people's behavior. Five hundred dollars isn't likely to do the trick. I see far more politics in this than economics. Washington has to look like it's doing something, and so it will.
5:12
5:21,
Some Dems like a "fight". They think it is ""rovian".
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2008/01250...
[snip]
These Democrats ridicule what they call Obama’s “kumbayah” strategy of trying to achieve some form of unity among America’s bitterly divided political factions. The mocking reference to “kumbayah” relates to the campfire song derived from an old African spiritual.
Obama’s “kumbayah” is dismissed as either hopelessly naďve or disingenuous.
Some of these hard-bitten Democrats, who now are rallying behind Hillary Clinton, also say they suspect that Obama is a “closet DLCer,” a reference to the centrist Democratic Leadership Conference, where ironically Bill Clinton was chairman for two years.
5:25
The kids are on to Rove.
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/01/25/stud...
5:31
A lot fo good articles.
For McCain to win, he needs a strong Conservative so that leaves out Lieberman.
http://www.thedemocraticstrategist.org/
5:36
You're right, Annilow, I don't want a rebate either. We do not need to buy any more "stuff."
Blog is still jumpy. And now I'm on my linux box using Opera, which is working quite well. That is, I can hit submit and it does. But, who knows where it ends up?
Well, at least when you refresh, it brings you to where it put your comment. LOL
McCain is a complete nut-job. He'll pick up where Bush left off and try to keep everyone scared while completely bankrupting the country.
6:07pm
Democrats deserve to lose both houses in November after their disgusting performance in the 110th. I just hope they lose mainly to indies, who will then hold the balance of power.
6:09pm
Hi Folks,
Couldn't help thinking of the last time we had inspiring politicians: JFK, my whole generation knows where we were when we heard he'd been shot. The supermarkt in Ann Arbor, Michigan became a tableau with no one moving, utter silence as the radio rasped the news.
Then Seashell calling me at 5 AM saying that RFK had been shot.
Then Martin Luther King.
And now we have the possibility of another young man, orator, inspirational, honest, willing to lead, and I tremble.
4:14 pm Mountain time, 6: 14 Eastern Standard
failure number one was so coveting the Chinese market that they were allowed to tilt the trading with currency manipulation
failure number two was trying to compete with the bad money by allowing the dollar to sink with artificially low interest rates which lead to in part the housing bubble, but also high oil prices
failure number three was tax law changes which allowed private money to be aggregated at artificially low tax rates such that the regulatory scheme did not apply
failure number four was tax loopholes allowing money to go untaxed if it left the country doubling the deficit increasing the acceleration of the dollar value decline
failure number five was allowing the Bush tax cuts continue to tilt the table against working people under wage pressure due to the unfair Chinese competiton and trade laws and for them to lose their historic share of productivity gains during expansion of the economy
failure number six not aggressively working for energy conservation to stem the inflationary squeeze of higher energy prices to co-exist with the downward pressures of the manipulated currency induced trading inbalance and job losses
in otherwords a downward spiral gone un-noticed because of the cooked books that gave a priviledged few a rosy scenario of pretend wealth
Hobson's Choice
http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_rafe_pil_080127_primary_fiasco.htm
We cannot now afford any treacherous connection to our future by the Republicans, who are really just incapable of totally sloughing off their criminality of the last seven years, and perhaps that since the first of the Reagan years. And it is evident now -- especially after being returned as the majority in both houses -- that the Democrats lack the spine and the integrity to deny themselves the prizes of greed and naked power should they prevail in the presidential sweepstakes (good word, that, this next election being perhaps the biggest political gamble in our history; then again perhaps not even a gamble when one realizes that decent and intelligent Americans don't have a solid horse to mount in this TV glitzified fiasco
6:16pm
the
http://www.the-grassroots.com/
got Patrick elected as govenor and the same, I hope, will get Obama elected as president
the tax rebate
we know you were robbed
if we give you half the loot back will you drop the charges
McCain/Huckabee is their strongest ticket.
I'll try once more. Just a thought. When Bill Clinton was President, it seemed that the Right Wing hounded him from the day he stepped into Office. I blamed the Right Wing for all the polarization and vituperation.
Now, after watching Hillary and Bill these past weeks, and watching them when Howard Dean was running, I'm not so sure they didn't contribute to the polarization. If Hillary could co-sponsor a flag burning resolution, she surely could have found ways to bring in the conservative and centrist Republicans with some commonalities and values we share.
I'm beginning to think that the Clintons are polarizers and are part of this whole problem of attack, distort, manipulate, and dominate. We'll see.
Off, as the blog is in time travel mode.
6:30 Easter Standard time
Edwards Leads Obama Among LA Progressives; Clinton, Kucinich Trail By Dick Price and Sharon Kyle
21 January 2008
How much confidence should we place in the outcome of a political poll? We don’t know. Judging from what we witnessed in the New Hampshire Democratic Presidential Primary, polls aren’t just unreliable, they can be misleading. But having said that, nearly 500 of you participated in a survey we conducted during the week of January 13 to 20. The survey closed minutes ago and, as promised, we are providing the results.
For context, during the same week as our poll, the Los Angeles Times, CNN, and Politico published an Opinion Research Corporation poll that showed Senator Hillary Clinton enjoying a strong lead among California Democrats. Our survey shows a very different trend. But before we get into the numbers, a brief disclaimer: Dick and Sharon are not professional pollsters. We simply sent out a questionnaire and collected the responses. By providing the respondents with the output, we let you do your own analysis.
How It Played Out
...The nature of our readership and our approach in conducting this survey make it difficult to extrapolate these results for the upcoming California primary on February 5th, but several results are telling beyond the order of the finishers. In particular, the survey confirms that Hillary Clinton draws a disproportionately high negative response even among Democrats, with nearly 20% saying they would not support her campaign in the general election. Her two closest competitors nationally, Obama and Edwards, draw much smaller unfavorable responses. ... For full article and survey results: http://www.northeastdemocrats.org/news.p...
37,
Not sure I agree with you on everything...
Number 1: You are correct because the Chinese use their economic muscle wisely and for their long-term benefit. If you want to sell there, then you have to build there. One building is done there, they can swap labor for goods.
Number 2: If your goal is to arbitrage labor then you need low interest rates to make the swap of labor for goods. The high oil prices may have been caused just as much by high Chinese and India demand. China has turned to Africa for raw materials and cheap labor.
Number 3 was a complete failure of the banking oversight system. The original thought in using these instruments, was they would not be a large part of a bank’s risky portfolio. However, they became so lucrative in the short term that everyone looked away. In fact, BushCo encouraged these loans because it allowed everyone to buy a home; regardless of financial position. I can where rampant greed screwed it up. For years, we have been trying to get banks to issue these types of loans for small businesses but the problem was always high risk and high insurance costs.
Number 4 and 5: You are correct about allowing money to leave untaxed. In fact, this is where the Bush tax cut money went - not to invest here - but invest offshore. This started long before BushCo as this was a major issue with Bush1’s economic policies. The amount of moving to offshore banks and then to other economies; and even back to our own is huge. There are shelter banks in using tiny Pacific atolls for safe haven money destination. It is funneled all over the world. This is not likely to change, as even though there are two parties, there is one Establishment.
Number 6: All marketing and financial people know the first one in a new market dominates it for years. While we have been fighting disastrous wars, Europe is dominating green energy markets. We wanted Bubba to step up in this area. As the IT craze was winding now, we were looking for the next thing. That next thing was energy conservation and devices. Even as governor, Bush was supporting renewable energy. However, Clinton had other priorities (a certain women in a blue dress), and the push for renewable energy died.
See those great giant wind turbines? Chances are they are made in Germany.
6:43...and good night
no offense John but ...
other than one seat in Vermont is there anyone out there that knows of a single seat that might go to an Independent
we are stuck with making our fights the Democratic primary fights for the time being
in fact the All Star voting gives us a wealth of choices
and Donna Edwards comes to mind
FDL already beat 'ya to it, DFA.
Or here (last night's thread).
Get SoapBlox (or WordPress)--both are robust, vs. this piece of useless crap (speaking of an unwillingness to "change")...four yrs. ago. I refuse to manually timestamp (enable), BTW.
Fix the damned thang.
I read FEC reports, & stonewalling isn't for a lack of staffing or $$$$.
Ted K. endorsed sKerry before the Maine caucus (@Momma B's restaurant, Bangor--owned by Gov. Baldacci's clan) & NH primary in '04, folks.
We pulled 26% for Dean (minus 30 degree weather)--sans zero ads/endorsements/freakin' buttons or bumpah stickuuhs. Beyond shameful....
All resources were in NH; & the "bats" went to WI (which pulled diddly squat, re: viability--too late by then).
42,
McCain\Huckabee beats Hillary\anyone.
Huckabee gives McCain his conservative credentials and if McCain desides not to run in 2012, Huckabee is in the perfect spot to carry on.
So, if HC wins, Dems could be shut out of the WH for the next 12 years.
See those great giant wind turbines? Chances are they are made in Germany.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
made in Iowa for a German Company now, they are pretty hard to ship
6:53
so Bush gave away a trillion dollar tax cut, the Chinese come in and finance our war, we seize the world's largest oil reserve and don't think the Chinese can claim it anytime they want without firing a shot?
an 80 year old McCain in the White House is a scary thought; thanks for the optimism of a Huckabee hand off in four years, heaven help us if we can't beat him though
the odds of Hillary running against anyone have dropped quite a bit though so I won't worry about a President McCain because Obama or Edwards can beat him
7:09...dinner calling
49,
Four things:
1 - Oil is fungeable which means ME oil is the same as African oil.
2 - Russian oil is different. It is far superior to ME oil because isis a refined product. The stuff is very high quality. The problem is their distribution system is horrific. They probably loose as much as they refine.
3 - We may have the Iraq oil wells now, but we won't be able to keep them.
4 - As soon as the US dollar is no longer the reserved currency, and it won't be if interest rates continue to fall, then things will get much worse very, very quickly.
-
By Jeff Morris on Jan 26, 2008 11:56 PM ESTI second that! They just keep borrowing and borrowing, like there's no tomorrow. After seven years of the Bush administration, and a year to go yet, I'm not so sure there will be a tomorrow for America! The debt that is going to be paid by our childrens children, and possibly their children too is truly obscene.