Ports...

Bush faces pressure to block port deal

Lawmakers voice concerns about takeover by Dubai-based firm

Tom Ridge told CNN, "I think the anxiety and the concern [over the deal] that has been expressed by congressmen and senators and elsewhere is legitimate."

Ridge said, "The bottom line is, I think we need a little bit more transparency here. There are some legitimate concerns about who would be in charge of hiring and firing, security measures, added technology in these ports that we'll need to upgrade our security."

"So I think it's very appropriate for the administration to go to the Hill and explain why they think they have not compromised security and, in fact, as they've announced, they will enhance and improve security," he said. "It's tough to see that right now on the surface."

CNN

The world is gone mad. I am not supporting Bush but Ican understand that he did not know about this. Heck I work in a school of only about 100 employees and can't keep up with who is and isn't pregnant.

I also think that the Congress needs to be told info but national security says some things may need to remain secret. However, as this is not seemingly the case and as both sides of the aisle are now screaming perhaps the President needs to say we are going to slow this down I am personally with Congressional leaders look at this and find the solution.

Of God I am helping W. I need a shower...

Cheney Alert The government plans to establish a color-coded system to warn of future veep attacks

WEB-EXCLUSIVE SATIRE
By Andy Borowitz
Newsweek
Updated: 2:32 p.m. ET Feb. 13, 2006
Feb. 13, 2006 - Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced today that his department would immediately implement a “Cheney Alert” system to warn Americans if an attack by the vice president is imminent.
The Department of Homeland Security has been under pressure to respond to the widespread panic and anxiety that have gripped the nation since Cheney shot and wounded a fellow quail hunter while on a hunting trip in Texas over the weekend.
Across the country, people have holed up in their homes and hoarded food and water, fearing another senseless attack by the gun-toting vice president.
“What we have learned, the hard way, is that Dick Cheney can attack without warning,” Chertoff said. “It is our hope that with this Cheney Alert system we will be able to give the American people some warning before he strikes again.”
The alert system, with five color-coded levels indicating the likelihood of another brutal pellet attack by the Vice President, was derided by some in Congress such as Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Del), who likened it to “closing the barn door after the horses have escaped.”
“The fact is, the White House already had ample warning that Dick Cheney was going to strike, and they sat on their hands and did nothing,” Biden said, referring to a Presidential Daily Brief dated February 4 with the title, “Dick Cheney Determined to Strike in U.S.”
Elsewhere, former Education Secretary William Bennett said that he was “outraged” that an NHL gambling ring has been in operation for five years and he was never invited to participate in it.

Even the Geeks like me are ticked!

ISTE Press Statement on Bush Administration’s 2007 Budget
(February 7, 2006)

Washington DC—The Administration’s proposed budget, particularly the elimination of The Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT) program, will have a devastating effect on the ability of schools and states to meet the requirements of No Child Left Behind Act. The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) calls for the Administration to commit to restoring funding to this program to ensure schools have the resources to educate students and train teachers to keep the United States competitive in the global marketplace.

“America’s share of the world’s science and engineering doctorates is predicted to fall to 15 percent by 2010,” according to the U.S. Department of Education’s document on Meeting the Challenge of a Changing World: Strengthening Education in the 21st Century, January 2006.

Donald G. Knezek, Chief Executive Officer of ISTE, the organization that developed the National Educational Technology Standards (NETS), said the following regarding the Administration’s 2007 Budget.

“We are deeply disappointed that the Administration has chosen, once again, to eliminate federal funding for education technology. Understanding and using technology are critical components of all students’ academic careers and, most certainly, barometers of their future employment prospects.
Given the President’s emphasis in the State of the Union on the importance of developing math and science skills in America’s students in order to keep America competitive globally, we do not see how eliminating federal education technology funding advances his global competitiveness agenda or helps our students.”

eSchool News online - Bush: Cut $3.2B from education

eSchool News online - Bush: Cut $3.2B from education

No need for technology its just a fad.
Plus who needs safe and drug free schools anyway.
Good call George.

He say what?

Horse slaughter will continue, officials declare - U.S. Life - MSNBC.com

Rep. John Sweeney, R-N.Y., denounced the decision, saying that “commerce and greed have ruled the day.”

Notice the R after the name. The world has gone mad.

New budget plan squeezes education, Medicare - Politics - MSNBC.com

New budget plan squeezes education, Medicare - Politics - MSNBC.com

New budget plan squeezes education, Medicare Bush’s $2.77 trillion proposal boosts defense spending, cuts other programs
The Associated Press
Updated: 5:21 p.m. ET Feb. 6, 2006
WASHINGTON - President Bush sent Congress a $2.77 trillion budget plan Monday that would make his first-term tax cuts permanent while reducing government-funded programs to deal with exploding budget deficits. Almost a third of the 141 targeted programs are in education.
The plan also calls for an increase in spending on the war against terrorism and a squeeze on Medicare funds.
“My administration has focused the nation’s resources on our highest priority — protecting our citizens and our homeland,” Bush said in his budget message.
The budget blueprint sharply decreases funding for supporting the arts, vocational education, parent resource centers and drug-free schools, and instead puts a heavy emphasis on keeping the country strong militarily. It maps out a way to make first-term tax cuts permanent at a cost of $1.4 trillion over 10 years, and still achieve Bush’s goal of cutting the deficit in half by 2009.
Achieving these goals constrained Bush’s efforts to offer new initiatives, although he did put forward a few mostly modest programs to deal with American anxieties about global competition, soaring energy costs and skyrocketing medical bills.
Bush’s spending proposals, contained in four massive volumes featuring green and beige covers, are for the 2007 budget year that begins next Oct. 1. The $2.77 trillion in spending would be up by 2.3 percent from projected spending of $2.71 trillion this year.
All-time-high deficitThe administration in its budget documents said the deficit for this year will soar to an all-time high of $423 billion, reflecting increased outlays for the Iraq war and hurricane relief.
But the administration says the deficits will be on a declining path over the next five years, which would allow the president to achieve his goal of cutting the deficit in half by 2009, the year he leaves office. However, the deficit of $354 billion that the administration is projecting for 2007 probably will be higher because the budget at present contains only $50 billion in spending for Iraq, White House Budget Director Joshua Bolten told reporters.
Bush is also seeking savings by trimming the growth of spending in Medicare, the government’s giant health care program for the elderly and disabled, by $35.9 billion over five years. The reductions, which are certain to face stiff opposition in Congress, would among other things reduce inflation adjustments for hospitals, nursing homes, home health care providers and hospices.
“These are not cuts,” Bolten said of Bush’s Medicare plans. “These are modest reductions in the rate of growth.”
Democrats attacked what they said were Bush’s skewed priorities. They said he was trying to impose austere budgets that will harm programs for the poor while protecting tax cuts Democrats said were going primarily to the wealthy.
Democrats point to war costThey also charged that Bush was understating future budget deficits by leaving out major items such as the true costs of the Iraq war and a long-term fix to keep the alternative minimum tax from hitting more middle-class taxpayers.
“It explodes deficits, but then conceals them by providing only five years of numbers and leaving out large costs,” said Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota, the top Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee. “The result will be more debt passed on to our children.”
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said that the budget was “filled with pages of giveaways to special interests and cuts to those who can least afford it.”
Responding, presidential spokesman Scott McClellan said, “The president is focused on making sure that we keep our economy growing, and that means keeping taxes low.”
Republicans in Congress expressed support for the spending document, which will kick off months of debate likely to last until the next budget year begins in October and perhaps beyond.
“We have to face up to this fiscal reality that this baby boom generation is going to retire soon, and we need to do something about it,” said Senate Budget Committee Chairman Judd Gregg, R-N.H.
In addition to trimming Medicare, other proposed Bush savings in so-called mandatory spending, because the payments are set in law for all who are eligible, include $4.99 billion in changes in farm commodity programs and $16.7 billion in reforms of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., the government program that backs private pensions.
Money for drilling?Bush’s budget also projects receiving $4 billion over the next five years for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, something Congress has repeatedly refused to allow.
The biggest spending increase would go to the military, a 6.9 percent rise to $439.3 billion for 2007, a figure that does not include the costs of fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The administration said last week it will ask Congress for an additional $120 billion to cover fighting for the rest of this year and the early part of 2007 while seeking $18 billion more in hurricane relief this year.
While the Department of Homeland Security would also see an increase for 2007, nine of the 15 Cabinet agencies would see outright cuts in their discretionary spending for next year with the biggest percentage reductions occurring in the departments of Transportation, Justice and Agriculture.
$14.5 billion reduction in 141 programsBush is proposing to continue a serious squeeze on the one-sixth of the budget outside of defense and homeland security that is subject to annual appropriations. This year he would cut spending in this area by 0.5 percent.
To achieve this goal, Bush is seeking savings of $14.5 billion by eliminating and drastically scaling back 141 government programs. Last year, he targeted 154 such programs and won two-fifths of the spending cuts he requested, amounting to $6.5 billion in savings.
Even programs not targeted for elimination are subject to tight budgets, including previously favored agencies such as the National Institutes of Health, which would see its spending essentially frozen at this year’s level.
Robert Eckel, president of the American Heart Association, said that it was a disappointment for the 71 million Americans who suffer from heart disease, stroke and other cardiovascular disease that Bush’s budget has placed funding for programs “that help prevent, treat and cure these diseases on the back burner of his domestic agenda.”
Medicare cuts controversialBush’s proposed Medicare reductions are expected to draw determined opposition in Congress, which just approved a package of $39 billion in cuts in benefit programs over five years, including $6.4 billion in reductions in the growth of Medicare and $4.7 billion in cuts in the growth of Medicaid, the joint state-federal program that provides health care to the poor.
The spending plan does contain some winners in the domestic arena.
Set for higher spending, as highlighted in Bush’s State of the Union address, are programs to address soaring energy costs through development of alternative fuels, rising medical bills through expanded health savings accounts and global competition through a new “American Competitiveness Initiative.”
That initiative would extend an expired business tax break for research and development, double the government’s commitment to basic scientific research and train thousands of new science and math teachers.
Instead of pushing last year’s Social Security overhaul proposal, the president is calling for creation of a bipartisan commission to study ways to deal with soaring spending for Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. However, his budget does include a projection that creation of private investment accounts for younger workers, the heart of his plan, would cost $712 billion over the next decade.

Cost of Iraq War to Date:4/3/2005: 160 billion dollars

This amount of expenditure could have funded:
• 6 years of global anti-hunger programs
• 1,446,714 additional units of public housing in the USA
• basic immunization for every child in the world for 53 years
• paid for 21,281,000 kids in Head Start
• funded worldwide AIDS programs for 16 years

All of these figures are from the National Priorities Project

http://nationalpriorities.org/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=182

Good Stuff

Bill Gallagher: 'Treasonous Bush fostering fascism"

Bill Gallagher, Falls Reporter

DETROIT -- We, the suffering American people, are now in the sixth winter of our national discontent, thoroughly numbed by President George W. Bush's radical agenda, wild misjudgments and wholesale lies. He sells fear to win support, when it is he we must fear most.The nation and world brace to endure more of Bush's obsessions, miscalculations, greed and sheer incompetence. We are in the seventh hell of an administration that claims all power and denies all responsibility. The state of our union is frightening.These are very dangerous times. Nothing in our national experience has prepared us for the chilling consequences of the double dose of foreign and domestic irresponsibility and recklessness Bush has wrought.Of course, I wish I could say I anticipated the cold reality of the Bushevik horrors. I didn't. I was horribly wrong. While I get a steady flow of hate mail accusing me of "hating Bush," I don't. I simply pity him as a tragically flawed figure who happens to be far more lucky than good and an effective prop for the interests he gladly serves. I do despise what he has done to our nation already and fear what's to come.But that's not what I thought five years ago, after the U.S. Supreme Court selected and anointed this failed progeny of a wealthy family, with a familiar name and vast influence.Left on his own and relying on his own merits and wit, Bush always fails.But his pedigree, the country club culture and the Ivy League affirmative action his family status guaranteed assured this manifestly mediocre man his richly undeserved academic opportunities, business "successes," personal wealth and the powers of high public office.Never forget that Yale University and the Harvard Business School gave our nation the worst president and manager of civic affairs we have ever had. That's a stigma those otherwise respected institutions must bear. They helped create this monster.Reflecting on what I anticipated and wrote when the supremely ill-qualified Texas cowpoke took office on that bleak January day, I now realize what a fool I was.I praised his inaugural speech, calling it "stunning." Dubya quoted Mother Teresa and urged Americans to see the "pain of poverty." The president who went on to do more to enrich the rich and steal from the poor than any other in our history was calling on people to sacrifice to help others."I ask you to seek a common good beyond your comfort," Bush said. He fretted that, in times of economic decline, "the vulnerable will suffer most."And then, in one of the most pixilated moments in my life, I gushed in the column that "our 43rd president set a decent tone for his administration far different from his shrill campaign. He called for 'a nation of civility, courage, compassion and character.'"What we got was corruption, cronyism, chaos and craven assaults on the civilized world. His "compassion" for the poor has turned into an unprecedented raid on the U.S. Treasury to give tax cuts to the richest Americans and his corporate sponsors. Middle-class workers are paying for the reckless debt, as their real income remains flat or declines. Programs to help the poor are being slashed as corporate welfare, business subsidies and pork-barrel spending have grown wildly under Bush's watch.A cover story in Britain's "Economist" warns this is "danger time for America" as a result of Bush's economic and fiscal policies and the retiring Chairman of the Federal Reserve Alan Greenspan's monetary policies.The article notes Greenspan's legacy and reputation may well falter quickly from the pain his work leaves."Mr. Greenspan's departure could well mark a high point for America's economy with a period of sluggish growth ahead. This is not so much that he is leaving, but what he is leaving behind: the biggest economic imbalance in America history," the "Economist" warns. America's housing boom -- enabled by Greenspan's low interest rates -- results in people borrowing against "the rising potential artificial value of their homes" to indulge in all kinds of superficial luxuries.As a consequence, "Americans have been able to literally consume more than they earn. ... Part of America's prosperity is based, not on genuine gains in income, nor on high productivity, but on borrowing from the future," the "Economist" offers.Consumer spending dominates the modest expansion of the U.S. economy, but Greenspan -- along with the Busheviks -- has created a fragile and unpredictable economic engine built with unsustainable devices."Robust consumer spending has boosted GDP growth," the British journal notes, "but at the cost of a negative personal savings rate, a growing burden of household debt and a huge current account deficit."Greenspan recently told the French finance minister, "We have lost control of the budget deficit."No, Mr. Greenspan, "we" have not committed this unconscionable act of generational thievery. You, Bush and the Republican Congress have created this mess with your addiction to borrow-and-spend federal budgets.Greenspan's irrational exuberance for Bush's irresponsible tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans has put us on the track of the fiscal trainwreck we are sure to have. Long ago, Greenspan lost any respectability as a central banker to become a hack politician and GOP partisan. Good riddance!American manufacturing, especially the automotive sector, is in big trouble, and Washington refuses to do anything to help. Detroit auto executives, with their hubris and shortsightedness, have contributed largely to their own plight, but some factors are beyond their control and government can and should do something about them.With Delphi in bankruptcy, Ford closing plants and cutting one-quarter of its workforce, and General Motors losing $8.6 billion last year -- and with that vulture Kirk Kerkorian ready and willing to use his large stake in GM to force liquidation of the company -- the industry and people who depend on it are in dire straits.But Bush is not prepared to help in any way. He told the Wall Street Journal last week, "I think it's very important for the market to function," and he downplayed any possible federal role in assisting the domestic automakers.Of course, Bush can't stop the Chinese from unfairly manipulating their currency, which hurts U.S. manufacturing, because Chinese banks are financing a substantial chunk of the enormous debt he's created. You can't get tough with the Chinese when they're keeping us fiscally afloat.Health care costs put American automakers at a serious competitive disadvantage with foreign competitors. A single-payer health care system would be the best thing the federal government could do to help U.S. manufacturers. We pay more per capita for health care than any other industrialized nation, and yet we still have 40 million people uninsured.Auto executives know a single-payer system would help enormously, but they don't have the guts to say so out loud.Besides, they probably figure the Busheviks are so beholden to the drug industry, insurance companies and for-profit hospital chains, it's pointless to broach the subject.But, by golly, some industries are doing just fine with their buddy doing a heck of a job in the Oval Office. Military contractors and energy companies are thriving. Halliburton, of course, is both.Vice President Dick Cheney's former company -- with the largess of government subsidies for oil exploration and no-bid Pentagon contracts in Iraq -- reports the most profitable year in its 86-year-history: $1.1 billion in net income. Halliburton still sends residual payment checks to Cheney's bunker.The corporate culture he created there has resulted in Halliburton being caught on numerous occasions cheating the taxpayers, overcharging and performing substandard work. A recent report showed that company provided untreated water for soldiers in Iraq. The market that best functions for Halliburton is based on influence and political clout.Chevron -- where Condoleezza Rice once served as a director -- made a record $14.1 billion for 2005. That's as fuel prices soar, consumers and businesses suffer, and Bush and the Republican Congress provide more tax breaks for oil companies. It's always better to be lucky than good. Just ask Lord Halliburton and Princess "Concealeezza."Bush's idea of "civility, concern, compassion and character" has made the world despise us. His war in Iraq will cost more than $1 trillion. That money would have been better spent investing in our own infrastructure and homeland security. Bush's neocon fantasy of forced democracy is failing in Iraq. Sunni fundamentalists and jihadists are gaining support in Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia.The desperate Palestinians -- tired of getting nothing -- just voted democratically for Hamas to run their government. Bush has never put up a dime of his "political capital" to help create a Palestinian state and forge a lasting peace. The invasion and occupation of Iraq have only diminished hope for political stability in the region and have spread chaos and extremism.Bush is fostering fascism to "protect" us, claiming he has the authority to spy on people without search warrants and indefinitely detain "enemies" without charges and legal representation. He condones kidnappings and torture. He says this illegal, unconstitutional and barbaric behavior makes our nation "safer."Bush's horrible adventure in Iraq has weakened our security and nurtured terrorism. At home, the economy is precarious at best. We are a fiscal basket case. Tuesday night, Bush will tell us how much better off we are with him at the helm. The truth is, the state of our union is a shambles. Can matters get any worse? Just wait until next winter.

Bill Gallagher, a Peabody Award winner, is a former Niagara Falls city councilman who now covers Detroit for Fox2 News. His e-mail address is gallaghernewsman@sbcglobal.net.