BartBlog

Excerpt:
Obama has a new ally in the war of words that Dick Cheney started after leaving his coffin and running his mouth once again in a speech to the Center for Security Policy.

His name is Gen. Paul Eaton (Ret.), who served more than 30 years in the United States Army from 2003-2004 and oversaw the training of the Iraqi military. He is currently the National Security Network Senior Adviser for the Obama administration.

Today, Gen. Paul Eaton also had a few words for Dick Cheney. His words are clear and need no further elaboration:

The record is clear: Dick Cheney and the Bush administration were incompetent war fighters. They ignored Afghanistan for 7 years with a crude approach to counter-insurgency warfare best illustrated by: 1. Deny it. 2. Ignore it. 3. Bomb it. While our intelligence agencies called the region the greatest threat to America, the Bush White House under-resourced our military efforts, shifted attention to Iraq, and failed to bring to justice the masterminds of September 11. The only time Cheney and his cabal of foreign policy ‘experts’ have anything to say is when they feel compelled to protect this failed legacy.

The only thing to add to that it is audacious for someone like Cheney, who had five draft deferments and never served a day in the military, to consider himself a self-proclaimed expert on national security.

 
It is also ironic that Cheney speaks more to the press now than he did when he was in office. Mr. Cheney, you had your chance and you blew it big time. Now go crawl back into your coffin, or bunker or wherever you came from, and leave it up to the new administration to finish the wars that you and your cohorts started.

Read more here: http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d23-Gen-Eaton-has-Obamas-back-in-war-of-words-with-Cheney

Excerpt:
According to The Washington Post, the health care and insurance industries spent money “at a rate of $2 million per day” on lobbying against health care reform through the first half of the year.

The Wall Street Journal reports that the biggest spender is the pharmaceutical industry, which spent $47.4 million on lobbying in the first three months of 2009, up 36% from the first quarter of 2008.

Lobbying disclosure forms, which are filed with both the House and Senate, do not measure advertising, grass-roots organizing and other efforts by special interest groups, such as Conservatives for Patients’ Rights, to influence the debate outside Congress or the White House. Total spending on health-care reform ads, for example, surpassed $100 million nearly a month ago, already making it the costliest advocacy issue in U.S. history, according to media industry estimates.

When a clear majority of Americans still support a public option, it does not take a rocket scientist, or perhaps in this case, a brain surgeon to realize that the companies that are fighting health care reform in this country do not have your best health interests in mind, nor are they spending millions to defend or defeat obscure political ideologies. They are spending millions on lobbying to protect their profit margin, which is made at the expense of their clients, and ironically, the money they are using to do that was also made at their clients expense.

While the various health care industries may be able to buy out members of Congress, hopefully they will not be able to buy public opinion.

Read more here: http://www.examiner.com/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d22-Health-care-industries-on-a-spending-spree

Excerpt:
In 1991 the first nuclear war was fought in Iraq. The second was fought in Serbia in 1999. The third and fourth are still being waged in Afghanistan and Iraq, thanks to our tax dollars, the callousness of the U.S. government and complacency in our media.

You will not like what you see in these photos, but get used to it. People in Afghanistan and Iraq will be seeing things like this for the next 4.5 billion years, because that is the half-life of depleted uranium (DU).

A study of veterans of the first gulf war showed that 67% had children with severe illnesses, missing eyes, blood infections, respiratory problems and fused fingers. In the Aftermath of the Kosovo conflict, cancer rates have increased 166% and are still rising.

Most Americans know little or nothing about DU and its devastating effect on human life. It’s about time you do. It’s yet another reason to end these wars that are destroying not only lives in Iraq, Afghanistan and the ranks of our military, but also the credibility of our nation in the eyes of the world community.

Read more here: http://www.examiner.com/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d21-Depleted-uranium-A-poisonous-legacy

Excerpt:
A new Washington Post – ABC News poll shows that a clear majority of Americans still back a government- run health care plan to compete with private insurers.

What perhaps is most striking about the new poll results are that 56% of Republicans responded that they would back a public option if a public plan were run by the states and available through subsidies only to those who lack affordable private options.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the public option is getting a new life in the Senate. Democrats writing legislation are now considering several alternatives to the Senate Finance Committee’s bill that did not include a public option. While none involve an expansion of Medicare that many progressive Democrats are advocating, several include a public option.

While a public option is only a possibility at this point, one thing is certain: Most Americans want a public option, and despite millions of dollars spent on lobbying and ads by the health care insurance industry, it is not dead yet.

Read more here: http://www.examiner.com/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d20-Poll-Majority-of-Americans-still-back-public-option-in-health-care-reform

Excerpt:
A report in the Washington Post on Sunday contradicts claims in the media that Iran is on the verge of producing nuclear weapons and states that Iran is incapable of making nukes for at least six to eight years. The report debunks “five persistent myths about Iran’s nuclear program.”

The significance of this report and the NEI report, if accurate, is that there is plenty of time left for negotiations with Iran regarding their intentions with their nuclear program. Moreover, there is absolutely no justification at this time, or in the near future, for a pre-emptive military strike to prevent them from acquiring nuclear weapons.

Read more here: http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d19-Report-Iran-cannot-make-nuke-for-six-to-eight-years

Excerpt:
According to a Pentagon report submitted to the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee, a gallon of fuel costs the taxpayers about $400 by the time it arrives in the remote locations in Afghanistan where U.S. troops operate.

That statistic is one of the reasons cited by the Pentagon to explain why the deployment of each individual soldier in Afghanistan costs U.S. taxpayers $1 million per year. That means a surge of 45,000 troops would cost U.S. taxpayers an additional $45 billion per year.

In an interview with The Hill, Rep. John Murtha (D-PA), the chairman of the House Appropriations Defense panel said, “It is a number that we were not aware of and it is worrisome. When I heard that figure from the Defense Department, we started looking into it.”

The question is, is it really worth it?

Read more here: http://www.examiner.com/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d17-400-per-gallon-fuel-in-Afghanistan

Excerpt:
John Bolton, former ambassador to the U.N. under the Bush administration, apparently has a novel idea of “ensuring peace” in the middle east. A nuclear first strike on Iran.

During a conference at the University of Chicago sponsored by the University Young Republicans and Chicago Friends of Israel, ironically entitled “Ensuring Peace,” Bolton stated once again:

Negotiations have failed, and so too have sanctions. So we’re at a very unhappy point — a very unhappy point — where unless Israel is prepared to use nuclear weapons against Iran’s program, Iran will have nuclear weapons in the very near future.

The mere mention of a nuclear first strike should wake people up to the fact that maniacs like Bolton, who would risk starting World War Three, are given air time in our media and access to our young minds.

Read more here: http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d16-John-Boltons-idea-of-peace-A-nuclear-first-strike-on-Iran

Excerpt:
Move over Wall Street bankers, there’s a new king on the block. Those greenbacks on your PC monitors haven’t been yours since 2005, and you’re going to need to kiss the camel, bend over, and open your bank accounts again.

While the corporate media has been gleefully pronouncing, between sound bytes about Anna Nicole Smith and teabagging rallies, that the recession is over, two significant stories have been overlooked.

The first was a report last week in The Independent UK claiming that China, Russia and Gulf States are among nations prepared to ditch the dollar for oil trades and have heightened the uncertainty surrounding the US currency’s future. The second is a report in the New York Times reporting that “Saudis seek payments for any drop in oil revenues.”

What’s killing the U.S. economy now is the cost of buying our own money back. Like true good capitalists, the Gulf kings charge a 7% interest payment from Citibank and 9% from Merrill. That, in turn, pushes adjustable rate mortgages into the stratosphere and pushes manufacturing into China by making borrowing and energy costs impossible to overcome. The results are felt by Americans as they lose their jobs and their homes.

Now, with falling oil prices, the Saudis have the nerve to secretly talk about dumping the dollar and publicly suggest that the U.S. pay them for a drop in revenues due to decreased oil consumption if pollution curbs cut oil sales! Perhaps we are bombing the wrong countries.

Read more here: http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d14-Meet-the-new-boss

Excerpt:
In a last-ditch effort to derail a vote for health care reform in the Senate Finance Committee, the health care insurance industry, ironically, made a case for a public option. Over the weekend, America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) circulated a study it commissioned from PriceWaterhouseCoopers. According to the president of AHIP, Karen Ignagni, also a key lobbyist for the health care insurance industry:

One key word, however, was left out: Profit.

The report is seriously flawed in its analysis of the projected impact of the bill passed by the Senate Finance Committee and does not even take into consideration the potential impact a public option would have on the health care insurance market.

Insurance companies set these premiums, not lawmakers in congress, or some magical market force that is beyond the control of insurance company executives. This is a glaring reminder that health insurance companies can and will continue to raise prices on the slightest predicates. Without a public option, consumers will have no choice other than paying higher premiums.

Let’s hope our legislators in the House and Senate listen to the voice of the people that they represent as well as the Senate Finance Committee has listened to the lobbyists in the health care industry.

Read more here: http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d14-Health-insurance-companies-make-argument-for-public-option

Excerpt:
Sarah Palin’s political action committee, Team Sarah, organized a “phone blast” today and members were urged to flood Senators with phone calls regarding health care reform.

What a true rogue!

There was, however, one small problem. Today is Columbus Day, a government holiday in which all Senate offices are closed.

Du,oh!

Read more here: http://www.examiner.com/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d12-Team-Sarah-organizes-Washington-phone-blaston-a-government-holiday

Excerpt:
It is common knowledge that a lot of members of congress are bought and paid for. The real story is about the ones that are not. The path to Mussolini-style facism does not start with socialized medicine or welfare programs, it starts with corporations dictating government policy.

Representatives Ron Paul, Alan Grayson, Maxine Waters, Dennis Kucinich, Marcy Kaptur and Brad Sherman have received little or no money from “too big to fail” banks.

On the other hand, lobbyists from the financial industry have paid hundreds of millions to Congress and the Obama administration, and have bought virtually all of the key congress members and senators on committees overseeing finances and banking.

History has shown that countries get into desperate economic situations for one simple reason: the powerful elites within them overreach in good times and take too many risks. Governments and their private sector supporters that run a country like a profit-seeking company in which they are the controlling shareholders start making bigger and riskier bets that eventually create a downward spiral that leads to collapse. Political connections allow the ruling elite to push onto the government any substantial problems that arise.

Read more here: http://www.examiner.com/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d11-The-best-oligarchy-money-can-buy

Congressmen Alan Grayson (D-FL) and Ron Paul (R-TX) have written and faxed a letter to every member of the Senate Banking Committee asking that the confirmation of Ben Bernanke as Federal Reserve Chairman be delayed until he releases information that was requested regarding which banks received government bailout money.

Click here for a text of the letter: http://www.examiner.com/x-23316-Madison-Independent-Examiner~y2009m10d8-Congressmen-Grayson-and-Paul-Delay-confirmation-of-Bernanke-until-bailout-information-is-released

It speaks best for itself. A shot of Chinaco to Grayson and Paul!