Jack & Jill Politics

I hope people realize that we are in the midst of the public option being completely abandoned. The senate finance committee voted to approve a bill that doesn't include a Public Option and President Obama spoke positively of these actions:

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/10/14/headlines

I don't know how this speaks positively to people of there being a Public Option - even on this website

Because of the lackluster efforts of Obama and Blue Dog Democrats, we have gone to a Public Option for everyone, to a Public Option for some, to undoubtedly a Public Option to none. What has been approved so far is a requirement that more people buy private insurance - this would be enforced by making citizens subject to fines who do not buy private insurance.

The wheels are turning and scheme and financial bonanza has been put in place for the benefit of insurance companies. I encourage people to call the offices of their Congressman and Senators when the final bill is drafted and encourage them to vote against any bill that does not include a Public Option.

The following is a link to Democracy now.org with the founder of firedoglake.org discussing the ongoing process

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/10/14/senate_h...

The interview is very informative.

Peace

Yeah, keep listening to Jane Hamsher.

Thanks for fighting for the Public Option President Obama!

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/10/14/headlines#1

Michael Steele: “I’m the cow on the tracks”
LMBAO at this
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/10/14/79...

How i learned to mine my own business
I was walking past the mental hospital the other day, And all the
patients were shouting, '13....13....13.'
The fence was too high to see over, but I saw a Little gap in the
planks, so I looked through to see What was going on.....
Some idiot poked me in the eye with a stick!
Then they all started shouting '14....14....14'... --

DJ,

You need to quit! LMAO!

LOL!

Can someone please ban Michael Steele from talking?

Appearing on Fox this morning to talk health care reform, Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele offered two contradictory -- and somewhat baffling -- metaphors for bipartisanship.

"I'm not trying to be an obstructionist here. To the contrary, I'm saying, Can we all get in the room and have a Rodney King moment?" he said. He was referring to King's famous "Can we all get along?" line following the 1992 Los Angeles race riots sparked by the acquittal of the police officers who beat King.

Later in the interview, Steele said he is indeed obstructing health care reform, calling himself the "cow on the tracks." The Fox anchor had noted that Democrats are saying the health care reform train has "already left the station" and "Republicans better jump on board."

"Well, I'm the cow on the tracks. You're gonna have to stop that train to get this cow off the track to move forward," Steele said. "They told us in June that there would be a health care bill on the president's desk on Aug. 1. I think our efforts helped change that dynamic, and our efforts this fall will continue to change that dynamic."

Video [at the link]

And when Steele elaborated on the "Rodney King moment," he said he wanted everyone to "work toward something that reflects the common sense, bottom-up approach that the voters, and certainly the insurers of our country, you, me and others, want to be done."

http://tpmlivewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/1...

He invoked Rodney King as a "moment" that brings people together?

I have no words.

LOL - you had some - you know you did. LOL

Between the failed website launch yesterday and these comments, I can't imagine the major players in the party are happy with him, given all the other crazy stuff he's said. There was already a story a couple weeks ago about him being on a short leash. How soon before they cut him loose?

I swear, give Mike Steele Moe Bling a black nose, shades and that furry hat, and he looks like "Humpty Hump" from Digital Underground.

I almost expect him to break out with:

"People say: 'Yo, Humpty; you're really funny lookin'
That's alright, cause I gets things cookin'"....

The Humpty Dance is your chance to do the Hump....

The Republican Buck Dance

Iz Yo Chance

To Play the Chump

Todays' Conversation: Dunbar Village Miscreants Get Life While A New Set Arrested For Setting A Teen On Fire http://ow.ly/15URbH

"Four 15-year-old boys and one 13-year-old accosted Michael Brewer of Deerfield Beach, Fla., accusing him of being a snitch for calling the cops on their leader, whom the sheriff's office identified as the local bully.

Brewer tried to leave, but the gang doused him with alcohol and set him on fire, authorities said. Flames burned 80% of his body, especially his torso and arms, and seared off much of his hair, including his eyebrows, family members said."
the kid set on fire also has a learning problem.
try them as adults - attempted murder.

LDS apostle: Prop 8 backlash against Mormons like civil-rights-era persecution of blacks

Now Dallin H. Oaks faces his own backlash
By Rosemary Winters And Peggy Fletcher Stack

The Salt Lake Tribune

LDS apostle Dallin H. Oaks on Tuesday likened the post-Proposition 8 backlash against Mormons to the persecution blacks endured during the civil-rights struggle.
Now Oaks faces a backlash himself.

"Were four little Mormon girls blown up in the church at Sunday school? Were there burning crosses planted on local bishops' lawns? Were people lynched and their genitals stuffed in their mouths?" asked University of Utah historian Colleen McDannell. "By comparing these two things, it diminishes the real violence that African-Americans experienced in the '60s, when they were struggling for equal rights. There is no equivalence between the two."

Oaks, in a strongly worded defense of the church's efforts opposing same-sex

Oaks speech
Transcript of Elder Dallin H. Oaks speech

marriage, told students at Brigham Young University-Idaho in Rexburg that Latter-day Saints "must not be deterred or coerced into silence" by advocates for "alleged civil rights."

Last year, the Utah-based Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints urged its followers to donate money and time to pass Prop 8, the successful ballot measure that eliminated the right of same-sex couples to wed in California. Afterward, protests, including several near LDS temples, erupted along with boycotts of business owners who donated to Prop 8 and even some vandalism of LDS meetinghouses.

"In their effect," Oaks said, "they are like the well-known and widely condemned voter-intimidation of blacks in the South that produced corrective federal civil-rights legislation."

Jeanetta Williams, president of the NAACP's Salt Lake branch, said there is "no comparison."

"I don't see where the LDS Church has been denied any of their rights," she said. "What the gay and lesbian communities are fighting for, that is a civil-rights issue."

In an interview posted on the LDS Church's Web site after the speech, Oaks called his analogy a "good one," but acknowledged that intimidation of Mormons in the wake of Prop 8 has not been "as serious as what happened in the South."

In his speech, the LDS apostle, a former Utah Supreme Court justice, cast the anti-Mormon furor as an attack on religious freedom.

"During my lifetime I have seen a significant deterioration in the respect accorded to religion in our public life, and I believe that the vitality of religious freedom is in danger of being weakened accordingly," Oaks said. "Atheists and others would intimidate persons with religious-based points of view from influencing or making the laws of their state or nation."

Judeo-Christian scriptures established the marriage of a man and a woman thousands of years ago, he said, and those who would change this ancient order "should not be allowed to pretend that those who defend the ancient order are trampling on civil rights."

Religious-freedom advocates said the speech contained sound points, but gay-rights supporters criticized Oaks for dismissing their cause.

Will Carlson, public-policy manager for Equality Utah, called legal protections for gay and transgender people, including anti-discrimination and hate-crime laws, "human rights."

"The right to earn a living, the right to stay in your home, the right to be free from violence, these are the priorities of the equal-rights movement," he said. "Even in the pursuit of marriage equality, it's about the legal protections that come with a marriage license. Just as the LDS faithful have a fundamental right to get married according to the dictates of their conscience, all Americans should have that right."

Carlson said his gay-rights group supports "religious liberty" and condemns "any vandalism or violence against any people."

Peter Danzig, a former Mormon and a spokesman for Foundation for Reconciliation, which aims to foster understanding between Latter-day Saints and the gay community, said he agrees on the importance of religious freedom. But he found it "astonishing" that Oaks failed to mention faiths that "honor" gay marriage. He also disagreed with Oaks' characterization of gay-rights advocates as largely atheists.

"Many activists are deeply religious people," he said.

Though they did not hear or read Oaks' speech, several religious-freedom advocates concurred with his description of the growing tensions between civil rights and religious freedom.

"He's not wrong about that," said University of Utah President Michael Young, who has studied religious-liberty questions across the globe.

Suppose the U.S. government determines that discrimination against gays in any form violates the country's basic social policies.

"For the most part, churches would have no trouble, but the devil's in the details," Young said. "If the law required full participation of gays in all aspects of religious life, including clergy ordination, that obviously would present a problem for Catholics, many Protestants and Mormons."

Douglas Laycock, a religious-liberty expert at the University of Michigan Law School, said he is not aware of all the Prop 8 fallout.

"I know there were some bad incidents of people being threatened," Laycock said. "To the extent that that kind of thing went on, it shouldn't have. It does intimidate the exercise of free-speech rights."

America's free-speech clause "is pretty robust, but we have had censorship of free speech on same-sex issues in public schools and in colleges and universities," said Laycock, editor of the 2008 volume, Same-Sex Marriage and Religious Liberty: Emerging Conflicts .

U.S. courts have not yet treated as unconstitutional sermons calling homosexual sex a sin, he said. "But Canada and Sweden have, so it's not unimaginable."

rwinters@sltrib.com

pstack@sltrib.com



Church and blacks
The LDS Church has drawn fire in the past for its racial views.

Until 1978, church policy prevented black members of African descent from marrying in LDS temples or holding the church's all-male priesthood.

Former LDS President Ezra Taft Benson was known in the 1950s and '60s for referring to the "so-called civil-rights movement" as a communist plot, said American history scholar D. Michael Quinn, a gay former Mormon.

Quinn heard echoes of that in Oaks' reference Tuesday to "alleged civil rights" for gay men and lesbians.

"It's demeaning millions of people with a little catchphrase," he said, "demeaning their legitimate aspirations for civil rights."

Latterday Taint
HOW GLENN BECK IS DRIVEN BY MORMONISM—AND WHY HIS FELLOW FAITHFUL (INCLUDING MITT ROMNEY) SHOULD BE WORRIED
http://www.boiseweekly.com/boise/latterday-tain...

If you want to study genalogy the LDS is a great resource. After that they can kiss my black w/ their long unending history of racism.

You ain't never lied, Rob.

And since the LDS is in the business of influencing politics, they need to be giving up their Tax-Exempt status, cause financing Prop 8 was most definately a blurring of the lines between church and state.

Utah only got admitted to the Union when the state agreed to give up polygamy. And didn't allow brothas in the sect until 1978.

All because Joseph Smith and Brigham Young probably ate something that didn't agree with them and gave them dreams which has turned out to be nightmares for many.

You ain't never lied, Rob.

And since the LDS is in the business of influencing politics, they need to be giving up their Tax-Exempt status, cause financing Prop 8 was most definately a blurring of the lines between church and state.

Utah only got admitted to the Union when the state agreed to give up polygamy. And didn't allow brothas in the sect until 1978.

All because Joseph Smith and Brigham Young probably ate something that didn't agree with them and gave them dreams which has turned out to be nightmares for many.

HEEEY CPL: :>)

You ain't never lied, LOL!! :>)

THIS is HANDY - - huh?? :>) :>)

Schumer To Reid: The Fate Of The Public Option May Be In Your Hands

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) threw down the gauntlet on the public option for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) last night. Appearing on The Rachel Maddow Show, Schumer essentially put the fate of the public option in Reid's hands -- saying that while the bill passed Tuesday by the Senate Finance Committee doesn't include a public health insurance option, it's up to Reid to decide whether to include a public option in the bill that merges the Senate Finance Committee bill with the bills passed by others committees -- all of which do include a public option.

"Leader Reid has the option of putting it in the final bill," Schumer said of the public option. "If he puts it in the final bill, in the combined bill, then you would need 60 votes to remove it. And there clearly are not 60 votes against the public option. And so we're urging him to do that, and he's seriously considering it."

Schumer continued:

It's very important to see if a public option is in the bill that Leader Reid puts together. He hasn't yet made up his mind, but many of us who believe in the public option are urging him to do so, and so far we're getting heard.

Schumer said this solution might take some of the heat off conservative Democratic senators like Sens. Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) and Ben Nelson (D-NE), since they wouldn't have to explicitly vote to put the public option in the bill, but would merely have to support a bill that already included a public option.

"If it's in the bill, you don't have to have every Democrat vote for it, because if it's in the bill, to take it out would take 60 votes," Schumer said. "So that's one of the cases, one of those rare moments, where this 60-vote rule which we usually abhor works in our favor."

Your move Sen. Reid.
http://tpmlivewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/1...

nice way of saying..

MAN THE FUCK UP, HARRY

I'd give Schumer the side eye - he's trying to save his own ass with his constituency, most of which want that public option and, despite his tenure as a Senator, he knows that New Yorkers can field and finance a challenger to his ass faster than microwave popcorn can pop.

Throwing down the gauntlet at Harry Reid might get him a STRONGLY WORDED LETTER of rebuke from Reid for Schumer's daring to attempt to call him out.

Harry Reid is about as strong as some soggy Panko crumbs.

Secret Bush Administration document concludes greenhouse gases endanger America
The curtain continues to open on Bush Administration actions that covered up the danger posed to America by global warming. You’ve seen the declassified photos, now read the declassified document (pdf).

The secret Bush document reaches the same conclusion as the Obama Administration’s 2009 endangerment finding on carbon dioxide, but might have prompted action to curb global warming two years earlier:
Reporting from Washington – The Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday released a long-suppressed report by George W. Bush administration officials who had concluded — based on science — that the government should begin regulating greenhouse gas emissions because global warming posed serious risks to the country.

The report, known as an “endangerment finding,” was done in 2007. The Bush White House refused to make it public because it opposed new government efforts to regulate the gases most scientists see as the major cause of global warming.

The existence of the finding — and the refusal of the Bush administration to make it public — were already known. But no copy of the document had been released until Tuesday.

The document “demonstrates that in 2007 the science was as clear as it is today,” said Adora Andy, EPA spokeswoman. “The conclusions reached then by EPA scientists should have been made public and should have been considered.”

via Bush-era EPA document on climate change released — latimes.com.

The Obama Administration’s endangerment finding empowers the EPA to regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases as pollutants, which has spurred Congress to introduce climate bills passed in the Houseand Senate.
http://trueslant.com/jeffmcmahon/2009/10/14/sec...

Who Loves You, Baby?
Posted by Zandar
The GOP's constant attacks on Obama as President and the neocon failure to learn anything from the Bush administration's foreign policy setbacks is beginning to take a heavy toll on the Republican brand, as Michael Cohen writes over at Politico.
The problems for Republicans are threefold: First, many on the right seem overtaken by a visceral dislike of Obama that is faintly reminiscent of Democratic attitudes toward President George W. Bush. This partisanship is manifesting itself in dangerous ways. It’s one thing to oppose Obama’s initiatives; it’s quite another to be seen as rooting against American interests.

Second, Republicans continue to engage in the same sort of knee-jerk attacks on Democratic “weakness” and naked appeals to American militarism that, while once resonant, have lost their political luster.

Third, Bush-administration-era views — and political appeals — on national security continue to dominate the GOP. Conservative columnist Ross Douthat strikingly noted this week that Obama passed up a chance to “establish himself” as an “American president” by failing to turn down the Nobel Peace Prize. Considering that even in late 2003, at a period of growing tension in the trans-Atlantic relationship, 84 percent of the country believed that it was in America’s national security interests to be liked and respected around the world, it’s hard to see how this would make Obama “more American” or better liked.

Republicans seem to be buying in to the myth of American indifference and even antipathy toward the rest of the world — adopting the neoconservative view, expressed succinctly by Liz Cheney last weekend, that Americans want a president who espouses the notion of U.S. dominance on the world stage. It’s hard to square these views with Pew Research Center polling from last year, which indicated that a majority of Americans viewed the country’s lack of respect in international eyes as a “major problem,” or regular survey results that show Americans prefer a foreign policy that is focused on cooperation and multilateralism.

The greatest irony of the conservative response to the Nobel Committee’s honor is that it is a clear indication that there is a global thirsting for American leadership and engagement. Conservatives should be delighted by what is basically a European call for American leadership; yet the response has been to treat it as a mark of shame for Obama.

And that's the real issue. It's only a mark of shame if Obama does it, and if Obama does it, it's a mark of shame. People are finally picking up on Obama Derangement Syndrome, and they're getting sick of it. "If you guys have a better idea," they say, "Let's hear it." The response is nothing but screaming and lies and stupidity. And yes, that's turning off large swaths of America to Republicanism.

Damn shame too, we need a party to keep the Democrats approaching actual honesty.

http://zandarvts.blogspot.com/2009/10/who-loves...

Damn,MC Steele new site gets no love from the wingnuts
New GOP Website is a Hot Mess
As Jillian subtly points out, GOP chairman Michael Steele is not 13-years-old and, therefore, should not have a blog entitled "What Up?"

But along with the chairman's new blog, a new GOP site has been unveiled as the party attempts to re-brand itself. "Something is happening at GOP.com," booms the voice of Steele as the page loads. No joke: a digital Michael Steele struts across the computer monitor to explain the new website and how "that something new -- is you!" Sure this tiny Michael Steele and cheesy line is enough to make you roll your eyes, but it gets worse. Much worse.

In fact, it gets downright embarrassing.
Read More
http://townhall.com/blog/g/53f458a2-d598-4ded-8...

From thegrio.com:

Hypocrisy reigns for non-black Hampton U homecoming queen

Today at 6:21am

The crowning of Nikole Churchill as the first non-black Miss Hampton University has caused a ruckus at the historically-black institution, and throughout the African-American community. As a student at Hampton, Churchill, 22, was certainly eligible to compete and ultimately win the award. Any objections to her crowning that are based on her skin color are nothing less than hypocritical.

Read the rest of the article here:

http://www.thegrio.com/2009/10/the-crowning-of-...

The runner up on her right does not look pleased.

I have no beef with a non-Black person being recognized or celebrated by a HBCU. But I give the side-eye to any person's recognition/celebration if they attended a satellite or annexed campus.

That's like being me being selected Yale valedictorian as an online student.

HEEEY RonnieB: :>)

That's like being me being selected Yale valedictorian as an online student.

LOL!! :>) SPEAK TA-RUTH!! :>)

Ronnie, the university doesn't make that distinction. If you go to Yale online when you graduate your degree will look no different than other student's degree besides the fact yours may say "Physical Education."

Just a little jokey joke don't flame me.

LOL!

For Real, Ronnie.

And from what I've read here, she thought she'd get the POTUS to come down and put those African-American students in their places regarding their reception of her as the Queen, because she knows Obama will tell US off and make us like it. /snark

She played herself - if she shuts up, the response to her being selected dies down and life goes on at Hampton.

Hampton gets the side eye because they provided Baby Tavis cover to hold his Annual Negro Super Bowl there as opposed to Jamestown, where it was initially planned, because some journalists asked him why was he trying to celebrate the enslavement of Black People as the reason for holding the SOBU at the site where Africans were offloaded into slavery for the next 450 years?

Actually in light of TavyTavs close ties to Wells Fargo, I'd say celebrating the enslavement of Black People by hosting his Signifying Soundbite Soriee @ Jamestown would be entirely more appropriate than HU.

BTW, this whole stupid controversy goes down as a Diva Pleez moment. Talk about delusions of grandeur. Name one Crown contest that didn't have its petty critics. Just because she's not Black doesn't mean she's getting embraced or dissed anymore so than the rest of the previous winners were. Had she been Black, they'd be mad about the lightness vs darkness or natural vs perm or weave vs grown or down vs bougie....

There have been plenty of Non-Black students @ HBCUs over the years that have been embraced by the student body. & like some have said, the non-black satellite student thing just gives the haters more ammo.

Thank you

If you have a school that is majority black and a non-black enters the school beauty pagaent, there's a great chance the non-black will win because the votes will be split among the black contestants. Same with white schools --the black contestant has a great chance of winning because the votes will be split among the white contestants.

I believe in HU's case, the queen is selected, not elected. So that's probably part of the problem there. In that case, get mad at the selection committee, not the girl.

Knowing the winner goes on to compete in the Miss America pagaent, the Hampton people who selected Churchill probably figured SHE would have a better chance of winning than say, Lakisha from DC. But good luck with that because 3 of the last 5 winners have been Miss Arlington. The only black winner* of Miss Virginia (Miss America) was Nancy Redd.

The black students being upset that Nikole Churchill was crowned Miss Hampton are no more hypocritical than the teabaggers railing against Obama with witch doctor and Lyin' African signs claiming it's not about race.

Also, Nikole Churchill doesn't attend the main HU campus in Hampton, she attends the satellite campus in Virginia Beach. So the kids on campus may be feeling that Nikole is not really part of the HU community but that's coming out as "this white girl came and stole the crown." It might be a totally different story if Nikole Churchill were known around campus (the main campus in Hampton).

Also, not all or even most of the students are upset or mad about this. The people on campus who are mad about it on racial grounds are probably part of the Soul Patrol anyway. I would guess there's a lot more of the "she don't even go here" sentiment than the "that white girl stole the crown" sentiment.

Now, on to Miss Churchill:

The letter to Obama was nothing but a drama queen move. She just got crowned LAST Friday (Oct. 9th). The letter to Obama was over the weekend/Monday Oct. 12th at the latest. Obama does not have time to go down to Hampton U. and lecture the black kids on accepting Nikole Churchill, which is basically what her letter to Obama was asking him to do. She evidently got a lot of push back because she's now apologizing for her drama queen move.

That's also what this Grio website is saying Obama should do. Unless they also ask Obama to lecture white people on their racism, their advice that Obama should lecture the black kids about diversity is just wrong.

*Nita Booth was the first black Miss Virginia (Miss America) back in 1998 when she became Miss VA after the reigning Miss VA became Miss America.

This is an interesting comment-
#

Monique 9:41 AM on 10/14/2009

If she was the best candidate, then it shouldn't matter what color her skin is and the fact that she attends an HBCU is irrelevant. HOWEVER, university officials have since admitted to crowning her in a strategic PR move to gain publicity for the school and to sweeten an invite to President Obama (as he is a fellow mixed-race Hawaiian) to come and speak at the University. If I were a tuition paying student at Hampton then maybe I would care and question the ethics of the school officials whose salary I would be paying, but I'm not so I don't.

I guess that's also why she wrote a letter to PBO, to help the college.

Sounds like Monique's opinion to me. Next!

If it isn't........ ROTFLMBAO!!!!!!!!

I saw that, too. But Im not sure if it was the posters assumption or actual fact. I couldn't find statements from officials admitting this was a PR move.

Oh, well hell if this is actually the case, the students DO need to be rasing cain over it.

"So the kids on campus may be feeling that Nikole is not really part of the HU community but that's coming out as "this white girl came and stole the crown." It might be a totally different story if Nikole Churchill were known around campus (the main campus in Hampton)."

True, this is nothing like the Miss Kentucky State winner's experience (she's white also). Miss KSU lived in the dorms and plus that was a student-voted competition. She campaigned and had a committee of other students assisting with her campaign. She was popular and won by a vote of her peers on campus.

Kentucky State is an AA school?

Yep.

The only black winner* of Miss Virginia (Miss America) was Nancy Redd.

Isn't the current Miss Virginia black?

No.

Edit--there are 2 Miss Virginias: Miss Virginia-America and Miss Virginia-USA. Caressa Cameron is Miss Virginia-America and she is black; however she won as Miss Arlington and 3 of the last 5 winners of the Miss Virginia crown have been Miss Arlingtons. Generally the winners are from NoVa or the Mountain/Valley Region.

To my knowledge there has never been a black Miss Richmond, either.

Please know that there has been a Miss Teen Miss Richmond who was black and two Miss Pre-teen Richmonds who were black. Caressa won Miss Greater Springfield the first year she was in the top ten. She then won Miss Chesterfield and was in the 2nd runner up. She then was Piedmont Region was 1st runner up. AS Miss Arlington, Virginia finally crowned her Miss VA.

Miss Norfolk 2010 is black and will probably get in the top 10.

Signed -- one who really knows.

Miss Virginia-America is where Miss Hampton will compete.

Caressa Cameron is definitely AA. Albeit, they are all tokens and there has never been a real attempt for inclusion in either of the pageants.

Why does she have to be a token. I looked more into the Miss Virginia organization and Miss Pre-Teen Virginia is black as well. It also seems like there are a lot of little black girls in the local pageant system. So maybe things are changing.

http://www.missva.com/2009/teen_preteen2009/200...

However, I'm not from Virginia. All I know about it is from a few months living in Herdon for work. Seemed okay to me but it could be very racist still and I just don't know.

Now how many AA women have won these pageants?

Which pageants? Of the three Miss Virginia America titles for 2009 (Miss, Teen and Pre-teen) two are black.

One here and there over the years versus a slew of AA contestants competing! Sounds like you have to either be 1000 times better than the white competition or a few got thru on tokenism. It just looked bad that no blacks ever held the title, so since we finally found a few that were a million times better, let them have it this year.

Yeah, I'm cynical.

Yes you are : )

LOL!

"Stony the road we trod, bitter the chastening rod, felt in the days when hope UNBORN had died. Yet with a steady beat, have not our weary feet come to a place for which our fathers died. We have come over a way that with tears have been watered, treading our path thru the blood of the slaughtered....."


Multicultural campus my azz.

Hey PJamma, how you been?!

This is VERY interesting. The article says that the first white Miss Hampton University was "selected" and makes no mention of an election. So, therein lies the first problem. But what perturbs me is after she realized that she is NOT going to receive widespread acceptance, SHE WRITES A LETTER TO OBAMA TO COMPLAIN. WTF!!

Okay, so here is where I get pissed. What is Obama supposed to do? Is Obama now judge and jury over all AA affairs?, Is he the school-principal-for-fairness?, Is he supposed to MAKE AAs accept her? WTF!!

From Nikole Churchill:
"Churchill's mother is of Italian ancestry, and her father is from Guam. In a letter to President Obama - a fellow Hawaiian - the nursing major said that many Hampton students do not accept her crowning, and have made negative comments about her. "It would be much easier to say that possibly some were not accepting of the news because I wasn't the most qualified contestant; however, the true reason for the disapproval was because of the color of my skin. I am not African-American," she told the president. "Despite the unfortunate beliefs that some are saying I should not have won, I am desperately trying to focus on those who believe in me and support me and my goal to represent this beautiful, multicultural campus the very best way that I can."
Churchill later apologized to the Hampton University community for writing the letter.

From thegrio.com
"The black experience in America has been one of exclusion, of society questioning our abilities and qualifications. The troubling legacy of racial exclusion by white universities is why historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) were founded in the first place."

Sounds to me like Hampton needs a good beat down and tongue lashing for letting this get to this point. REVIEW YOUR POLICES AND PROCEDURES HAMPTON.

Hey Myth!

There was no "election" per se. She was selected pagent style with five judges instead of the student body weighing in which is how I think a lot of schools do it.

I, too, was taken aback by her letter to Obama. Was she trying to get her invite to the WH for beer and peanuts? Was she trying for media attention?

Seems to me this issue (if there really is an issue) could have been resolved within the halls of Hampton.

Where is her respect for the institution? Could she not have addressed her concerns with the Hampton President? Now this is where she is going to have most of her "elitist" problems for the next year. Is she too good to address this in-house?

Whoever "selected" her thinking that she will have a better chance of being selected Miss Virginia becaus she is white needs a good beating down and tongue lashing. If a black girl can't win a pageant in a racist state, so be it. It is what it is. TOTALLY WRONG MESSAGES BEING SENT TO YOUNG AA WOMEN. What's the makeup of the Judges panel? Was Rush on the panel?

And, what percentage of Hampton is multicultural?

Maybe she was selected because she was better than the other contestants. The only reason why this is "newsworthy" because the color of her skin. If in the judges mind she was the best contestant then so be it. If the judges would have chosen one of the other contestants would we been even talking about this? She goes to the institution and she won. What's the problem? She didn't choose herself.

agreed 100% Guns

"Better than" in whose eyes, a handful of those on the selection panel I suppose? That's the way the process is set up at this school and that's how it apparently played out. It is definitely an issue for the thousands of AA women on that campus who are also "better than" Nikole, those who competed and those who didn't compete. The problem here is the selection panel, the subjective judging, the process/procedures upon how contestants are judged. I am not saying that maybe Nikole wasn't the most qualified, BUT in a pool of 10-20 African American women vying for the crown, something less than objectivity was going on in the Judges heads. I would love to know more about the Judges before I can respond to your "better than" assumption.

Nikole's biggest problem throught her reign is going to be her "power play" and disrespect for ANYONE at Hampton in directing her insecurities. It is not going to be easy for her by any stretch if in fact she thinks she's "better than" in directing her concerns.

"the problem here is the selection panel, the subjective judging, the process/procedures upon how contestants are judged"

ALL pageant judging is subjective...always has been!

If you choose to compete in a pageant you darn well should know this.

Myth, atleast admit this much. The only reason why you are questioning the judges (which the Hampton leadership chose) is because they chose the white student. If there were some behind the scene politics going on it had nothing to do with the contestant. It's kind of like those conservatives slamming PO for accepting the Noble Peace Prize. No matter if you thought they earned the award they didn't chose themselves. My point is this is really out the realm of reality that a white beauty contestant could be more qualified in a field of black ones at an HCBU? I don't think so.

(1) True, I am questioning this white woman's win on a campus of thousands of AA women.

(2)I don't know about behind the scenes politics, BUT I do believe something adverse was going on in the heads of this handful of judges.

(3) This is not just out of the realm at Hampton, this is totally unbelievable and embarrassing to them. What is the woman apologizing for now that the letter has been written?. They would have eventually accepted her as a white woman winning the pageant, what is not going to happen for her now that she wrote the letter is to NEVER BE RESPECTED OR ACCEPTED.

Was she "better than" to have gone outside of the university to get what she felt was an objective response from "Barack-the-magic-Negro? She fixta find out.

The only reason this is newsworthy is because she pulled a drama queen move and wrote to President Obama to come down to Hampton University and lecture the black kids on acceptance and diversity. That's the ONLY reason why her win is newsworthy. Most media outlets in the state only pay attention to what's going on at Virginia Tech and UVa. Any other school, especially a black school, can go kick rocks. The only time a black school is given media attention in VA is when somebody gets shot.

I agree except, there are no schools, black or white, that get any media attention in VA outside of a campus paper. When was the last time you heard about life @ Washington&Lee or James Madison or William&Mary. What's new @ ODU, VCU, or Radford? [Crickets]

It's UVA & VT. As of late its been more VT than UVA.

At least Hampton gets some regular love from the larger HBCU network.

Town, the girl probably felt alienated. In her mind she felt like she honestly competed and won the competition no matter the behind the scene politics the she doesn't have anything to do with. And now she is feeling backlash from some of the student body because "IN HER MIND" she is not the right color. She probably feels like diversity is a one-way street by the way she has been treated. She felt like she had to do some something drastic(letter). I remember a few years ago I think at an HBCU a white guy was the valedictorian. Some people had a problem with it. I don't. As blacks if we get bothered when he compete in our own backyards how are we ever going to compete in the world.

"I think at an HBCU a white guy was the valedictorian"
Morehouse?.

Uh yeah, & do you remember THAT controversy?!

I think some of the alum were more upset than the current students.

Fo sho!

She SHOULD feel alienated because she alienated herself.

1) She didn't attend the main Hampton campus in Hampton; she attended the satellite campus in Virginia Beach. If I attended the UVa satellite campus in RICHMOND and got crowned Miss UVa, the CHARLOTTESVILLE students would be like WTF? because I'm not really a part of the UVa campus community.

2) She just got crowned on FRIDAY. Yet she wrote this letter to Obama over the weekend to complain about her reception? To come down and lecture the black students about diversity? Get out of here wit that ---that was a pure drama queen move. By her own admission, not all of the black students were against her.

I contend most of the anger towards her is because a) she's not a part of the Hampton University community and b) she pulled this drama queen move.

Not because she's non-black.

I'm done with this issue because my girlfriend is going to give me shit for "blindly" defending the "defenseless" white woman. She has been going through my posts on JJP lately and told me I can't call people toolbags for not agreeing with me.

LOL

Sounds like you got a good woman..betta listen UP!

Your first point is irrelevant because a student is student no matter what campus they attend. When she receives her degree it is going to say Hampton University just like the others. If where she attended was an issue the university wouldn't have let her compete. I'm sure some of the other contestants attend the same campus where she does and I know for sure there wouldn't have been this outrage if one of them would have won.

The letter was a drastic drama move I'll admit it. A typical "white woman in distress" move that got the intended attention but like I said she probably felt she was receiving backlash for being chosen which wasn't right.

The real question I have is how many other white women competed in this competition because people like Myth are insinuating she won because she was white.

Here's a comment from the Grio:

HU alum says odd choice 11:41 AM on 10/14/2009
For me skin color is not really the main issue. Realize, Mr. Pirate is not white this year (Asian I think) and NO ONE CARES!! It is just odd to choose this young lady who seems like a total break from the traditional Miss HU. I personally don’t think she is prettiest, but beyond that, maybe outsiders would understand the annoyance better if they realize many students and alumni still see the pageant as more of a Homecoming Queen contest. Ms. Hampton is Homecoming Queen and the scholarship, the “duties”, and the chance of placing in the Miss America pageant are all tiny. From my experience Miss Hampton contestants are generally somewhat popular or active contributors to the Student Leadership program, a sorority, Student Government Association, an Alumni Association...SOMETHING. From what I read this young woman does not attend the main campus and the students don't know her, that's what keeps coming up. Most of the students and most of the activities are on the main campus, but attending school at a satellite campus does not keep you from participating. There are grad students and commuters who throw themselves whole heartedly into campus life. Time and distance are no excuse. She found time to travel to Hampton for weeks and give up countless hours to practice and will now give more hours to prep for the Miss VA pageant. What makes HU (and most HBCU's) great are the lifelong connections, nurturing environment, social activism, and feeling that you are truly a part of the campus and not just a number. HU has tons of pageants and winners usually “pay their dues” and get rewarded with the fun and excitement of wearing a crown. I blame the judges, not Ms. Churchill, for allowing a person to add nothing to campus life, have no connection to what it really means to be a Pirate and then take away an opportunity from girls who are there daily. As an HU alum, I think that Miss Hampton should embody the true spirit of the school. The judges seem hungry for a Miss Virginia win and are starting to alienate the students and lose sight of that part of the pageant.If she were an active, involved member of the Hampton family, I KNOW she would be welcomed. Something about choosing an unknown person to serve as what is essentially Homecoming Queen is just odd. So, it does give you pause and make some students and alumni wonder if she has been chosen specifically because she is white, under the cheap guise of celebrating diversity.

This insinuation if true, is insulting to every African American student at Hampton and in particular, AA females.

So this is the question. If she didn't add anything to the campus. Why was she chosen in your humble opinion Town? Hmmmmm

The selection committee only chose her because a white Miss HU would have a better chance of progessing in the Miss Virginia pagaent than a black winner.

There have only been 2 black winners in the Miss VA (America) pagaent. The first was in 2003, the second only this year and that's probably only because of Obama.

I don't think the students would be nearly as mad if Nikole Churchill had some connection to the HU main campus community because as the poster said, Mr. Pirate is not black this year either and nobody is mad about that.

Excellent assessment!

Disgusting!

Stony the road we've trod... (uh, okay Myth stop it)

Actually it's very relevant where she attends campus. The majority of the students are based at the Hampton campus. Nikole is based at the VaBeach campus. If Nikole never spent a significant amount of time at the Hampton campus, nobody knows who she is.

Most universities have a main campus and satellite campuses in other cities that mainly offer night courses. The people who attend those satellite campuses might get their degree from the same school but they are not really a part of the school community (unless they take the time to be a part of the school community).

The fact that she decided to write Obama from the safety of Virginia Beach shows she's not a part of the Hampton community. Because if she was, she never would have written that letter and embarassed herself and the school like that. She would have known there was a Soul Patrol on campus who would have a problem with it, and she would have also known there were black students on campus who DIDN'T have a problem with her win.

She's not a part of the HU community, and I think the people who are mad about her win are more mad about that and her drama queen move than her skin color.

Town,

I have appreciated your comments on this issue, and you held it down.

I love that you keep on bringing up that the HU KING isn't Black either, but there are no problems....

one should ask the question WHY, as you say.

I think the main part of the problem is Mr. HU is voted on by the student body, while Miss HU is chosen by this selection committee.

I don't care if it's Virginia State or Virginia Tech, the student body is going to be pissed if the Homecoming Queen is somebody that NOBODY knows.

Like the commenter on the Grio said, she found the time to trek her ass to the Hampton campus for this Miss HU competition, she could have found the time to trek her ass to campus to be a part of the campus community. I know the bridge tunnel is backed up a lot but come on!

Well said Town.

Town, don't believe for a minute that the Virginia Beach campus is all that safe for her. She is not going to be able to go to class now or walk across that campus. Every Delta, AKA, Zeta, Que, Alpha, Kappa, Sigma (who did I leave out) and Black Student Organization Soul Patrol will step to her with their very, very candid comments about "who she thinks she is and whyfore you had to write that letter". She aint safe on that campus. Betta ask somebody. Frats and Sorors facebook jumping as we speak. Word has gone out!

The VaBeach "campus" is just a building, not an actual campus. Probably a floor or two of a building that's been leased out.

I have been away from campus for a very long time: what the heck is the soul patrol??

Heard of the Fashion police?
Well Soul Patrol, speaks to violators of Soul/?blackness...they in charge of yanking "black" cards you know you ain't black based on their idea of designated 'blackbehavior/attitude
The village abandons you.
i.e. not real.

She was the only white contestant. Although I don't know if shed be classified as white since she is half-Italian half-Guamanian.

She is non-black.

Pleeease...Italy too close to Africa for her to be non-black.
Momma Italian?...she has African roots.
Plus, Guam has significant Spainiard heirtage..even their language has 70% Spanish words.

And everyone knows...the MOORS built & ruled Spain.
http://www.hispanicmuslims.com/andalusia/Abercr...

Based on lineage..I hereby DECLARE

Miss Hampton U...BLACK..

she just don't look it and we could say she don't claim it...but since she IS at an HBCU...that can be debated.

From the looks of her in the picture then, she appears to be succeeding at "passing"

You are what you think you are and this woman is white. Don't try to make her into being something that she is not trying to be. Didn't she state in the letter she wrote to the President of the United States of America, "save me I'm white and they mad about it"?

"You are what you think you are and this woman is white. "

Well, she IS matriculating at an HBCU!!!!

"save me I'm white and they mad about it"?

Peeps never told her she black.

Lineage, lineage, lineage...she is BLACK

Meow! No cat fight here.

No, Myth, she didn't say she was white. She said she was not African-American. But I just read the letter and I am hot all over again. Girl is going to get clowned during the Homecoming ceremony. Here is the link:

http://hiphop.popcrunch.com/first-white-miss-ha...

"She said she was not African-American."

YEPPER!!!!

Please!

She was crowned on Friday and she wrote the letter to Obama critisizing her fellow students on Sunday (in some way that the media was able to pick up on it). I think she could have waited and talked to the school officials first before making any statements about the school to the President or the media.

To me, that's the story.

I could call less if a non black won the pageant. If she was the best candidate, crown her.

I will admit. The letter to Obama was a bit theatrical but like I said the girl probably felt alienated and we all know how woman can be. VICIOUS. I'm sure a lot of women on the campus were throwing her a lot of attitude and probably she didn't know how to deal with it properly.

She is truly fixta find out now. Can somebody fetch the names and background on these most fair and objective judges. Then we can answer the question as to why Nikole was "better than" in their eyesight.

Hampton needs to look at a election versus a selection process.

she is truly fixta find out now.

BWA HA HA HA HA HA HA

Here is the info on the panel. Two of the five aren't even affiliated with Hampton but are with the Miss Virginia pageant.



This year's pageant was judged by five people, including two certified by the Miss Virginia competition, which leads to the Miss America pageant. The other judges were Joan Gentry, an HU counselor for freshman studies; Lorraine Bell, an HU music professor; and Henry Mills, a senior vice president at Old Point National Bank

Taken from http://www.dailypress.com/news/dp-local_missham...

Thanks PJ. Well now, here we have it. Does anybody know if Henry Mills, senior VP at Old Point National Bank is AA?
And what about the 2 certified by the Miss Virginia competition?

And not just the color of their skin but also "what's under their skin in the heart" Maybe white is "better than". Who are we really dealing with.

I bet one thing, they won't be judges next year. What are the officials at Hampton thinking? Are they so desperate to win a damned beauty pageant that they would stack the deck including State Pageant officials to try and win at the expense of thousands of AA women on their campus. What message does this send to them and me too?

This is making my blood boil. Guess its time for a little light-heartedness and talk about my babies - the Somalian Pirates. (Hehehehehehe-anybody heard anything from them lately)

LOL!!!

Whatever happened to the young pirate you were going to adopt and rehabilitate? Is he eating three meals a day with play time on the yard at one of our juvenile detention centers?

He didn't mean to be in the wrong place at the right time.

Now he is away from momma 'nem and in another culture where he can't even speak the language. And who knows what else might be happening to his tender young azz. OMG!

Mr. Mills is black and from google images he is very involved in the black community.

You probably won't see any of these 5 judging there again. Something went terribly wrong in their minds eye, trying to win a state beauty pageant over the well being of the university.

OOOps..there it is!!

But the current Miss Virginia is black!

http://www.missva.com/

So the argument some are making that she won because the Hampton officials thought a white girl would do better in the state pagent then a black girl is false.

I'd hope her win was because she was the most qualified and not PR for the school.

There have been 3 black Miss Virginias (Miss America):

Nita Booth, 1998 --because Nicole Johnson won Miss America.

Nancy Redd, 2003

Caressa Cameron, 2009.

I'm not sure how many black winners of Miss Virginia-USA there were, I know there was at least one, Patricia Southall in 1994 (Emmitt Smith's wife; Martin Lawrence's ex-wife).

Generally the winners (of any race) come out of Northern Virginia or the Mountain/Valley Region. Sometimes a Tidewater pops in there (Pat Southall was from Chesapeake but I don't know what she ran as). And the majority of the black Miss Virginias are light skinned with the weave flowing.

Nita Booth doesn't count because she didn't win as Miss Virginia (America), she was 1st runner up and assumed the crown after Nicole Johnson won Miss America.

Well now that's a stretch. Just because the present Miss Virginia is black doesn't help. What 2, 3, 4 pageant winners in the last 2000 years? Who was on the panel is the key to the answer here as well as their motivation to send whatever their message is to thousands of black women on that campus. Out of the many, many qualified AA women on that campus, do you go hunt for a needle in a haystack to prove a point. Would this level of "fairness" ever have happened at say Alabama State?

Okay Judges, give the women at Hampton a freaking break with your damned "fairness". Multicultural campus my azz. This dog just ain't gon hunt!

Preparations for April’s 2010 Census are well underway. The federal government’s largest ever peacetime operation, the 23rd decennial headcount is a tightly choreographed effort involving years of planning, $14 billion and 700,000 staff.

After some fits and starts, the Census Bureau is ready to deliver an accurate census. However, an appropriations amendment just introduced by Sens. David Vitter (R-LA) and Robert Bennett (R-UT) could derail that outcome. The Senators want to bar the Census Bureau from conducting the census unless it adds questions on each person’s citizenship and immigration status.

It’s difficult to overstate the importance of the 2010 Census. Census results will drive congressional and Electoral College apportionment; legislative redistricting; voting and civil rights enforcement; the annual distribution of $500 billion in federal funds to U.S. communities; the siting of roads, health centers, and schools; response to disasters; and the location and hiring decisions of millions of businesses from mom-and-pop to Wal-Mart.

The census aims to count everyone, regardless of citizenship and immigration status. The amendment’s sponsors complain that the current approach to congressional apportionment is skewed because unauthorized immigrants are included. They want the census to identify the unauthorized in order to exclude them from the apportionment process.

But they are ignoring the Constitution itself. It requires a count of all “persons” residing in the United States, not just citizens or legal residents. The framers intended the census to be an inclusive count and so avoided the term “citizen” used elsewhere throughout the Constitution.

Additionally, the Census Bureau doesn’t ask about a person’s legal status to avoid intimidating immigrants, authorized and unauthorized, from participating in the census. While Census Bureau employees are held to strict standards of confidentiality, under threat of criminal penalty, many immigrants may still be reluctant. Charged with getting a full count of the U.S. population, the Census Bureau can’t afford additional risk that a significant number of people will not fill out the form.

In addition to compromising census accuracy, the Vitter-Bennett amendment would wreak havoc with census timing and cost.

Due to additional needs for testing, printing, and training, changing the census questionnaire would delay the census well beyond the congressionally mandated date of April 1, 2010. This, in turn, would postpone the Census Bureau delivery of population figures to states for apportionment and redistricting beyond April 1, 2011, as required by law. Ironically, in their fervor to deny congressional representation to non-citizens, Senators Vitter and Bennett would disrupt the entire apportionment process.

Then there is the added cost to taxpayers. Extending and remaking the massive census operation over many months will create, in the words of Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), Commerce-Justice-Science Appropriations Subcommittee chair, a “financial challenge that borders on . . . a nightmare.” The Vitter-Bennett amendment would waste hundreds of millions of dollars already spent on testing, printing, training, and advertising and require spending hundreds of millions more.

Changing the Census? Don’t Even Think about It

It has a snowball chance in hell of passing.If it passes the senate and then get through the house the President would veto it.In no way could congress get enough votes to override it.This b.s is D.O.A

Why Rush wants to own an NFL team
Rush Limbaugh wants to be an NFL owner. Or does he? Jason Whitlock says it’s a publicity stunt, and he may be right. Glenn Beck has been getting a lot of run lately and Rash needs to maintain his position as the Barking Right’s alpha blowhard. Whitlock also wonders why the NFL’s uber-dominator, Commish Roger Goodell, didn’t immediately neuter this, the Mother of All Bad Ownership Ideas. After all, a high percentage of the league’s players, coaches and fans are black, and Rush has a history of saying bad things about black people. Some samples:
I mean, let’s face it, we didn’t have slavery in this country for over 100 years because it was a bad thing. Quite the opposite: slavery built the South. I’m not saying we should bring it back; I’m just saying it had its merits. For one thing, the streets were safer after dark.
…
You know who deserves a posthumous Medal of Honor? James Earl Ray [the confessed assassin of Martin Luther King]. We miss you, James. Godspeed.
…
Look, let me put it to you this way: the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons. There, I said it.
…
The NAACP should have riot rehearsal. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies.
…
Take that bone out of your nose and call me back(to an African American female caller).
…
Despite the fact Obama graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law school, Limbaugh has called him an ‘affirmative action candidate.’ Limbaugh even has repeatedly played a song on his radio show ‘Barack the Magic Negro’ using an antiquated Jim Crow era term for black a man who many Americans are supporting for president.

There was also the time ESPN was dumbass enough to let Limbaugh on their pre-game show. That didn’t work out so well, did it?

Let’s set aside for a second the obvious troubling question about how a team with Rush at the helm would get new players, since presumably it would dodge the draft. And the also-obvious question of whether, given its stance against illegal drug use, the league would be forced to ban Limbaugh from his own facility. Instead, let’s ask a more basic question: why would a guy like Limbaugh want to own an NFL team, knowing all the hassle involved in the process?

I think I have it figured out. Because it’s the closest he can get, in this day and age, to actually being able to buy, sell and trade Negros.

There. I said it.

_________________

UPDATE: A colleague e-mailed in to note that a couple of the quotes in the NewsOne link above are disputed and that “Rush repeated on his show yesterday that the slavery quote is slander. No one can locate an actual broadcast or date on which those quotes were delivered.”

So there. We’ve now accorded Limbaugh more fairness than he’s probably earned. Never say we’re not fair and balanced
http://www.scholarsandrogues.com/2009/10/13/why...

This guy argues for $23b in bonuses. The only thing I disagree w/ is that to many of these companies are on the public till. If they were true private companies(not publicly held) they could not have the levels of capital to speculate at the level they did. For those that were bailed out there should be no bonuses at all.

The author had to ignore and walk over a lot of bodies to reach his conclusion.

Questions to be asked.

Under the USofA's distortion of captialism, is GS's bonsues based on 1) use of trading software that could be used to, in their own words, “manipulate markets" in unfair ways, 2) creating and artificially maintaining bubbles, 3) selling crappy investments, and, 4) advise investors to bet against the financial health of a state whose bonds Goldman helps sell.

If daytime wholesale robbery is to be overlooked then GS 'earned' its bonuses.

This is Ritholtz's appearance to discuss bonus's. Dylan Ratigan opens by discussing JP Morgan's earnings. I think you'll like his definition of capitalism .

As a trauma surgeon, I've looked at the political landscape for the last four years and have written about my thoughts and experiences on my blog. Before my blog, I naïvely wrote a book that I thought would change the dynamic of the 2004 election -- yes, I know, I'm naïve. Although I'm naïve, I'm not stupid, I do learn but I learned slowly. I have been amazed at the venom and vitriol that conservatives have been spewing over the last two years. It should've warned us of the fight that we had ahead. Yesterday, we got a health care bill through the Senate finance committee. This was key. Don't think that this fight is over. It isn't. We saw earlier this week at the health insurance industry has cranked up his rhetoric another notch. They've released a study that is cynical at best. It is equivalent to me releasing a study about trauma surgeons saying they were underpaid and overworked. Biased? You think? The health insurance cabal will stop at nothing to derail healthcare reform or at least water it down so it is meaningless. We have to keep our eye on the ball.

Over the last three months I've set out the goals for healthcare reform as I see them. What ever comes out of Congress must be portable, it must be affordable, it must cover everyone and it must truly improve healthcare.

My two cents.

1) How to make it affordable while expanding services, covering everyone, and not instituting rationing or restrictions on new medical devices/medications?
2) Who will provide primary care?
3) How will this universal healthcare impact Medicare since the current plan projects bogus savings in Medicare?

The only studies I have seen about what you call bogus savings in medicare has come from the insurance industry.If you have a neutral party please provide a link.

Use common sense: The baby boomers are starting to retire. They will all go on Medicare and off of private insurance (except for Medigap). About 76 million boomers will retire in the next 10 years or so. This is about double the numbers to be covered by the new health care "reform". And as they get older the retired boomers will use massive amounts of health care dollars.

Your common sense is really common, as in everybody knows that. I'm sure that projections take into account of demographics; if we know that, then I'm sure the budget office does. So do you have a link that shows that the savings are bogus?

The projection is that we will save $50 billion from current projections (prior to passing the "reform" bill).
So what has changed from last years projections that the Medicare Trust Fund will run out of money in about 9 years (or less) without a tax increase or restrictions on benefits -
NOTHING. What will change - about 76 million more people on Medicare. Most of them living longer than projected when Medicare was implemented.

The savings in Medicare were posited as occuring when unneeded tests are eliminated. As in: "you don't need a CAT scan - we took a x-ray and your fine" OOPS - my mother had a broken back not picked up by x-rays. My sister persisted until they did a cat scan - yep - broken back.

Then you are making the case for single payer or medicare for all.

Kent Conrad: High-Population States Have Disproportionate Level Of Representation
By: David Dayen Tuesday October 13, 2009 5:13 pm


Kent Conrad’s talking point against the public option tied to Medicare rates is that it would destroy the health care system in his state of North Dakota. He’s said this before, in interviews with Ezra Klein among others. And he always makes this point, one of the silliest I’ve ever heard from a Senator, which he repeated today in the Senate Finance Committee:

The public option as defined by the committee of jurisdiction in the House, the Ways and Means Committee, is tied to Medicare levels of reimbursement. My state has the second-lowest level of Medicare reimbursement in the country. If my state is tied to that reimbursement, every hospital goes broke.

People say, “Just fix it.” I’ve been on the Finance Committee more than 15 years. I’ve been trying to fix the unfair aspects of Medicare reimbursement all the time. We run into the House. Membership is determined by population, and the big population states write levels of reimbursement that unfairly treat hospitals in states like mine. My hospitals get one-half as much as urban hospitals to treat the same illnesses.

The way he termed it today, Conrad said that high-population states have a “disproportionate representation” in the House of Representatives.

OK, so North Dakota has an estimated population of 641,000 as of 2008. They have the same representation in the Senate as California, with its population of 36,756,666.

According to Conrad, this is the way it should be.

To the extent that any state has a disproportionate representation in the US House, it’s… small states like Conrad’s. Their 2000 population was 641,000. In 2000, the Census set the average size of a Congressional district at 646,000. Meaning that the Congressional district made up of the state of North Dakota is smaller than the average Congressional district.

Conrad is welcome to make the argument about Medicare reimbursement rates, but in order to do that he argues that, essentially, the US government should base its representation totals on acreage and not people.

Conrad is considered a very serious person in Washington.
http://firedoglake.com/2009/10/13/kent-conrad-h...

" My hospitals get one-half as much as urban hospitals to treat the same illnesses."
this is very true. and they have to buy the same materials/drugs/devices/etc.. as urban hospitals. And they have to meet the same Joint Commission, CMS standards as urban hospitals. The rational is that the hicks in the sticks don't need as much money to live on.

So 2 people should get the same amount as 4 people when there is only so much money in the till to begin with?

pretending Conrad is a woman...

Bitch, please.

you're trying to justify being bought and paid for.

Not to mention trying to justify NOT voting for something that North Dakota would DIRECTLY benefit from.

That payola gets cut off if he votes wrong and Conrad knows IT.

Another look at the economy:
https://ems.gluskinsheff.net/Articles/Breakfast...

When I check for this I can pull it up. Let me know if you can?

No. Website presents login page.

Thank you.
Webmaster can Pdf's be posted here?

John Stewart did a great job on showing CNN not "fact checking" the politicians they interview but did highlight a fact check on an Obama SNL skit. Stewart is funny but it really does show the sad state of the "news."

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-october-1...

DAMN FOLKS HAVE REALLY GONE WILD

Surveillance video captures brutal beating of gay man, Jack Price, in Queens; Both suspects arrested
BY Rocco Parascandola
DAILY NEWS POLICE BUREAU CHIEF

Updated Wednesday, October 14th 2009, 1:22 AM

Jack Price lays in a medically induced coma at a Queens hospital.
Daniel Rodriguez Related NewsArticlesSecond suspect ID'd in anti-gay attackGay man gets brutal beatingA shocking video shows a gay man trying in vain to fend off two thugs who repeatedly punch and stomp him on a deserted Queens street.

Jack Price, 49, tries again and again to get to his feet and escape, only to have the cowards knock him back down in their brutal onslaught, the footage shows.

Two men have been arrested in the beatdown.

Daniel Aleman, 26, was nabbed Sunday night, and Daniel Rodriguez, 21, was captured Tuesday night in Norfolk, Va., police said.

The attackers walk away from Price at one point, only to return. One of them slugs Price one last time in the face before they leave for good, the video shows.

"From beginning to end, it was horrible," said Price's sister-in-law JoAnne Guarneri, 42. "Absolutely horrible."

Price, somehow, manages to get to his feet and stumble off after last Thursday's 4:30 a.m. attack.

Late Tuesday, however, he remained in critical condition at New York Hospital Queens, hooked up to a respirator. His lungs are collapsed and his jaw and ribs are broken.

"It's a despicable crime," Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said of the assault in College Point, where the victim and his alleged attackers all live.

"The individual was attacked simply for his orientation, and we're just not going to tolerate it in this city."

Police captured Rodriguez after they learned through the Real Time Crime Center database he had relatives in Virginia. Norfolk detectives and the U.S. Marshals Service were mobilized, and NYPD officers were dispatched immediately.

"It basically helped us identify people connected with him. It helped us find out who to talk to," said NYPD Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne about the database.

Aleman was ordered held on $20,000 bail Tuesday as he was arraigned on a charge of felony assault as a hate crime. Charges were pending against Rodriguez.

"As Americans, each of us isfree to choose where and how we want to live our lives," Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said. "An illustrative example ofthat freedom is clearly Queens County, the most culturally diverse county in the nation. Crimes of hate will never be tolerated here."

Price was mocked with anti-gay slurs by the two men as he was walking to a deli. When he left the store, the slurs continued, Brown said, and then the suspects attacked.

The video is from one of several surveillance cameras installed in the area by the College Point Board of Trade to deter graffiti.

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan) said the video illustrates the "hatred and bigotry" behind the beatdown. "I know the Queens community is outraged that hate has tainted their streets ...," said Quinn, who is a lesbian.

"I applaud the NYPD for taking swift action on this case

To see the video: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2009/1...

McChrystal's 40,000 Troop Hoax
Submitted by robert naiman on 13 October 2009 - 12:47pm
It's a time-honored Washington tradition. If you want to bully the government into doing something unpopular and the public into accepting it, manufacture a false emergency. Iraq war? If you don't approve it, mushroom cloud. Banker or IMF bailout? If you don't approve it, financial collapse. Social security privatization? If you don't approve it, the system will go "bankrupt." Our brand is crisis, as James Carville might say.

General McChrystal says that if President Obama does not approve 40,000 more U.S. troops for Afghanistan, and approve them right away, "our mission" - whatever that is - will likely "fail" - whatever that is.

But even if President Obama were to approve General McChrystal's request, the 40,000 troops wouldn't arrive in time to significantly affect the 12-month window McChrystal says will be decisive. So McChrystal's request isn't about what's happening in Afghanistan right now. It's about how many troops the U.S. will have in Afghanistan a year from now and beyond.

There is no emergency requiring a quick decision by President Obama. The current situation in Afghanistan is being used as a bloody shirt to try to lock America into to an endless war, and, as Andrew Bacevich argues in the Boston Globe, lock the Obama Administration into the continuation of military force as the main instrument of U.S. foreign policy.

The Washington Post reports:

In his 66-page assessment of the war, McChrystal warns that the next 12 months will probably determine whether U.S. and international forces can regain the initiative from the Taliban.

But as the Wall Street Journal notes:

a recent study by the Institute for the Study of War - a Washington, D.C., think tank headed by Kimberly Kagan, a military analyst who worked on Gen. McChrystal's assessment team - suggested it would be difficult to move enough troops from other posts to deploy anywhere close to 40,000 troops before next summer at the earliest.

The military agrees with the institute's overall findings, although [it] has identified different units it could deploy over the course of the next year.

Let's plot these two facts on the same graph.

Let's say that "12 months" equals 12 months. So, McChrystal's window is between now and next October.

Let's say that "next summer at the earliest" equals June.

We're in October now, so June is eight months away.

That means that for 2/3 of McChrystal's window that will "probably determine" whether we "win" or "lose" in Afghanistan, the 40,000 troops that Obama is being pressured to approve will be mostly irrelevant.

There is no crisis demanding a quick decision on McChrystal's troop request, and plenty of time to explore alternatives, including dramatically reducing our list of enemies, and dramatically increasing the role of diplomacy, negotiations, and deal-making, in Afghanistan and in the region.

In particular, if it's true that 70% of the insurgency consists of "$10-a-day Taliban," as a Senate report estimates, that suggests that we could make deals with (at least) 70% of the insurgency. Suppose that these deals cost us $20 per day, per fighter, and that there are 15,000 Taliban fighters overall. Then a deal with 70% of the insurgency would cost $210,000 per day. The war, on the other hand, costs $165 million per day.

If you assume that fighting this 70% of the insurgency has average cost, then fighting these 70% of Taliban fighters costs $115.5 million per day. So, if we made a deal with them, instead of fighting them, we'd save $115.3 million dollars, every day, for an annual savings of $42 billion dollars. By comparison, if the 10 year cost of health reform is a trillion dollars, then the annual cost is $100 billion. So making a deal with 70% of the Afghan insurgency would pay for roughly half of the cost of health care reform.

In addition, at the current rate about 23 American soldiers are being killed in Afghanistan every month. Assuming, again, average costs, that means that making deals with instead of fighting with 70% of the insurgency will save 16 American lives a month, or 194 American lives a year.

In what is surely an undercount, in the first six months of 2009, the UN Assistance Mission to Afghanistan recorded 1013 civilian deaths. If we use this figure and assume average costs, removing 70% of the insurgency would save 118 Afghan civilians every month, or 1418 per year.

And this analysis doesn't even consider the benefit of avoiding the wounding of American soldiers and Afghan civilians, nor the many other benefits of less fighting, including less trauma for American soldiers in Afghanistan - many of whom are depressed and deeply disillusioned, military chaplains tell the Times of London.

Nor does this analysis consider the benefits of less fighting in terms of less trauma to Afghan civilians and the economic benefits of less fighting for Afghan civilians.

In other words, there is at least one alternative to military escalation that would save more than a thousand lives and tens of billions of dollars every year, among many other benefits over military escalation.

Now, tell me again that there is an emergency requiring President Obama to approve sending 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan.
http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/node/369

We have 68,000-strong troops in Afghanistan to clean up the less than 300 Al Qaeda fighters who are holed up in Pakistan. According to the president’s national security adviser, Gen. James Jones there are less than 100 Al Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan.

Why do we need another 40,000 – 80,000 troops to fight 300 – 400 Al Qeada fighters?

Republicans who basically said, “Forget Afghanistan because Iraq was the central front for terror” now insist that Afghanistan is the new central front.

Huh?

Why are the Republicans always behind the wrong war against Al Qaeda? Have they forgotten the real war? Have they heard of Somalia and Yemen?

The war is against Al Qaeda and it is not a geographically defined war.

The Taliban are fighting to get us out of Afghanistan like they fought against the British and the Soviets. Their cause is liberating their land from an occupying force. Al Qaeda makes for convenient allies since they are there anyway. This subtlety is not insignificant. It is the crux of the matter. We can win over the Taliban (who by the way were the same mudjahadeen we supported during the Soviet occupation) if we improve the conditions for the Pashtuns and other tribes and quit supporting a hopelessly corrupt government.

150 Thousand troops to defeat 3 Hundred Al Qaeda

This article is a little to simplistic for my tastes. You are asking that the Taliban turn over the 300 to 400 AQ by buying them off. If people will not bite for thousands of dollars what is the case for a bidding war w/ AQ?

Lets start with the question the article asks: why do the U.S. need 40,000 – 80,000 troops to fight 300 – 400 Al Qeada fighters?

THANK YOU!!!

Because they are supported by the army called the Taliban.

Last night on frontline special Obama's War they said the taliban's funds come from the drug trade to a tune of 100 million.Now I am not a foreign policy expert but wouldn't make sense to spend 150 million to buy the drugs and cut off their funding?I know it may sound stupid but if you have no money to buy guns and pay your fighters wouldn't that at least slow down the insurgency.

Didn't watch frontline, there is more to the story, did they mention:

Since the U.S. invasion on Oct. 7, 2001, opium output has increased 33-fold. The US and Taliban had rocky ties that was shaken in July 2000 when Taliban leaders banned the planting of poppies. When the B___ administration had opportunity to destroy the crops it refused to do so.

The problem w/ the opium crop is it is literally the hardiest crop in the area and people pay cash for it. It would be nice if there was a substitute but there isn't.

As for buying it up I like that idea. the problem wit it is the Taliban would simply murder those whom sold to US. Without the troops to protect them they will not sell to US.

I'd simply legalize it to take the money out of it.

The first thing the Administration should do,padlock the doors and put a sign up saying NO REPUBLICANS ALLOWED GROWN UPS AT WORK

Epic Hire Better Tech Support Fail
Posted by Zandar
The GOP. Can't run a web site, sure as hell can't run the government.
Just how embarrassing has the launch been for the Republican National Committee's new website? This afternoon, RNC Chairman Michael Steele told Fox News it isn't even a website.
"It's not even really a web site," Steele said. "It's a new platform for us."

To those that have been mocking the site by saying just that, he said it's "a beta site."

"So we're working out a lot of the kinks and the bugs. So the Democrats can have some fun," he said.

Oh, they're not the only ones. Marc Ambinder put together a very compelling top-10 list with the reasons why the RNC's relaunch "is fizzlin'."

Oh, and they managed to post the admin instruction page on the site at one point, because whoever's running the website coudln't fix a plate of waffles.
By the afternoon, the site had crashed altogether. Blue State Digital's Joe Rospars said, "You know your web program is in trouble when your site can't even handle the traffic bump from people making fun of your web program."
Nice. More competence from the guys that brought you the Bush administration...

EPIC FAIL.

http://zandarvts.blogspot.com/2009/10/epic-hire...

Rock Salt, Paper, Morons (alternate title: We Will, We Will, Rock Salt You!)
by John Cole

The moment I heard Snowe was going to vote for the bill, I began furiously refreshing Red State for the reaction. Finally, they deliver:
Pour Rock Salt on Snowe

Posted by Erick Erickson (Profile)

Tuesday, October 13th at 4:09PM EDT

54 Comments
Olympia Snowe has sold out the country. Having been banished to our world after Aslan chased her out of Narnia, Snowe is intent on corrupting this place too.

So we should melt her.

What melts snow? Rock salt.

I’m going to ship this 5 pound bag of rock salt to her office in Maine. It’s only $3.00. You should join me.

It is a visible demonstration of our contempt for her. First she votes for the stimulus. Now this.

It’s time to melt Snowe. ORDER YOUR BAG HERE.
That is right, folks. To show unhappy they are, they are going to ask you to buy rock salt through their amazon store and mail it to Olympia Snowe. They don’t call them the Red State Strike Farce for nothing.

Seriously, how do I make a joke about this?
http://www.balloon-juice.com/?p=28178

That video IS alarming indeed!
If true …
But people care about Justice?
A belly full and a sparking TV suffices for the majority.

Moyers' commentaries repeatedly speak to common knowledge about daily betrayal of the bought and paid for members on Capital Hill. This summer, the same monied interests funded and created the circuses of distraction pretending citizens were against health care reform when 75% supports reform. As he explains, the so-called political process is co-opted and corrupted by the ruling class. What's more amazing, some people know what Moyer says is true, but still point to PBO as a failure, go figger.

So you are saying that President Obama was not or can not be bought? That is beyond naive. The president is still a politican and represents interests.

My point is about a corrupted political, period. And, just how does ONE person operate within a corrupted system or work from within, and be apart at once?

They can't. They can choose where to be corrupted.

Yeah!
I blame the same mouthy Left, that still, seem baffled by Hillary not being the president.
It is impossible to restrain the tentacles of money, but for it to be this publicly displayed IS insulting and most people just ignore it?

Does people wonder WHY the Roman empire imploded (actually i think it was revived by the catholic church)?

Good Morning.Your Wednesday Jam.Enjoy
Kemdi - Still A Dancer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46r7BUP5bPw

thanks dj

fyi
http://www.bluezones.com/about

"The Science Behind Blue Zones
For the past five years, I’ve been taking teams of scientists to five pockets around the world where people live the longest, healthiest lives. These are called the Blue Zones.

In Sardinia Italy, for example, we found a Bronze-Age mountain culture that has, proportionally, 20 times as many 100-year-olds as the United States does. Their secret: wine with staggering levels of antioxidants and a tradition of celebrating old age.

Last year, our team discovered a new Blue Zone in Northern Costa Rica where adults have the longest life expectancy in the world. Our scientists found eight factors that make this region one of the longest-lived in the world.

Our work has been funded by National Geographic and the National Institutes on Aging, and our findings have appeared on Good Morning America, Anderson Cooper 360 and the ABC Nightly News.

How it Works
In my book, The Blue Zones, I reveal the secrets of the Power9: the nine common denominators that all of the world’s longevity all-stars share. Here at BlueZones.com, we've organized these behaviors into four main categories:

Move Naturally – Make your home, community and workplace present you with natural ways to move. Focus on activities you love, like gardening, walking and playing with your family.

Right Outlook – Know and be able to articulate your sense of purpose, and ensure your day is punctuated with periods of calm.

Eat Wisely – Instead of groping from fad diet to fad diets, use time-honored strategies for eating 20% less at meals. Avoid meat and processed food and drink a couple of glasses of wine daily.

Belong to the Right Tribe – Surround yourself with the right people, make the effort to connect or reconnect with your religion and put loved ones first."

The First Family dancing on stage last night, sort of.

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&source=hp&q=F...