Jack & Jill Politics

Another reason for immigration reform: military spouses: http://is.gd/4FnwD

IRS "Scaring the Hell" out of the Super Rich
by MeMeMeMeMe
Tue Oct 27, 2009 at 09:13:16 AM PDT

Dodge this:

The U.S. Internal Revenue Service's new global wealth unit will focus on taxpayers with assets worth tens of millions of dollars who are sheltering wealth through complex business entities, the IRS chief said on Monday.

* MeMeMeMeMe's diary :: ::
*

One way of dealing with record budget deficits, besides raising taxes, is to actually collect taxes.

The IRS is opening new offices in Beijing, Panama City and Sydney, to focus on funds flowing out of Europe and into Asia, in part because of a heightened focus on international enforcement in Europe, Shulman said.

The IRS has already gone after the biggest Swiss bank in court, and succeeded in getting lots of names:

The U.S. government has already opened cases against about 150 clients of UBS AG, names it obtained when the Swiss bank paid $780 million to settle a criminal suit in February after admitting it helped Americans skirt the law.

Seems they were just getting started:

"The IRS has new momentum in this entire area and in the coming months our efforts will only intensify," IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman said on Wednesday.

Are they really serious about this? Well, just ask the rich:

"The IRS has done a very good job of scaring the hell out of everybody," said Ken Rubinstein, a lawyer with his own firm who counsel clients in tax matters. He said he expects more prosecutions to keep the heat on offshore bank customers.

And wealth advisors are "upset", according to the Wall Street Journal (via Raw Story).

The surest way of knowing whether this is actually a serious effort? Rich cheaters are scared and upset. Works for me.


http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/10/27/797641...

The things I saw beggar description
The concentration camp in Ohrdruf was the first to be liberated by U.S. forces during World War II, and just a week later, General Dwight D. Eisenhower paid a visit in order to survey the scene. The following letter, in which Eisenhower describes said experience, was written by the future President three days later and sent to General George C. Marshall in Washington. Although the entire letter is interesting and worth reading, the now famous description by Eisenhower can be seen in the image below and found in the transcript's 6th paragraph.

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

On a recent tour of the forward areas in First and Third Armies, I stopped momentarily at the salt mines to take a look at the German treasure. There is a lot of it. But the most interesting - although horrible - sight that I encountered during the trip was a visit to a German internment camp near Gotha. The things I saw beggar description. While I was touring the camp I encountered three men who had been inmates and by one ruse or another had made their escape. I interviewed them through an interpreter. The visual evidence and the verbal testimony of starvation, cruelty and bestiality were so overpowering as to leave me a bit sick. In one room, where they were piled up twenty or thirty naked men, killed by starvation, George Patton would not even enter. He said he would get sick if he did so. I made the visit deliberately, in order to be in position to give first-hand evidence of these things if ever, in the future, there develops a tendency to charge these allegations merely to "propaganda."

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2009/10/things-i-s...

from Chris Chambers

Saturday, October 24, 2009
Mayor Adrian Fenty: No Corey Booker art thee
[Nat's on tamiflu and quarantined till Monday night...but here's something to chew on till then...]
Been watching "Brick City" on Sundance? It's a documentary series on Newark and its mayor Corey Booker; akin to Season 3 of The Wire

without the fiction (sorry The Root.com and others, but Nat minted that analogy, not you). Corey Booker--Ivy League mayor, bald-headed and piss colored like yours truly Nat--is the central character, and if indeed fiction scribed by The Bard, he'd be one part Hamlet, one part Henry V. "Once more into the breach/To be or not to be/And Gentlemen in England now a-bed will think themselves accursed and hold their manhood cheap." And he is counterpoint to the Sharpe James paradigm of old school ghettofab urban power politics. Brick City gets its name from, well, bricks of crack, not aging masonry of the projects. Sorry.

Though DC has its bamma chimera, Marion Barry and that old, now inapt moniker "Chocolate City," don't have a Corey Booker. And that's despite all appearances. Nope, no brooding Dane or brave Prince Harry at Agincourt. We have Benedict in "Much Ado About Nothing." That's my photo of Hizzoner, doing what he does best: PR appearances. But hey, he's not Marion Barry. He's not an ACORN boogeyman or slave to "corrupt" unions or homophobic mega-pastors and church ladies hiding their felonious grandchildren in the basement or immigrant activists, right? Nor is he the automaton, slave to the white developers & Congressional Republicans--Anthony Williams, righty-right? And doesn't he and Booker have a sort of siamese twin quality, right-righty-right?

http://natturnersrevenge.blogspot.com/2009/10/m...

Zogby asks if "Good White People" should worry about blacks and gays ! I'M NOT KIDDING !!!
by LaurenMonica [Subscribe]
Tue Oct 27, 2009 at 03:53:54 PM PDT

Zogby asks if FCC should force "good" white people to make room to African-Americans and gays. I'm not kidding.

* LaurenMonica's diary :: ::
*

Here how Zogby elaborates the question in a poll for The O'Leary Report not Fox News as previously said:

Federal Communications Commission Chief Diversity Czar Mark Lloyd wants the FCC to force good white people in positions of power in the broadcast industry to step down to make room for more African-Americans and gays to fill those positions. Do you agree or disagree that this presents a threat to free speech?


http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/10/27/797840...

Yes, Black Women Play Lacrosse
Just when you thought black people were done breaking athletic barriers, enter Howard University’s women’s lacrosse team.
By: Eboni Farmer | Posted: October 23, 2009 at 6:44 AM

During my sophomore and junior years of college, I woke up each day for a 6 a.m. lacrosse practice that had no coach. In a typical lacrosse game, there are 12 players from each team on the field. Our first game last season, there were only nine of us.

Once, in the heat of battle, one of my teammates got called the N-word.

These are the conditions you face when you are a member of the nation’s only African-American college lacrosse team.

Needless to say, playing lacrosse for Howard has been a challenge. But given what our team’s efforts to integrate the lily-white sport symbolize, it’s been mostly a privilege.

But, you say, “hold on. I'm lost. Since when does Howard University have a women's lacrosse team?”

That’s the question I get from surprised strangers whenever I wear my Howard lacrosse sweatshirt or T-shirt. I understand the image of 12 black girls on a field with sticks, throwing around a ball may be a little difficult to digest. That is why I am always happy to answer and share a little bit of our history.

In the mid-‘90s, two Howard women, Jennifer Brown and Monique Richards, had a vision of an all-black lacrosse team. In 1998, what began as a club sport became the first Division I women's lacrosse program at a historically black college or university. It is because of Richard and Brown's vision that I and other Howard women have this unique opportunity.

Despite notable black lacrosse players like Jim Brown, who some consider to be the greatest lacrosse player of all time, throughout the years the sport has been dominated by white athletes. There are few black players on the rosters of top lacrosse schools like Princeton University, Duke University and the University of Virginia, but at Howard, we are all we have.

I came to Howard, first and foremost, because it is the school that I thought would be best for me academically. But Howard has given me the opportunity to experience something that I would have never had the chance to experience had I went to a majority white school.

This is my final season before I graduate, and we have a lot to build on and look forward to. Most of Howard's sports teams compete in the Middle Eastern Atlantic Conference (MEAC) with other HBCUs. But because no other MEAC schools have lacrosse teams, for 11 seasons we have competed independently without a conference. Last season, we proudly took our place at the National Lacrosse Conference and competed in its inaugural conference tournament.

Last year, the Intercollegiate Women's Lacrosse Coaches Association recognized the need for diversity when they launched there Identify, Recruit and Mentor Program. The program is designed to get more minorities involved in the game.

Our current coach, Jessica Morgan, is one of those minorities. When she took over, she became one of only three active black women's lacrosse coaches in Division I. (The other two are Bryant University coach Karen Healy and University of California at Davis coach Elaine Jones.) Just knowing this makes me appreciate her for the sacrifices that she makes for the team. Her passion for the game is evident, and she really believes that she was put on this earth to coach Howard lacrosse.

We may be in the rain, soaking wet and freezing, but Coach Morgan keeps pushing us until she gets what she wants. We are in a constant fight to prove to ourselves and to others why Howard University should even have a women's lacrosse team.

But as much as I take pride in the fact that we are the only black women's lacrosse team, I still think it’s unfortunate. It means that we are not just playing for ourselves and our team, but also the whole race. We will always have the bragging rights to be called the first, but I hope some time really soon that we will no longer be the only.



Eboni Farmer is a writer and intern for The Root.

http://www.theroot.com/views/yes-black-women-pl...

This is neat. The game can be passed on by the players introducing it to their younger family and friends when they aren't in school. They have started something and I'll bet alot of younger people of color don't even know what lacrosse is. Hell, I would bet there are pockets of caucasian kids who don't know what lacrosse is.

RobM,

I saw Mad Men!

It was terrific. I swear, Jon Hamm, has thrown down for the Emmy with this episode. He was stunning. It was unbelievable, seeing him go from Don Draper, to Dick in a nanosecond. I am stunned at how powerful the scenes between DICK and Betty were. Amazing.

wow...what a payoff.

where did they find Jon Hamm...where has he been before Mad Men?

How bout the Breck girl? "I do not need to take my earrings off. I don't need to take off my wig. Don, I will get that drink for you. It's the least I can do now that I cut out your heart."
If they don't win the Emmy for male/female leads you will truly know farce.

For a treat read the MadMen thread on Te-Nehisi Coates blog on Monday.

I was so happy to see Betty with a thinking spine, I think I didn't take January Jones' acting that seriously, because I was so blown away with Hamm.

double post

KARZAI'S BROTHER ON CIA PAYROLL AND ALSO SUSPECTED OF BEING A MAJOR PLAYER IN DRUG TRADE

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/28/world/asia/28...

didn't know the CIA angle, but had read months ago about about his brother being involved with drugs.

Don't these people read their own after action reports. This sound so much like Diem in Viet Nam its ridiculous.

Anatomy of a Victory: CIA's Covert Afghan War (al-Qaeda or al-CIA-duh)

http://emperors-clothes.com/docs/anatomy.htm

Well let the games begin
Something is Fishy in the Healthcare Debate Reporting
by PiRierran
Share this on Twitter - Something is Fishy in the Healthcare Debate Reporting Tue Oct 27, 2009 at 03:32:27 PM PDT
Something doesn't add up. I mean, we have the obvious republican hypocrisy about the public option and cost. (the public option will reduce cost, but cost-conscious democrats oppose it, but claim the opposition is ideological)

However, I count at least 3 likely democrat 'no' votes on healthcare for the senate:

Joe Lieberman here
Ben Nelson here
Blanche Lincoln here

PiRierran's diary :: :: Yet at the same time, Harry Reid insists that the public option will be in the final bill, and it will pass. So does Schumer here.

Not only that, but we see on CNN, HuffPo, and other places articles expressing surprise that the public option "may not be dead yet" and "waning hopes for healthcare reform". What is going on?

I wonder if this, this and this have anything to do with it.

Let me delve into a little conspiracy-theory type scenario:

With all of the running around, closed door meetings, and other sausagemaking, is it possible that a few republicans have privately called Harry Reid and told him they'll vote for cloture? I know two of the articles are talking about possible healthcare reform defectors in the house, but the senate is a possibility too.

Here are a few possibilities:

A couple republicans have been bought off with healthy earmarks to be slipped in at committee in exchange for a cloture vote (this could happen even without a yea vote on the final bill).
A couple of republicans have been swayed by the huge outpouring of support for healthcare reform.
A couple of republicans have family members who have been hurt by the healthcare system in a really horrible way. Assuming that, of the 44 republicans and DINO's in the senate, the 880 to 4400 people in their close circles, combined with a 0.5% recission rate, suggests that between 5 and 25 of those people would be screwed by health insurance companies. It would only take one case to make someone want to get revenge. Two or three republicans with a vendetta might be a dangerous thing.
A bloc of republicans are going to make a 'power play' within the caucus to unseat their hawkish leadership and try to take control of the caucus. In this case, these republicans (10, 12?) in the senate would vote in favor of cloture and the bill, and launch a media blitz at the last minute as moderates. They would dominate the news cycles for days afterwards, and it would make quite the high-risk, high-payoff gamble.
It's not just the health insurance lobby that has influence and power. Some big businesses may see an economic advantage in healthcare reform. (lower costs against overseas competition for example). They may have communicated this to their puppets and/or Harry Reid, letting him know that they will deliver those votes.
A number of religious republicans may have decided to heed Jesus's words on caring for the sick.
There is no intention of going down the 60-vote path, but instead the path of reconciliation, despite what Harry says.
The nuclear option.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/10/27/79...

The GOP's leading blob of hate

"http://mediamatters.org/research/200910270044

Limbaugh repeatedly refers to Obama as a "boy" and a "man-child"
October 27, 2009 7:36 pm ET — 6 Comments

On his October 27 radio show, Rush Limbaugh referred to President Obama as "this little boy, this little man-child president." Limbaugh has repeatedly referred to Obama as a "boy" and as a "man-child", including calling him "the little boy president" and claiming that Democrats and the media criticize "so-called 'ferocious attacks' " on Obama because "you can't criticize the little black man-child."

In my best Denny Green voice.... "They are who we thought they were."

it's OK. The President doesn't think the attacks on him are because he's AA. It's only his policies.

LOL

Ok this website has officially made me crazy tonight. Beck and Limbaugh don't care what they say about President Obama and Black people.

As the president of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the daughter of their owner, Gay Culverhouse was the woman in the men’s locker room. Twenty years later, she is trying to keep her former players out of the emergency room.
...
She will testify before the House Judiciary Committee at its hearing on football brain injuries on Wednesday to, as she put it, “tell the truth about what’s going on while I still have the chance.”

Culverhouse has blood cancer and renal failure and has been told she has six months to live.
...
The N.F.L. and the players union have added programs to aid former players since their pension and disability plans came under public fire two years ago. One helps with joint-replacement surgeries, another with cardiovascular health screenings. The most prominent is the 88 Plan, which helps pay expenses for players with dementia. But for the hundreds of those whose cognitive decline falls short of dementia, the industry’s disability plan has little to offer.

A recent New York Times analysis of the plan’s 73 current members suggested that N.F.L. retirees ages 60 to 89 are experiencing moderate to severe dementia at several times the national rate. A recent telephone survey sponsored by the N.F.L. had similar results, corroborating findings from several independent studies, but the league and its doctors continue to discredit all evidence of such a link.

Ex-N.F.L. Executive Sounds Alarm on Head Injury

In the four weeks since director Roman Polanski's arrest, Samantha Geimer has once again found herself in an unwanted spotlight.

Phone calls from the media besieged her at home, on her cellphone, at work, seeking comment from the woman who was the 13-year-old victim in the director's sex case three decades ago.

Calls have come at all hours of the day, from as far as Germany, Israel and Japan. Every TV network's national morning show called, as did Larry King and Oprah Winfrey. The calls to Geimer and her attorney, Lawrence Silver, numbered close to 500.

Some media outlets offered money. Others ambushed her at the airport. Reporters and photographers showed up at her children's schools and at her husband's job. They offered her children toys in exchange for information. They camped out in front of her home in Hawaii and photographed and videotaped her through holes drilled in their cars.

The details are contained in a statement filed with the 2nd District Court of Appeal, in which Geimer's attorney asked that the case against Polanski be dismissed. The statement argues that as a victim of crime, Geimer has a right to "finality" guaranteed by the California Constitution.

This statement makes one more demand, one more request, one more plea: Leave her alone, she said through her attorney in the filing.

Polanski's victim asks court to dismiss charge

Does anyone know if Rev Al has a podcast? I can't listen at work all the time. Why isn't his show on I tunes so I can download it?

Can this website put up a picture of coon of the week? Can u let people vote for their favorite slave catcher of the week? Maybe start a coon hall of shame?

I think something like that would make this site into some stupid gossip site. I'm looking for intelligent political opinions. As a consistent member of this blog that would be a TERRIBLE move. And lets be honest it's simply going to be another way to mock conservative blacks that most people on this site don't agree with.

You may be correct. However, not every conservative is a disgrace to the race. Not every Black liberal/progressive is a credit to their race. I do think that when Blacks get on TV and sell out their race for a dollar that person should be called out.

Some would ask how is your statement different /if not worse than . . .Rush Limbaugh referring to President Obama as "this little boy, this little man-child president." Limbaugh has repeatedly referred to Obama as a "boy" and as a "man-child", including calling him "the little boy president" and claiming that Democrats and the media criticize "so-called 'ferocious attacks' " on Obama because "you can't criticize the little black man-child."

Rush L. is allowed to say what he wants with out any consequences. I think African Americans who speak or act in a way that I/we/some in the Black community see as being counter productive to African Amercians should be called out for behavior not helpful to the community. It's all free speech right?

trose.... Field negro does a house negro of the week or day.

I will check it out ...thanks

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3cKTKJeeRI&feat...

Do they think popping their coochies will bring the dead back to life?

They all need their asses whupped.

"Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke also weighed in on Friday, saying he preferred "a more subtle approach without losing the economic benefit of multifunction, international firms.""

Why is the Chair of he Fed offering soverignty to a multinational company?
Read the whole thing: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/ar...

Oh snap..........looks like another set of Barbie Bandits! I wonder if they'll get the sweet treatment our little blonde bank robbers got here in Gawga!

Teen Burglary Ring Rooted in Friendship

The world is learning more about the gang of suspects arrested on suspicion of burglarizing Lindsay Lohan and other Hollywood Hills celebs. Police say the group, dubbed the 'Burglar Bunch,' may have been involved with similar heists involving Audrina Patridge, Paris Hilton, Orlando Bloom and Rachel Bilson.

One of the suspects, 18-year-old Alexis Neirs, is the sister of Playboy model Tess Taylor and the subject of a reality show pilot for E!, called 'Home-Schooling With the Arlingtons.' Sources tell PEOPLE that Neirs was in the middle of filming the show when the raid occurred and cameras may have kept rolling all the way to jail.

Full Story:
http://www.popeater.com/2009/10/27/teen-burglar...

Here is a joke for you
An Irishman in a wheel chair entered a restaurant one afternoon and asked the waitress for a cup of coffee. The Irishman looked across the restaurant and asked, 'Is that Jesus sitting over there?' The waitress nodded 'yes,' so the Irishman told her to give Jesus a cup of coffee on him.


The next patron to come in was an Englishman with a hunched back. He shuffled over to a booth, painfully sat down, and asked the waitress for a cup of hot tea. He also glanced across the restaurant and asked, 'Is that Jesus over there?' The waitress nodded again, so the Englishman said to give Jesus a cup of hot tea, too.

The third patron to come into the restaurant was a Brother from the hood on crutches. He hobbled over to a booth, sat down and hollered, 'Hey there sweet thang, hook a brotha up with a cold glass of RC!' He, too, looked across the restaurant and asked, 'Is that God's baby boy over there?' The waitress nodded again, so the Brotha said to hook Jesus up with a cold glass of RC, too.

As Jesus got up to leave, he passed by the Irishman, touched him and said, 'For your kindness, you are healed.' The Irishman felt the strength come back into his legs, got up and danced a jig out the door. Jesus also passed by the Englishman, touched him and said, 'For your kindness, you are healed.' The Englishman felt his back straightening up, and he rose up his hands, praised the Lord and did a series of back flips out the door.

Then Jesus walked towards the Brother from the hood. The Brother jumped up and yelled, 'Slow ya role playa, don't touch me dog, I'm drawin' disability!!!!!'

dead wrong, but funny as hell.

BWA HA HA HA HA

*dead*

Media Alert - I think Rev. Al's radio show is going to be hilarious tomorrow. He's going to calling out some folks. the genesis of tomorrow's show came from a call he had from one of his folks in Georgia.

Remember the man who beat the Black woman IN FRONT OF HER CHILD -at the Cracker Barrell?

well this racist mofo - HIRED A BLACK LAWYER TO DEFEND HIM.

it's gonna get heated on Rev. Al's show tomorrow....lol

I would like to nominate Tony Axam for Sellout of the Year.

Who is Tony Axam, you say? He is a black lawyer representing Troy Dale West (the man who assaulted the black female Army reservist at the Cracker ass Cracker Barrel). Read more here.

Snippet:

West's attorney, Tony Axam, argued that the only reason his client is still in jail is because he attacked a black woman.

"He happens to be a man who struck a woman. The woman happens to be black and he happens to be white," said Axam, who is black.

......

West's lawyer said Hill threatened and spit on West, prompting the attack.

"It is regrettable," Axam told the judge. "There should have not been a threat, should have not been spitting and probably on hindsight, there should not have been a striking."

......

Prosecutors said they feel West is a danger to the community because he has a history of violence.

In 1998, West was charged with simple battery and terroristic threats after he attacked a cashier at a K-Mart in Tifton, said Dennis Baker, chief administrator for the district attorney.

According to Baker, West created phony receipts showing he had purchased Matchbox cars at other K-Marts for 59 cents. He argued with the cashier that the price of the cars should be lowered. {WTF???}

When the cashier denied the request, West got into a dispute with him, Baker told the judge.

“The defendant pushed him [the cashier] against a telephone booth and said he would kill him,” Baker said.

The cashier called the police and West fled, Baker said. Police arrested West at a nearby Waffle House, where he was hiding in the bathroom with a loaded pistol, according to Baker.

The case was later dismissed after the records could not be located.

SMH.

What time?

here in Chicago, he's on from 12:00 noon - 3:00 p.m. CST.

you can tune him in at http://www.wvon.com

And if I'm not mistaken, this black lawyer approached this racist mofo. I could be wrong, but I think I remember reading that, just cant find it now.

say what!

I might have heard this info on WAOK here in Atlanta, I cant remember...but I remember wondering if this guy was a public defender (nope) or maybe he got assigned this case on some pro bono level with the Bar Assocation (not)....every reason I could think of that he would be taking this case was not the one I heard, he approached the defendant - but again I'm trying to remember exactly and I cant....but this much I KNOW, he was not in any way shape or form obligated to do this as a requirement of his law license.

Sounds like an opportunistic scumbag lawyer selling out for the personal fame that comes with reppin & winning this case.

sad. We are still our own worst enemies.

I listened to Rev Al's show today. I am definetly listening tommorow. It is time the "Black Community" start calling out the Uncle Tom's, Uncle Fester's, Aunt Janes , Aunt Betty's and "slave catchers" (rikyrah words). I am sick of the shuckin, jivin, jiggin, and wiggin black people. Rev AL is right: a ho is a ho is a ho!