THE STEEL DEAL

The Jihad Ritz Martyrdom Hotel

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 Berlin - The United States and its allies must make sacrifices to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said Wednesday in a high-profile appeal for Europe's help. Holder spoke to the American Academy in Berlin, not long after telling reporters that the United States had approved the release of about 30 Guantanamo detainees. "We must all make sacrifices and we must all be willing to make unpopular choices," said Holder. "The United States is ready to do its part, and we hope that Europe will join us - not out of a sense of responsibility, but from a commitment to work with one of its oldest allies to confront one of the world's most pressing challenges," he said.

 Holder spoke before a select group of policy experts, academics and journalists in a crowded room of about 100. In answer to a question about Bush administration officials' decisions to authorize tough interrogation techniques, Holder said he believed that many of them would, privately, admit to having made some mistakes in the pressure and worry that followed the Sept. 11 attacks. "I don't suspect that would be true of Vice President Dick Cheney," Holder added. At another point, a questioner earnestly asked if those Guantanamo detainees who are believed to be innocent could be put in a hotel somewhere. "Hotels might be a possibility, it depends on where the hotel is," joked Holder. Check out is 11AM

 Guaranteed it won't be some cheap joint with the taxpayers footin' the bill - it'll be nothing but the best.

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Lies, lies and damned lies

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 Washington - "That wasn't me," President Barack Obama said on his 100th day in office, disclaiming responsibility for the huge budget deficit waiting for him on Day One. It actually was him - and the other Democrats controlling Congress the previous two years - who shaped a budget so out of balance. And as a presidential candidate and president-elect, he backed the twilight Bush-era stimulus plan that made the deficit deeper, all before he took over and promoted spending plans that have made it much deeper still.

 Obama met citizens at an Arnold, Mo., high school Wednesday in advance of his prime-time news conference. Both forums were a platform to review his progress at the 100-day mark and look ahead. At various times, he brought an air of certainty to ambitions that are far from cast in stone.

His assertion that his proposed budget "will cut the deficit in half by the end of my first term" is an eyeball-roller among many economists, given the uncharted terrain of trillion-dollar deficits and economic calamity that the government is negotiating. He promised vast savings from increased spending on preventive health care in the face of doubts that such an effort, however laudable it might be for public welfare, can pay for itself, let alone yield huge savings. There's much more! 

   Well, it has been 100 days since this charlatan took the oath and he has damned near driven this nation into the ditch in every conceivable way possible and he's not done by half. We still have one thousand, three hundred and sixty one days left. Most of us are in a state of shock at just much damage he's been able to do and even more disturbing - how quickly and with such ease. The real ramifications and long term effects of his incompetency won't be felt for a few months and when they are - those who voted for this moron are going to rue that day greatly. I'm so disgusted with him, his ideas, his ideology and his utter lack of honesty that I can no longer bear to hear his voice or even watch him in silence. To do either only reminds me of how stupid people can be, how difficult things are going to be and how repulsive a creature he is. His repugnance is exceeded only by the disdain his handlers have for this nation, its people and its value to humanity.

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Restorative Justice & Moral Relativism = Social Collapse

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 The Obama administration joined a federal judge Wednesday in urging Congress to end a racial disparity by equalizing prison sentences for dealing and using crack versus powdered cocaine. "Jails are loaded with people who look like me," U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton, an African-American, told a Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing. Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer said the administration believes Congress' goal "should be to completely eliminate the disparity" between the two forms of cocaine. "A growing number of citizens view it as fundamentally unfair," Breuer testified. It takes 100 times more powdered cocaine than crack cocaine to trigger the same harsh mandatory minimum sentences.

 Sen. Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat who chairs the subcommittee, said, "Under current law, mere possession of five grams of crack — the weight of five packets of sweetener - carries the same sentence as distribution of half a kilogram of powder or 500 packets of sweetener." Durbin said more than 81 percent of those convicted for crack offenses in 2007 were African-American, although only about 25 percent of crack cocaine users are African Americans. Congress enacted the disparity during an epidemic of crack cocaine in the 1980s, but the senator said lawmakers erred in assuming that violence would be greater among those using crack.

 Breuer said the best way to deal with violence is to severely punish anyone who commits a violent offense, regardless of the drug involved. "This administration believes our criminal laws should be tough, smart, fair," Breuer said, but also should "promote public trust and confidence in the criminal justice system." Walton said, "We were mistaken" to enact the disparity. "There's no greater violence in cases before me." He added that jurors have expressed an unwillingness to serve in crack cocaine cases because of the disparity. President Barack Obama had called for such a change while campaigning for the White House.

 Breuer said the government should focus on punishing drug trafficking networks, like the cartels wreaking havoc in Mexico, and those whose crimes include acts of violence. The Obama administration is also seeking to increase drug treatment, as well as rehabilitation programs for felons after they're released from prison. Miami's police chief, John Timoney, also favored ending the disparity, commenting, "It's the same drug. It's just manufactured differently."  While politicians often support laws lengthening prison terms for various crimes, it is rarer to try to reduce sentences, in part out of concern they may appear soft on crime. But recently, some states have been moving on their own to temper long-standing "get tough" laws. Snort

   I have had the sad misfortune to deal much too personally with both crackheads and cocaine freaks, so I know what I'm talking about. This relativistic argument is specious beyond belief. Crackheads use those tiny amounts to get every bit as high as some fat cat nose candy head - in fact, it is my experience that crackheads get higher. But what is most important to bear in mind about this is that BECAUSE crack is so cheap, chronic use is within the budgets of most - while blowing through enough powdered cocaine to reach that level takes more money than anyone has, except rock stars and Wall Street brokers. It is not the drug that causes people to start deteriorating, sticking up liquor stores and mugging their mothers - it is the chronic use of that drug and once a person has reached that point - whether they're torching their high in a crack pipe or sucking it through hundred dollar bills, they are lost. If the coke head has any money, friends or relatives left, he might be retrievable, but crackheads never have anything left, because they have had access to cheap shit for so long their bodies, brains, friends and relatives are all long gone and they will never rehabilitate - never. Prison is the best place for 'em. To draw the distinction between crackheads and coke freaks, the damage done and the resultant harm to society based on race is analogous to blaming cheap fast food for fat black people. I ain't buyin' it because I know better.

This is what's  known as 'restorative justice' and it should make the hair on the back of your neck stand up.

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Contest!

Photos courtesy of anniemation.com
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   Nevada. Say that anywhere else and images of neon and fast money come to mind. That is the public face of this State. The realities are so much more. A few facts for your consideration. Nevada is the least populated of the contiguous United States, the federal government owns more of Nevada than any other State and there are far more cattle and sheep than people. Excluding Las Vegas and Reno, the rest of the towns scattered across Nevada look as if you'd thrown a handful of pebbles onto a basketball court. The Southern part of Nevada is low desert and Las Vegas. Up north, things are different.

   It's still mostly desert, but enough grows to range cattle. There's enough water in a few places to grow crops. The geology is young so a few mines dot the landscape and hot springs are never too far away. It's high mountain desert punctuated by snow-tipped mountain ridges with the occasional lake or salt flat. The wind never stops blowing. Roads are few and far between and the towns even more so. The people who live in those little towns and on the surrounding ranches, the folks who work those mines or the fields think this damnably inhospitable place is Heaven on Earth.

   Self-sufficiency is a way of life in northern Nevada. More people own guns here than anywhere else in this nation - they are not hobbyists - this land is still that wild. The relationship with Mother Nature is a standoff at best. Thriving here is a full time job with more overtime than most are willing to put in. Consequently, folks up here don't have a lot of time for politics. Northern Nevadans tend to take what comes their way from Carson City and Washington D.C. and go on about their lives. But things have changed.

   Politicians in Washington want to tell us how to do things - worse - they want to force us to do things we know won't work here. Whether for misguided reasons or with malicious intent, Washington is doing everything imaginable to eliminate all of the industries that make living here possible and all the things that make it enjoyable - ranching, farming, mining, hunting, fishing, boating, off-roading, dirt biking, snowmobiling - every reason to live in northern Nevada. And who do we have as our spokesman in Washington? Harry 'Pinkie' Reid.

   Between Harry Reid and those idjits back East, we stand to lose this place. If they don't regulate us off the land, they will tax us so severely to pay for their big city dreams that we will lose our own. People  who have never experienced Nevada beyond a casino door or a freeway off ramp are intent on imposing their way of life on us and they will get away with it unless we do something about it. It's time for folks in northern Nevada to wake up and smell the sagebrush.

   You may have heard about the 'Tea Parties' held on April 15th. Regular folks, with full time lives and jobs showed up to voice their discontent. People who have neither the time nor the inclination to bother with such things, mostly because they are too busy living and thriving. It was a great turnout - doubly so because folks around here just don't DO that sort of thing - far too independent and self-reliant. Live and let live is the rule. Trouble is, Washington has changed the rules.

   We have to fight back. It cannot end with the Tea Parties. We may be few in number, here in northern Nevada, but if we speak with one voice - they will hear us in Washington D.C. We need to them to leave us alone. We need to tell them we don't want to pay for their delusions. We need to send Harry 'Pinkie' Reid a pink slip. We need to let those politicians know we have had enough and we ain't gonna take anymore.

   In that spirit, the people at Anger is Brewing would like to carry those messages straight to the politicians. They also want to help, encourage and support people who will run for office and remember where they came from - northern Nevada. Not Las Vegas. Not the big city. Not the back room and not from some nameless corporation. They are from HERE and speak for US.

   These folks are going to create a political action committee - a PAC. PACs are the new power in Washington and money talks as loud there as it does in any poker game. They need a name for this PAC. It should be easy to say and hard to forget. It should be about 'we the people' and not about any political party or ideology. It needs a name that reflects northern Nevada sensibilities.

   So there's going to be a contest - NAME that PAC! I have placed an ad in the sidebar - you can't miss it. Click on that and make some suggestions about just what to call this PAC. There will be prizes and you will be able to contribute, in whatever way you can, to lettin' those snakes back in D.C. know in no uncertain terms what's on YOUR mind. If we don't do something and soon, they will take this wondrous place away from us. Link

 

The Flu Map - Cases Worldwide

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This is not a democracy.

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 New posters showing iconic French comedian Jacques Tati have caused a stink - because his trademark pipe has been replaced by a yellow toy windmill. In the original picture, the actor and director of comedy classics such as Mon Oncle and Jour de Fetes is riding a bicycle with his pipe firmly clamped between his teeth. Tati starred in his own films as Monsieur Hulot, a quixotic character confronting societal changes in postwar France. Mon Oncle was an instant international hit when it was released, and won the 1958 Oscar for Best Foreign Language film.  But new posters for a recent Jacques Tati retrospective show the iconic Hulot without his pipe after the Paris public transport network banned the picture, citing a 1991 law that prohibits  advertising tobacco. “The law is the law,” said an RATP spokesman.

 Organizers of the Tati film festival though are furious. “We cannot accept this kind of censorship in France,” said Costa Gravras, president of the Cinematheque Francaise. “It's his trademark and part of the character.” Anti-smoking campaigners however said they understood why the change was necessary. “The photo itself would pose no problem if it were displayed at an exhibition,” said Gerard Audureau, a representative of a French association for non-smokers’ rights. “But, when a large number of giant posters are printed and put up in metro stations, then we should ask ourselves if they're not serving as publicity for cigarettes and for smoking.” Le stinque

   One aspect of Orwell's '1984' and all other totalitarian regimes that receives little or no attention is the arts. In every case, the State controls art - must control art - in order to squelch that last vestige of humanity that will survive and endure anything - freedom of expression. To the State - art is for adorning icons or furthering a particular agenda. Witness all that passed for 'art' during the Soviet years or Nazism - jingoistic murals and posters heralding leaders or causes - never simply flowers or landscapes. Those are considered heretical, bourgeois or 'counter-revolutionary' - all antithetical to central control. Consider Fahrenheit 451.

When the powers that be start trying to control art - the end of freedom is just around the corner.

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Spaßsachen zum zu tun, wenn Sie blank sind!

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 Appenzell, Switzerland - Voters in the heart of the Swiss Alps on Sunday passed legislation banning naked hiking after dozens of mostly German nudists started rambling through their picturesque region. By a show of hands citizens of the tiny canton of Appenzell Inner Rhodes voted overwhelmingly at their traditional open-air annual assembly to impose a 200 Swiss franc ($176) fine on violators. Only a scattering of people on Sunday opposed the ban on the back-to-nature activity that took off last autumn when naked hikers - primarily Germans - started showing up in eastern Switzerland.

 The cantonal government recommended the ban after citizens objected to encountering walkers wearing nothing but hiking boots and socks. “The reactions of the population have shown that such appearances over a large area are perceived as thoroughly disturbing and irritating,” the government said in a statement. A similar legal move is expected in neighboring Appenzell Outer Rhodes with legislation being prepared against “this shameless behavior.”

 German Web sites promoting the activity describe it as “a special experience of nature, free and healthy” and said nude walking in the Alps has roots in antiquity. The verdant Appenzell region has been regarded as a favorite, with trails the nudists regarded as off the beaten path. The German sites also promote walks in France and in regions of Germany, where public nudity has roots going back to the 18th century through a movement that has come to be called “Free Body Culture.” Nudism in more conservative areas of Switzerland is less common. O-de-lay-e-O

    
   Can't you just see it? You live in one of the most beautiful places on Earth - the Swiss Alps. Rocky crags reaching to the clouds, fat cattle feeding on Spring green grass, picturesque chalets with rosy-cheeked children playing about and all of a sudden some tattooed bitch with hairy armpits and her equally repulsive traveling companion stop to ask directions ...

... welche weise ist Zürich?

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Wish I had the ice cream concession.

4/20 Day Celebration at University of Colorado, Boulder campus.

For your Sunday contemplation ...

From good friend and frequent commenter, Jim McFalls.

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The Porcine Prince

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 So powerful was Representative John P. Murtha at one time that he used to put up billboards in his Western Pennsylvania district declaring that “the P is for Power.” Few in Congress dared disagree: he doled out or withheld billions in federal money each year for lawmakers’ pet projects, better known as earmarks. Now, however, a string of federal criminal investigations of contractors or lobbyists close to Mr. Murtha, the top Democrat on the defense appropriations subcommittee, are threatening to undermine his backroom clout.

 In the weeks since the news that prosecutors had raided the offices of the PMA Group — a lobbying firm founded by a former Murtha associate that became a gateway to his office and his biggest source of campaign money — about two dozen rank-and-file Democrats have risked his wrath by calling for a House ethics investigation of the matter. One Democrat has even foresworn seeking earmarks for the military contractors in his district because of ethical concerns about the process.

 In a private meeting with the chairman of the House appropriations committee, Mr. Murtha, the unofficial leader of the “old bulls” who oversee the subcommittees, was forced to accept a series of new restrictions on his authority to grant earmarks, Democratic aides briefed on the meeting said. In previous weeks he had already acquiesced to another steep cut in the volume of earmarks he dispenses, down by half this year from a few years ago. He had also accepted new disclosure requirements, including public hearings, that cramp his ability to cut last-minute deals.

 Now Mr. Murtha lost another fight to block a new rule requiring competitive bidding on earmarked contracts. Furthermore, one of his usual lieutenants - Representative Peter J. Visclosky, Democrat of Indiana and member of the defense subcommittee who is chairman of the energy and water panel - unexpectedly switched sides to back the new restrictions, perhaps because he too is under new scrutiny for his ties to the PMA Group. There is so much more!

From the New York Times, believe it or not.
More compelling evidence in favor of term limits has never existed.

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