Jack & Jill Politics

you must watch O'Donnell take on Liz Cheney....this tape must be kept

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036677/#33557704

Hung Out to Dry: One Former VP Chief of Staff
By: emptywheel Saturday October 31, 2009 12:29 pm


HangingScooterOutToDry

If I were Scooter Libby right now, I’d be seething. I’d be utterly disgusted with the way Dick Cheney hung me out to dry, over and over and over, in his interview with Fitzgerald. Cheney denies any knowledge of issues he and Libby worked on together repeatedly and he denies that his own orders and instructions had anything to do with activities that ultimately (though Cheney of course didn’t admit this) ended up outing Valerie Wilson.

There are three general categories of information about which Cheney hangs Libby out to dry.

These are:

Oppo research conducted during week of June 9, 2003

While not asked directly, Cheney pretended to know nothing about Libby being tasked to collect information on the Wilsons starting the week June 9, 2003. Cheney claimed not to remember the document dump he received on June 9, 2003, compiled by John Hannah. (7) He went on to claim that he might not have seen Wilson’s trip report until after Wilson’s op-ed. (9) But not only did he receive a briefing on this material, but he was trying to get that information released even before the op-ed came out.

Cheney further claimed “he is unaware of anyone in the administration conducting any research or completing a research project on either Joe Wilson or his wife. He advised that he never directed anyone on his staff to conduct such a project and no one advised him they were working on one.” (13) Of course, Libby kept a Wilson folder during the leak period and into the investigative period. Cheney, I guess, claims he knew nothing about that.

This allows Cheney to disconnect his own research at CIA (and elsewhere, probably) into Wilson’s trip from Libby’s activities. While Cheney admitted to having learned of Plame from Tenet (note, I have reasons to doubt this was his only source), he denied discussing Plame with Libby. (13) Yet, Libby reminded Cheney–in October 2003–that there was a note reflecting Cheney informing Libby of Plame’s identity, so not only should Cheney have remembered the event itself, but he should have remembered the reminder.

And Cheney downplayed his involvement in responding to Walter Pincus’ questions about Wilson the week of June 9. “[A]ny press inquiries about the trip that may have been made by Walter Pincus in preparation for his June 2003 article … would have gone to either Libby or Cathie Martin.” (4) However, Cheney and Libby and Martin met on June 11, 2003 at 1:05PM about Pincus’ requests, and from that meeting called Robert Grenier, ostensibly for a first explanation about how the trip had been generated (though at that point both Libby and Cheney almost surely knew of Plame’s identity). Cheney went on to claim he could not remember discussing Plame with Cathie Martin, nor remember Martin telling him that she had learned of Plame’s identity. (11)

Now, frankly, Libby himself never admitted how goal-oriented his actions were during this week. He downplayed the importance of a note, from first thing that Monday morning and just hours after Condi got beat up on ABC News, reflecting learning of Bush’s concern about Wilson’s allegations. Libby himself claimed to have forgotten being told three times that week of Plame’s identity. And Libby also didn’t explain that he and Cheney–at a time when they almost certainly knew of Plame’s identity–called CIA to re-learn it for Cathie Martin’s benefit. So to some extent, Cheney’s denials may help Libby here. And Cheney may be feigning ignorance to protect his sources of Plame’s identity–who are likely not limited (as Cheney claims) to George Tenet. And, if Bush did order Libby to take the lead on this, then Cheney’s forgetfulness may protect Bush here.

Libby’s interactions with journalists, especially during Leak Week

Then there are Cheney’s denials of any knowledge of events from Leak Week–including events that he ordered himself.

Cheney denied making inquiries about Wilson’s contractual relationship with the CIA (a subject that may pertain to a 1999 AQ Khan trip Wilson took), though he did say “someone else might have made such an inquiry.” (13-14). Of course, Libby did make such an inquiry–at a minimum, of David Addington. But he did so on the instructions of Dick Cheney.

Cheney claimed he wasn’t closely involved in Libby’s response to journalists during leak week and before. “He stated that Libby was not required to clear every public statement and press contact because the Vice President had confidence in Libby’s abilities and experience in handling such inquiries. …. He had no specific recollection of any reporters being talked to by Scooter Libby prior to July 14.” (14) Of course, Libby’s notes show Cheney was directing much of this coverage directly, most notably with the Judy Miller meeting and on July 12.

Cheney then claimed he “was not aware of any attempts by Libby to complain to Tim Russert about Chris Matthews’ coverage” (14; the redactions hide references to Matthews and Russert). But Libby had told Cheney of this conversation in October 2003, if not contemporaneously, and Matalin had advised Libby to go to Russert.

Cheney claims to have no memory of directing Libby’s contacts with journalists on July 12, though in this context and in contradiction with earlier statements, he suddenly admitted to sometimes consulting with Libby on such subjects. “Though he cannot recall any specific conversation, he would not be surprised to learn that he had such a discussion with his Chief of Staff. The Vice President advised that he sees Libby several times each day and the two have previously discussed communication strategies for responding to questions from particular journalists.” (18) Just after Cheney claimed not to have directed Libby’s actions, Fitzgerald asked him to read from Libby’s very detailed notes of Cheney’s dictated talking points. Oops.

Even after receiving that document, Cheney blamed Libby for the on the record and deep background instructions in the notes he dictated Libby to use with journalists. “Mr. Libby alone would be the judge of whether or not information was to be presented to any reporters with that caveat [deep background]. … Any decisions about whether Libby, when talking to the media, provides information ‘on the record’ or ‘on background’ are made by Libby himself.” (19-20) Yet, at least according to Libby, Cheney was the one directing what should be on the record and what should be deep background.

Most egregious of these “lapses” in memory, though, is Cheney’s claim to know nothing about Judy Miller. “The Vice President does not recall any member of his staff, including Scooter Libby, meeting with New York Times reporter Judith Miller during the week of 7/7/03, just after publication of Joe Wilson’s editorial in the New York Times.” Libby has the note reflecting Cheney’s order that Libby leak information to Judy at this meeting. And Libby explained that note away (only somewhat plausibly) by saying Cheney instructed him to leak the NIE. Cheney says, though, he “cannot specifically recall having a conversation with Scooter Libby during which Libby advised the Vice President that he wanted to share the key judgments of the NIE with Judith Miller. Although the Vice President cannot recall having such a conversation, if one did occur, he would have advised Libby only to use something if it was declassified.” Cheney went on, “When asked if ever had a conversation with Scooter Libby wherein Libby informed the Vice President that certain material within the NIE needed to be declassified before it could be shared externally, Vice President Cheney advised that he does not recall.” That’s when Cheney started refusing to answer based on presidential privilege. In any case, Libby’s notes show that not only did Cheney know of the meeting with Judy Miller, but Cheney gave Libby a detailed order of what to do at that meeting. But Cheney simply can’t recall those details less than a year later.

Now, if I were Libby, this is where I’d begin to be really furious. Cheney’s pinning all the secret back-channel discussions with journalists (including Libby’s meeting with Judy at the St. Regis, which wasn’t put on Libby’s official schedule) on Libby. But Libby has notes showing that Cheney gave him meticulous instructions on many of those exchanges. And Cathie Martin also testified that Cheney directed Libby to work with journalists that week.

Of course, given how central the Judy meeting is (and, potentially, the July 9 Novak conversation that was hidden by the parties even more assiduously), I can understand why Cheney would want to pretend he had nothing to do with the events. What I don’t understand is how Libby would let Cheney sustain that claim.

The cover-up conversation he and Libby had in October 2003

And then there’s Cheney’s denials of any knowledge of or participation in a cover-up in October 2003. As a general matter, Cheney claims to have “no specific memory” of conversations with Libby about the leak in October 2003–even though they were in Jackson Hole together during one of their later discussions on the subject. I guess that’s why he disclaims all knowledge of the things Libby told him at that time.

Cheney claims “no one told him [after the investigation was announced] of talking to any reporters about Joe Wilson or Wilsons wife.” (23) But Libby claims he told Cheney–at the least–about his fictional conversation in which Tim Russert told Libby about Plame. And Cheney claims he “has no specific memory of … a conversation [when] Libby told him he was not Novak’s source.” (24) But the “meat-grinder note” shows Libby making that claim in writing, with Cheney writing instructions to Andy Card and/or Scott McClellan in response!

Cheney denies knowing “if Scooter Libby independently attempted to get the White House press office to make a statement clearing him prior to discussing it with the Vice President.” (24) Admittedly Libby’s “recall” on this matter was as spotty as Cheney’s, but in his grand jury appearance, he made it clear he talked to Cheney about his inability to get an exonerating statement on his own before Cheney called himself.

All this is the more ridiculous given Cheney’s claims that he has no memory of writing the “meat-grinder note” and especially has no memory of why he wrote “Tenet / Wilson memo” next to Libby’s note where he claimed he hadn’t leaked classified information. When Addington reviewed this note as it was collected for discovery in fall 2003, he called Cheney’s lawyer Terry O’Donnell to warn him about it! So not only must Cheney be aware of this note, his lawyer must be too. Though perhaps that explains Cheney’s lack of all recall about it.

Most of all, though, Cheney claims to have no knowledge of what can only be described as their cover-up conversations, in which Libby told Cheney his fictional story about Russert, but then later reminded Cheney that he–Cheney–had really been the source of his knowledge of Plame’s identity.

He cannot recall Scooter Libby telling him how he first learned about Valerie Wilson. It is possible Libby may have learned about Valerie Wilson’s employment from the Vice President after the Vice President’s phone call with George Tenet, but the Vice President has no specific recollection of such a conversation. The Vice President also cannot recall ever waving Libby off, at a certain point in time, when Libby offered to tell him everything he knew about the Wilson matter. The Vice President has no recollection of Libby saying that he’d learned about Valerie Wilson from a reporter, nor does he have any recollection of Libby indicating that anyone else in the administration knew about Valerie Wilson’s employment at the CIA. Moreover, Vice President Cheney does not have recollection of Libby indicating that reporters with whom Libby was speaking about the Wilson matter, ever informed him of Valerie Wilson’s employment with the CIA.

Now, I don’t blame Cheney for denying any memory of these discussions about a cover-up. The conversations were utterly damning, and perhaps both Libby and Cheney are better off that Cheney didn’t confirm Libby’s version of that story. At the same time, though, as someone who sat in Jackson Hole with Cheney devising a story (and also a strategy about hiding behind journalists), I’d feel betrayed if I were Scooter Libby, seeing Cheney disavowing that close cooperation. This cover-up was always about faithfulness to the cause, but even while Libby spent four years holding up his side of the bargain, Cheney was selling him out with Fitzgerald.

Ironically, in his Fitzgerald interview Dick Cheney treated his trusted former aide in much the same way Cheney treated Joe Wilson after he revealed his trip: Cheney denied having made orders and inquiries that set in motion the whole process, and then later claimed that, since he didn’t get a specific report back, he had nothing to do with the whole thing.

How’s it feel to get the Joe Wilson treatment, Scooter? I know when Wilson got treated that way, he got mighty chatty. Are you getting that urge to hit the talk shows?


http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/10/31/hu...

How Detroit, the Motor City, turned into a ghost town

Wall Street is celebrating a recovery in the US economy, but the future looks increasingly bleak in America's industrial heartland
* Paul Harris in Detroit
* The Observer, Sunday 1 November 2009


Try telling Brother Jerry Smith that the recession in America has ended. As scores of people queued up last week at the soup kitchen which the Capuchin friar helps run in Detroit, the celebrations on Wall Street in New York seemed from another world.

The hungry and needy come from miles around to get a free healthy meal. Though the East Detroit neighbourhood the soup kitchen serves has had it tough for decades, the recession has seen almost any hope for anyone getting a job evaporate. Neither is there any sign that jobs might come back soon.

"Some in the past have had jobs here, but now there is nothing available to people. Nothing at all," Brother Jerry said as he sat behind a desk with a computer but dressed in the simple brown friar's robes of his order.

Outside his office the hungry, the homeless and the poor crowded around tables. Many were by themselves, but some were families with young children. None had jobs. Indeed, the soup kitchen itself is now starting to dip into its savings to cope with a drying up of desperately needed donations. This is an area where times are so tough that the soup kitchen is a major employer for the neighbourhood, keeping its own staff out of poverty. But now Brother Jerry fears he may also have to start laying people off.

Officially, America is on the up. The economy grew by 3.5% in the past quarter. On Wall Street, stocks are rising again. The banks – rescued wholesale by taxpayers' money last year – are posting billions of dollars of profits. Thousands of bankers and financiers are wetting their lips at the prospect of enormous bonuses, often matching or exceeding those of pre-crash times. The financial sector is lobbying successfully to fight government attempts to regulate it. The wealthy are beginning to snap up property again, pushing prices up. In New York's fashionable West Village a senior banker recently splurged $10m on a single apartment, sending shivers of delight through the city's property brokers.

But for tens of millions of Americans such things seem irrelevant. Across the country lay-offs are continuing. Indeed, jobless rates are expected to rise for the rest of 2009 and perhaps beyond. Unemployment in America stands at 9.8%. But that headline figure, massaged by bureaucrats, does not include many categories of the jobless. Another, broader official measure, which includes those such as the long-term jobless who have given up job-seeking and workers who can only find piecemeal part-time work, tells another story. That figure stands at 17%.

Added to that shocking statistic are the millions of Americans who remain at risk of foreclosure. In many parts of the country repossessions are still rising or spreading to areas that have escaped so far. In the months to come, no matter what happens on the booming stock market, hundreds of thousands of Americans are likely to lose their homes.

For them the recession is far from over. It rages on like a forest fire, burning through jobs, savings and homes. It will serve to exacerbate a long-term trend towards deepening inequality in America. Real wages in the US stagnated in the 1970s and have barely risen since, despite rising living costs. The gap between the average American worker and high-paid chief executives has widened and widened. The richest 1% of Americans have more financial wealth than the bottom 95%. It seems the American hope of a steady job, producing rising income and a home in the suburbs, has evaporated for many. A generation of aspiring middle-class homeowners have been wiped out by the recession. "Poor people just don't have the political clout to lobby and get what they need in the way Wall Street does," said Brother Jerry.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/01/det...

"When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist." –Dom Helder Camara

Thanks. I like that quote a lot.

"This is a true story that happened about two hours ago"
For many on this forum it might seem a simple and painfully evident point; but when I read this personal account, in a post at Reddit.com, from someone who encountered a woman with a son who have become homeless because the disability checks inexplicably stopped coming, out in the rain and hungry, I felt ashamed.

It brought tears to my eyes, because I have plenty to eat and a roof over my head. And more.
http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/9zlyp...

damn, this just makes me sad and angry.

to the JJpers...ran 63 miles this week....down from size 14 to a solid 10 and size 8 looking close. Aiming for my first short marathon over Thanksgiving ...

Also working the weights trying to get those Michelle Obama arms!!!!!!

HEEEY Angelar! ***BIG HUGS**!! :>)

MEGA-C-O-N-G-R-A-T-U-L-A-T-I-O-N-S!! :>)

Here are some songs - - IN YOUR HONOR:

+Patti LaBelle and Gerald Levert - Wind Beneath My Wings :>)

Angelar - - U R my hero!! :>)

+Run On [Blind Boys of Alabama] :>)

ENJOY! :>)

You're my idol, Angelar... Congratulations!

hey, thanks...just pass it on by example..inspire someone else.

My inspiration was an 82 year old woman who still runs marathons and she started running at 61....I read her story and started running at 59 and now 60..

Like I said just pass it on..it is never too late.

I'll definitely share the story of your spirit, Angelar. It is inspiring!

still scared of you...LOL

think Maureen Dowd got this one just right

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/01/opinion/01dow...

"On the tarmac in the darkness, he stood at attention, saluting, as 18 flag-draped cases were taken off an Air Force C-17 and carried to Port Mortuary by military teams in camouflage fatigues and black berets.

The Halloween-eve parade of death included casualties from America’s most horrific day in Afghanistan in four years, and its bloodiest month of the war.

It may have been a photo op, another way Obama could show he was not W., the president who started the Iraq war in a haze of fakery and then declined to ever confront the reality of its dead.

Certainly, as Obama tries to figure out how to avoid being a war president when he’s saddled with two wars, he wants as much military cred in the bank as he can get.

But it was also a genuinely poignant moment. It is how we want our presidents to behave, doing the humane thing especially when it’s hard. And Obama, who called it “a sobering reminder” of sacrifices made, signaled to Americans that he will resist blinders as he grapples with the byzantine, seemingly bottomless conflicts he inherited.

Leave it to Liz Cheney, in her continuing bid to out-Cheney her scary dad, to suggest that Obama is a crass publicity-seeker.

“I think that what President Bush used to do is do it without the cameras,” she told a Fox News radio host.

She’s right: There were no press cameras at Dover in the previous administration. There was also no W.

While Bush occasionally visited the wounded and the families of those killed, he never went to Dover to salute the fallen. And he barred any media coverage of it, trying to airbrush the evidence that the wars he started were not the cakewalks he had promised. He did not attend a single funeral. It reflected an emotional and spiritual smallness typical of his administration, like Donald Rumsfeld signing letters to families of dead troops with an autopen and Paul Wolfowitz understating the number of war dead.

Dona Griffin of Terre Haute, Ind., the mother of Army Sgt. Dale Griffin, who was among those Obama saluted, appreciated the president’s presence.

“Unless we can see the images and look into the eyes and the faces of those that are sacrificing, we forget,” she said on “Good Morning America.”

As Obama conducts his White House seminar on war, Dick Cheney accuses him of dithering. He and W. not only didn’t dither before Iraq, they never bothered to ask “Whither?” Debate and due diligence were for sissies. Far more fun playing Jove, heedlessly throwing thunderbolts.

President Obama bore witness just as he is deciding whether to accede to Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s request for up to 80,000 more troops in Afghanistan."

I just read on the Daily Dish that Hoffman doesn't even LIVE in NY-23?

how can you run for Congress in a district that you don't have a residence? did I miss something? wouldn't that be like one of the basic rules for running for office - you gotta LIVE where you're trying to represent?

It's OK if you're a Republican.

politics is the new mafia..I have said it before....when you dealt with the mafia you knew from the get go you pay up front and waited to get screwed...now the new paradigm is politicians fronting with the flag and apple pie and they screw the voters left and right and frankly they are worse than the mafia. You still get killed, but in a different way.

The President is going to China in November? how'd I miss that. Is the First Lady going too?

The President Takes the Dover Test
Former U.S. Sen. John Glenn, D-Ohio, who as a Marine pilot had flown 59 combat missions during World War II and an additional 90 missions in Korea — where in air-to-air combat during that war's last nine days, alone, he had shot down three Soviet MiG fighter planes — knew firsthand the suffering of war. So the plain words John Glenn spoke in the Senate on Jan. 22, 1997, about what he called "the Dover test" are worth recalling: "It's easy to see the flags flying and the people go off to war, and the bands play and the flags fly. And it's not quite so easy when the flag is draped over a coffin coming back through Dover, Delaware."

Waiting until after midnight to leave the White House, President Barack Obama traveled to Delaware, and there in the pre-dawn darkness on Oct. 29, 2009, he personally took "the Dover test."

The most momentous of national decisions — to send American citizens into combat — ought to first be subjected to the Dover test, which according to former Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Hugh Shelton, begins with whether "the American public (is) prepared for the sight of our most precious resource coming home in flag-draped caskets."

The scene, so familiar to older generations, where the military pallbearers in their white gloves so respectfully carry the caskets bearing the human remains of the fallen — and where the families and loved ones mourned, but were also comforted by the ceremonial care — had been banned from public view since 1991 until the Obama administration changed the policy to allow families to decide whether the solemn occasion could be covered.

The scene at Dover is no ordinary picture. No, Dover is truly the portrait of sacrifice and of human loss.


Statistics do not bleed. Real sons and real fathers — and, yes, real sisters — bleed. And they die. However any of us might feel about the wisdom of the decision to go to war or of how that war has been waged, all of us need to appreciate — and to share — the grief and pain of the human cost of war.

The president of the United States is not just the commander in chief. The president is also the comforter in chief. That is what President Ronald Reagan was when, after 241 American servicemen, mostly U.S. Marines, were killed by a terrorist attack on their Beirut barracks, he went to Camp Lejeune in North Carolina to honor those killed, to comfort those who survived and to give voice to the national grief. War's endless expense in human suffering ought not to be shielded from either public view or from public responsibility.

President Obama, during his winning campaign, promised to make Washington more "transparent" and more "accountable." At 4 a.m. on Oct. 29, as he stood silently by as six soldiers carried the remains of Army Sgt. Dale R. Griffin of Terre Haute, Ind., back to American soil and to those who mourned him, President Obama made both himself, and the national government he leads, more responsible and made the reality of war more transparent.

At Dover, he personally met with and consoled — in their time of profound sorrow — the families of 18 fallen Americans. No form letter or phone call. Just human being to human being.

As John Glenn said: "It's easy to see the flags flying and the people go off to war, and the bands play and the flags fly. And it's not quite so easy when the flag is draped over a coffin coming back through Dover, Delaware." Barack Obama, by choosing the "not quite so easy" path, has earned his nation's thanks.
http://www.creators.com/opinion/mark-shields/th...

The End of Prohibition
Why gay marriage, getting high, and going to Cuba will soon be legal.
"I think this would be a good time for a beer," Franklin D. Roosevelt said upon signing a bill that made 3.2-percent lager legal again, some months ahead of the full repeal of Prohibition. I hope Barack Obama will come up with some comparably witty remarks as he presides over the dismantling of our contemporary forms of prohibition—laws that prevent gay marriage, restrict cannabis as a Schedule I Controlled Substance, and ban travel to Cuba. "You may now kiss the groom," perhaps, or—a version of the comment he once made about smoking pot—"I inhaled—that was the point."
Read More
http://www.slate.com/id/2234017/

Victim of wrongful incarceration refuses reparations because his legal costs aren't fully covered

A Fort Lauderdale man only needs to sign a few legal papers to start receiving $179,000 from the state and become the first wrongfully convicted person compensated under a new Florida law.

But Leroy McGee is refusing to complete the documents, though the father of five is now living paycheck to paycheck. The carpenter's apprentice fears that taking the money available under the new Victims of Wrongful Incarceration Compensation Act could end up hurting others who will seek similar reparations in the future.

"I really can use the money, but I want to take a stand," said McGee, who spent three years and seven months in prison for a convenience store robbery that took place while he was at his janitorial job.

The compensation law was hailed as a milestone when the state Legislature passed it, 159-1, last year. It allows someone who has been wrongfully convicted to apply for reparations--$50,000 for every year spent in prison--without having to submit a claims bill to the Legislature. Claims bills can take years to win lawmakers' approval.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/broward/fort-l...

I'm all about locking up criminals but if the system screws up they need to compensate that person. All legal bills paid including pain and suffering.

"I'm all about locking up criminals but if the system screws up they need to compensate that person. All legal bills paid including pain and suffering."

Stop making Sense!

On the Cusp in California
How PreK-3rd Strategies Could Improve Education in the Golden State
Linda Jacobson

New America Foundation | October 2009
As we peer into the California crystal ball, the forecast for a well-educated population doesn't look too good. This report on the state's early education system offers a dark assessment, but not a fatalistic one, especially if leaders can seize and build on reform efforts that have already started in patches throughout the state.

If children are the future, then looking at a state's educational system is like peering into a crystal ball. California is a state teeming with young children -- 4.7 million under age 8, to be exact. One in every eight young American children lives in California. And many of these children come from minority ethnic and racial backgrounds and speak languages other than English. If Americans want to get a glimpse at our future as a "majority minority" country they don't have to look beyond California
Read More
http://www.newamerica.net/publications/policy/c...

"The health-care package unveiled by House leaders Thursday comes closer to national reform, health policy experts said. It would create a national marketplace where those who lack insurance could shop for policies, including a plan designed and administered by federal health officials. States would play a supporting role, helping to design the largest expansion of Medicaid in 40 years and to develop high-risk insurance pools for people in immediate need of coverage.

THE PACKAGE UNDER DEVELOPMENT IN THE SENATE IS A DIFFERENT STORY. A BILL APPROVED BY THE FINANACE COMMITTEE WOULD LEAVE VIRTUALLY EVERY MAJOR DECISION TO STATE OFFICALS" my caps

You cannot have different standards for different states. One of the purposes of reform was to have everyone have a MINIMUM level of care NATIONWIDE. If it isn't nationwide then it isn't PORTABLE.

Imagine your spouse/child is sick and you're unemployed. Are you going to take a good job in another state if your spouse/child can't get care. I'm not talking living in VA w/ a job on the Beltway. I'm talking you're systems manager in MA and you are offered a job in LA.

If this passes this is not the public option. It is healthcare endentured servitutde. You might as well turn back the clock to be a serf in England, a peasant in France, a kulak in Czarist Russia or sharecropper in antebellum America. This is not progress. This is not change.

Read the whole story here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/ar...

Whatever comes out of the senate and the finance committee is not the only game in town, still has to go to conference.

I hear you but talk like that is just.........

The golden age of infinite music

Not long ago, if you wanted music, you had to save up your pocket money, take a trip to the local record shop and lovingly leaf through its racks.

Now, it's almost all free, instant and infinite. And our relationship with music has changed forever.
Read More
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/833063...

Williams Tennis Association

So.

Serena and Venus Williams were in the championship caliber group for the second-year running, but this time, they both emerged, battered and bruised, to contest the final final of the WTA.

(I don't count that other event. I consider it an exhibition of mediocrity. It has no place whatsoever on the tour's calendar.)

I'm writing this before their doubles effort after "suitable rest" because I expect Spain to take that match. But the sisters will take the court and give the fans a semifinal.

And they will not retire.

Serena's left leg is mummified with Kinesio tape and heavy strapping. As though the injury that kept her from defending her title in Miami and interrupted her preparations for Roland Garros has returned. Venus is without mummification (yet), but her back and her knee are not up to snuff.

Neither sister can serve. Neither can run with any confidence. Changing directions looks painful even on the television screen. And yet here they are in the singles final of the season ending championships. The oldest in the field with bodies slowest to recover. Arguably the two best players on the tour -- still -- they've given their naysayers and the propagandists (far too often one and the same) heartburn. I would imagine a couple are choking on their own bile right about now.

Some of the propagandists give the sisters little to no credit, no benefit of the doubt, no matter what they do. The sarcasm that flooded Twitter and the forums after Serena announced her pullout from Fed Cup was quite catty. Any opportunity to pounce, the propagandists take it, and they don't back down.

They're more like the sisters than they care to admit.

Read the rest...

"And yet here they are in the singles final of the season ending championships. The oldest in the field with bodies slowest to recover."

nuff said right there!! Love the Williams sisters!

thanks GLH!!! liked the witches shoes filled with candy corn and the old time cartoons on the music vid. working on a grant proposal today and you brought a smile to my face!

HEEEY Dr. zackboston!! **BIG HUGS!!***

U! JUST! WRITE ON!!! :>) :>)

THANK YA!! SMILIN' BACK!! :>)

HEEEY rikyrah! **BIG HUG** :>)

****insertin' my Kodak paper into my printer*** :>)

THIS PIC is F-A-N-T-A-S-T-I-C!! and very creative!! :>)

+HAPPY HALLOWEEN - - JJP!! :>) :>)

+ENJOY YOUR TREATS!! :>)

+Halloween Music Vid - "Thriller" :>)
[A TRIBUTE 2 MICHAEL!! TIMELESS MUSIC!! R.I.P.]

+MISSIN' Y'ALL!! :>) :>)

Hey GLH! How r u? *hugs*

HEEEEY Sepia! **Hugs back-at-choo** :>)

I'm improvin'!! :>)

THANK YA!! LUV YA!! :>) :>)

New From AOFBlog: Mary J Blige Opens Women’s Empowerment Center http://bit.ly/2OpkYk

Speaking women's empowerment and since October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and thhis is the last day of October, here's a link to some important information to about breast cancer:

http://weeseeyou.com/2009/10/31/breast-cancer-a...

Feel free to pass it the link on to friends and family. Thank you!