Murtha finds military progress in trip to Iraq

Well well well.
Seems like Murtha is eating crow.

Thursday, November 29, 2007
By Jerome L. Sherman, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

WASHINGTON - U.S. Rep. John Murtha today said he saw signs of military progress during a brief trip to Iraq last week, but he warned that Iraqis need to play a larger role in providing their own security and the Bush administration still must develop an exit strategy.

"I think the 'surge' is working," the Democrat said in a videoconference from his Johnstown office, describing the president's decision to commit more than 20,000 additional combat troops this year. But the Iraqis "have got to take care of themselves."

Violence has dropped significantly in recent months, but Mr. Murtha said he was most encouraged by changes in the once-volatile Anbar province, where locals have started working closely with U.S. forces to isolate insurgents linked to Al Qaeda.

He said Iraqis need to duplicate that success at the national level, but the central government in Baghdad is "dysfunctional."

Mr. Murtha's four day-trip took him to a Thanksgiving dinner with troops in Kuwait last Thursday, and he then made stops in Iraq, Turkey and Belgium.

Murtha conceding that progress is being made?
I thought the troop surge was not going to work Murtha? Hmmm.... Guess once again you were wrong.

This is going to be an interesting election season as more progress is made in Iraq. So much so that even the New York Times could not ignore it last week in an article. The rest of the MSM media has not jumped on board yet. But eventually they will have no choice BUT to take notice and actually report on it.

Slowly we will start to see the shift of posturing by the Democrats on this issue.
Watch as they move the bar now from Military solutions they said were not possible to the new tactic of BUT LOOK there is not political triumph. To that I say. NOT YET!

Much like many conservatives have been saying. You need to provide SECURITY FIRST in order to let the political take hold. Now that security has taken hold of the country, the new focus is on seeing that talks resume and that the political process in Iraq brings the nation forward.

Now I just will go ape shit when Dingy Harry Reid actually acknowledges that the troop surge has worked!

In book, FBI agent says Saddam Hussein cried at last meeting

The crying part was not what got to me in this story. I personally think he should rot in hell. What did however was the following:

Until 9/11, Saddam thought UN sanctions would go away and he could make a nuclear bomb. His prewar weapons of mass destruction deceptions were a ruse to convince Iran - whom he feared - that he had an arsenal.

This is exactly what I have been saying since the war began back in 2003.
Saddam had kicked out the inspectors to hide the weapons somewhere in that country and or move them into Syria then invite the inspectors back to then reconstitute his Nuclear Program.

With the watching eye of the US and the UN sanctions he could not start that program up again. The last thing Saddam wanted to do was loose power of his country. He wanted to hold it as long as possible.

My contention then as it is now is that the War should NEVER have happened and continuing Sanctions were all the deterrent needed to keep Saddam in check.

What is worrisome however is the fact that he did have plans to start up the nuclear plan again. But we know it would have been decades for him to acquire them if at all with continuing sanctions.

Also of note is the fact that the news media has focused VERY VERY little on Iraq in the last few months. Positive news is NO NEWS.

Guberment skools rule!

I told you once, i told you twice, I told you a thousands times! So-called public schools are failing our kids!
Instead of teaching our children the fundamentals we have school admins distributing condoms and birth control pills, diversity/multicutural classes, a now yoga and de-stress periods!
Give me a break!

Now an article shows that goverment school are "dropout factories." Gotta love it folks.

1 in 10 Schools Are 'Dropout Factories'

WASHINGTON- It's a nickname no principal could be proud of: "Dropout Factory," a high school where no more than 60 percent of the students who start as freshmen
make it to their senior year. That description fits more than one in 10 high schools across America.
"If you're born in a neighborhood or town where the only high school is one where graduation is not the norm, how is this living in the land of equal opportunity?" asks Bob Balfanz, the Johns Hopkins researcher who coined the term "dropout factory."
There are about 1,700 regular or vocational high schools nationwide that fit that description, according to an analysis of Education Department data conducted by Johns Hopkins for The Associated Press. That's 12 percent of all such schools, about the same level as a decade ago.
While some of the missing students transferred, most dropped out, says Balfanz. The data look at senior classes for three years in a row to make sure local events like plant closures aren't to blame for the low retention rates.
The highest concentration of dropout factories is in large cities or high-poverty rural areas in the South and Southwest. Most have high proportions of minority students. These schools are tougher to turn around because their students face challenges well beyond the academic ones - the need to work as well as go to school, for example, or a need for social services.
Utah, which has low poverty rates and fewer minorities than most states, is the only state without a dropout factory. Florida and South Carolina have the highest percentages.
"Part of the problem we've had here is, we live in a state that culturally and traditionally has not valued a high school education," said Jim Foster, a spokesman for the South Carolina department of education. He noted that residents in that state previously could get good jobs in textile mills without a high school degree, but that those jobs are gone today.
Washington hasn't focused much attention on the problem. The No Child Left Behind Act, for example, pays much more attention to educating younger students. But that
appears to be changing.
House and Senate proposals to renew the 5-year-old No Child law would give high schools more federal money and put more pressure on them to improve on graduation performance, and the Bush administration supports that idea.
The current NCLB law imposes serious consequences on schools that report low scores on math and reading tests, and this fallout can include replacement of teachers or principals - or both. But the law doesn't have the same kind of enforcement teeth when it comes to graduation rates.
Nationally, about 70 percent of U.S. students graduate on time with a regular diploma. For Hispanic and black students, the proportion drops to about half.
The legislative proposals circulating in Congress would:
-Make sure schools report their graduation rates by racial, ethnic, and other subgroups and are judged on those results. That's to ensure that schools aren't just graduating white students in high numbers, but also are working to ensure that minority students get diplomas.
-Get states to build data systems to keep track of students throughout their school years and more accurately measure graduation and dropout rates.
-Ensure that states count graduation rates in a uniform way. States have used a variety of formulas, including counting the percentage of entering seniors who get a diploma. That measurement ignores the obvious fact that kids who drop out typically do so before their senior year.
-Create strong progress goals for graduation rates and impose sanctions on schools that miss those benchmarks. Most states currently lack meaningful goals, according to The Education Trust, a nonprofit group that advocates for poor and minority
children.
The current law requires testing in reading and math once in high school, and those tests take on added importance because of the serious consequences for a school of failure. Critics say that creates a perverse incentive for schools to encourage kids to drop out before they bring down a school's scores.
"The vast majority of educators do not want to push out kids, but the pressures to raise test scores above all else are intense," said Bethany Little, vice president for policy at the Alliance for Excellent Education, an advocacy group focused on high schools. "To know if a high school is doing its job, we need to consider test scores and graduation rates equally."
Little said some students pushed out of high schools are encouraged to enroll in programs that prepare them to take the GED exam. People who pass that test get certificates indicating they have high-school level academic skills. But the research shows that getting a GED doesn't lead to the kind of job or college success associated with a regular diploma.
Loretta Singletary, 17, enrolled in a GED program after dropping out of a Washington, D.C. high school that she describes as huge, chaotic and violent. "Girls got jumped. Boys got jumped, teachers (were) fighting and hitting students," she said.
She said teachers had low expectations for students, which led to dull classes.
"They were teaching me stuff I already knew ... basic nouns, simple adjectives."
Singletary said a subject she loved was science but she wasn't offered it, and complaints to administrators went unanswered. "I was interested in experiments," she said. "I didn't have science in 9th or 10th grade."
A GED classmate of Singletary's is 23-year-old Dontike Miller, who attended and
left two D.C. high schools on the dropout factory list. Miller was brought up by a single mother who used drugs, and he says teachers and counselors seemed oblivious to what was going on in his life.
He would have liked for someone to sit him down and say, "'You really need to go to class. We're going to work with you. We're going to help you'," Miller said. Instead,"I had nobody."
Teachers and administrators at Baltimore Talent Development High School, where 90 percent of kids are on track toward graduating on time, are working hard to make sure students don't have an experience like Miller's.
The school, which sits in the middle of a high-crime, impoverished neighborhood two miles west of downtown Baltimore, was founded by Balfanz and others four years ago as a laboratory for getting kids out on time with a diploma and ready for college.
Teachers, students and administrators at the school know each other well.
"I know teachers that have knocked on people's doors. They want us to succeed," 12th-grader Jasmine Coleman said during a lunchtime chat in the cafeteria.
Fellow senior Victoria Haynes says she likes the way the school organizes teachers in teams of four, with each team of teachers assigned to a group of 75 students. The teachers work across subject areas, meaning English and math teachers, for example, collaborate on lessons and discuss individual students' needs.
"They all concentrate on what's best for us together," Haynes said. "It's very family oriented. We feel really close to them."
Teachers, too, say it works.
"I know the students a lot better, because I know the teachers who teach them," said 10th-grade English teacher Jenni Williams. "Everyone's on the same page, so it's not like you're alone in your mission."
That mission can be daunting. The majority of students who enter Baltimore Talent Development in ninth grade are reading at a fifth- or sixth-grade level.
To get caught up, students have 80-minute lessons in reading and math, instead of the typical 45 minutes. They also get additional time with specialists if needed.
The fact that kids are entering high schools with such poor literacy skills raises questions about how much catch-up work high schools can be expected to do and whether more pressure should be placed on middle schools and even elementary schools, say some high-school principals.
"We're at the end of the process," says Mel Riddile, principal of T.C. Williams High School, a large public school in Alexandria, Va. "People don't walk into 9th grade and suddenly have a reading problem."
Other challenges to high schools come from outside the school system. In high-poverty districts, some students believe it's more important to work than to stay in school, or they are lured away by gang activity or other kinds of peer or family pressure.
At Baltimore Talent Development, administrators try to set mini-milestones and celebrations for students so they stay motivated. These include more fashionable uniforms with each promotion to the next grade, pins for completing special programs and pizza parties to celebrate good attendance records.
"The kids are just starved for recognition and attention. Little social rewards matter to them," said Balfanz.
Balfanz says, however, that students understand the biggest reward they can collect is the piece of paper handed to them on graduation day.
Without it, "there's not much work for you anymore," he said. "There's no way out of the cycle of poverty if you don't have a high school diploma."

Where are all the hurricanes?

We were getting life altering world ending predictions for the hurricane season again this year and yet it was TAME to say the least. Not that I was not greatful for mother nature to bless us with a calmer season but all the alarmists in the MSM media were calling for a dire season.

So this year was one of the warmest years on record right?
Several records broken just last week in North East and The Chicago Marathon was canceled because it was too hot.

Yet where are all the Hurricanes.
Dr. Gray made his annual predictions for Hurricanes back at the beginning of the year. It was also revised downward from 17 named storms, nine hurricanes and five high-intensity storms to 13 named storms, 8 Hurricanes and 3 High intensity storms.

So far Gray has not gotten it all right after all. Mind you however, Dr. Gray is the leading Hurricane forecaster in the US if not the world and he got it wrong even with years of research and analysis.

Yet just last week Al Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize. Which is an absolute joke and a mockery of such a prestigious award. An award that is supposed to embody great scientific work for the betterment of man kind and in some ways bringing more peace to the world and you give it Al Gore? Who's only real accomplishment is making OODLES of money touting Junk Science Global Warming.

I didn't get it.
In Gores film (An Inconvenient Truth) he talked about the intensity of Hurricanes being directly related to Global Warming and how many more Katrina's are waiting to happen. He made it sound so factual despite there being no real correlation to that notion.

In fact a Judge in the UK Ruled the film had 9 errors that it touts as facts. And that is just the proverbial tip of the ice berg.

In a stinging rebuttal to Gores claims of man made global warming and on the day of Gores announcement of winning the Peace Prize, Dr. Gray ripped Gore and his film a new one:

ONE of the world's foremost meteorologists has called the theory that helped Al Gore share the Nobel Peace Prize "ridiculous" and the product of "people who don't understand how the atmosphere works".

"We're brainwashing our children," said Dr Gray, 78, a long-time professor at Colorado State University. "They're going to the Gore movie [An Inconvenient Truth] and being fed all this. It's ridiculous."

"The human impact on the atmosphere is simply too small to have a major effect on global temperatures," Dr Gray said.

He said his beliefs had made him an outsider in popular science.

"It bothers me that my fellow scientists are not speaking out against something they know is wrong," he said. "But they also know that they'd never get any grants if they spoke out. I don't care about grants."

So far gores winning of the Peace Prize has been seen as ridiculous and getting plenty of flak. Soon the rest of Al's message will ring as just as ridiculous to folks as well.

But not yet, lets wait till after the Hurricane season this year is over. Watch all the light bulbs go off in peoples heads, hopefully they are Fluorescents.

Want to stop Global Warming... Eat Kangaroo's

Yes folks, as though the Global warming BS could not get any weirder not Greenpeace wants everyone to eat more Kangaroo's. I am shaking my head here too folks.

MORE kangaroos should be slaughtered and eaten to help save the world from global warming, environmental activists say.
The controversial call to cut down on beef and serve more of the national symbol on our dinner plates follows a report on curbing greenhouse gas emissions damaging the planet.

Greenpeace energy campaigner Mark Wakeham urged Aussies to substitute some red meat for roo to help reduce land clearing and the release of methane gas from flatulent cattle and sheep.

"It is one of the lifestyle changes we can make," Mr Wakeham said.

"Changing our meat consumption habits is a small way to make an impact."

The eat roo recommendation is contained in a report, Paths to a Low-Carbon Future, commissioned by Greenpeace and released today.

It also coincides with recent calls from climate change experts for people in rich countries to reduce red meat and switch to chicken and fish because land-clearing and burping and farting cattle and sheep were damaging the environment.

Canada cuts power lines to battle cannabis

Hey the DEA should take some pointers from the Canadians.
Makes perfect sense to me. But I am sure the ACLU would be all over this here in the US as some sort of right infringement here.

It's not hard for police to identify the pot growers in this western Canada town: They merely scan residents' utility bills to determine who is using a lot more power than the average homeowner.

Armed with that information, local authorities cut the power off to the home of the suspected offender, often leaving scores of pot growers without the artifical light and water needed to cultivate their home-grown cash crop.

British Columbia, with a population of four million, has an estimated 20,000 inhabitants who raise a potent local marijuana known here as "B.C. Bud."

The plants, collectively worth nearly seven billion dollars each year, account for a whopping six percent of this province's power consumption.

The labor-intensive crop is an energy sponge thanks in large part to the 1,000 watt halogen lights, fans, irrigation pumps and other equipment needed for their cultivation. As a result, the pot growers' energy bills are about three times that of the average consumer.

Those energy consumption patterns drew the notice of authorities, who have benefitted from a 2006 law allowing BC Hydro, the area's main power company, to share its residential power consumption records with local officials.

Armed with a list of likely offenders, a team of inspectors -- including a firefighter, an electrician, an admistrative employee and two policmen -- is dispatched to each suspect residence.

"We inspect between 70 and 80 homes a month, said Len Garis, head of firefighters in Surrey, a suburb of Vancouver.

Inspectors are looking to verify, first and foremost, that the power lines' insulation coating is in good condition and that the circuit breakers are working properly.

About 90 percent of the time, this is not the case: Inspections often reveal serious problems in the electrical connections as a result of the high demands placed on them. According to the city, pot growers' homes have a 24 times greater chance than the average home of catching fire and burning down.

In the event of electrical problems, the current to the home is cut and cannot be reestablished until repairs are made.

The inspection team rarely sees the real target of the operation -- the pot plants -- because authorities are obliged by law to notify residents at least 48 hours prior to an inspection. The early tip usually gives the home pot grower more that adequate time to stow away his illicit crop.

"It's not about a criminal operation, but simply a means of insuring security for the people," said Joel Giebelhaus, an aide to Surrey's mayor.

Since the beginning of inspections in 2006, the number of home cannabis plantations has dropped by 65 percent in Surrey and 14 other towns in the province participating in the power-cutoff approach to the war on drugs.

"I'm afraid of these inspections," one local marijuana farmer told AFP, under condition of anonymity, acknowledging that without power, it would be impossible to operate the powerful lights he has going 18 hours a day to keep his pot plants growing.

It is not a one-sided battle however.

Marc Emery, who heads the "BC Marijuana Party," a small political group pushing for the legalization of pot, insisted that the province's offensive will prove futile, as growers figure out new methods to grow their crops without overtaxing the power infrastructure.

For example, one company selling hydroponic crop equipment also stocks a lamp that consumes 80 percent less energy than the traditional grow lamps.

In a counter-punch however, officials in some localities decided in late September to impose tighter restrictions on the companies selling hydroponic growing equipment.

Whoopie Called on Sharpton to Appologize to Duke Players

Wow I am like Totally Shocked.....




Few things I agree with Whoopi on an and this is one of them.


Sharpton responds to Whoopi's demand for Duke lax apology

Blogger Spins Facts.

I stumbled across another bloggers post about Michael Medveds recent Townhall.com article.

Round of applause for the Spin of the blog. Nice indeed. The Blogger falls WAY short of being anywhere near coherent or for that matter factual. In fact his liberal spin starts from the very Tittle of the post.
White conservative says slavery is exaggerated

Here are the basic FACTS that Medved lays out.

FACT:
SLAVERY WAS AN ANCIENT AND UNIVERSAL INSTITUTION, NOT A DISTINCTIVELY AMERICAN INNOVATION.


FACT:
SLAVERY EXISTED ONLY BRIEFLY, AND IN LIMITED LOCALES, IN THE HISTORY OF THE REPUBLIC – INVOLVING ONLY A TINY PERCENTAGE OF THE ANCESTORS OF TODAY’S AMERICANS.



FACT:
THOUGH BRUTAL, SLAVERY WASN’T GENOCIDAL: LIVE SLAVES WERE VALUABLE BUT DEAD CAPTIVES BROUGHT NO PROFIT.

FACT X100!:
IT’S NOT TRUE THAT THE U.S. BECAME A WEALTHY NATION THROUGH THE ABUSE OF SLAVE LABOR: THE MOST PROSPEROUS STATES IN THE COUNTRY WERE THOSE THAT FIRST FREED THEIR SLAVES.


FACT:
WHILE AMERICA DESERVES NO UNIQUE BLAME FOR THE EXISTENCE OF SLAVERY, THE UNITED STATES MERITS SPECIAL CREDIT FOR ITS RAPID ABOLITION.


Arbitrary:
THERE IS NO REASON TO BELIEVE THAT TODAY’S AFRICAN-AMERICANS WOULD BE BETTER OFF IF THEIR ANCESTORS HAD REMAINED BEHIND IN AFRICA.

---But if you are one of those African Americans that feel you would be there is always expedia.com---

Medved also lays out facts to his points made.
At no point in time does he even TRY to say that the horrors of slavery were exaggerated. Simply that the exaggeration is Americas complete and sole culpability in slavery as it is made out to seem by liberals and those seeking reparations.


I find the blog interesting in that in Point 2 he wants to point to the beginning of slavery from the point of the BRITISH COLONIES and not from the point of the US emancipation from Britain. Interesting indeed. Also interesting how Britain is never held culpable by any African Americans that are so gung-ho about the slave trade in the Americas. No blame rests ever on the Portugese that enslaves millions, none on the Spaniards either. Just on America itself but only to point the finger at America.

Fact is that the colonies were extensions of the British Empire and it is FACTUALLY correct and Historically correct to talk about America from the point of its emancipation from Britain.

LMFAO.... In the blog in part 3 he says basically that Medved used the true definition of genocide and then in part 4 blames him for not defining wealthy. LMFAO... This blogger is a moron.

In part 5 he solidifies his stupidity in this blog. Again discounting the fact that Slavery was not a American invention yet says it should not have happened. Fact is that again it did happen and happened often throughout history from the Sumerians all the way till TODAY with the sex slave trade around the globe. All are deplorable but America was the FIRST of the western Nations to stop Slavery in its tracks. Which is again Medveds point but the blogger loves to spin. Residual problems persisted in it yes as in Indentured Servitude and Civil Rights violations but that again has been sped up by Americans when even in Latin America and even in African countries being too dark is shun and those folks are treated differently.

On point 6. Africa MAY have been a different continent today had it not been for Slavery but it would PROBABLY I would venture to say it would be almost as savage as it is today. Probably more so. Still to this day you have tribes and regions killing each other but don't believe me just look at Rwanda, Somalia and the Congo.

2 weeks 1300 arrested

:eek2::eek2::eek2:


Federal officers in Southern California over the last two weeks have arrested more than 1,300 immigrants, most of whom either have criminal records or have failed to abide by deportation orders -- part of an intensifying but controversial effort across the nation to remove such violators.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which plans to announce the operation at a news conference in Los Angeles today, called the sweep the largest of its kind in the U.S. Nearly 600 of those arrested at homes, workplaces and in jails have already been deported.

"Where these laws may not have been enforced in the past, that has changed," said Jim Hayes, Los Angeles field office director for ICE.

Since the 9/11 terrorist attacks, pressure has been growing on the federal government to crack down on illegal immigrants, especially those who have committed crimes. And ICE has been waging a public relations battle to show that it is addressing the problem.

In the recent ICE operation, nearly 90% of the immigrants arrested had criminal records, deportation orders or had reentered the United States after being removed. The rest, 146, were "collateral" arrests -- people who encountered the agents and could not prove they were in the United States legally. Officers arrested 530 immigrants in their homes and workplaces and took custody of nearly 800 others from jails in Los Angeles, Orange, Ventura, Riverside and San Bernardino counties.

The 1,327 arrests surpassed the 1,297 undocumented immigrants arrested by ICE agents at meat processing plants in six states last December, part of an investigation into identity theft.

The enforcement is the latest example of the how some local law enforcement agencies are cooperating with federal authorities to ensure that criminals are identified and deported, rather than simply released from jail. ICE recently created a 24-hour command center, complete with a specific e-mail address and phone number, where local law enforcement officers can exchange information with immigration agents to identify possible deportees.

Though Los Angeles police, under a controversial policy, do not routinely inquire about suspects' immigration status, Los Angeles, Riverside, Orange and San Bernardino counties have formal agreements with ICE that allow local sheriff's officials to check the immigration status of inmates. ICE agents also work in some city jails, including Costa Mesa and Anaheim.

Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca called the partnership between ICE and jail personnel "very successful." He said his department had identified and interviewed 8,000 illegal immigrant inmates in the county jail system between January and September.

"It shows the volume in Los Angeles County is significant when it comes to the managing of illegal immigrants that have committed local crimes," Baca said.

In Orange County, officials found that about 10% of the 46,000 inmates that have gone through the system since mid-January were illegal immigrants.

"It's exceeding our expectations," Sheriff Michael S. Carona said of the screening program. "The communities are slowly but surely" buying into it. "We are not going down the street asking people for their immigration status."

In many cities, there has been a rising backlash to special treatment of illegal immigrants, including in Los Angeles, where officers have long interpreted the department's Special Order 40 as prohibiting them from asking the immigration status of suspects in most routine cases. Anti-illegal immigrant groups are suing to overturn the order.

The federal arrests also signal a change in how Immigration and Customs Enforcement deals with absconders and violators. In the past, most immigrants simply ignored their deportation orders, knowing there was little chance of arrest. Even those who were detained often posted bond and hid in plain sight in the community.

"There is no question that the immigration problems that our country is facing are problems that have grown over a long period of time," said ICE Assistant Secretary Julie L. Myers. "Historically, the agency was not aggressively focused on detaining those who posed a risk of flight."

But Myers said the agency is expanding bed space, detaining more immigrants and increasingly using alternatives to detention, such as electronic monitoring.

In 2003, ICE created 17 fugitive operations teams to target specific immigrants. As of this week, there are 75 such teams around the nation, including five in the Los Angeles area. Since the program's inception, ICE teams have arrested more than 61,000 immigrants, including 17,331 who had criminal convictions.

Overall, there are an estimated 595,000 immigration fugitives in the United States, down 37,000 from a year ago -- marking the first-ever decline, ICE authorities said.

About 1,100 of the recent arrestees were from Mexico. An additional 170 were from Central America, and others were from countries including Vietnam, Indonesia and Ireland. They had committed crimes such as burglary, domestic violence, assault and transportation of drugs, agents said. Some of them were legal, permanent residents who were deportable because of the crimes they committed.

The U.S. attorney's office plans to prosecute more than 45 of the arrestees for reentry after deportation, a felony that could land them in prison for up to 20 years.

"These are people who, No. 1 , have no right to be in the United States legally and they've exacerbated that crime by committing additional crimes," Hayes said. "These aren't people that we want in our communities. These aren't just people looking for work."

At 5:15 a.m. last Thursday, several armed officers wearing bullet-proof vests met at a Food 4 Less parking lot in Maywood. Supervisory Agent Jorge Field ran through the list of targets they were seeking.

Among them was Ramon Yac Mahik. Field showed the officers his photo and recited his information: Male from Guatemala. Thirty-five years old. Previous convictions for vehicle theft and domestic violence. An Immigration Court ruled against him. His appeal was denied by the Board of Immigration Appeals.

Several ICE vehicles pulled up quietly on his street in Los Angeles and within seconds the officers had surrounded the house. They knocked on the front door, but the people living at the apartment didn't know him. Then a woman came down a side stairway leading to an upstairs apartment.

Field asked her name and her husband's name. After getting permission to go inside, officers found Mahik. Field told him that he had an immigration warrant for his arrest. After the Guatemalan said goodbye to his children and gave his wife his boss' phone number, he was handcuffed and escorted to a van.

Later that morning, he sat on a metal bench at an immigration processing center in Santa Ana. In an interview, he acknowledged his criminal record but said it was from years earlier and that he deserved to have a chance to stay in the United States. Mahik said he was ordered deported in 1999 after posting bond and then failing to show up in court.

He works in the garment industry and has three U.S.-born children, ages 16, 10 and 5. His wife was injured in a recent car accident and can't work, he said.

"I don't consider myself a criminal," he said in Spanish. "I would like to fight to see if they let me stay here with my children. To leave them abandoned would be horrible for me. . . . And I don't want them to suffer."

The arrests break up families and create an unfair and inaccurate impression of the immigrant community, which is by and large law-abiding, said Reshma Shamasunder, director of the California Immigrant Policy Center. Enforcement actions also cause fear in immigrant neighborhoods and families that may include U.S. citizens.

"It directs public attention away from the real need to reform the immigration system overall," she said. "This is not going to solve our problems. . . . This is just one narrow-minded, mean-spirited way of trying to fix the immigration problem."

Anti-illegal immigration groups, however, said the action showed what the government can do when it is motivated to enforce the law.

"I hate to sound ungrateful, because we're grateful for any enforcement," said Rick Oltman with Californians for Population Stabilization. "But at this point, we're wondering what took so long."

Online Videos May Be Conduits for Viruses

An FYI for all readers.

Online videos aren't just for bloopers and rants - some might also be conduits for malicious code that can infect your computer.

As anti-spam technology improves, hackers are finding new vehicles to deliver their malicious code. And some could be embedded in online video players, according to a report on Internet threats released Tuesday by the Georgia Tech Information Security Center as it holds its annual summit.

The summit is gathering more than 300 scholars and security experts to discuss emerging threats for 2008 - and their countermeasures.

Among their biggest foes are the ever-changing vehicles that hackers use to deliver "malware," which can silently install viruses, probe for confidential info or even hijack a computer.

"Just as we see an evolution in messaging, we also see an evolution in threats," said Chris Rouland, the chief technology officer for IBM Corp.'s Internet Security Systems unit and a member of the group that helped draft the report. "As companies have gotten better blocking e-mails, we see people move to more creative techniques."

With computer users getting wiser to e-mail scams, malicious hackers are looking for sneakier ways to spread the codes. Over the past few years, hackers have moved from sending their spam in text-based messages to more devious means, embedding them in images or disguised as Portable Document Format, or PDF, files.

"The next logical step seems to be the media players," Rouland said.

There have only been a few cases of video-related hacking so far.

One worm discovered in November 2006 launches a corrupt Web site without prompting after a user opens a media file in a player. Another program silently installs spyware when a video file is opened. Attackers have also tried to spread fake video links via postings on YouTube.

That reflects the lowered guard many computer users would have on such popular forums.

"People are accustomed to not clicking on messages from banks, but they all want to see videos from YouTube," Rouland said.

Another soft spot involves social networking sites, blogs and wikis. These community-focused sites, which are driving the next generation of Web applications, are also becoming one of the juiciest targets for malicious hackers.

Computers surfing the sites silently communicate with a Web application in the background, but hackers sometimes secretly embed malicious code when they edit the open sites, and a Web browser will unknowingly execute the code. These chinks in the armor could let hackers steal private data, hijack Web transactions or spy on users.

Tuesday's forum gathers experts from around the globe to "try to get ahead of emerging threats rather than having to chase them," said Mustaque Ahamad, director of the Georgia Tech center.

They are expected to discuss new countermeasures, including tighter validation standards and programs that analyze malicious code. Ahamad also hopes the summit will be a launching pad of sorts for an informal network of security-minded programmers.

Reid is kidding me right!

I mean really he is joking with this garbage about being unpatriotic.
One of the most unpatriotic senators in recent history, joining the ranks of Kerry, Murtha and Schumer, Reid has got to be quite simply on crack!

Here is what he said:

Last week, Rush Limbaugh went way over the line, way over the line. While I respect his right to say anything he likes, his unpatriotic comments I cannot ignore. During his show last Wednesday, Limbaugh was engaged in one of his typical rants. This one was unremarkable, indistinguishable from his usual drivel, which has been steadily losing listeners for years, [sic] until he crossed that line by calling our men and women in uniform who oppose the war in Iraq, and I quote, "phony soldiers." [sic] This comment was so beyond the pale of decency, and we can't leave it alone. And yet he followed it up with denials and an attack on Congressman Jack Murtha, who was a 37-year active member of the Marine Corps, combat veteran.

What Rush was talking about when he said Phony Soldiers was Jesse MacBeth. A man that faked his time in Iraq and his service in order to downplay and break apart the war effort.

Details:

MacBeth, 23, of Tacoma, claimed to have killed more than 200 people, many at close range, some as they prayed in a mosque. He spoke at an anti-war rally in Tacoma and appeared in a 20-minute anti-war video that circulated widely on the Internet.

Trouble is, none of MacBeth's claims was true. He made it through only six weeks of Army basic training, was never a Ranger and never set foot in Iraq.

Reid seems to be confused with his own words that have waived the white flag for our troops from the comfort of a press conference earlier this year, in which Reid declared that the surge only 1 week old had failed and that the war in Iraq "Was Lost, the surge has failed".

Here stands Reid condemning Rush but saying ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to Moveon.org for their attack on a decorated war hero in General Patraeus! With their General Betrayus ad that was in the paper. A move which Republicans in the Senate condemned, but Reid and his ILK have not.

The double standard here is clear folks.
Its also very clear now that the Democratic party has been taken over by the Moveon.org crowd, seeing as they get daily conference calls with democrats.

Shame on you Reid, but then again it is what is expected of you now, since you do not have a brain of your own but follow the drum beat of defeatists and appeasers.

Oak Lawn Schools May Cancel Holiday Traditions

You know I wish I could say I was shocked by this but its a growing trend around the US to remove any form of the Christian religion from the foundation of the nation.

OAK LAWN, Ill. A southwest suburban school district has taken action, responding to the concerns of a parent who is Arabic.

But now, as CBS 2's Suzanne Le Mignot reports, other parents are angry that traditional school holidays will be renamed or even eliminated.

"That does not represent all the Muslims, all of the Arabs at that school," said Qais Nofel, the father of a student in Ridgeland School District 122.

There was some heated discussion between parents outside Columbus Manor Elementary School in Oak Lawn on Friday. The thought of no more traditional holiday celebrations has many parents really upset.

For now, children in Ridgeland School District 122 will celebrate fall festival instead of Halloween and winter festival instead of Christmas.

Brenda Elvidge said, "It's not fair to our kids. This is America and that's an American tradition."

The decision affects the children at four elementary schools in Oak Lawn and one junior high school in Bridgeview.

The district has a 30 percent Arabic population. The superintendent says the reason for the change in tradition comes after one parent wanted Ramadan decorations put up inside Columbus Manor Elementary. They were taken down.

Superintendent Tom Smyth said, "I go back to our policy which says that public schools are to remain neutral in this respect."

Meantime, Arab children are being allowed to pray during what's being called their own time, that's lunch time, during Ramadan.

Parent June Quigley said, "They get to pray in our schools. That is religion in a public school."

Arab-American parents have different views on the issue.

Sala Abour said, "To take away Halloween and Christmas from little kids, that is very wrong."

Nofel said, "We go and we celebrate the holidays and traditions here, but we do have the right to be Muslims as well."

Other parents say the controversy is overshadowing what really needs to be addressed at all five schools in the district.

Ronnie Carroll said, "The fact that they are cash strapped. Our classroom size is way above the average mean, 38 children in our first grade classroom. The concern should be our school, not the whole holiday issues."

Those issues along with the holiday controversy are going to be addressed at a school board meeting on Tuesday. Members will decide if holidays will be celebrated or not.

Meantime, the Illinois PTA district director says the state is now investigating this issue and there's a meeting with the superintendent next week.

Its really simple folks, for the people that want a complete secular nation they need to start young. What better way to get this done then by having kids believe that celebrating Christmas is wrong and a dumbed down version of it is okay.

You have got to love the appeasement mentality.

Callers support Irving's deportation policy

Round of applause for Dallas Texas!

The phone calls started pouring in at Irving City Hall on Thursday morning.

They were prompted by activists who implored a crowd of more than 1,000 people at a rally Wednesday night to call for an end to a program that turns over arrested illegal immigrants to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

But most callers weren't asking for an end to the program – they were voicing their support.

"It was ringing over and over, and by far, the biggest percent was in favor," City Secretary Janice Carroll said Thursday afternoon.

Irving police last year began using what's called the 24/7 Criminal Alien Program. It provides for around-the-clock communication with federal authorities and is designed to detain illegal immigrants who have been accused of a crime. It's the latest tool being used by local governments in the absence of a federal overhaul of immigration laws. So far, Irving police have turned over more than 1,600 people to immigration officials.

Mayor Herbert Gears estimates that about 300 people in Irving are being turned over each month – more than in any other city in the nation. He said city officials are obligated to uphold the law and will continue to use the program, which is available to any city that wishes to participate.

"Of the 200 e-mails I've read so far, one is negative and all the rest are positive," Mr. Gears said Thursday afternoon. "People are very overwhelmingly supporting what we are doing."

This program should be something that runs nationally.
Its the only way to solve the illegal immigration problem. Seeing as the Federal Govt isn't doing much about it Local and State govts need to start taking matters into their own hands.

Obama: Reappraise Wall Street Values

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama told Wall Street investors Monday that several of them have been too focused on their own gain at the expense of struggling Americans and echoed Franklin Delano Roosevelt's call for a "reappraisal of values."

Obama prides himself on delivering tough messages directly to the source, and his address at the NASDAQ Marketsite was another example. He said a "what's good for me is good enough" mentality has crept into parts of the business world while working men and women toil longer hours and still struggle to pay for health care, tuition and taxes.

"If we are honest, I think we must admit that those who have benefited from the new global marketplace—and that includes almost everyone in this room—have not always concerned themselves with the losers in this new economy," the Illinois senator said.

"The danger with this mentality isn't just that it offends our morals, it's that it endangers our markets," Obama said.

Economic experts including former Commerce secretary Bill Daley, former Fannie Mae CEO Jim Johnson and University of Chicago economist Austan D. Goolsbee helped Obama with the speech, which risks alienating some Wall Street supporters. But Obama said in a recent interview with The Associated Press that he is determined not just to campaign by telling people what they want to hear, but to win support for an agenda for change.

Other examples include Obama's lecture to Detroit automakers that they need to build more fuel efficient vehicles and his support for performance-based merit pay before the teacher's union that opposes it.

Obama blamed Wall Street for wasteful and unethical anti-market practices such as corporate boards that allow executives to set the price of stock options to guarantee they'll make money regardless of performance and CEOs who get massive severance packages or perks even when workers lose their jobs or pensions. But he also accused the Bush administration of approving mergers with little scrutiny and maintaining more than $1 trillion worth of corporate tax loopholes.

"This administration has accelerated these trends through its tax policies and spending priorities to the point where there is greater income inequality now than at any time since the Gilded Age," Obama said. He also compared the situation to the Great Depression, when Roosevelt challenged the cynicism by calling for faith in the United States and its institutions.

"We certainly do not face a test of the magnitude that Roosevelt's generation did, but we are tested still," Obama said.

"I am asking you to join me in ushering in a new era of mutual responsibility in America," he said. He said he believes Wall Street leaders want to be part of building a more just nation, but they haven't been asked before.

He used the subprime mortgage crisis as an example, saying it started as a good idea until some lenders and brokers began lowering their standards as they saw how much money could be made. It was tempting to look the other way, he said.

"The consequences are now clear: nearly 2.5 million homeowners could lose their homes" and millions of others could see their homes devalued, Obama said.

Obama said markets need to be more open and transparent to keep the trust of investors and the public. He said that trust can be restored by federal action like:

—New mortgage rules with tough penalties for lenders who trick homeowners into loans they can't afford;

—An investigation of the relationship and business practices of rating agencies and their clients;

—A five-star credit card rating system to inform consumers about the level of risk for their credit card, including how easily the company can change the interest rate;

—A request that lenders show some flexibility to people trying to sell or refinance their homes.

Lets break this down a bit shall we.

• New mortgage rules with tough penalties for lenders who trick homeowners into loans they can't afford;

As a Mortgage Broker myself I can honestly say that people are not TRICKED into anything when it comes to a Mortgage. or should I say 99.99% of the time they are not. EVERYTHING is spelled out in the contract even before closing. On the Good Faith Estimate EVERYTHING is gone over and clients want to know everything about their loan. I get stopped every time like clock work on the APR rate. Every time I need to tell them that this is not your actual rate. Everything is explained to these folks that take out ARMS. How their rate WILL go up a X amount of time and how there are penalties for paying off the loan too soon in some instances.

What a joke. Another way for Democrats to remove blame from the individual and blame companies for offering a service that like it or not has served the market VERY WELL. No one wants to look at the the positive numbers of RECORD number of home owners living in their homes right now.

Here is the reality for this FOOL Obama. John Hope Bryant, founder of Operation Hope says it clearly that Healthy and Responsible Sub-prime lending has lifted more poor people out of poverty then anything in the last 50 years!

That is a reality! Liberals don't get that.

A request that lenders show some flexibility to people trying to sell or refinance their homes.

LOL. What now he wants to make it easier for flippers to get out of property as well?
Hell they are part of the problem with the real estate market. Some of these Foreclosures you are seeing are flippers that are STUCK in their purchases that they can't flip as quickly as they thought. That is the risk with the investment.

—A five-star credit card rating system to inform consumers about the level of risk for their credit card, including how easily the company can change the interest rate;

Give me a damn break.
People need to show fiscal restraint. Can't afford that pair of shoes at the mall. DON'T BUY IT. People know how their interest rates can go up on Credit Cards. They aren't THAT NAIVE, they just act like they are when shit hits the fan.

Florida's Welfare Rate Is Lowest In The Nation

This is what true conservatism is like.
You adjust things accordingly through the legislature to make people NOT depend on the govt for their living. You then couple that with proper fiscal restraint in the state govt and promote small business and large business. The result is fewer people living off the Govt and taking responsibility for their own lively hood.

What a far out concept!

TAMPA - Florida had the nation's lowest rate of households on welfare last year, according to figures recently released by the U.S. Census.

Just 1.3 percent of Florida households reported receiving welfare payments in the 2006 American Community Survey, a yearly demographic portrait of the nation set to replace the once-a-decade Census long form in 2010.

Welfare experts such as Ron Haskins, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, aren't surprised to find Florida ranked so low.

There are a number of reasons for it, they say. Florida has had higher job growth, tougher welfare eligibility rules and lower welfare payments than many states. And it lies in the South, where tradition - and legislation - more often attaches a greater stigma to welfare than other regions do.

"The South has always been more conservative than the rest of the country, so they're less encouraging to people about welfare … especially as compared to the New England states," said Haskins, author of "Work Over Welfare: The Inside Story of the 1996 Welfare Reform."

"The Southern states also tend to have the lower benefits [and] the lower the benefits, the easier to earn your way off welfare."

Florida has ranked low in the category for years. The survey lists it 51st among the states and the District of Columbia. In addition to Florida, there were six other Southern states rounding out the eight with the nation's lowest welfare participation rates: Virginia, Alabama, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Georgia. Wisconsin was the only non-Southern state. In all those states, less than 2 percent of households reported receiving welfare benefits in the survey.

Alaska had the highest rate of households receiving public cash assistance - 6.3 percent - followed by Maine; Washington, D.C.; Oklahoma; and Hawaii.

"Alaska and Hawaii have benefits that are off the scale, because cost of living there is so high," Haskins said. "D.C. and Maine have probably among the lowest-income populations in the country. Oklahoma's kind of surprising."

A U.S. Department of Health & Human Services survey of 2002 welfare benefits for a family of three lists Alaska and Hawaii with the highest monthly payments nationwide: $923 and $712, respectively. Alabama offered the lowest monthly benefit at $164.

Florida's monthly benefit of $303 ranked 43rd in the nation. That is still the maximum benefit today for a family of three, according to Don Winstead, deputy secretary of the Florida Department of Children and Families, which determines eligibility for welfare payments, also known as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families.

Winstead thinks the lower payments have helped maintain the state's standing among those with the lowest rates for welfare recipients.

"That absolutely plays a role. Depending on the audience, I say Florida has among the lowest benefits in the country, or among the highest in the Southeast," Winstead said.

"Historically, Florida is a state with low benefits. Largely [it's the state] just not wanting to set benefits too high to encourage people to be on welfare rather than working. It's basically a legislative decision."

The federal welfare reform law, passed by Congress in 1996, made changes intended to make welfare more of a temporary benefit. The revamped program required states to set a five-year limit on the time families with an adult could receive cash benefits, with some exceptions. Florida set a stricter limit: four years.

The federal law said beneficiaries had to start working no later than two years after they first receive welfare benefits. Florida requires beneficiaries to start working right away.

Winstead said the tough standards of Florida's 1996 welfare plan, passed in anticipation of the broad federal reforms, require able-bodied adults to get jobs right away. Florida also will cut off all benefits, after 10 days' notice, if an adult in the household refuses to work without a good reason. The federal law allows a partial cut-off.

"The combination of a policy structure that rigorously enforces the requirement for work has resulted in a dramatic reduction in the welfare caseload," Winstead said.

"In 1996, there were over 200,000 families on welfare in Florida. There are less than 50,000 now."

We can all give a round of applause to Jeb Bush and the State Legislature in Florida for a Good Job. Now lets see if Christ can keep that momentum going.

10,000 Black men to patrol the streets

This seems like the type of plan that could work.
Its long been my stance that it takes the PEOPLE of the community to fix and correct the problem inside of poor communities.
Only through the people taking a firm stance and saying NO MORE can things truly take hold. No other way is possible for long lasting calm and peace. You can throw a cop on every street corner but till the PEOPLE come together to turn their HOOD into a Neighborhood, nothing will last.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The city's embattled police chief, acknowledging that police alone cannot quell a run of deadly violence, has called on 10,000 black men to patrol the streets to reduce crime.

Sylvester Johnson, says black men have a duty to protect more vulnerable residents. He wants each volunteer to pledge to work three hours a day for at least 90 days.

"It's time for African-American men to stand up," Johnson told the Philadelphia Daily News, which first reported the story Wednesday. "We have an obligation to protect our women, our children and our elderly. We're going to put men on the street. We're going to train them in conflict resolution."

The program's backers include Dennis Muhammad, a former Nation of Islam official who has been hired by police departments in Detroit, Syracuse, N.Y., and other cities to conduct community-sensitivity training.

Philadelphia, the nation's sixth-largest city, has nearly 1.5 million residents, 44 percent of them black. It has notched 294 homicides this year. More than 80 percent of the slayings involve handguns, and most involve young black males.

Johnson plans to introduce the "Call to Action: 10,000 Men, It's a New Day" program on Oct. 21, three months before his planned retirement.

"He won't get anywhere near that number. If he gets 1,000 people, it will be great," said Heather DeRussy, who leads a local Guardian Angels chapter that has recruited just seven members in the past two years. Given its size, the group focuses on a single north Philadelphia park plagued by prostitution and drug use.

DeRussy lauded Johnson for his effort but said she fears the volunteers will find it dangerous to patrol their home turf.

"In their own neighborhoods, with the 'Don't snitch' mentality, they're kind of putting themselves in harm's way, because there are going to be people who disagree with what they're doing," DeRussy said.

The men who join Johnson's program will not carry weapons or make arrests but will instead emphasize conflict resolution, similar to the Guardian Angels' ground rules.

Police in other cities have hired Muhammad in recent years to provide sensitivity training to officers and community members, but it was not immediately clear whether any have deployed a volunteer patrol force.

Johnson, who had led the police department for seven years, appears increasingly frustrated by the daily gun violence. He and other city leaders have blamed the Legislature for not passing gun-control measures.

Mayor John F. Street, whose term is up at the beginning of 2008, has voiced support for the program, but it was not clear whether he would become involved. His office did not return a call for comment Thursday, nor did Johnson's office.

Street and Johnson have both endured withering criticism from frustrated residents and community leaders who say they should do more to halt the violence.

One gun-violence researcher said the idea of putting citizens on patrol had the potential to show children that adults care.

"A steady exposure to violence just creates this toxic environment for children and youth. As adults, we don't want them to think they have to handle it on their own," said Rose Cheney, executive director of the Firearm and Injury Center at the University of Pennsylvania.

"If, by putting people out there — not just as a town watch, but as resources who connect them to what they need from adults — that can be very promising," she said.

There was another program in I think St Louis that sought to bring in dozens of black leaders or black male role models for the local Junior High and High School black teens. I think coupling this effort with the one that the Police Chief has, real change can take hold.

The problems that are effecting Philly are SERIOUS.
They have today 294 murders so far this year. Its only September.
I applaud the actions of this Police Chief.
More should follow suit.

HEAVILY Discounted Rate for Moveon.org

Very interesting.
And people that the audacity to say that the NY Times is NOT a liberal News Paper. Or that the Media is not run by liberals.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - An ad criticizing the top U.S. general in Iraq raised charges on Thursday that The New York Times slashed its advertising rates for political reasons -- an accusation denied by the paper.

The ad by liberal anti-war group moveon.org ran on Monday, the day of Gen. David Petraeus' testimony to Congress about the war and how long U.S. forces will stay in Iraq.

Moveon.org confirmed it paid $65,000 for the full page ad headlined "General Petraeus or General Betray Us."

The New York Post ran a story on Thursday asking why the basic rate of $181,692 for such an ad was discounted.

"Times Gives Lefties a Hefty Discount for 'Betray Us' Ad," was the headline in the Post, owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp.

Times spokeswoman Catherine Mathis denied the rate charged indicated a political bias and said it was the paper's policy not to disclose the rate paid by any advertiser.

"We do not distinguish the advertising rates based on the political content of the ad," Mathis told Reuters.

"The advertising folks did not see the content of the ad before the rate was quoted," she said, adding that there were over 30 different categories of ads with varying rates.

Mathis confirmed the open rate for an ad of that size and type was around $181,000. Among reasons for lower rates are advertisers buying in bulk or taking a standby rate, she said.

"There are many instances when we have published opinion advertisements that run counter to the stance we take on our own editorial pages," she said.

The ad in the main news section of the Times accused Petraeus of "cooking the books for the White House."

It angered Republicans, including Rep. Duncan Hunter of California, a presidential candidate who brought it to the Petraeus hearing on Monday and waved the ad in the air, telling lawmakers he was "irritated" by it and other criticism by Democrats.

Jeff Jarvis, a journalism professor who blogs on media at buzzmachine.com, said the key question for the Times was could any other political or advocacy group get the same rate under the same circumstances.

"The quandary the Times gets stuck in is they don't want to admit you can buy an ad for that rate, no matter who you are," Jarvis said, noting that with print advertising revenues in decline newspapers generally did offer big discounts.

On a more general note, Jarvis said U.S. papers should emulate their counterparts in Britain where, for example, The Guardian makes no effort to hide its liberal stance.

"In the U.S., I would argue newspapers should be more transparent and open about the views taken ... and the (New York) Times is liberal," he said.

That is a pretty damn sweet deal. Only 65 K to get that much attention nationally and on top of that, commit a drive by character assassination of a war hero. NICE.

I wonder if they'll give Rudy that same discounted price for his ad?

I doubt it though. If anything Rudy better be ready, following this stunt by him the NY TIMES may REALLY go after him.

Federal Deficit Running Lower This Year

Where do you see this blazing across in headlines in national news papers?

WASHINGTON (AP) - The federal deficit is running sharply lower than last year even though spending in August set an all-time high, the government reported Thursday.

The Treasury Department said that the deficit through the first 11 months of this budget year totaled $274.4 billion, down 9.8 percent from the same period a year ago.

Analysts believe the deficit for all of 2007 will actually be even lower because they are forecasting a sizable surplus in the final month, reflecting in part timing issues that caused about $44 billion in Social Security and Medicare payments that normally would have been made in September to be shifted into August.

The Congressional Budget Office is forecasting that when this budget year wraps up on Sept. 30, the deficit will total $158 billion, down by 36.2 percent from last year's $248.2 billion deficit.

The government's books have been helped this year by record flows of tax receipts, which have continued even though economic growth has been reduced by a serious slump in housing.

A deficit of $158 billion would be the best showing since the budget was actually in balance for four years. The last surplus was in 2001, President Bush's first year in office.

While forecasts had projected that government surpluses would total $5.6 trillion over the next decade, the 2001 recession, spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the president's first-term tax cuts all combined to wipe out those surpluses.

Republicans contend that Bush's tax cuts are a major reason that government receipts are so strong now, but Democrats contend that the tax cuts are providing very little economic stimulus and that revenues are simply rebounding to more normal levels after slumping earlier in the decade.

The deficit hit an all-time high in dollar terms in 2004 at $413 billion and has been declining since then. The administration is projecting that the government's books will be in surplus by 2012 if Congress follows Bush's recommendations on spending restraint. However, the Democratic-controlled Congress is pushing for higher spending for the budget year that begins Oct. 1. Bush has pledged to veto spending bills that exceed his requests.

For August, the deficit totaled $116.9 billion. However, about $44 billion of that figure reflected payments for Social Security and Medicare that were mailed in August because Sept. 1 fell on a Saturday and Labor Day came on Sept. 3.

Through the first 11 months of the current budget year, receipts total a record $2.282 trillion, up 7.5 percent from last year, while outlays totaled a record $2.557 trillion, up 5.3 percent from last year.

Or better yet where are the doom and gloomers on the economy?

Unions are a joke

It used to be that Unions served a purpose. They were protecting American workers from unsafe working conditions, and from outside tariffs and economic impacts.
They used to actually work to improve conditions of the people say in Steal Factories, Car Manufacturing etc. But over the years it seems like Unions have become nothing more then cash revenue streams for the Unions themselves.

Now comes the ultimate slap in the face to the American worker.
Unions that are in support of Illegal immigration:

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - A union representing workers at six Swift & Co. meatpacking plants sued federal immigration authorities Wednesday, alleging agents violated the workers' rights during raids by roughly handling even those not suspected of crimes.

The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union and the eight workers named as plaintiffs in the lawsuit seek unspecified damages and an order to stop U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement from conducting what the union says are illegal raids.

ICE officials investigating identity theft arrested 1,297 workers at the plants in December, but union officials have said that more than 12,000 workers were detained against their will during the raids. Swift has estimated the financial impact at up to $50 million.

Union president Joseph Hansen said workers were handcuffed and held for hours and denied access to phones, bathrooms, legal counsel and their families.

"What happened to the Swift workers ... is absolutely an outrage," Hansen said Tuesday.

According to ICE, 274 of those arrested during the raids were charged with identity theft or other crimes unrelated to immigration law. Nearly all were convicted, ICE spokesman Tim Counts said Tuesday. He disputed the claim that workers weren't allowed access to phones.

Of those arrested for being in the country illegally, 649 had been deported as of March 1, according to the most recent numbers available from ICE. All were sent to Latin American countries.

ICE returned to the plants in July and arrested 20 more people, including a human resources manager and a union representative on charges of recruiting and harboring illegal immigrants. The latter two cases are pending.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Amarillo, Texas, names as defendants Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and Assistant Secretary Julie Myers, the two agencies and unnamed federal agents who conducted the raids.

A Department of Homeland Security official referred questions to ICE. Counts said ICE attorneys had not yet seen the lawsuit but planned to fight it.

"From what we've heard from the complaints, they are baseless," Counts said.

Counts said civil search warrants gave the agency the right to fully search the plants and question everyone there. Workers were allowed to use their cell phones, company phones and even the phones of federal agents during the operation, he said.

The Food and Commercial Workers union represents 1.3 million workers in the United States, including 250,000 workers in packing and food processing. The plants raided were in Grand Island, Neb.; Cactus, Texas; Greeley, Colo.; Hyrum, Utah; Marshalltown, Iowa; and Worthington, Minn.

Officials at Swift, which is not named as a defendant, did not immediately return a message left Wednesday seeking comment on the lawsuit. Brazilian firm JBS S.A. acquired Swift from a private equity firm for about $1.5 billion in July, making the company the world's largest beef processor.

Its a damn shame.

Over 500 scientists published studies countering global warming fears.

This was way too good to pass up.

Challenge to Scientific Consensus on Global Warming: Analysis Finds Hundreds of Scientists Have Published Evidence Countering Man-Made Global Warming Fears.

A new analysis of peer-reviewed literature reveals that more than 500 scientists have published evidence refuting at least one element of current man-made global warming scares. More than 300 of the scientists found evidence that 1) a natural moderate 1,500-year climate cycle has produced more than a dozen global warmings similar to ours since the last Ice Age and/or that 2) our Modern Warming is linked strongly to variations in the sun's irradiance. "This data and the list of scientists make a mockery of recent claims that a scientific consensus blames humans as the primary cause of global temperature increases since 1850," said Hudson Institute Senior Fellow Dennis Avery.

Other researchers found evidence that 3) sea levels are failing to rise importantly; 4) that our storms and droughts are becoming fewer and milder with this warming as they did during previous global warmings; 5) that human deaths will be reduced with warming because cold kills twice as many people as heat; and 6) that corals, trees, birds, mammals, and butterflies are adapting well to the routine reality of changing climate.

Despite being published in such journals such as Science, Nature and Geophysical Review Letters, these scientists have gotten little media attention. "Not all of these researchers would describe themselves as global warming skeptics," said Avery, "but the evidence in their studies is there for all to see."

The names were compiled by Avery and climate physicist S. Fred Singer, the co-authors of the new book Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years, mainly from the peer-reviewed studies cited in their book. The researchers' specialties include tree rings, sea levels, stalagmites, lichens, pollen, plankton, insects, public health, Chinese history and astrophysics.

"We have had a Greenhouse Theory with no evidence to support it-except a moderate warming turned into a scare by computer models whose results have never been verified with real-world events," said co-author Singer. "On the other hand, we have compelling evidence of a real-world climate cycle averaging 1470 years (plus or minus 500) running through the last million years of history. The climate cycle has above all been moderate, and the trees, bears, birds, and humans have quietly adapted."

"Two thousand years of published human histories say that the warm periods were good for people," says Avery. "It was the harsh, unstable Dark Ages and Little Ice Age that brought bigger storms, untimely frost, widespread famine and plagues of disease." "There may have been a consensus of guesses among climate model-builders," says Singer. "However, the models only reflect the warming, not its cause." He noted that about 70 percent of the earth's post-1850 warming came before 1940, and thus was probably not caused by human-emitted greenhouse gases. The net post-1940 warming totals only a tiny 0.2 degrees C.

The historic evidence of the natural cycle includes the 5000-year record of Nile floods, 1st-century Roman wine production in Britain, and thousands of museum paintings that portrayed sunnier skies during the Medieval Warming and more cloudiness during the Little Ice Age. The physical evidence comes from oxygen isotopes, beryllium ions, tiny sea and pollen fossils, and ancient tree rings. The evidence recovered from ice cores, sea and lake sediments, cave stalagmites and glaciers has been analyzed by electron microscopes, satellites, and computers. Temperatures during the Medieval Warming Period on California's Whitewing Mountain must have been 3.2 degrees warmer than today, says Constance Millar of the U.S. Forest Service, based on her study of seven species of relict trees that grew above today's tree line.

Singer emphasized, "Humans have known since the invention of the telescope that the earth's climate variations were linked to the sunspot cycle, but we had not understood how. Recent experiments have demonstrated that more or fewer cosmic rays hitting the earth create more or fewer of the low, cooling clouds that deflect solar heat back into space-amplifying small variations in the intensity of the sun.

Avery and Singer noted that there are hundreds of additional peer-reviewed studies that have found cycle evidence, and that they will publish additional researchers' names and studies. They also noted that their book was funded by Wallace O. Sellers, a Hudson board member, without any corporate contributions.

Man Made Global Warming right Al?
Suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuure......