Week In The News: North Korea, Payroll Tax, Trouble In Iraq

Michiganjf

Restored Faith!!!

It’s so good to see poll after poll showing that the vast majority of Americans realize Republicans (and especially and most recently TPers) are culpable for Congressional deadlock and the lack of progress in improving the current woes of the middle class and poor in America.

With the TPers fairly marginalized and the Republican Party in shambles, perhaps our country can finally make more stringent strides towards renewed prosperity and fairness.

The 2012 election may well bring significant enough gains for Dems that Government can begin to work for the people again, with President Obama at the helm and a real (not fabled) Democratic majority in both the Senate and the House… without having to rely on quasi-Republican independents like Lieberman to give Dems a so-called filibuster-proof majority.

The Republican Clown Rodeo has opened many eyes to the JOKE of Republican “leadership…” they were given one last reprieve after getting hammered in 2008, and of course they blew it, exposing their true nature now more than ever: the party exclusively of the wealthiest .05 percent.

Racists, hypocrites, cheaters, liars, and perhaps worst, as far as the health of our country is concerned in these difficult times, idiots.

America has just opened its eyes to a second chance at putting Government back on the track to success and fairness… now if we can just get rid of Roberts, Scalia, and Alito, we’ll really have a country “for and by the people!”

Whoareyou

Thankfully most do not share your vision of a parasitic class suckling at the government teat. But we get it, it works for you and that’s not going to change.
- JP
  
  By “parasitic class,” I take it you mean the wealthiest one percent who are sucking the rest of the country dry?
  
  Yes, government should stop letting the wealthy suck “at the government teat.”
  - Notgoneyet
    
    Spoken like a parasite.

Ed

Christopher Hitchens, who compared religion to living in North Korea, died. Then the leader of North Korea died. Coincidence? But he had it exactly wrong: there are no Catholic priests in North Korea, they worship their leader, and look at their society. ‘The truth shall set you free.’ Let’s hope that when God called him, he didn’t say no as he had during his life. Not much future in saying no.

Guest

Ed, did God create you in his image, or are you trying to create God in yours?
Anonymous

Worshiping anyone, whether a real dictator or a fictional one in the sky, is not in humanity’s interest.
Nutricj

hitch said he wouldn’t mind the surprise, long as god shows up with whiskey, they are probably having a great party right now
Terry Tree Tree

Wonder if N.Korea had as many pedophiles as the Catholic church?
- Four Elements
  
  OUCH!

Angie Post

It seems like it would make more sense to make tax policy for only two-week periods at a time. That way we could respond with more flexibility to current conditions. In the present environment, this could only help.

Newton Whale

The fight over the payroll tax holiday should be the final proof that Republicans actually don’t believe that tax cuts pay for themselves.

For 30 years they have been espousing a supply side theory bolstered by the Dickensian-named Laffer Curve which claimed that tax cuts would pay for themselves with increased economic growth. George H. W. Bush rightly called this “Voodoo economics” before he drank the Kool-Aid in order to become Reagan’s Veep.

Defending the unpaid for Bush tax cuts last year, Sen. John Kyl said: “My view, and I think most of the people in my party don’t believe that you should ever have to offset a tax cut”.

Turns out Republicans only believe that when the tax cuts primarily benefit their base: the richest Americans. If the middle class gets most of the benefit, the GOP suddenly discovers that supply side economics doesn’t work and tax cuts have to be paid for:

“Minutes after declaring “I’m not an economist. I don’t know what kind of impact it’s going to have,” Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner said renewal of the tax cut would be economically beneficial…But Boehner said his party was sticking to its demand that the tax cut be paid for and not add to the country’s $15 trillion debt.”

http://news.yahoo.com/boehner-says-tax-cut-extension-help-u-economy-184708409.html

For 30 years Republicans have been waging war on the middle class in order to benefit the 1%. And it worked. This week proved that they fully understand that the tax cuts they have enacted have ballooned the national debt, and, as Dick Cheney famously said; “Deficits don’t matter”.

What matters is putting money in the pockets of the rich, who they have canonized with the ultimate salute in the war on the middle class: “Job creators”.

William

The majority of the Bush tax cuts went to the middle class according to Obama.
- Newton Whale
  
  • In 2010, the top 1% of earners (i.e., tax filers making over $645,000) received 38% of the breaks in the 2001-08 tax�
  changes; 55% of the tax breaks went to the top 10% of earners (those making over $170,000).
  2
  �
  • The top 0.1% of earners (i.e., making over $3 million) received an average tax cut of roughly $520,000, more than�
  450 times larger than the share received by an average middle-income family.
  3
  �
  • A multitude of tax cuts overwhelmingly benefited the wealthiest Americans. These cuts included lower tax rates on�
  capital gains and dividends, elimination of both the personal exemption phase-out and the limitation on itemized�
  deductions, lower marginal rates for the top two tax brackets, and lower estate tax rates and an increase in the estate�
  tax exemption. For instance, individuals in or below the 25% tax bracket (single-filers making less than $83,000 and�
  joint-filers making less than $138,000) received only 16% of the benefit from reducing rates on long-term capital�
  gains and qualifying dividends in 2005.
  4
  Similarly, the top 5% of earners received 100% of the benefit from partially�
  repealing the personal exemption phase-out and the limitation on itemized deductions in 2006.
  5
  
  http://www.epi.org/page/-/EPI_PolicyMemorandum_184.pdf?nocdn=1
  - William
    
    Last year Obama extended the Bush tax cuts because the majority of these cuts went to the Middle Class. He said so himself.

Fnotwhen

My wish for next year is drastically reduced government spending and greater personal freedom when it comes to keeping hard-earned wages. Americans know best how to allocate their earnings; they don’t need government bureaurcrats making these decisions for them.

Thomas W

The democrats won the language battle on this one. Boehner, Rove pragmatica, real politik, squishy spines.

Upshot, taxpayers win the right to borrow approximately forty dollars a week from their social security account. Monetizing the social security funds available later for flatscreens now.

Newton Whale

The payroll tax holiday is not coming out of the SS fund. This claim is bogus and has been repeated by Republican politicians who know it s false and by media figures who either cannot bother to learn the truth or are deliberately lying:

“When Mr. Obama hammered them in speeches around the country for risking a tax increase for most Americans to protect the wealthy few, many Republicans explained their opposition as a stand to protect Social Security’s revenues. Then they proposed their own payroll tax cut, which, like the Democrats’ version, would transfer general revenues into Social Security’s accounts to make up the loss.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/22/us/politics/obama-reaches-out-to-congressional-leaders-over-payroll-tax-standoff.html?pagewanted=all
- Hidan
  
  Republicans lie and distort? I heard if they believe the lie it’s not really lying.
  - Gregg
    
    That was Holder squirming about his lies in “Fast and Furious” before he said it was all about racism.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      What about the ‘W’ admin., that STARTED the ‘Fast and Furious’, under another name?�
      WHY are you NOT after them, if you are so concerned?
    - Gregg
      
      Because they did not break the law and no one was killed. Duh.
- Gregg
  
  Social Security is funded by the payroll tax. Assuming a tax rate hike on some would offset in this economy is fantasy IMHO. It’s redistribution of wealth which does not stimulate, it stifles.
Newton Whale

Bachmann said she didn’t support the payroll tax cut because “it denied $111 billion to the Social Security trust fund” and “put senior citizens at risk.” That’s false. The shortfall will be covered by the government’s general fund.http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/story/2011-12-20/fact-check-bachmann/52101976/1

The payroll tax cut law specifies that Social Security receive every dollar it would have gotten even without the payroll tax cut. This happens by automatically transferring resources from the government’s general coffers to the Social Security Trust Fund. And indeed, the chief actuary of the Social Security Administration has confirmed that the payroll tax cut would have no impact on the Trust Fund.

http://www.ssa.gov/oact/solvency/RCasey_20111206.pdf
- Gregg
  
  “General fund”? Is that the money we print or borrow from China?
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    Since the Budget Surplus that ‘W’ claimed he would make BIGGER?

SteveV

This is a study in contradictions. The American public believes both houses of
Congress are dysfunctional yet they continue to vote for these same people over
and over. Many, but not all, of these politicians can act like they do because
they know, come election time, there’s little risk to their careers. I suggest
we don’t learn much from the past, whether pertaining to war, politics or
economics. This means that every generation is destined to repeat the mistakes
of the past. Only now we need not wait a generation, a few months will do.
Congress dysfunctional? I suggest they are simply a reflection of the state of our society.

JustSayin

A None of the above option should be on every ballot, because many of these entrenched parasites run unopposed. If “none of the above” wins, then the illusion of representation is removed.
- Hidan
  
  The problem with that is these parasites will than go on to claim a mandate even if 10% of the voters in there district voted for them. Just look at 2010 vs 2008. In 2008 there were over 60% of the voting public voting as opposed to little over 40% in 2010 of the voting public. That 20% difference didn’t stop the republicans claiming a mandate and that 60% didn’t stop republicans blocking all things democrat.
  - Anonymous
    
    If 40% of the population voted in 2010 and the GOP won elections they won with a majority of the 40%.
    The problem is people don’t vote. I can’t blame them with our choices being the extreme right wing leanings of the republicans and the corporate leaning democrats who do not seem to be able to lead at all. It’s hard to vote for dysfunctional government. Which is what we have.
    - Hidan
      
      Lose Lose than. If someone votes third party or stays home due to the hackjobs running for office. The right will still claim a mandate even if 10% of the voting population voted and because of the Filibuster rules 13% of the country can still block process
    - TFRX
      
      It’s not about the Right.
      
      It’s about our false equivalence media.
      
      Remember all the bandwaganbandonment from the sinking ship of George W. Bush when his approval ratings were 30%, month after month?
      
      Neither do I. The media has a fuzzy math for the GOP: A Democrat has to be at least 15% more popular to be treated with the same narrative.
    - Gregg
      
      Conservatives who were not happy with the squishy middle McCain sat home and gave us Obama.
    - nj
      
      “Squishy” McCain? No, i think it was, “Holy, sh*t, this idiot Palin could actually be President if McCain’s heart stops? No, thanks!”
    - Gregg
      
      Palin was the ONLY reason Obama didn’t win 70%. Gotta love Palin.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      ‘Huntress’, that doesn’t know a gun-scope sight from a surveyor’s transit?
    - JustSayin
      
      Maybe the US should move to the Australia model. People can choose to not vote, but they will pay a tax penalty if they don’t?
      
      The non-voter is a huge problem, but then again the non-voter is likely the most persuaded by propaganda.
      
      Perhaps Congressional votes could be weighted by the voting %…as in only a rep who had a clear voter mandate could vote on legislation that impacted the nations budget?
      
      We the people must keep looking for a meaningful control over the corrupt congress.
  - Gregg
    
    2010 was the largest turnover in the House in nearly a century. That’s kind of hard to downplay.
    
    Clinton was elected with 43%.
    - Hidan
      
      http://elections.gmu.edu/Turnout_2010G.html
      
      http://elections.gmu.edu/Turnout_2008G.html
      
      So far, 89.1 million votes were cast for the
      highest office in 2010. The estimated 2010 voter turnout expressed as
      vote for highest office divided by the voting-eligible population is
      40.9%
    - Gregg
      
      5 million more people voted for GWB than voted for Clinton. It is what it is. I don’t get the point.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Largest MONEY spent? Most unfounded attack ads?
Hidan

Since the 1970′s Government Officials realize that it’s just to much to control people in an democracy using force and realize the only way to get people to vote against there interest is the use of P.R. and propaganda. If the Military or Government royally screws up it will be spun as something else, spun to blame others or spun that holding the Military or Government accountable would hurt the citizens.

The Payroll tax cut debate is one such example the bombing that killed 24 Pakistani Solders is another.

Gregg

What a debacle. The payroll tax thing shows the total ineptness of Government. A 2 month extension is not only meaningless, it’s impossible to implement. All this fuss for squat.

Obama and the media have beat the drum about not forcing a tax hike on the middle class. Yet during the Bush tax cuts extension debate the language was much different. Then it was all about no tax cuts for the rich even though no tax cuts were on the table and the tax hikes affected every American not just the rich.

A payroll tax cut is a horrible idea. It defunds the already troubled Social Security system. It does not stimulate (witness the first round).

James

Actually, the only people that looked inept were the Tea Party/Republicans.
- Gregg
  
  They all look stupid. What have we gained? Zip.
- Hidan
  
  Who would have thunk it that the Tea Party republicans could lower the congressional approval rating even lower?
  - TFRX
    
    “Lower congressional approval”? At some point we must consider that a Teabaggers’ goal, not an obstacle.
Newton Whale

– According to Macroeconomic Advisers, allowing the payroll tax cut to lapse “would reduce GDP growth by 0.5 percent and cost the economy 400,000 jobs.”– Barclay’s estimated that letting the cut expire would knock 1.5 percent off of first quarter growth next year.
– Ameriprise Financial Services estimated that extending the cut “is likely to add between 750,000 to 1 million jobs.”– Susan Wachter, a finance professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, calculated that the payroll tax cut “would add 1 percentage point to economic growth and create 1 million jobs next year.”– Regional Economic Models Inc. estimated that the cut would pump “$120 billion into U.S. households in 2012.”http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/12/19/391989/what-happens-payroll-tax-expire/
- Gregg
  
  None of that happened with the first round. Where is the calculation for the affect on Social Security and all the tentacles thereof? This does nothing but kick the can down the road another 2 months. Wouldn’t it be better to do something more than putting a band aid on a hemorrhage?
  - Newton Whale
    
    FACT: Economist Mark Zandi Credits December 2010 Payroll Tax Cut With Helping Prevent Recession
    Zandi: “Without That Payroll Tax Cut This Year, I Think We’d Be Skirting Recession Now.” During a June 26, 2011, appearance on CNN’s State of the Union, Moody’s Analytics economist Mark Zandi stated: “On the other side of that, there are a few things I think that can be done that would make a difference in the very short term if we need it. So extending the payroll tax holiday for another year seems like a reasonable thing to do. I think that can get done politically. Without that payroll tax cut this year, I think we’d be skirting recession now because of the higher energy prices.” [CNN's State of the Union, 6/26/11, emphasis added]
    http://politicalcorrection.org/mobile/factcheck/201112120007
    Moody’s Analytics estimates that every $1 reduction in federal tax revenue resulting from an employee-side payroll tax cut expands the economy by $1.27.[CBPP.org, 9/7/11, emphasis added, internal citation removed]
    - Gregg
      
      Here’s an article that mentions Zandi and the opposing argument.
      
      http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/801-economy/200987-economists-split-on-impact-of-tax-cut-expiration
      
      As you wrote, it is a “FACT” Zandi gave credit to the payroll tax cut but that does not make what he said a fact. But really, you miss my point. I don’t presume to be smarter than economist on either side. It’s the bigger picture that I’m looking at. Saving and paying down debt should be encouraged. That restores fiscal sanity and builds a sounder footing than handing out money and saying spend. Sooner or later we have to eat our peas. And to your point that the payroll tax cut is stimulative, if that’s true it is only in a very narrow sense. We need a comprehensive (addressing Obamacare, entitlements, spending, regulation and the entire tax code) fix and this is not it.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    Where are the calculations of the effects of the wars, tax cuts for the rich, the massive influx of illegal aliens-after Reagan Amnesty to end the problem, the higher health costs due to ‘W’ admin. cutting pollution control?
Terry Tree Tree

The GREEDY rich have created how many JOBS, with their tax cuts in EIGHT years?
- William
  
  More than Pelosi did.
  - BHA in Vermont
    
    What does Pelosi have to do with the rich NOT creating jobs even though GWB cut their taxes?
- Anonymous
  
  It’s way worse than that. The financial sector greedheads, through their fraud and shenanigans, DESTROYED millions of jobs. And that’s even counting the ones they just shipped to other countries. $10 trillion is mostly middle-class assets up in smoke and the fees made dong so kept and taxed at the lowest rate in history.
TFRX

What you call “inept government” even the WSJ Editorial page calls “Republican failure”.

And your idea of economic history is not to be trusted. Not to mention the NewGOP fetish for having taxcuts ‘paid for’ after the Shrub “Loaves for the rich, crumbs for the rest” debacle.
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  If you read the WSJ article they were accusing the GOP of a political failure even if they were correct on substance and policy.
  
  Do we want our representative to do right by the country or score political points?
  - TFRX
    
    You lost me (and millions more) with “WSJ’s editorial page’s opinion about policy” and “do right by the country”.
    
    They’re the ones who don’t care about the likes of you and I. They will spin, lie and frame everything they can to make the righter-most party look good. All they care about is the politics.
    
    Even they have given up trying to turn Boehner’s turd into turd-ade.
    - Gregg
      
      Give Republicans and Democrats everything they asked for and we’re still in deep doo doo. It’s a pointless argument about a pointless exercise and it’s sucking all the oxogen out of an honest debate. That’s what I mean by inept.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Paolo-Caruso/1778940602 Paolo Caruso

Who could be more out of tune with the populous than Mitt Romney? From birth he was weaned on wealth and political influence. His Mormon convictions actually presented some degree of distinction from the other pampered politicos – until I recently heard him discuss his obligatory teenage mission in a interview with Tavis Smiley. Mitt didnt serve in the Congo, nor China or India, nor in any third world country…. Mitt served his Mormon duty in FRANCE. But as Mitt explained… it was in a lower to middle class neighborhood. LOL. Le pauvre garcon. It must have been hell.

Notgoneyet

I think we’ve all seen the ineptitude of a former “community-organizer” in action. Being “in tune with the populous” didn’t help us much.
- Newton Whale
  
  1 And seeing the multitudes, he went up into the mountain: and when he had sat down, his disciples came unto him:2 and he opened his mouth and taught them, saying,3 Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.4 Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.5 Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.6 Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.7 Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.8 Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.9 Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called sons of God.10 Blessed are they that have been persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
  
  Merry Christmas.
  - nj
    
    OAS* sufferer? (Obama Apologist Syndrome)
    
    Would Jesus have not fought for single-payer healthcare?
    Would Jesus have failed his promise to not hire lobbyists?
    
    Would Jesus render alleged terrorists to countries where they can be tortured?
    
    Would Jesus refuse to sign a treaty banning the use of land mines?
    
    Would Jesus have extended the PATRIOT Act with no reforms?
    
    Would Jesus have sold $60 billion in military armament to the Saudi dictators?
    
    Would Jesus authorize civilian-killing drone attacks in Pakistan?
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  You preferred the self-admitted AWOL, who was drunk when he had duty, born-again hypocrite, that ‘lead’ this country into this mess?
- Four Elements
  
  “Populace”
  
  (meant constructively)
Anonymous

And it got him out of Vietnam.

Hidan

Who Knew the Gipper would support Gassing Kurds if an farm deal and support against Iran was on the line.

Once-secret Reagan administration documents on Iraq

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/11/20/sbm.documents/index.html
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/11/20/sbm.overview/index.html

Date: March 3, 1988
Subject: Iraq’s Foreign Policy: Deeper into the Mainstream
Summary:
Anticipating an end to the Iran-Iraq war, a State Department official
is optimistic that continued ties between the United States and Iraq
will lead Saddam Hussein “deeper into the mainstream.” The author
concludes that “fears of Iraq’s aggression seem exaggerated.” Two weeks
later, Iraqi forces attack Kurdish civilians in Halabja with poisonous
gas. Read the document (pdf)

Date: December 29, 1988 Subject: Export-Import Financing for Iraq Summary:
In the closing days of the Reagan administration, the State
Department’s top human rights official argues that continued financial
aid to Iraq “can simply not be squared with our worldwide human rights
policy.” However, Assistant Secretary of State Richard Murphy counters
that U.S. financial ties with Iraq have “far greater use with Baghdad as
a carrot than as a stick.” A year and a half later, Iraq invades
Kuwait.

Gregg

http://supertart.com/priceofteainchina/index.php

Gregg

Not a bad job at the piano by Huntsman.

Terry Tree Tree

Clinton had good sax, from what I hear!
Pertinence to Presidency?
- Gregg
  
  None, but I have to give props. I remember Clinton on Arsenio. That was cool too.

Hidan

Crushed ego sends Newt to hospital

The GOP candidate collapsed in rage after being asked about whether he was too “unstable” to be president

http://www.salon.com/2011/12/22/crushed_ego_sends_newt_to_hospital/

lol

Gregg

Satire is not always funny.
- Voltaire
  
  But in this case it is.
Terry Tree Tree

If true, is hilarious!

Hidan

Bradley Manning charged with aiding Terrorist

The pre-trial hearing for Pfc. Bradley Manning, accused of releasing
classified information to WikiLeaks, concluded with the government
revealing in its closing argument for the first time the enemy, which
they believe Manning’s actions aided: the terrorists.

http://www.salon.com/2011/12/23/manning_to_be_charged_with_aiding_terrorists/

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

A plan for North Korea.

The President of North Korea should doing business with China and America to create factories in NK to break the hunger of millions of North Koreans use the Nuclear reactors of North Korea to power the factories in NK and China. So China will stop eating our oil reserves and more manufacturing jobs for north the more Koreans will be happy. The man for the job is Mitt Romney.

http://www.facebook.com/people/Paolo-Caruso/1778940602 Paolo Caruso

Tom should discuss the now famous Navy homing kiss between female Petty Officers Marissa and Citlalic [sic]. It is now accepted in the US but I would imagine it serves little benefit to the US military image, which has already been severely degraded since Vietnam. One could only imagine the reaction in Asia, Africa and the Middle East is quite similar to the subjects of Roman provinces viewing the morals of their decadent occupiers.
Some people in the US are calling this a staged social experiment. If so for what purpose?

http://www.facebook.com/people/Paolo-Caruso/1778940602 Paolo Caruso

I meant Home-coming kiss.
Terry Tree Tree

To prove we more have the right to life, liberty, and THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS?
Terry Tree Tree

To prove we more have the right to life, liberty, and THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS?

Gregg

Fourth greatest President

http://youtu.be/qymIXlcO3JY

Worried for the country(MA)

Narcissism, anyone?

I think we’d prefer Andrew Johnson to this incompetence.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

Payroll Tax.
It should be extended for another year. $40 a week for me is a lot of money. I can shop at S&S on the discount aisle and use the 40 bucks to buy me 10 items or more with a help of a little math.
American middle class is hurting and it hurt the most if you are a lower class.

Gregg

Instead of defunding Social Security, how about a gas tax holiday?
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
  
  it’s not gonna make any difference. the best way to buy a cheaper gas is how the owner of that gas station Bid for the gas price. finding the right seller or bidder.
  - Gregg
    
    The government makes more money per gallon than the gas companies do. Fuel cost affect everything. It’s just one suggestion, I don’t understand why defunding SS is the first option.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      it is not defunding it reducing reimbursement rate in order to avoid defunding. The money is coming in but the cost of care are going high. like hospital supplies,medical supplies,hourly rate of employees etc.
    - BHA in Vermont
      
      SS has NOTHING to do with the cost of health care or paying for it. You are confusing SS wit Medicare and Medicaid
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      The oil companies build SOOO many public roads? The oil companies fight for higher mpg?
      Let’s all cry now for the $BILLIONAIRE oil executives?
- BHA in Vermont
  
  The gas tax is used to pay for repairs to the 2.6 MILLION miles of roads in the US. And those are only the PAVED roads. SS currently takes in more than it pays out so it is an “easy” target. Just borrowing (as usual) from the future.
  
  The Fed gas tax hasn’t been raised since 1993 (it went from 14.1 to 18.4 cents) but the cost of road repair is a whole lot more per mile now than it was 18 years ago. Cutting the gas tax would not be real popular with the ‘people’ as they watch the roads decay under their cars and trucks.
  
  But, since McConnell and Boehner are so hot to cut government spending, I think they should push and pass a bill that says “NO PUBLIC money will be spent to replace the Brent Spence Bridge connecting Ohio and Kentucky over the Ohio River”. Oh, but WAIT, that would affect the people they need to get re-elected! Guess that idea won’t float.
  - Gregg
    
    And the payroll tax funds social security. Pick your poison. I think we’d be fine for a year or so but what about all the infrastructure spending in the “stimulus” bill? They repaved my perfectly good rural road. Better spend that money or lose it.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

Iraq. I told you the war is not over.

Hidan

bribing the Sunni Awaking doesn’t seem to be working anymore. That’s right folks the nation that state they will not work with Terrorist bribed the sunni’s to stop attacking U.S. forces. But the last 1 or 2 the Shia lead government said they weren’t going to keep paying after the U.S. handed over the bribing to the Iraqi government.
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
  
  The terrorist, Sunnis and Shiites should stop killing each other. Bribes? Hey! the American government do that all the time around the world. it is the matter of fact the the biggest US Embassy in the world that can house 17,000 troops is more likely the cause of the bombings that are still going on around Iraq.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

Medicare will not be broke but less reimbursement are more likely to happen. save money for medical bills to those baby boomers.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

And please If you are against Socialism and Communism.
I wonder who is the most powerful nation right now with money and manufacturing? The money that can buy America and the world. The factories that feeds the greed of America.

Bravo your guess is right. China

Nutricj

i am still reeling from Christopher Hitchen’s death this week. the void this leaves for a sane sustaining voice on reason, where religio-politico-war-extremism needs to be challenged, is immeasurable. my wish for the new year is that a great orator and impossibly great writer that was a follower of Hitch, will emerge. but, it is hard to imagine someone else that could remain so steady and clever and witful and simply brilliant as he….but i hope hope hope. great minds are what we need the most. i am just heartbroken at this enormous loss. cj

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

please I don’t read Vogue or whatever gayish magazine he wrote for and

what did he do for mankind?
- Nutricj
  
  gayish? woww!!! your ignorance is blinding.
  
  if you can follow these l i tt l e let t ers, try r r rreading a bbbook. sound it now fax, sound it out.
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
    
    sorry he does not fascinate meeee eee.
    - Nutricj
      
      you admit you havent read his work, yet you attack him (or me) or both. how do you know if he fascintes you or not? he has written close to 30 books, literally countless articles and he was a true writer. everyone that worked with him over the 35 year career said they could never match his mind- he was too smart for the rest of us. that fascinates me. even people that hated his ideas were stunned by his brilliance. you know, i see your arguments all the time on these boards- i would think you would appreciate a lively argument expert.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      I read his writing but never really finish it. Remember Mother Teresa?
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      And he is only a human being I don’t worship other people for what they wrote about other people. i find him nothing
    - Nutricj
      
      oh thank goodness, you have proven you know how to google AND agree with hitch about NOT worshiping. you have restored my “faith” in you
      
      again, we need great minds, as many as we can find
      
      cj
    - Anonymous
      
      Hitchens did a great job exposing that fraud. She kept money from Charles Keating.
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
    
    “That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.” is this one of his famous quote? Nutricj.

Chris B

For my Christmas wish I’d like Baby Jesus to give all the Republicans souls so they’ll have the opportunity to rot in Hell

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

ouch!!!
Anonymous

I think they would rather burn there so they could annoy Al Gore by increasing their carbon footprint.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

Congratulation Filipino Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago the first Asian woman to be appointed at the International Criminal Court – The Hague.

Terry Tree Tree

Republicans REVEALED that working people don’t matter to them! The payroll tax cut was, and still is in a month, at risk! Tax cuts for the rich, are sacred to Republicans!

Worried for the country(MA)

No, they care about the solvency of the country and the longevity of SS. There is no evidence the temporary tax cut created jobs this year and there is no evidence it will do it next year either.

What both sides should have done months ago and sit down and pass a form of Simpson-Bowles instead of these temporary band aids.
- TFRX
  
  Republicans worry about SocSec? Hilarious!
  
  And when the stacked-with-centrists Catfood Commission approves a report, then we can talk.
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    “catfood commission”? Is that the same as the death panel?
    - TFRX
      
      Uh, the death panel doesn’t exist, the Catfood Commission does.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Death Panels=Insurance Company EXECUTives!
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Death Panels have existed for a hundred years! Can YOU say ‘Insurance Company EXECUTives?
- Gregg
  
  Absolutely.. and that was only a start. They’re not serious.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  There is no evidence that the ‘W’ tax cuts created jobs, actually the contrary is true! Yet, Republicans held the Unemployment Extension HOSTAGE, until the ‘temporary’ tax cuts were extended!

Worried for the country(MA)

Mitt: “I would deport Uncle Omar”
Town hall attendee: “Newt, what about you?”
Newt: “No comment”

Ellen Dibble

I just heard Eric Hobsbawm, historian (born in Egypt, Jewish, Berlin, Cambridge, left-Marxist bent) telling Andrew Whitehead on BBC World News that “”The traditional left was geared to a kind of society that is no longer in existence or is going out of business. It believed very largely in the mass labour movement as the carrier of the future. Well, we’ve been de-industrialised, so that’s no longer possible.” See�
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16217726 for his views on OWS and Arab Spring in historical context. The idea of labor owning the means of production was the Marxist counter to rabid capitalism. I guess we need a new approach, given labor is replaced by assembly lines (overseas). He thinks years of persistence could take us where we need to go, just as it took a while for the South Koreans to wrest a democracy from a military junta — specifically: ”
More likely, he believes, is a wider push for gradual reform of the sort which, in the 1980s, saw a movement of the young and middle class in South Korea wrest power from the military.”

Anonymous

As a country we are now on track to be Greece

http://www.prisonplanet.com/its-official-us-debt-to-gdp-passes-100.html

peter

Just keep playing the clip: “Why not do the right thing for the American people even though it’s not exactly what we want” …such honesty: what we want vs what the american people want

Anonymous

The only problem is the American people want the tax cut to be for 12 months and not for 2 months!
- Anonymous
  
  No one except Republican talking point spouters claimed it was only for two months. It is an extension while they resolve the issue.
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    What will change in 60 days? Why do they get to go on vacation 2 weeks before Christmas before the job is done? The rest of us have to work until the job is done.
    They should have just got it done.
  - Anonymous
    
    Can you tell me how many pages the bill is?
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Congress had plenty of time to do that! They tried to raise taxes on the working-class, while savavely DEFENDING the tax cuts for the GREEDY rich!
  Showed their colors, to ALL but the self-deluding!
  - Anonymous
    
    Exactly what�
    tax cuts for the GREEDY rich are you talking about?
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      The ones that ‘W’ said ten years ago would CREATE JOBS!�
      WHERE are those JOBS?
    - Anonymous
      
      I would recommend visiting the http://www.bls.gov/ webpage. Bush grew jobs from 03-08 thanks to his middle class tax cuts.

Jeff from Belmont

They should pay for the Payroll Tax bill with a small charge on each Wall Street transaction. I’ve heard this could generate 100′s of billions of dollars a year and would it really hurt Wall Street? And if it did hurt Wall Street would that be a bad thing?

Anonymous

It would because anyone that has taken Econ 101 knows a tax on Wall Street will only be passed on to the consumers, so really you are taxing investment, which slows down job creation and personal savings via retirement accounts.
- Anonymous
  
  Job creation? OK Wall street has had record profits for the last 10 years where are the jobs?
  They have had record profits even during the this downturn and I don’t see that many jobs being created. This argument of yours is as thin as the ice the GOP walks on.
Terry Tree Tree

It would hurt hundreds of small investors! That will be the Republican line! There are how many THOUSANDS, OR MILLIONS, of transactions on Wall Street daily?

Dbianco74

Does the President have the power to issue an actual permit for the Keystone pipeline? If they are looking at alternative routes, the environmental review will take months if not longer – and the environmental review process is codified in law. How can he circumvent that?

Worried for the country(MA)

They spent 3 years on reviews. Nebraska had some concerns and now those concerns have been allayed.
Time to get it done.

BHA in Vermont

The last quote says it ALL

“Fought a good fight”

You people (since I can’t type the words I am thinking) in the House and Senate are NOT there to FIGHT. You are there to get things done for the citizens of the USA!.

Do you wonder AT ALL why your approval ratings are lower than a snake’s belly?

Are you concerned AT ALL that your approval ratings are lower than a snake’s belly? Probably only to the point of getting re-elected.

Anonymous

The problem is that Boehner can’t manage the Tea Baggers.

Gregg

I don’t know why people insist on the homo-erotic term to describe patriots. O well.

For what it’s worth, I heard an interesting take on this from A.B. Stoddard. Boehner is letting the Tea Party Freshmen learn the hard way by actually allowing votes. It’s part of the process.
- Anonymous
  
  They called themselves it for a while. I’m more offended by them calling themselves a name referencing the Boston Tea Party so I’m using the alternative.

Mogl

If Obama says “no” to the pipeline, he should have Greenspan write the reason and let Congress spend week/months trying to figure out what it means.

Dbianco74

When we were an economic powerhouse, what was the highest tax bracket?

Worried for the country(MA)

Oh how I love straw men.

How many pages was the tax code when we were an economic powerhouse? We are at 73,000 pages today and we were at 14,000 pages in 1954.
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  How many pages would 9/9/9 require? 100?
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  WHY are there more than 14,000 pages of tax code? Who could read that much, and run a business, work for a living, or do much of anything, especially with cross-referencing and such?�
  Which party has made ANY effort, to clean up those pages of regulations, WITHOUT it benefiting some of their biggest contributors mostly?
  Why does someone that just moves a computer mouse around, to move money around, pay LESS tax percentage than those of us that risk our lives to actually make the things that keep this country functioning?

Strobaffa

TOM! The oil from the tar sands in Canada for the most part won’t be sold in the US. It doesn’t matter if Iran blocks oil from coming from the Middle East!

Worried for the country(MA)

Huh? If they build the pipeline to the US refineries who would use the oil?
- Strobaffa
  
  The oil from Canada from the XL pipeline will be under contract by countries other than ours. Believe it or not, the oil is not intended for US markets, but just like any other commodity, it will be sold to the highest bidder, in this case most likely not the US. If oil companies in the US can successfully bid on the oil (if they want it) then it will stay in the country, otherwise – see you later oil! Thanks for the pipeline! Just remember – oil is a global commodity. There is no obligation to sell it here.
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    Everything you say is correct but oil transport is always considered in the bidding process and we will be at an advantage having the oil local and available.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Wind, Solar, Hydro, and other renewables are FAR more likely to enhance ‘National Energy Security’, as they will be used locally, and harder to export electricity!
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      Don’t forget nuclear. The NRC just approved the AP1000 today.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Nuclear has too many costs, and problems, including the extreme cost of Security! Been in one! Just the lost-productivity of time to pass through Security, adds up to $Millions per month!
    - Anonymous
      
      They are also more expensive and less reliable/consistant, increasing costs for everything in the US!
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      The ‘fuel’ for them is FREE, almost universally available, and non-polluting.�
      It costs LESS to build either, than to build a coal-fired plant, oil-fired plant, nuclear power plant, or natural gas-fired plant, and the infrastructure to transport the fuel to them. Plus, deal with the dangerous residue and by-products!
      Can you prove me wrong?
    - Anonymous
      
      I will let you make an attempt to prove your point before I will even have to prove you wrong.
      
      Please give me the proof that you are not lying!
    - Anonymous
      
      You are living in a dream world.
      The oil from this pipeline, which will never be built, will be going to other nations. That is the plan, don’t you get it?

Michiganjf

Gingrich’s INSANE CRAZY TALK requires an ignorant and stupid audience, and unfortunately he has one in the Republican base.

Ellen Dibble

I heard Gingrich speaking to Bob Schieffer on Sunday. I immediately started gearing up personally to debate Gingrich. Clearly Schieffer is not situated to do that. Nor are any of the other candidates. But oh, I could make mincemeat of such talk. It is subversive in the extreme, subversive to objectivity and logic. But some of us know how to go at that.

Worried for the country(MA)

Ellen, it’s not too late to get in the race. Newt was still getting signatures in VA yesterday.
TFRX

Schieffer’s job isn’t to anger any of them. If it were, he’d concern himself first with, oh, let’s say, the indepence of the judiciary rather than the logistics.

The collective false equivalence our media has shown to Newt now v. Obama in 2008 is hilarious. If you’re an old white right-wing male, it takes soooo much more to set off the alarms in the mainstream pressl

Worried for the country(MA)

Come on Tom, don’t worry about Newt arresting judges. That’s just Newt being Newt.

TFRX

Hilarious. Wonder what you’d do when a Democrat says it.
Anonymous

I would worry. This man is attempting to get the nomination to run as the GOP candidate for president of the United States. I find a lot of what he says to be pretty scary and to me he’s nothing more than a demagogue.

Nutricj

creamy peachy tom, i’ll say

cj

TFRX

So, another Republican gets to shoot off their fekking mouth to rile the base. Our mainstream press remains a tad deaf to their dogwhistles.

Newt’s “let’s round up the bad judges” was “not a serious proposal”, per a panelist?

Why is that assumption made? Shouldn’t we be asking him how seriously he means this until he backs off off with a wimpy “Not intended to be a factual statement(TM-GOP)”?

Lando868

XL Pipeline. Democrats should demand an end to OIL INDUSTRY SUBSIDIES. And tell the Republicans that they’ll wait until further environmental review to make a decision.

Jeff in Belmont

What about the stupid idea that the Tar Sands oil will be “ours”? Why not build an oil refinery in Canada and then ship the gas produced directly to the gas stations in the USA? Because they want to pump the oil down to the Gulf so it can be sold to anyone who will buy it on the open market.

A caller already mentioned how this isn’t a real jobs issue (maybe a couple of thousand temp jobs will be created). But this is not a issue of energy security either, the oil won’t stay in the USA.Why doesn’t anyone talk about this?

MonogomousVetNewt

Jack Beatty just cited Newt Gringrich’s point regarding the proposed pipeline regarding the need for oil in a potential strategic crisis with Iran. I believe that all oil is to be shipped to Houston for export. Not much help to us in a strategic crisis, though it would make additional oil available on the world market.

Worried for the country(MA)

Silliest thing I’ve ever heard. We’ll pipe oil to Houston so we can ship it somewhere and continue to import oil from the middle east?
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  How many proponents for the XL pipeline, pledged with their own fortunes, that ALL the oil would go to domestic use? Since that is the ‘National Security’ arguement? Does ALL the oil in the other pipelines go for domestic use, or do they export some of it? Alaska Pipeline was touted for ‘National Energy Security’, and is mostly exported to Japan!
- Anonymous
  
  It will be shipped to other countries, that’s the whole point. Port Arthur, TX, where the Keystone XL would end, is a Foreign Trade Zone. Don’t you get it buddy? This is about maximizing profits nothing more or less. When was the last time you heard of an oil company that was doing something out of a sense of patriotic duty. Anyway you go on about free markets and since all oil is sold on the free market how would this stuff do anything to lower our dependence on foreign oil.
  - Gregg
    
    Maybe you can help me, I really don’t know the answer. I agree oil is fungible and sold on the open market. Leaving aside the needed jobs that would be created, I still think it would lower prices because of speculation. But if exploiting ones own resources does not dramatically affect domestic gas prices then why is gas 12 cents a gallon in Venezuela? $.40 in Iraq? $.90 in Saudi Arabia?
    - Anonymous
      
      In the case of Venezuela the oil companies are nationalized. In Saudi Arabia it’s controlled by the Saudi royal family who keep the prices low to keep the population happy. Have you seen what’s happening in the rest of the Middle East?
      
      I’m not sure about Iraq. I do remember there being some serious shortages due to refining problems.
      
      In the case of jobs Keystone would not be providing enough of them to really make it the crux of the argument. This is about oil company profits, that’s all.
    - Gregg
      
      Kuwait $.78; Egypt $.65; Nigeria $.38.
      
      I don’t know, there seems to be a pattern.
    - Anonymous
      
      Yeah they have a lot of oil and we don’t.
      I have to ask, do you really think that if this pipeline was built that the price of gas at the pump would go down?
      
      By the way in Norway which has oil rigs in the North Sea they pay twice what we do for a gallon of gas.
    - Gregg
      
      I do, but I don’t claim to be an expert. Increased supply will help. Speculators would speculate down instead of up. And the jobs are much needed.
      
      What are the fuel and energy taxes like in Norway? Government can mess up anything.
      
      Again though, I don’t know and am not picking a fight. It just seems more complicated than how it is portrayed.
  - Anonymous
    
    How many cars have you bought from your state of residence vs a state across the country from you? Why didn’t you buy any cars thousands of miles away from you? Could it be because transportation costs to get it home make your effective cost of the car greater than someone that lives within 30 miles of the car! It is the same with oil.
    
    It doesn’t move across oceans for free!
    - Anonymous
      
      So. I live on the East coast and all of the oil we get here is from the Middle East or from Canada. your argument is really not holding up any, oil…
      First off it’s all about profits, nothing more or less. If you think this pipe line is going to help you in the case of gas at the pump you are really mistaken. I’m not sure what your background is but you seem very misinformed about how energy works in this country. Crude oil versus refined fuels such a gasoline and diesel and heating oil for homes and businesses. You also sound like you think you live in Venezuela and that the government has control of the cost of crude. It does not. I would also like to point out how I’ve read lord knows how many comments by you about letting free markets dictate the costs of goods and services. Well you can’t have it both ways. Of course it’s all Obama’s fault including that dismal Red Sox season.
    - Brandstad
      
      You are right when you say “First off it’s all about profits, nothing more or less.” I don’t know if you know much about economics, but since the oil is shipped to the US, it is cheaper for US companies to process the oil and sell it inside the US than it would be to ship the oil on tankers thousands of miles to any overseas destination.�
      The Federal government only has control over the cost associated with their regulation of the industry and the taxation put on the product and the companies that make it. The government profits more from every gallon of oil or gas than the company that produced it! The government also controls land leases and permits. for a while no US companies could get a permit to drill in the gulf, but any non-US company could drill just a few miles away in international waters.

Ellen Dibble

I see that Wednesday EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson stated at Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, that Obama’s administration is going to use the authority from Congress in 1990 to clamp down on “about half of the 1,200 coal- and oil-fired [plants] nationwide that still lack modern pollution controls.” No, that was in 2000, but still not done. “When fully implemented in 2016, the standards will slash mercury pollution from burning coal by 90 percent, lung-damaging acid gases by 88 percent, and soot-producing sulfur dioxide by 41 percent.” (“contaminants linked to cancer, IQ loss, heart disease and lung disease… and also pollute lakes, streams, and fish”) — for me, this is huge, if I dare believe my eyes.

Worried for the country(MA)

Remember Obama promised during the last campaign that electricity rates will “necessarily skyrocket” under his policies. He is keeping his promise.
- TFRX
  
  You’re flat-out lying. And more than usual.
  
  Fortunately, this isn’t some idiot radio show, so it’s not having the impact or reinforcement you think it does.
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    Where’s the lie? There a large news article in USA today last week enumerating large in creases in electric rates across the country. They did a state by state analysis and tied it specifically to coal plant closings.
    - TFRX
      
      Pfft.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Those coal plants would have closed soon, as the companies DON’T do the maintenance to keep them going!
      Do YOU live within two miles, and down-wind of a coal plant?
    - TFRX
      
      Of course not. “Collateral damage” is for “little people”.
    - Anonymous
      
      Presidents do not set the cost of energy. The rate increases are due to energy costs.
      Of course lets keep on burning coal and while we are at it lets lower the air quality standards so that heavy metals are more prevalent in the air we breath. Which would increase health care costs.
  - Gregg
    
    You need better news sources. You were sold a bill of goods. I would suggest Fox or Rush.
    
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqHL404zhcU
    - TFRX
      
      Now I know you’re just peddling plop.
    - Gregg
      
      Dude, it’s Obama’s words straight out of his mouth. You said it was a lie. It’s true. Why would you think it a lie if you were properly informed?
      
      I know a little about plop.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  They were going to skyrocket anyway! Haven’t you seen fuel prices?
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    Natural gas prices are at an all time low. Nuclear costs are flat since they refuel every 5 years. Maybe wind is going up? No it is all about shuttering coal plants.
  - Anonymous
    
    Thanks for reminding me. I would like to thank Obama and Bernanke for that also.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Fuel prices went UP dramatically in ‘W’ admin.!�
      Their ‘deregulation’ just let companies pollute more, and do shoddy work, which has killed 29 coal miners, and 11 Deepwater Horizon workers!
      When oil companies sit on millions of acres of oil and gas leases, and keep whining to tie up more, their prices are going UP!
    - Brandstad
      
      Please tell me exactly what “ ‘deregulation’ just let companies pollute more, and do shoddy work, which has killed 29 coal miners, and 11 Deepwater Horizon workers!”
      
      Oh wait you can’t!
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      The ‘deregulation of ‘regulators’, and government inspectors, NOT doing their job, per the implied consent and leadership, of the ‘W’ admin, to NOT do real inspections, and let companies get away with safety-cutting operating proceedures! The mining equipment was tampered with to keep it from shutting down for safety issues (Methane), for production’s sake! That was reported by miners for Massey, before, and after Upper Big Branch. So the owners could get GREEDY richer!
      Deepwater Horizon inspectors were reported to have NOT enforced safety protocols there, too!
- Gregg
  
  I remember that. As I recall, he also said he would put the coal companies out of business.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    A LOT of coal exported to China NOW! A whole port for part of that business!
BHA in Vermont

I dare not believe your eyes Ellen
We will hear:
- IT WILL KILL JOBS
- IT WILL RAISE ELECTRIC RATES

and it won’t get done. Makes you wonder about all who call “cut government regulations”. I guess they don’t live down (air)stream from the polluting plants. Back on my soap box:

Create just TWO regulations for manufacturing plants (electricity, chemical, whatever) that put toxins in the air or water:
1) NO stack may be higher than 100′, or 10′ above the top of the building to which it is attached, whichever is higher.
2) ALL execs for that plant MUST live between ONE MILE and TWO MILES down wind from the plant.

Won’t need any scrubber laws when they are living in the cr@p that comes out of the stacks.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  RIGHT ON !!!
- nj
  
  Energy prices will go up. It costs money to implement pollution reduction.
  
  Remaining fossil fuels are more remote, harder to access and harness.”Renewable” sources, generally, are more expensive.The Age of Cheap Energy is over.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    Wind is FREE!.. Sunshine is FREE! Tides are FREE!�
    With FREE fuel, and lower costs to build, how are they more expensive? Maintenance costs are LESS too!
Worried for the country(MA)

Ellen, I’ll surprise you and agree that dirty coal plants should be upgraded as long as they don’t try and regulate CO2. Spewing mercury and uranium into the atmosphere is unconscionable.

Many of these coal plants will be shuttered and most likely natural gas plants will take their place. It is frustrating because natural gas is better suited as a transportation alternative to oil and nuclear is the best alternative for base load electricity. Unfortunately, we have a dysfunctional NRC that blocks nuclear innovations and advancements that would benefit us all.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  The coal plants will be shuttered until they see that they can’t just ‘pollute as usual’! Then they will clean up their emissions, and go back to making money.�
     Since they’re cleaning up pollutants anyway, why NOT invest a little more, and take care of as much CO2 as reasonably feasible?
     If the rich owners, and executives had to LIVE in the mess they make, they’d make a LOT less mess!�
     In the time it takes to plan, build, and certify a nuclear plant, we could have thousands of wind-turbines and solar fields ON-LINE, and making electricity! NO radiation hazzard, NO risk of terrorists making nuclear weapons from the fuel, or waste, and a WHOLE LOT of other dangers!
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    I too dream of cheap solar power but that is a long way off. Wind will always be marginal. Nuclear is safe and massively scalable if done properly. The latest designs are even safer. The latest trend is for small nuclear reactors that can be factory built so they can up and running in about 1/2 the time. But hopefully they will get the LFTR thorium reactors working because those can burn up the waste left by the current plants.
    
    CO2 is plant food so why capture it? But even if you wanted to capture it I don’t think they’ve developed a reasonable way to do it.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      A nuclear physicist that I know, says that thorium is NOT radioactive enough to use as a fuel.�
         There have been a LOT of high-level, and low-level nuclear accidents that got burried from the news!�
         It takes several hours to bring a nuclear reactor down safely. It takes a day, or more, to bring it back up to production.
          If you’ve never worked in one, you cannot imagine all that is involved in building and running one.
          One seemingly small mistake can bring one down. One part that can cost less than $1.oo, can conceivably bring one down.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      For over 60 years, nuclear fusion has been ’25 years away’ from being a reality.�
      Those $BILLIONS, or $TRILLIONS, could have produced a LOT of wind, solar, and other renewables that don’t pollute, or it’s so infintismal, compared to oil, coal, natural gas, wood, etc…!

Ellen Dibble

If the Alawites (Assad dynasty) are Shiite, and by far most of Syrian are Sunni, and the Middle East is angling to have Syria in the Iranian camp (Shiite) versus Saudi (Sunni), and the bombings in Damascus today were staged by the Alawites to demonstrate to the Arab “observers” that they are under attack — help me. My IQ isn’t up to this.

Mogl

Iraqi “democracy”: one man (Maliki) is Prime Minister AND Misister of Interior AND Minister of Defense AND Minister of National Security Affairs AND leader of the party in power (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nouri_al-Maliki)?!!

Terry Tree Tree

That is the ‘democracy’ that Republicans put in there!

Michiganjf

The ultimate deterioration of Iraq will be an indictment against the Republican Neocons, yet some (McCain) are already trying to blame the inevitable mess on President Obama, despite the President being given no choice but withdrawal by the Iraqi government.

Blame Cheney/Rummy/Bush and other Republican Neocons for having put America’s foot where it nevr belonged.

Terry Tree Tree

Tea-Baggers and other Republicans are trying to blame President Obama for getting us INTO Iraq, evidently!

Anonymous

If we were to have pulled out of Iraq ten years from now, the results would be the same as they were this week. Some of us predicted this before Bush chose to invade them.

Terry Tree Tree

Unfortunately we weren’t rich enough to be listened to!

DetroitDave

I am struck by the collective amnesia journalists seem to have about the
so-called “Bush Tax Cuts”.” Am I the only one who remembers that they were
designed to be temporary? At the time they promised that all that money would
create jobs and prosperity. The argument against them was they would balloon
the deficit and bankrupt the government and the nation. So the proponents, in
order to get them passed at all, put in a sunset of 2010 and said if the deficit
is ballooning by then they would simply let them expire. Hello? It’s pretty
clear to see what these insane tax cuts did to the deficit and the country.

How about some collective memory here?

Dave TaylorEasley, MO

BHA in Vermont

Many Americans only remember that which supports their position.
- TFRX
  
  He addressed the media in particular, and that being said:
  
  Nobody is going to get invited to all the Kool Kids’ cocktail parties if they get all picky about which tax giveaway to the rich was to expire when.
  
  That’s not how you keep a valuable source on your side in today’s mediascape.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    Darn! There goes another invitation to be a Kool Kid! Must be because I work for a living?
pete

You don’t need collective memory, you just need clear memory. The Bush tax cuts helped create a 4.6 % unemployment rate. It was the rabid spending under Bush and increased hyperactive spending under Obama that have brought us these deficits.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Thanks for mentioning the rabid spending of ‘W’ admin.! So many want to blame it ALL on President Obama!
Terry Tree Tree

You are NOT the only one that remembers!

BHA in Vermont

Perhaps Ron Paul should instead run for governor of the Libertarian “Free State”. Oh,wait, it doesn’t exist. All the Free Staters who voted to take over New Hampshire didn’t want to move there to do the deed.

Ellen Dibble

The pipeline. Does anyone else see the irony of us doing our best to cut down on emissions and our warming of the planet whilst pumping stuff from Canada to Texas to become marketable to developing countries which are busy cutting UP on emissions and increasing the warming of the planet?

Strobaffa

Unfortunately for the President, he’s going to get hammered on how this is a “jobs” issue, when any responsible listener should know otherwise. Come on Mr. President, do the right thing and say NO to this!
Gregg

Canada will sell to China if not us. If fossil fuels equal warming and destruction then China will only make it worse.
- Anonymous
  
  Gregg maybe you should do a little research.
  The oil is going to be sold to South America and elsewhere. Not to us. Why do you think they want to down in Texas. Port Arthur, TX, where the Keystone XL would end, is a Foreign Trade Zone.TransCanada is also not be trusted on anything they say on regards to safety and environmental issues as their record is not good in this area.
  
  Since its operation began in June of 2010, the Keystone 1 pipeline has
  suffered more spills (12 spills in one year) than any other 1st year pipeline in U.S. history, a
  track record which does not bode well for the proposed Keystone XL
  which tracks across one of the largest aquifers in the world – the
  Ogallala – which supplies drinking water to millions of mid-Westerners
  and provides 30% of the nation’s groundwater used for irrigation.
  
  As to the jobs, well that’s already been proven to be nothing more than fuzzy math. The US would be lucky of it ended up with 7 to 10 thousand temporary construction jobs. Not what one would call a job creating project.
  
  This is about oil companies making money at our expense, period.
  
  Stop Keystone XL now.
  - TFRX
    
    He’s probably well outside the Ogallala. Maybe as many as 100 miles away. What does he have to worry about?
    - Anonymous
      
      That’s a very narrow minded way to look at it. Given that 30% of the irrigation in something like 8 Western states is from the Ogallala it would be wise and prudent to keep this huge water source healthy. Given that it has a direct affect on food prices. You can’t eat crude oil.
  - Gregg
    
    Ms. Dibble expressed concern for the environment. My point was it won’t make a difference if one thinks globally. The oil will be exploited no matter what with China being the worst alternative.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Do YOU live within two miles, and down-wind of a coal-fired power plant? Of an oil refinery? Why NOT, if you are such a proponent?
    - Anonymous
      
      Thanks for another worthless comment showing Gregg won this argument hands down.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      How so? It’s easy to be FOR something, if YOU are NOT going to suffer the pollution, or bad effects of your proposal! �
      I have worked in coal-fired power plants, oil refineries, nuclear power plants, chemical plants, so I ask their proponents if they know what they are talking about! If they haven’t been there, HOW can they know?
    - Gregg
      
      Cut the crap TTT. Your saying greedy rich evil Republicans don’t care about their fellow man. It’s disgustingly shallow.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Accurate?
    - Gregg
      
      No, Total and complete BS
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Tony Haywood spent ALL his time cleaning up the Deepwater Horizon mess? Didn’t he decide it was MORE IMPORTANT that he watch a horse race?�
      Rick Waggoner turned down a $20 MILLION BONUS, to make sure the employees of the company he led into bankruptcy, would be ok? The Banksters gave back ALL the money they got for ruining the U.S. economy? Or, are they just GREEDY rich, that got their money at the expense of others, and don’t care?
    - Anonymous
      
      That’s my point. That the oil from these tar fields will end up on the open market one way or another.
      Why damage so much unspoiled land and put one of the largest aquifers at risk? TransCanada has already proven that they cannot be trusted with leaks and they also use cost cutting at the peril of the environment. This is not about wildlife it’s about 30% of the water used to grow the wheat we all eat.
      If this water source became polluted it would be a huge economic disaster.
      That’s the issue, let Trans Canada sell the oil to China.
Anonymous

Well, when we’re still lagging in emissions standards from many of the OECD nations, when our workplaces, schools and homes have ‘light sweaters in the summer’ and ‘shorts in winter’ conditions and when so much of the population is filled with single drivers still caught in the ‘bedroom on wheels’ mentality, I really don’t see that we’re doing our best to cut down on emissions at all. Rather I see us in a geopolitical jockeying game mostly with China where finger pointing is the instrument to buy our collective will and industry more time for what is being sold as a more painless transition. But the irony I see is that this stupid pipeline will come in handy in 30 to 40 years not to pump fuels but to pump drinking water from Canada from TX.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

These oil pipeline and Canadian oil arguement are giving me headache.

Notgoneyet

Obama rejects a jobs program so he can play politics, what a stooge!

Terry Tree Tree

Were YOU down there cleaning up from Deepwater Horizon, for FREE, since you are such a proponent?
Or just another HYPOCRITE?
- Notgoneyet
  
  Yes I was.

John in Amherst

Authorizing the Keystone XL project as a job creator is akin to legalizing crack to employ more people as dealers and drug rehab workers. In a few decades, let alone a few centuries, the consequences of the Keystone project for jobs and the economy will be a footnote in history. Not so the environmental consequences. Future generations will live with the environmental and climatalogical fallout of our actions (or inactions). Whether we are judged as heroic and courageous or as short-sighted greedy dolts by our grandchildren and their offspring will hinge on how we move forwrd on the environmental issue. Job creation may play well in a 2 year political cycle. Too bad politicians can’t think beyond that time frame…

Terry Tree Tree

Very Insightful Analysis!

Alan R. in Omaha, NE

I am wondering if anyone has fact-checked the Gingrich comment about the Justice Department ordering U. S. Marshals to arrest a federal judge. I was under the impression that the U. S. Marshals were the “enforcement arm of the federal courts” http://www.usmarshals.gov/duties/factsheets/general-2011.html. I don’t think they are even in the chain of command of either the Executive branch (Justice department) or the Legislative branch. They are under the command of the federal judges. If that is correct, I wonder what it says about how well informed Gingrich, Schieffer, and we the people are about even the most basic fact about U. S. government.

Gregg

Andrew McCarthy wrote a good piece on it. He says there is no justification.

John in Amherst

Romney seems to be running for liar-in-chief. His political attack adds against Obama are as rife with misinformation, out-of-context quotes, and bald faced lies as his policy history is full of flip-flops. It is apalling that, when called on some of these, he seems to dismiss the critique as irrelevant. What is worse is that many GOP primary voters do not demand truth from their candidates, and that the bumpersticker lies resonate with them. At the bottom of the mess lies the media, which largely fails to call Romney or any other candidate on these distortions and falsehoods, or, as in the case of FOX, joins in to repeat and amplify them. To quote Twain: “A lie can travel halfway round the world while the truth is putting on its shoes”.

Worried for the country(MA)

Name one lie.
- John in Amherst
  
  I wish I could name one – and only one – lie that Romney has spun out. Coincidentally, Krugman provided this, today: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/23/opinion/krugman-the-post-truth-campaign.html?_r=1&ref=todayspaper
  If you doubt the facts, rather than dismiss these, I suggest you check with independent sources.
  And what are the distortions you reference?
  - Gregg
    
    Someone please familiarize crackpot Krugman with Joe the Plummer.
    - John in Amherst
      
      is joe the plumber is your idea of an authoritative source? Check your facts, then dis the source if they are wrong. It is all a matter of record, independent of Krugman (a Nobel prize winner btw)
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      Krugman jumped the shark long ago.
    - John in Amherst
      
      still haven’t come up with a lie from Plouffe?
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      “Romney has no core” is BS
    - Gregg
      
      Yea, I heard something about crackpot Krugman being a Nobel laureate… somewhere. He wrote Obama never said anything to imply he wasn’t for legislating equal outcome. Not true, he told Joe the Plummer it was better to “spread the wealth around”. the source was Obama not Joe the Plummer. “Worried for the Country” is absolutely correct, Krugman jumped the shark long ago. He is far too partisan to be taken seriously. He’s a laughing stock to serious minded people.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      You think it’s better to amass ALL the wealth to one or two people? What CEO works 500 times as hard as those producing the product that brings in the wealth?
    - Gregg
      
      “You think it’s better to amass ALL the wealth to one or two people?”
      
      Better than what?
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    Krugman. LOL
    - John in Amherst
      
      FOX, Rush, etc – (whatever sound a cat makes as it gucks up a fur ball)
Worried for the country(MA)

Are you equally disturbed by the distortions Obama and his henchmen Axelrod and Plouffe are running against Romney?
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Personally, I was disgusted with lies and distortions in political campaigning, decades ago!
     When one side starts it, it is hard for the other side to keep it clean!�
     Many elections have been won by mud-slinging of lies and distortions!
     It is hard to ignore these truths, for a political candidate!�
     Too bad we cannot afford to take a winner out of office quickly, when their campaign has been truly fact-checked, and found to be lying and distorting the truth!
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    I agree. The American Idolization of the process and sound bite-itis is sad.

Anonymous

The never ending claim, by both sides of the political spectrum that the U.S. economy can be steered in a desired direction by policy claims of presidential administrations or political parties is laughable, and has long been so. After twenty five years of post World War II growth and economic stability, the game began to change drastically in the early seventies, during Nixon’s presidency. Since those days, only one president has escaped the stigma of recession during his time in office, Bill Clinton. Democrats thump their chests and claim this to be the result of Clinton’s careful economic deliberations. Republicans bury their heads in the sand and ignore the reality of Clinton era growth. Neither point of view is of any value. The American economy has, for decades, been far too large a beast to be tamed by any political ideologies. Economic cycles come and go. They always have and always will. If Presidents or political ideologies could temper economic instability, it would have been figured out long ago. Instead, we have a never ending battle between left and right, Republican and Democrat, Keynesian and Laissez-Faire, all claiming to posses the answer, yet the economic turmoil continues. If Mitt Romney or any other Republican candidate wins the presidency and the economy is still weak after his first year in office, the GOP will do a magnificent tap dance in their efforts to blame someone else. If Obama is re-elected and the economy doesn’t improve quickly, the Democrats will blame obstructionist Republicans in congress. It’s neither. It’s a huge economy that’s going to do what it’s going to do. Even China has more to say about the state of our economy than the president or congress.

Zing

Thank you for some common sense on this board of raving maniacs.
Gregg

Very good points but the economy can be steered by politics. The best thing is for government to get out of the way.

ita hardesty masom

Tom, I listen to your show and I am grateful that you cover what you do. On todays show within the section about the Payroll tax cuts and the Keystone Pipeline I tried to get a call in after you cut short the lady from Mass….you said you have covered this story …and you have…but this is today. What I wanted to share with you and especially the listener is the following…The political move to tie this pipeline in with the payroll tax cuts is dirty politics at its worst and our economy and our environemt is at stake here…not the deep pockets of politicians and oil lords… The Citizens Unity ruling has allowed huge amounts of money to be spend to possibly allow this horrible crude oil flow though our breadbasket…leaving a wasteland in the heart of Canada…all for some of the last great oil reserves on our planet. Climate experts/ not politicians/ say it will ruin our atmospere. Pres Obama came into office stating he wants to end the way DC does business and environmentally see a turning point for generations to come…end the tryanny of oil.
The mythes about jobs is misleading and the union folks understand if allowed the USA can be on the front end of the Green Energy switch…not behind China and India…we have much to discuss here….not yesterday or today…but tomorrow.
I ask that you invite Naomi Klein, Bill McKibben and Dick Gregory on for some serious discussion on this MOST important issue- the future of Earth as we know it.
I was so moved by this subject that I was one of over 12,000 that made it to Dc to circle the White House on Nov 6 2011.

And if you have not read this yet I recommend you do…
Here is a brilliant new article by Naomi Klein, seamlessly melding economic justice and climate change. �
http://www.thenation.com/article/164497/capitalism-vs-climate
thank you for your time and your efforts…
Ita Hardesty Mason
TennesseeNashville area/

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

Child Labor in Asia.

I want to explain to the American people that is normal for a 12 to 18 year child in Asia to work has an adult in factories or on the streets of Asia.

Why? Because that is an Asian culture is to help their families to survive hardship and to feed their poor families
even rich Asian do work has child laborers.

I am one good example for being a child laborer in the Philippines. No one force me to work. I volunteer to help my step father to sell fruit, rice and plant rice at age of 13.

I loved it. it makes me more responsible child than sitting at home watching television or do something stupid like Americans kids doing nowadays.

I believe majority of Asian Children will tell you the same thing.

Child Labor is a myth an economic sabotage against China or other poor Asian nations.

I was a Child Laborer and I am proud to be one

Terry Tree Tree

There is a difference in voluntarily helping your family, and the exploitave Child-Labor that we have laws against.�
In Tenn., a business cannot hire a child under 16, has a limited number of hours they can work, and the child’s school-work is supposed to come first.
I, and my children, worked to help out, or to buy the things we wanted, that we were not going to get otherwise.
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
  
  Terry Tree Tree you still don’t understand.
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
    
    American politcal culture does not apply to real Asian culture.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    Few people have the completely same background and experiences. Mine were similiar, but different. I can apply what I know about mine, what I have read and heard about conditions there, and arrive at an approximation. I can never go back and live your life in your shoes. That doesn’t mean that I cannot get to some approximate understanding of your life.
    I have used my background, to try to make life better for others, my children, and myself. I don’t forget what and where I come from. I try to help others. If I had MONEY, I would be starting a LOT of JOBS, regardless of the tax-breaks, etc…, because I love my fellow man!�
    I have plans to start some, with my meager resources, anyway. First, I will provide jobs for my fellow Volunteer Fire Fighters, and Volunteer Rescue Squad members, that need the income, then veterans, and more, if it grows that big!
Anonymous

Point taken but I too grew up in Asia (South Korea) and I can tell you that I, my siblings and relatives nor any of my friends and school mates ever worked as children. My first job ever was a paper route and that was here in the US when I was 13 or 14. IOW, better to not speak for all Asians.
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
  
  Korea is develop country try going to India, Philippines,Vietnam or Thailand or try Malaysia too There ARE kids working hard for their families. You grew up in Asia doesn’t mean your Asian too and do you speak Korean. You must be child of US servicesman. if you are the arguement is close.
  
  And we talking about Poor people not like your kind. better not speak for all Asians PLEASE
  - Anonymous
    
    Korea is a developed country now but I grew up there during the 70s when it was still rebuilding from the total devastation of the war when it was so “developed” that the ROK president at the time, Park Jung Hee, flew on commercial flights for stateside visits and the per capita was one of the lowest in the world. And yes, I speak Korean fluently. Please don’t question how “Asian” someone is because they have a different life experience than you and please don’t speak for any other Asian in the future.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      What different life style? Koreans and Japanese has different life style than Southeast Asian people. The culture is totally different especially the winter you have in North. I can speak to all Asian poor because I grew up with them even Vietnamese refugees in the Philippines and Malaysian kids living in my town in Davao City. You don’t know the culture of Southeast Asia. you have answer my questions are you a child of serviceman or Korean? As I said if you born and grew up in South Korea doesn’t mean you know the culture and I again you are not poor.
    - Anonymous
      
      What is it about don’t speak for me as an Asian that you fail to understand in your series of bracktracking replies and defensive strawmen?
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      Please I do understand you. the one I don’t understand that you pretend to know about WHY CHILDREN IN ASIA ARE WORKING SO HARD!!! Is it a Sin to work hard to feed a family? If you never work so hard in your child because you have a rich parents and don’t need to work. Well I am very happy for you but for me kids who worked so hard for their families in the rice fields or factories has more an Asian heart than you. period GO AND TELL THOSE KIDS TO STOP WORKING BECAUSE YOU ARE GOING PROVIDE THEM WITH FOOD.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      SO YOUR RICH THEN YOU ARE AN ARROGANT KOREAN, YOU NEVER WORK SO HARD IN YOUR ENTIRE LIFE. THAT IS WHY WE 99% PERCENT ARE SICK TIRED OF YOU RICH ARROGANT PEOPLE TELLING US POOR PEOPLE WHEN OR NOT TO WORK. STAY AWAY FROM RICH ARROGANT RICH BOY
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      Give me one good example of Filipino culture?
    - Anonymous
      
      Man of man, you do have a chip on your shoulder the size of an house.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      Please don’t start with me mister know everything TAX MAN.

Four Elements

Every once in a while, there is a guest who simply nails it. Gail Haddock, in her quiet, thoughtful way, perfectly skewered the American public with her comment that it cannot absorb more than three sentences at a time. Isn’t that tragic? Ms Haddock is that rare example of a commentator who is all business, eschews jargon, does not try to impress, and simply allows her powers of perception and intellect to shine through. Bring her back often!

nj

Hey, there’s something fishy here!

Gail Chaddock would be the correspondent. I do think they have her on fairly frequently.
- Four Elements
  
  Thanks for the correction! What a goof. And I was going to add that she never said “gonna” even once…
Gregg

I didn’t get past your first 3 sentences.
- Nutricj
  
  LOL
Worried for the country(MA)

She was certainly a lot better than the NYTimes guy today.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

Child Labor in Southeast Asia. REVISED I apologized for saying that All Asian do child laborer. I forgot some Asians are rich and they don’t need to work especially in South Korea.
I offended the rich Asians.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

1,000 Filipinos are missing in Flooded cities. one good factor of this tragedy is the slash and burn farming by local residents. Children and parents engaged in this kind of farming in order to survive from hardship. They KNOW the consequences of less trees around the surrounding areas but we cannot blame them for they need to survive. To those Koreans who visited my country please put your trash in the trash can my American friend is complaining about Koreans throwing their trash all over mount Pinatubo.
- Anonymous
  
  Actually, Koreans are known to clean up after themselves. Even when causing havoc demonstrating at anti-global venues like Davos, Cancun, Hong Kong, Florence and so forth, they always make some attempt to pick-up after themselves and the local police have been quick to note this in addition to all the disparate non-Korean groups who take part in such gatherings.
  
  One thing’s clear though, my polite request that you refrain from speaking for me and other Asians on the issue of child labor has gotten your panties in such a bunch that you’re reduced to making up anti-Korean rants on a public forum. This reflects nothing of your ethnicity, background, gender or anything else for that matter but more about you as an individual.
  
  I’ll not bother even replying to your attempts at replies. If anything, they’re a continuation of your boorish and base “you’re not Asian enough,” “you don’t know Asia,” “you’re some rich guy,” “you probably don’t know even your own culture or your langugae” pattern of utter, childish refuse.
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
    
    Whatever. RICH PEOPLE ARE ALWAYS RIGHT.
    - Anonymous
      
      Not always but in this case, yes I’m right and you’ve proven that you should not speak for other Asians when you harbor such resentment towards groups that do not agree with your limited views. Way to defeat your own argument and position.
      
      Again, don’t speak for other Asians and learn some manners. If there’s a common thread amongst Asians, it’s politeness and manners. Being ignorant of our basic customs thoroughly disqualifies you from presuming to speak for any other Asian.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      So you admit that your rich.
      I am not speaking for the RICH Asian. I am speaking for the poor Asians. I am not ignorant because you are more ignorant than me about Why Asian poor children are working so hard” that is my point. But you don’t want to admit that they working hard or being a child laborer that helping their families. That’s what I am so upset about.
      
      I spoke with 4 Chinese at my work today and they Admit that they were also child laborers when they were in China. Why is so hard for you to accept that Asian poor kids are working so hard for their families? is that hard to contemplate if you don’t see that in South Korea when you were growing up or never ever seen a child begging on streets of Seoul or just too blind to see the truth about the poor Asians.
      By the way. you should say Thank you to the Filipino soldiers who fought for your Beloved South Korea during the Korean War. don’t be such a Hyprocrite your Asian Boy too. Me rich? funny I live pay to pay check even though I don’t speak or write Ive league english like you I know Asian culture.
      �
      Please!!! I speak 2 Filipino languages and 2 dialects. You hate to Admit the Asian culture help their families” THAT IS A VERY SAD PART OF YOUR KOREAN CULTURE. ANTI- KOREAN. Please how many Filipino maid murdered by your people throw them out of the window like a piece of rug dolls. I have to right to say things about Koreans because I know what they did to my people.
      
      Tell me why is so hard for you to accept the Child working i
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      Koreans clean AFTERr themselves. please!!! ask that American living in Clark Airbase married to a Filipino. He video the event. if I can only find his video.
      Now I know why the Japanese treated Koreans like crap because you don’t admit about how other ASIANS work so hard. Look at the Japanese they always give money to Filipino poor because they know they were wrong during World War 2. We can go on all year with this arguement about CHILD LABOR IN ASIA and You a rich south Korean who grew up in America pretent to know Asian culture.
    - Anonymous
      
      Wow, very uncalled for pal. You should stop.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      I have civil liberty to tell the world how Koreans treated FILIPINOS MAID ON KOREA
    - Anonymous
      
      I never had a Filipinomaid. Manyou’re one sick puppy.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      SO WHAT YOUR PEOPLE MURDERED MY PEOPLE
    - Anonymous
      
      And what then would the your twisted, backwarded and sociopathic reasoning on why the Japanese treated the Filippinos so poorly during WWII?�
      Try to keep it real, kid. We’re talking about exploitative child labor. And with such racist comments and sentiments against another Asian group, you presume to speak for all Asians?
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      don’t get mad kiddo. You don’t know how child labor means. because you never WORKER DURING YOUR CHILDHOOD. like me. a former child laborer and just like the millions OF pooR ASIANS KID IN SOUTHEAST ASIA.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      I NEVER WROTE I SPEAK FOR ALL ASIANS. read again WHAT I WROTE AND YOU ARE SO ARROGANT.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      yes the Japanesetreated us like shit but they Apologized to the Filipino. Did they apologized to the Korean people.
    - Anonymous
      
      Yes, theydid. But whyevenbringit upin the first place?
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      WHEN?
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      we never argued about Child Labor we are arguing that you are telling not to speak for all Asians. I asked you questions you never answered all of them.
    - Anonymous
      
      I never feel the need to answer to low-lives like you. Just who do you think you are? If you weren’t so pathetic, you’d be hilarious.
    - Anonymous
      
      You’ve been answering to him, over and over and over again, for hours. Incredibly boring.
    - Anonymous
      
      Actually, it has not been hours because for most of the night, I’ve been out and just came back about an hour ago to find a flood of replies. But there is a difference between replying and answering. If you find it boring, then move on.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      where and when?
    - Anonymous
      
      This is all a strawman. I’m so far into your polluted head that I have you arguing with yourself. If you’re not so utterly sad, it would be mildly amusing. And Asian boy, I took care of my dad for a year during the end stage of his life. Feel free to twist that around in your sociopathic campaign and turn it into some “you’re not Asian” “you have no Asian value,” “you’re just rich boy who doesn’t understand life” and you usual series of psycho-babble.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      I never wrote that I speak for all Asian I wrote that the Asian culture help each other especially with their families. if your family never help each other or you never work when you were young like other poor asian kid did in their life. That is not my problem. okay? call me stupid again you will find a new friend on line.
  - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
    
    how can you understand child labor when you never work during your a kid when you were growing up in Korea. you just insulted me multiple times already. Asian Boy what a hyprocrite. use all the great words and sentences you can gather BUT IT DOESN’T PROVE YOU A BETTER PERSON THAN ME ASIAN BOY!!!!
- Anonymous
  
  They don’t do it because they expect a thank you or because they want to sway the racists like you to their corner. They do it because it’s the right thing to do.
  
  S. Korea to send emergency aid to flood-stricken Philippines
  
  SEOUL, Dec. 21 (Yonhap) — South Korea will send emergency supplies worth US$500,000 to the Philippines, which was battered by flash floods triggered by a heavy downpour last week, the foreign ministry said Wednesday.
  
  The aid includes food, blankets, drinking water and clothes, foreign ministry spokesman Cho Byung-jae said in a statement. More than 1,000 people are dead or missing in the southern Philippines after flash floods caused by the tropical storm ravaged their homes and villages.
  - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
    
    Racist? my ex-gf was North Korean refugee my friend. she is now living in Europe. She told why your 2 countries will never unite but that will be a long story and to argue with a rich boy like you. you will never understand my point and thank you for sending the Aide to the victims of the Typhoon even though it wasn’t from you.
    - Anonymous
      
      You dated a North Korean. Congratulations. That, however, does not absolve you of the racist rants you’ve posted here. Deal with it, Asian boy.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      ME RACIST? I never throw Filipino Maid out of the building like what your people did to my poor Filipino people.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      YOU NEVER BUT YOUR PEOPLE DID. TELL ME HOW MANY KOREANS GETTING ARRESTED IN MANILA FOR PEDOPHILIA?
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    Please convey my thanks to your people! I cannot be everywhere, or do everything. I do what I can for my fellow man.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  My condolences to your country-men/women.
  - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
    
    TY. it is just happening every year.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Sounds like they need a new architecture, or something! The paradigm of doing the same old thing, expecting different results, is currently referred to as insanity.�
      Public buildings built for emergency shelters? Scattered where the populace is? Emergency Alert System?
Anonymous

You know what you’re offending a lot of people with this kind of stuff. It’s really not working, I’m sure you feel good dumping on people and going into rages online but really, it’s not helping any of your legitimate points or arguments.
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
  
  I just hate people who never seen the true side of Child Labor. Especially with an Asian who grew up with A SILVER SPOON. Never ever experience hunger his/her life. And telling me that I cannot speak for the Asian poor. The Asian poor has no time to be on internet or message board. They only have time to work on factories even though they are under age.
  
  I have the right to speak because I was a child laborer. that’s my point
  - Anonymous
    
    Well try doing it with a rational mind. Your anger is getting in the way of your message.
    - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68
      
      i have a rational mind. I am sick and tired of rich people who keep telling us POOR PEOPLE what to say and when to say it. I will respect Wotan_617 if he/she is poor and never did CHILD LABORER then I can admit that I am wrong but coming from arrogant Korean who has the money to survive and telling me that I can’t speak for the poor Asian is unacceptable because he never work hard labor during his childhood.
    - Anonymous
      
      Again, my arrogance is your projection. I had asked you politely to not speak for me and other Asians on the topic of child labor to which your series of replies were accusatory ad hominem that questioned whether I was Asian enough, whether I spoke my own language, whether I knew my own culture and on and on. Your series of stupid, ill-adjusted and utterly Un-Asian replies were from the gutter. At this point, it’s clear that’s all you know.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      you are arrogant.
    - Anonymous
      
      In reaction to your gutter trash rants and strawmen, yes I will be arrogant.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      if i am gutter you live in a GHETTO RICH WORLD. YOU PRIDE YOURSELF WITH MONEY BUT YOU ARE LESS UNFORTUNATE BECAUSEYOU HAVE NO HEART.
    - Nutricj
      
      fax, my grandmother was a japanese w. war II child, orphaned and struggled from her grade school age and throughout her life. my mother, the oldest of ten in an irish/japanese catholic poor family grew up with so little- she throughout her childhood gave up her food to her younger siblings. i have myself had to start working as a child (started when i was 12 regular work, by 14 full time) so that i may have clothes and have been homeless twice in my life, once with my mother and sister as a child and once after my parents divorced finally. does my opinion matter less because i am part japanese and was once poor, but today would be considered “rich” by many. i am the oldest of 28+ grandchildren and i made my wealth the old fashioned way- work, lots of it, then military, then gi bill paid college, etc. and i have been lucky to have made a few really good “guesses” when the time was right in business and now i get to be a bit spoiled. i never forget where i came from, i never stop giving back. you think what you want and that is a good thing- but all that hostility is only stopping your messages in their trax. you alone suffer for it. you are correct that you have the right to speak- but wouldn’t it be a little more compelling if you taught us something with your experiences and wisdom, rather than offending all of us? Heiwa, CJ.
      
      ps. my “j” is for jade, because my grandmother hoped this powerful stone would add to the “richness of her grandaughter’s future.” because her life was so poor (financially)
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      Thank you Nutricj but Wotan_617 is trying to argue with me that he never work during his/her childhood and I don’t speak for the millions of Asian kids or teenagers who worked hard for their families. because he is a gago.
    - Anonymous
      
      Don’t put it on me. You brought this upon yourself and you see, I’m not the only one who thinks your stupidity is patently offensive.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      Ya I am Stupid and your Not. please look at the mirror and ask yourself are you really a nice person.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      oh please. I don’t care about what other people think. if you do you got issues.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Sounds like her hard work was rewarded with jade, and 27 other gems!
    - Nutricj
      
      thanku triple T, and the great grand babies abound too- they all have the better life she wished for- happy holidays sista vet! wishing you peace and wellness in the coming year for you and yours too! cj
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      You’re welcome! Happy Hollidays to ALL! Actually, I’m a brother vet. Unless someone has been lying to me all these decades! If so, I guess I’ll stay gender-confused the rest of my life? Sandra Bullock appeals to my interest , NOT Johnny Depp.
    - Nutricj
      
      oh my gosh!! whoopsie!! merry xmas brother vet, then!! well, i suppose this is the hard part about blind reltionships, LOL. it was on another day when you said something so eloquent and fem supportive- i made the wrong conclusion! i’ll take depp
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      i noticed that too.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Some of us guys value women, and their abilities! I live in the Bible Belt, where ‘barefoot and pregnant’ has been the standard man’s attitude about women. I saw through it.
      ‘The DaVinci Code’ gives the best explaination that I have read, or heard, for this paradigm!
    - Gregg
      
      I live in the “Bible belt” as well and would never make such a generalization. My Congresswoman is Virginia Fox and my Governor is Bev Perdue. Hardly, wallflowers.
      
      You will never see me ridiculing highly accomplished women like Sarah Palin, Condoleeza Rice or Hillary Clinton. I am very happy women are not stoned to death in Iraq anymore and the little girls can go to school in Afghanistan.
    - Nutricj
      
      ahh, here here Gregg!! i hope there will be a day where women across the globe needn’t fear their communities because of their gender!
    - Gregg
      
      Back atcha’ with the “here here! But it won’t happen by itself. That’s the rub.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Again we agree! Is the world coming to an end? Oh! Mayan 2012?
    - Nutricj
      
      i meant to tell you, there was a day Tom read my post and then he and guests discussed and all of them said “he, him, his…” about my ideas..when people see CJ they think man, and one of my best friends from the AF is a guy named Stacy- he cracks me up joking that people always think his wife has a wife and are confused when he shows up to a party. sorry, i know getting off topic but i kicked myself for hearing your pro-women remarks and guessing you are a woman! heck, my mid-western, car obsessed husband is the greatest feminist i know.(with a very traditional midwest family, their views on women and their roles, in their own words, “christian values about women”) it still tickles me/us remembering when he brought home his “mutt” wife from NY in combat boots, LOL
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Grew up being teased that Terry is a girl’s name! Moda was visualizing me as female, though I have stated my gender many times on here! My neice is a former active duty Marine.
    - notafeminista
      
      Sure you do. As long as they agree with you.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      You KNOW better! I have a history on here, and in person, of what I said!
    - Anonymous
      
      I put myself through college and grad school. Anything else stupid you want to say?
      
      And if you want to appear more rational, next time don’t spew utter BS then “like” your own comment under a different ID.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      BS!!!
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      really? you said you never work in your life read your first arrogant Kimche comment. you know what you sound like a Kimche. A sour person!!!
    - Anonymous
      
      Now you are being a bigot.
      Stop please.
    - Nutricj
      
      you both, please take a breath. you are on the same side- the side of good, accomplishemnet, perseverence, work togather and you would accomplish- tearing each other apart is against your common goals here. jeffe and TTT are right…
    - Anonymous
      
      Sorry but you don’t. You’re raging and lashing out at people who disagree with you.
      It’s not helping you for the last time. Wotan has let you admonish him with your diatribes and even tried to reason with you. But no you go off and then what’s left to do but to call you what you are. A guy with a huge chip on his shoulder who has a lot of issues with anger. It’s not helping you.
    - Zing
      
      Michiganjf…are you listening?
  - Anonymous
    
    I was not brought up with a silver spoon. That again is your baseless assumption and the lastest in a series of assumptions beginning with the stupid assertion that I am not Asian enough, do not speak my own language, do not know my own culture and on and on. All of this because I had asked you politely in my first response to you to not speak for all Asians. How stupid and ill-adjusted can someone be?
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      you are the one who called me Stupid and you want me to respect you. You fired the first shot. I never said I represent ASIANS but you brought up that Idea to me. so we will argue and we will see what a real person you are. Never underestimate the mind of a Filipino.
    - Anonymous
      
      Never underestimate the mind of a Filipino, eh? Well, I never did until now. You’ve given me good reason to begin.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      I have more colored friends that you. korean boy who never BEEN POOR IN YOUR LIFE. if you Parents never teach you the VALUE OF HARD WORK to help your family. That is a big shame in your life. Instead OF arguing with me why don’t pack gifts so you can GIVE THEM TO THE HARD WORKING CHILD LABORER IN ASIA. God Bless your arrogance.
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      Act stupid? You’re the one commented on my post telling the world that you never work during your childhood. did you ever think about that? of course you never DID work Because you’re rich or have the money to survive. That makes me mad. I was talking about child labor and came posting. OH!! I NEVER WORK IN MY LIFE. if you never work in your life when you A CHILD WHY COMMENT.
- Zing
  
  Awesome comment. I missed your same admonition to Michiganjf this morning..not to worry; I will save and use appropriately. Merry Christmas!
  - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
    
    Zing not all people are the same.
Anonymous

Not all South Koreans are rich and I’m sure there are many South Korean children who work. At some point, you’ll stick to a subject you know better without assumptions, generalizations and most of all, presumptions based on ignorance. But given your limited track record here, I’m sure you’ll turn this into another personal pissing match when proved that you’re just stupid.

Worried for the country(MA)

Why is Eric Holder still AG? He’s an albatross around Obama’s neck. The ‘Fast and Furious’ coverup could be a modern day ‘Watergate’.

david

Because Obama is still President!
Check out the book “Injustice” by Christian Adams.
If you think ‘Fast and Furious’ is an albatross, there is more!
Gregg

Do you suppose John Ashcroft could have gotten away with crap like this?
Terry Tree Tree

Why isn’t the ‘W’ Justice Dept. being cricified, for starting that program? If Holder is bad for continuing it, why wasn’t it bad to start it?
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  Sorry, different program and Bush’s team tracked the guns.
- Gregg
  
  If W had made a concerted effort to sabotage the 2nd amendment and the result was Americans being killed, I would be calling for impeachment.

Worried for the country(MA)

First he says he’s one of the four greatest Presidents.

Now he says he’s just lazy.

If he wasn’t so lazy we’d have to save room on Mt. Rushmore.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/12/23/obama_i_think_theres_a_laziness_in_me-comments.html

Gregg

He’s half right.
TFRX

Context, anybody? Or do you just like to think of a guy who went from State Senator to President in a few short years as “lazy”?

Keep reading your Real Clear Politics. It’s educated you so well to this point.

“It’s interesting, there is a – deep down, underneath all the work I do, I think there’s a laziness in me. [snip] But, with myself, [snip] if I get lazy, then I get mad at myself. ”

(From full transcript provided by White House.)

david

More skewed politics from Washington.
The payroll tax deal is a trojan horse!!!!
Obama and Company wanted a 1 Yr. deal, now they insisted on a 2 month bandaide deal and got it.
Pelosi comes on the air and brags about the thousands this tax cut will save the middleclass person and puts the blame on Repubs. for holding it up.
Well!!!!! She lied, the average middleclass family will get around $20 per pay period or $160 for the two month period.
Sounds great, $20 a pay period is something!!!!!!!
Where is the money coming from to pay for it???????
First, the payroll tax cut will come out of your Social Security withholdings, you know the bankrupt SS that has NO money but IOU’s, putting even less into that fund.
Second, they plan to pay for it by increasing fees on people who, guess what????? are buying houses, that is good news for home buyers! Who cares, they can afford it!
I listened to an Accountant on all this and he just laughed, Americans have been baited by another campaign year gimmick!
$15.1 Trillion and still growing awfully fast!!!!

Long live politicians, politics and “they hope” foolish Americans.

Terry Tree Tree

Wouldn’t NEED a payroll tax cut, if the GREEDY rich had CREATED all those JOBS they claimed would be started, when the ‘W’ tax cuts were passed!
- david
  
  The country might have recovered by now if this administration had not declared war on the free market system! In their effort to win workers favor, he pitted workers against the corporations.
  Piled new restrictive regulations on companies and even in a statement to press, said he would shut down some of them with added regulations and then try to mask over how many jobs would be lost, research it!
  I know several contractors, it is getting harder and more expensive to stay in business with all the new regs. You must be certified to paint over old paint on old houses are face a big fine.
  Or, in bulldozer work, you have to change lubricants in your machine if you work near water, around $1000 in expense.
  A company that makes hot water heaters had to invest $1 million because of new regs.
  Today there are less greedy rich people than there was a few years ago.
  So maybe once we get rid of the rich, things will get better?????
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    6 people of Wal-Mart fortunes have as much as the lower 30% of the population of the U.S.? The wealthiest 1% have over 50% of the wealth of the nation, and there is less GREEDY rich than a few years ago?
        Lead-based paint was proven HARMFUL decades ago! Why shouldn’t painters be trained to protect their health, and the health of those in danger?
       You want to drink the lubricants of bulldozers? Your children swim in it?�
       Regulations that protect public health, are an INVESTMENT in the future of lower health problems!
       I do NOT want un-necessary regulations, but companies have PROVEN that they cannot be trusted to do what is best for everyone, if they can short-cut, and take more ‘profit’, at others’ expense!
    - notafeminista
      
      Given up everything but food, shelter and fuel yet?
  - nj
    
    Show us the regulation that requires changing equipment lubricants when working “near water.”
    
    Take your time, we’ll wait.
    - Gregg
      
      I have a commercial contractors license but I don’t do much with it. I can attest the regulations have increased dramatically. That is a big reason I don’t speculate in this economy. There are just too many regulatory hoops and not enough wiggle room for profit.
      
      As to David’s claim, I can’t specify the regulation and in fact it may be a case of preventative medicine to lower the risk of devastating fines. I saw something on the Learning channel or maybe the Discovery channel a while back. They call them “biobased lubricants” I think. If a dozer is working near water and a hydraulic line burst these lubricants are bio degradable. Sorry, I’m not going to dig it up but I think David is right.
    - david
      
      Iam right!!! This came from a friend of mine who is a certified Caterpillar machanic!!
    - david
      
      I got it straight from a certified caterpillar machanic!
  - Anonymous
    
    That’s not what Terry is saying.
    But you wont listen anyway.
    You post a lot of misinformation that is exactly what the GOP wants people to do and think.
    
    It’s called a fair and better tax system that taxes things such as dividends, as income.
    
    For the record I think the payroll tax is a load of BS. I think the democrats have created a something here that will hurt them in a year or so.
    I don’t make a lot of money but I don’t need the $40 a week or less that this thing is supposed to be giving me. I would rather they used it to pay down the debt and deficit.
    - david
      
      The truth hurts, that is why you wont listen!
      I know what Terry is saying.
      I made a statement as to why jobs are stalled, from people who know and have voiced their concern.
      The examples are fact!
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      The GREEDY rich have had their tax cuts to CREATE JOBS, for over 8 years! WHERE ARE THE JOBS?? They keep adding other factors, but NOT adding U.S. Citizen JOBS! The GREEDY rich are LIARS?? Who would not reach that conclusion, from the EVIDENCE??
      ONE CEO received $20 Million BONUS, on top of $28 Million Salary, and who knows how many $Millions of Perqs, for bankrupting GM, while the workers that put the products together, got their pensions cut, and their jobs cut!! HOW can anyone, NOT GREEDY rich, defend this?
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    MORE EXCUSES for the GREEDY rich to NOT create the jobs they said they would!!

http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston

P.S. my Filipino friends are also successful. they are now living in USA and Europe. it is Asian culture to help each or work. right?

http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston

This comment is for Nutricj
- Nutricj
  
  yes, i agree very much with that. i have been taught- no complaining, head down, work hard, help your relatives, loved ones and friends. that served me well in the military- and it has served me well as a business woman, as a mother, as a community contributor, teacher, chef, and more. i am only quoting that i have a lot of “stength.”
  
  on the one hand we envy those that get the opportunity to break out- my grandmother- i say this with love, was jealous of those that had the easy road- yet her light shone through because she wanted more for us- her baby’s babies, and the cycle- it does repeat. now i have children and they have no knowledge of work at their tender ages which makes me happy and worried all at once. when you don’t know what it takes to earn your “bread” how can you possibly appreciate it? my other grandmother came from puerto rico- she speaks eloquently of how my papi came to the usa after the typhoons destroyed his long standing family farming business. i feel the breath of my grandparents, japanese, puerto rican, irishmen on my neck and i say- they endured– so too shall i. and that makes me american, that makes me spirited, wildly eager with goals, and angry/set in motion to protect those who need it- such as the children of forced labor as i feel your pain for them and feel it profoundly myself.
  
  i look like my irish grandfather- blonde/aubrurn hair, green eyes, burnt in the sun pale skin, way too much hair certainly short- gift from both grandparents sides…and i think- this is the real gift, the real message- to work hard in their honor and to strive for a better tomorrow. now i know i will get pishawed here on these boards for such idealistic, if not sentimental notions- but we absolutely must protect each other- care of one another’s ideas is just immeasurably significant.
  
  you my brother, you my sister, here i hope to provide you shelter-
  
  even if that is just to bitch at me on an npr board
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    The American Dream, is the dream of almost every poor person, of ANY country, and ANY culture, to make life better, for themselves, especially their children, and their fellow man!
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      you have a heart Terry Tree Tree.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Thank you. I like to think so. That’s why I rally so much against the GREEDY rich! They seem like King Midas, before he got what he wished the most for!   They LUST after more POWER, for the sake of having MORE POWER. They ignore the GOOD they can do, with what they have, and make life better for their fellow man.
         A two-year old can pull a trigger, or otherwise cause a death! It takes training, skills, dedication and heart, to SAVE lives!
         DEstruction is FAR easier than CONstruction!
         I hope you, FAX68, and Wotan, can see more of your similiarities, and the CONstructive things each of you do, and see more of the other’ s side of the issues!
      
      Happy Hollidays!!!!! Whichever you celebrate!
  - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
    
    you speak from your heart not from your mind. you have a great emotional intelligence. One of the reason your family accomplished a lot to over come hardship.
    you reminded of millions of Asians who are working so hard just to survive. god bless
    - http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston
      
      not only Asian but Americans and other people who are living in a time of needs to overcome the burdens of life.
    - Nutricj
      
      one day when i was young, i said, “i hope someday to be very rich.” i was very much punished in my family and ridiculed for this. but when i said, “i want to be rich so i can give it all away to people who need it.” then they just thought i was a silly girl and giggled me off.
      
      now, almost all of them give to my causes there is sooooo much power in “do as i do”
      
      i learn a lot on these boards that helps me define and narrow my focus for efforts.
      
      i hope you know about grant makers without borders and the many contributers that are working to bring clean water solutions, foodstuffs, and edu establishments in various Asian, Indian, etc. locales. I am personally working to build a school and clean water supply chain in an earthquake devasted Haiti community at present and looking to do some work in japan in the new year. with your energy- you could make/be a part of the changes you so earnestly wish for! cj

Anonymous

FAX 68 originally wrote: “I want to explain to the American people that is normal for a 12 to 18 year child in Asia to work has an adult in factories or on the streets of Asia.”

To which I replied:

“Point taken but I too grew up in Asia (South Korea) and I can tell you that I, my siblings and relatives nor any of my friends and school mates ever worked as children. My first job ever was a paper route and that was here in the US when I was 13 or 14. IOW, better to not speak for all Asians.”

After series of ad hominem attacks by you in response to the above stating that I’m not Asian enough, I probably don’t speak my language and so forth followed by childish whines about how I’m a rich boy, arrogant and of course the old and true “you started it” lie, you also thought it in your best interest to conjure a sociopathic, gutter reply that the brutality of Koreans by Japanese during the early 1900s was somehow explained by my taking exception to your opinion on child labor. But best of all, and now, posting as:

FilipinoBoston, you wrote: “I never wrote that I speak for all Asian…”

Re-read your first sentence posted on top. Stupid, sociopathic and a liar is no way to get through life, Asian boy. That’s why I keep telling you not to speak for me or any other decent Asian. It’s you against the world, isn’t it and it’s exactly gutter imbeciles like you who give credence to pernicious Asian American stereotypes. Lastly, if someone of your lowliness is the product of child labor, then by all mean we should object to it at all costs.

http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston

what attack? are you so arrogant that you can’t see how many times you Insulted me with your Korean Kimche sour attitude. Remember you fired the shot for calling me names. Yes you grew up in Asia but YOU NEVER EXPERIENCE CHILD LABOR LIKE THE 1.2 BILLION POOR CHILDREN IN ASIA. CAN YOU NOT UNDERSTAND THAT. WHY COMMENT IF YOU NEVER BEEN A CHILD LABOR. DON’T YOU GET THAT.

Yes you never experience child labor like me and other billions of poor children in Asia. And I again I am not speaking for the Asians. I am telling the world why YOUNG KIDS are working in order to support their Families. Is that hard for you to understand.

Children are working in Asian in order to survive to help their Families and your comment is bragging about you never work has a child. Is that connect to my Posting about child labor.
- Anonymous
  
  I didn’t bother reading this or any of your other worthless replies. But as I’ve noted, 17 or 18 or whatever it was on Christmas Eve of your usual gutter trash and childish attempts at insults on the internet says more about you, your lack of an upbringing and your status in life. In my world outside of the internet, you would have gotten your ass kicked. And that you can count on. But consider this and the misery, anger, irritation and angst you obviously went through on Christmas Eve to be a good lesson even here on the internet. It would have been worse in life.
  
  Now kindly fuck off and return to your miserable, insignificant life with 40 twitter subscribers.
Anonymous

Don’t waste your time. This chap has a huge chip on his shoulder and he’s never wrong. He’s a legend in his own mind who uses insults and rants and thinks this is how one rationally debates issues. I’ve been around the block with this guy and I know it’s very frustrating. I’m now thinking one has to just step away from the fools as life is to short.
- Anonymous
  
  Thanks for the heads-up and while I don’t post here on a daily basis, it’s clear he’s another shut-in internet warrior trying to troll his way out of misery.
  
  18 replies on Christmas Eve says more than that ever needs to be said about this guy.

Worried for the country(MA)

Merry Christmas to all!

Dee

Jack Beatty has it wrong on Gingrich’s Fear Mongering on Iran

I rarely find disagreeing with Jack Beatty position but I think Gail Chaddock has the argument right Obama needs to stand
up to the disinformation by the oil companies on job creation and the pipeline. Plus I think she is absolutely right the Ameri-
can people expect the administration to side with the environ
mentalists on Global warming and climate changen ot the uil companies.

Jack Beatty maybe right this could be a liability for the Pre-
sident due to Gingrich’s comment that Iran block oil coming �
from the Middle East to the US-but I would argue it would be
more of a liability for the president to follow Gingrich and in-
deed I feel what is the oil companies fear mongering on Iran.

Notgoneyet

Listen to Leon Paneta and then tell me where Newt was wrong.
- Hidan
  
  CBS, Panetta and (Hypothetical) Iranian Nukes
  
  http://www.fair.org/blog/2011/12/21/cbs-panetta-and-hypothetical-iranian-nukes/
  
  Aides Qualify Panetta’s Comments on Iran
  
  http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/21/world/middleeast/pentagon-officials-qualify-panettas-iran-remarks.html
  
  “In today’s New York Times, we see a story headlined, “Aides Qualify Panetta’s Comments on Iran,” which leads with this:
  
  An assertion by Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta that
  Iran could have a nuclear weapon as soon as next year was based on a
  highly aggressive timeline and a series of actions that Iran has not
  yet taken, senior Pentagon officials said Tuesday.”
  
  “The report added these comments from a Pentagon spokesperson (bolded for emphasis):
  
  “The secretary was clear that we have no indication that the Iranians have made a decision to develop a nuclear weapon,”
  Mr. Little said. “He was asked to comment on prospective and
  aggressive timelines on Iran’s possible production of nuclear
  weapons–and he said if, and only if, they made such a decision. He
  didn’t say that Iran would, in fact, have a nuclear weapon in 2012.”"
Hidan

You catch this?

http://www.salon.com/2011/12/08/right_wing_listserv_targets_israels_critics/

It totally failed

http://www.salon.com/2011/12/23/ex_aipac_flack_loses_gig_over_anti_semites_flap/singleton/

Dee

addendum

Rather than take on a lengthy argument on why the President�
will face a greater liability from his voting base and the Ameri-
can people if he doesn’t take on the oil companies & GOP fear�
mongering on Iran , I will let the authors below (URLs) speak for themselves… Indeed, it isn’t a situation unknown to the president as he has been there and lost siding with Big Busin-
ess and their apologists in the GOP leadership….This time I�
don’t think the public will “oblige” as the first authors notes…
Indeed, I predict they will be in the streets over this pipeline.

Especially, since this will be in Americans backyards and will�
be a threat to across the board’s for peoples’ livelihood in the�
8 states the pipeline would runs through …..Dee

Four ways to kill a climate change Bill
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/opinion/26wasserman.html

Who cooked THe Planet? Paul Krugman, NYT
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/opinion/26krugman.html

Who Won at Cancun, Patrick Bond, ZCOM
http://links.org.au/node/2041

Niger Delta’s agony dwarfs in comparison to the Gulf Oil Spill
John Vidal, The Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/may/30/oil-spills-nigeria-niger-delta-shell

Gregg

Krugman writes: “Every piece of valid evidence — long-term temperature averages that
smooth out year-to-year fluctuations, Arctic sea ice volume, melting of
glaciers, the ratio of record highs to record lows — points to a
continuing, and quite possibly accelerating, rise in global
temperatures.”

I can’t imagine what he means by “long-term”. The highly productive Bronze age was hotter than the present. Ice ages have come and gone. Continents have collided to form mountain ranges. Millions of years of rule by dinosaurs ended suddenly and catastrophically. He talks of melting glaciers but does not mention the growing ones. He acts like melting ice raises sea levels. If that was true, why doesn’t my full glass of ice water overflow when the ice melts? If by long-term he means a coupla hundred years (he seems to) then it’s a joke.

I made it through the first article and most of Krugman’s but that’s as far as I got. I can’t endorse the views.

I want clean air and water BTW.
- david
  
  Krugman also believes we should spend more on the military to fight a alien invasion.
  Said it would help the economy!
  So, should we consider his thoughts credible??
  - Anonymous
    
    Oh boy, he was joking you numb-chuck.
- Anonymous
  
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  The overall worldwide
  trend is that glaciers are retreating and doing so in record amounts.
  
  What happen in the past
  can be used to formulate a lot hypotheses.
  
  ·
  
  · The concentration of carbon dioxide in
  the atmosphere was as low as 190 ppm during the last Ice Age, about 21,000
  years ago.
  
  The last Ice
  Age began to recede about 20,000 years ago.
  
  · Measurements of the concentration of
  carbon dioxide since 1959 (316 ppm) have revealed an increase to 392 ppm in
  2011, or at an average 1.46 per year.
  
  · The concentration of carbon dioxide has
  increased an average of about 1.8 ppm per year over the past two decades.
  
  · The concentration of carbon dioxide
  increased 2.87 ppm in 1997-98, more than in any other year of record.
  
  · The year 1998 was the warmest of
  record. The year 2002 was the second warmest (to that date). The year 2003 was
  the third warmest (to that date). The year 2004 was the fourth warmest (to that
  date). The year 2005 equaled 1998 as the warmest of record. The year 2007
  equaled 1998 as the second warmest of record. The ten warmest years have
  occurred in the twelve-year period 1997-2008.
  
  I get the feeling you’re
  one of those people who live inland and can’t wait for your home to become
  water front property.
  - Gregg
    
    “The overall worldwide trend is that glaciers are retreating and doing so in record amounts. “
    
    Not sure where you got that (maybe it’s true), it looks like a proclamation. I’m glad you didn’t end the sentence with “period”. Let me go at it from another direction. In the interest of honest debate, don’t you think these glaciers should at least be mentioned?
    
    http://www.iceagenow.com/List_of_Expanding_Glaciers.htm
    
    That’s an impressive list there but it’s a scientific fact (as proven by Algore’s graph) temperatures rose BEFORE increased CO2 levels not after. The correlation is evident when the lines are juxtaposed but zooming in reveals what I wrote to be true. Again, it is not honest debate to show the correlation and knowingly omit which happened first as Algore did.
    
    “The ten warmest years have occurred in the twelve-year period 1997-2008. “
    
    It’s statements like these that make me want to curl up in the fetal position and cry. What does “warmest years” mean? In the history of the universe?
    
    I am curious where Victor Ponce got his data and how much of it comes from the fraudulent 2007 IPCC report. I can’t find it on his site. I may have missed it.
    
    My background is common sense as if that had anything to do with it. It’s not a matter of how much I know, it’s who is making the best argument as determined from examining BOTH sides of the debate. I could just as easily ask you what qualifications you have to dispute Dr. Ivar Giaever?
    
    http://cnsnews.com/blog/marc-morano/nobel-laureate-resigns-society-because-its-global-warming-fear-mongering
    
    There are many many more but I picked him because of his support for Obama. I thought it might avoid the Fox/Rush accusation.
    
    If you think the AGW debate has been honest then I am astounded.
    - Gregg
      
      When the debate is not honest things like this happen.
      
      http://www.washingtonpost.com/solyndra-politics-infused-obama-energy-programs/2011/12/14/gIQA4HllHP_story.html?wprss=rss_politics
    - Anonymous
      
      “The ten warmest years have occurred in the twelve-year period 1997-2008. ”
      
      It’s
      statements like these that make me want to curl up in the fetal
      position and cry. What does “warmest years” mean? In the history of the
      universe?
      
      Why do I feel that you are just playing games. You then go on to say I’m like Al Gore which is absurd. What the data is saying that it is the ten warmest years on record, since they started keeping them.
      How you get this to mean the entire universe just tells me that you are not really interested in a debate.
      
      I’m not sure what is really happening in terms of global warming, but from what I’ve read on this it seems to me that something is happening and that it’s pretty evident that a lot of things that are happening in Antarctica are pretty serious and do tend to point to a trend. It seems to me that the majority of scientific community is in agreement on the data and the planet if warming. If you chose not to believe this go right ahead. I on the other hand do not. It has nothing to do with Al Gore.
    - Gregg
      
      I apologize if for not being clear. Your interpretation is not at all what I meant to imply.
      
      I don’t know how long accurate records have been kept but I posit unless you are talking about temperatures over the history of the universe they are meaningless. As I’ve said, ice ages have come and gone before humans. Continents collided to form mountain ranges before humans. Millions of years of rule buy dinosaurs ended suddenly and catastrophically before humans. To conclude one or two hundred years of records prove man is changing the climate just because it’s hot, IMHO, is insane. Industrialization is but a tiny speck in time comparatively.
      
      I also didn’t mean to imply you were like Algore and I really don’t know how you got that but I’ll again chalk it up to my not being clear. My over arching position is the debate is not honest. I sure wish someone would address the increased temperature before the increased CO2 but it’s not forthcoming. You are the latest example. It seems to me to be a fatal flaw in logic. I cringe when I see the graph portion of his movie and realize how his wording is purposely misleading. Algore got a Nobel for fraud.

http://twitter.com/FilipinoBoston FilipinoBoston

Nearly half of Asia’s 1.27 billion children live in poverty — deprived of food, safe drinking water, health or shelter, a development agency said in a report.

Gregg

Merry Christmas to all the thoughtful, insightful commenters here at On Point… and the liberals too.

david

Merry Christmas to you Gregg and to all.

Gregg

Except you have no problem ragging Sarah Palin. If you had your way, women in Iraq would still be being stoned and little girls in Afghanistan would not be able to get an education. I’m glad you agree but it’s easy to talk the talk. Merry Christmas.

Gregg

Sorry, wrong place. That was a reply for TerryTreeTree.
Heinekee

Women in Iraq are more likely to be stoned now then they were under Saddam. Saddam kept the islamists in check.
- Gregg
  
  That is not true in the least. However, it may return to that now that we’ve cut and run.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    ‘W’ admin. said we’d be out of Iraq in 18 months or less!�
    We left at the time ‘W’admin. said we would, their last announcement of a time!
    You’re ragging President Obama for keeping ‘W’s word?
Terry Tree Tree

I ragged Sarah Palin’s organization about a false statement, that shows that either Sarah wasn’t much of a hunter, or didn’t know what they were talking about with a surveyor’s transit!�
   If I had MY way, men that mis-treat women, children, and any weaker individuals, would suffer the same treatment they abused with, with interest!�
   I have promoted the better treatment of women and children, and will continue to do so!�
   That was a LOW statement from you about me!�
    SHOW me a comment that I have made, subjugating, demeaning, or otherwise minimalizing women!!
   Perhaps in the On Point article about Ahn Song Su Kee, the political prisoner of Myanmar?

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