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Archive for the ‘politics’ Category

Sarah Palin A ‘Nincompoop’ For Reagan Reduction

06 Nov

The whole article is worth a read – but the quote alone – if you are lacking time – is an interesting summary of Reagan’s ‘rapid’ rise to the top.

FULL ARTICLE HERE : Sarah Palin A ‘Nincompoop’ For Reagan Reduction by Peggy Noonan

Excuse me, but this was ignorant even for Mrs. Palin. Reagan people quietly flipped their lids, but I’ll voice their consternation to make a larger point. Ronald Reagan was an artist who willed himself into leadership as president of a major American labor union (Screen Actors Guild, seven terms, 1947-59.) He led that union successfully through major upheavals (the Hollywood communist wars, labor-management struggles); discovered and honed his ability to speak persuasively by talking to workers on the line at General Electric for eight years; was elected to and completed two full terms as governor of California; challenged and almost unseated an incumbent president of his own party; and went on to popularize modern conservative political philosophy without the help of a conservative infrastructure. Then he was elected president.

 
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Posted in link, politics, quote

 

Biased Reporting of BP Oil Disaster ?

13 Jun

Cards on the table. This post is not about the oil fiasco per se. It is not a defense of BP. It is a question about fair and balanced media coverage. About lynch mob mentality. About bias.

There is no doubt in my mind – or any body else’s for that matter – that the gulf disaster is – well – actually – there are no words – and not for me to add to the commentary here. Nuff said.

I am English. I live in America. BP is a multi-National. And ‘British Petroleum’ (as Mr. Obama keeps calling the company) hasn’t been their name for 12 years. I guess partly because the ‘British’ bit was past its ‘use by date’. (Side point – 39% of the BP business is actually US owned.)

Read the main stream press, listen to the mainstream media all you here is that ‘BP did this’ – ‘BP did that’ -’when will BP pay us’ – ‘What is BP going to do’ ….. all good questions.

BUT I am rather wondering about that ‘noise’.

Last time I looked BP, Transocean and Halliburton (see note 1 at bottom of page on the click through) were all in this together.

That is you have contractors, sub contractors – and the usual collection of outsourced messes that make up today’s world. We know they are all going to blame one another – we also know that the buck stops at BP. One of the reasons we know that is that right at the very beginning Tony Hayward declared ‘mea culpa’. And yes of course – they are. But where is everyone else?

Read the rest of this entry »

 
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Posted in annoying, business, management, news, politics, true ?, world

 

Think about this …

18 Aug

This extracted from an email from a friend (one Perry Offer) – email me if you would like a direct connect – would welcome thoughts …

“In any society, the balance of power between individual rights and government control will be determined by the extent to which government succeeds in convincing the population that an individual engaging in a NON criminal act causes harm to others.

Every citizen would agree that any person caught causing harm to others as a result of a criminal act deserves to get their collar felt and to have their actions limited/controlled by government.

So if the politicians can convince you that ANY NON CRIMINAL action (such as, for example, putting your needs for your own life ahead of the needs of others) also causes harm to others, they can demand that you are treated like a criminal and that they should be given power to control non-criminal actions as well as criminal actions.

If they CAN convince you that EVERY action you undertake causes harm to others – they can demand total control over the entire population.

This is the basis of power in our current political system.”

I welcome feedback …. and am reminded of both of these recent posts of mine to facebook :::

 
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Posted in intriguing, politics, quote, true ?

 

Milo Minderbinder

04 Aug

You know how it is – your mind suddenly veers off on a tangent – and you wonder where did that come from ?
Case in point. Milo Minderbinder. It has been more years than I care to remember since I read Catch 22 – so other than recently reading Portrait of an Artist as an Old Man (that is ‘old’ – not young – so don’t be confused) … it is filed in my ‘hard drive’ as ‘great book’ – so one day I will need to revisit it.
Anyway – in it pops to ‘RAM’. So I check out Wikipedia – to see what they have to say … this comment struck me

Joseph Heller intentionally seeded Catch 22 with “anachronisms like loyalty oaths, helicopters, IBM machines and agricultural subsidies”, all of which only appear in the McCarthy-Era, in order to create a more contemporary atmosphere.

Likewise, Heller created Minderbinders famous saying “What’s good for Milo Minderbinder, is good for the country” (insert Syndicate or M&M Enterprises for Milo Minderbinder) as a parody of Charles E. Wilson, who said “What is good for the country is good for General Motors, and what’s good for General Motors is good for the country.” during a hearing of a Senate subcommittee in 1952.
Wilson was the head of General Motors in 1952, but became Secretary of Defense in January 1953, thus being an early example of the military-industrial complex, which the Minderbinder character well represents.

Hmmm – prophetic … in the light of all we see around us today ?

Full article here : Milo Minderbinder – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia – and of course thanks to the most awesome ‘free resource’

 
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Posted in politics, thoughts.from.the.web

 

Think About This

09 Jul

Not my original thought – but it made me think.

In any society, the balance of power between individual rights and government control will be determined by the extent to which government succeeds in convincing the population that an individual engaging in a NON criminal act causes harm to others.

Every citizen would agree that any person caught causing harm to others as a result of a criminal act deserves to get their collar felt and to have their actions limited/controlled by government.

So if the politicians can convince you that ANY NON CRIMINAL action (such as, for example, putting your needs for your own life ahead of the needs of others) also causes harm to others, they can demand that you are treated like a criminal and that they should be given power to control non-criminal actions as well as criminal actions.

If they CAN convince you that EVERY action you undertake causes harm to others – they can demand total control over the entire population.

This is the basis of power in our current political system.

Thanks to Perry Offer – good friend and political commentator that you will hear about soon.

I would go further – there are very clear examples of govt abdicating responsibility to their citizens to other governments – no questions asked. (Think of ‘The Bliar’ signing the unilateral terrorist agreement with the US – which now allows the US to reach its arm across the Atlantic to grab them, manacle them and send them to prison – and we do NOTHING (and BTW – these are not terrorists – those guys are still in the UK – and we continue to invite more.) Oh – and the terrorists hiding in the US we can’t get to because the US never signed their side of the treaty !!

On the other hand there are other govts who stand up for their own laws – think of the US / Switzerland UBS case that is brewing.

Not saying ANYTHING about right and wrong – am talking about governments representing their citizens.

 
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Posted in annoying, law, politics, thoughts.from.the.web

 

Obama Speech In Cairo: Full Text

05 Jun

There is a consistency to Obama’s message … to paraphrase … let’s work out what we have in common – and go from there.

Wasn’t the old regime’s message along the lines of ‘you’re either ‘with us’ – or ‘agin us’ ‘ ?

Which one is better ? Really ?

Particularly liked this one:

Obama’s Speech In Cairo

“you must place the interests of your people and the legitimate workings of the political process above your party. “

 
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Posted in news, politics, quote

 

What A Day !

29 Apr

“Since my election in 1980, as part of the Reagan Big Tent, the Republican Party has moved far to the right. Last year, more than 200,000 Republicans in Pennsylvania changed their registration to become Democrats. I now find my political philosophy more in line with Democrats than Republicans.”

Arlen Specter

 
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Warren Buffett on the Economy

08 Mar

The synopsys : Warren Buffett on the Economy – Real Time Economics, WSJ

The Full Report

Specifically :


… the lending operation of Clayton Homes, the largest player in the manufactured-home industry, is being threatened by having to compete with funders that have worse credit than Berkshire Hathaway. Firms that are backed by government guarantees — banks with FDIC support, issuers of commercial paper backed by the Fed, and others getting themselves under the government umbrella — have “minimal” money costs, Mr. Buffett says. Highly-rated firms such as AAA-rated Berkshire face record borrowing costs in relation to Treasury rates. At the same time, funds are “abundant” for government-backed borrowers but “scarce” for others. “This unprecedented ’spread’ in the cost of money makes it unprofitable for any lender who doesn’t enjoy government-guaranteed funds to go up against those with a favored status,” he writes. “Government is determining the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots.’”

Translation

if you are a succesful company – you can no longer afford to compete with the failures – becasue the failures have the governments on their side …

… with thanks to : The WSJ, for the source.

 
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Posted in annoying, business, link, news, politics

 

Balanced Politics Here ….

13 Jan

I wonder if there is a list out there called ‘Broken Government | Successes by Full List’ ?

Until then – we will have to live with this; Broken Government | Failures by Full List

 
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Posted in link, politics

 

Order Order Order

19 Dec

Order order order…..I should like to make a statement to honourable members about how none of this extraordinary police action had anything to do with me because after all I am The Speaker and above politics and therefore very unlikely to attend Government meetings designed to ask how the Hell we wriggle out of this until such time as such meetings come to light, in which case I definitely cannot attend them…..

Order order order……may I just say it is unreasonable of honourable members to expect me to know my sphincter from my nostril in this matter just because I get paid £146,000 a year to do the job of protecting MPs from raids by Plod when he has no warrant and decides to bully his way in by conning the sergeant at arms for whom of course I feel eternally sorry, but not so sorry that I can’t quite justifiably lay the whole blame at her door the silly cow I mean what was she thinking….

Order order order…..and may I finally point out that I did not know the bluebottles needed a warrant or that they hadn’t got a warrant or that the Cabinet Office had authorised this action or who the suspect was or even that today was the Queen’s Speech it’s absolutely typical, nobody tells me anything……

Order order order, pray silence for Nipper Reid who will now explain why the public’s right to know does not extend to them knowing what we don’t want them to know because it is not in the interests of national security for dangerously coordinated terrorist foreigners to know what a complete and utter horlicks the Government is making of all security operations, of which I of course know nothing because I’m above all that now and do little except choose expensive wallpaper and shout

Order order order….

My Thanks To : ‘Not Born Yesterday’

… so do we think that it is all going to go away … again ?

 
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