try it again

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLQGWpRVA7o

 

Hack

the question

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So let the crying begin.  We’ll see if the self-annointed will use a page from the Jane Fonda “just cry if you can’t figure it out” book.

Hack

Who's Your Hillary?

…depends on where she is, who she’s talking to, and too many other variables to make a prediction, except one:

 

She Desperately Wants to be Your President.

 

There’s the flap about questions fed to audience members (found here:

http://news.aol.com/political-machine/2007/11/12/a-question-for-hillary-clinton/?ncid=NWS00010000000001),

 

and the admission by several deep-pocketed Democratic contributors, David Geffen among them, who simply will not contribute a plug nickel because ‘Hill and Bill’ simply cannot be trusted anymore?

 

Before we toss every lick of sense out the window, and fully submit to political naiveté, we’re talking about whether a politician can be trusted, held to their word, and whether we can count on them to protect our nation, our foreign interests, and make sure we can continue to function as a civilized society. 

 

Has Bush Jr. done this?  Polls would tell you a resounding NO, with 60% or more respondents saying this presidency is as bad as any in history, and the lowest approval ratings since they were being conducted.

 

Can Hilary do better?  Would it be Bill’s show, with Hillary wielding the rubber stamp?  Can we trust any candidates right now?  If we can’t, who can we trust the LEAST?  That should be one point to think about, because if we want to move away from the type of deceit and double-talk we have endured for the past 6+ years, we need to think about WHO our president should be, not what the political machines tell you who your president should be.  It’s still a choice by the voters, if they want to ask the right questions.

 

Hack

 

local politics gone wack-o

Seems the sleepy suburban town of Eagan, MN has a row going about whether to enact a City Charter or not.  Wished we could learn more about it, but for now, it seems, both parties are spending more time and resources hacking each other’s web site (www.eagancharter.org VS www.eagancharter.com).  Neither is available and virtually un-ping-able!

 

Democracy in the hands of ‘net heads…

infatuation with royalty

Is there a reason why we need to follow up a Bush with a Clinton?  What’s the matter with mixing it up a little?  Have we lost our ability to be bold, creative, and go into a new territory?  Don’t give me this ‘but we’re going to elect a WOMAN to the White House’ BS.  Wasn’t this effectively done back in 1992?  Remember, Bill was part of the package.  Do we really have to do this again?  And if we’re gonna go 8 years with Clintons, Part 2, does this mean Jeb Bush should form a committee to explore the presidency in 2016?  Bush – Clinton – Bush – Clinton – Pepsi – Coke – McDonald’s – Burger King – Wal*Mart - Costco…? Ahhh, we sure can handle simpler choices, can’t we people!

As another icon of the early 90’s, a spikey-haired fitness guru used to say,

“Stop the Insanity!”

good grief

with more 'Re-bumbling-cans' ready for a fall, how is it that the Democrats in MN are still trying to counter with horrific choices like Stuart Smalley / al-Franken? 

 

Hollywood money, kids.  it's not about who's best qualified, it's about who's best-funded.  Democracy in America.  you get what you pay for, that's why we're in Iraq with very few options out.  doesn't matter if you're BLUE or RED, it's what David Geffen, Babs, and Blackwater Nazi's want.

Get Ready for Hillary-Care, Part 2

OK, maybe it’s just me, but isn’t there a complete lack of interest, thus far, in the ’08 Presidential contest?  Alright, it’s only September, ’07, but the current crop, now with Fred (‘Damn, I even act Presidential’) Thompson finally into the mix, it just seems bland.  All the candidates sound alike, practically look alike; except for the one with the dress.  And even she’s not too distinctive.

 

Just the way she wants it, for now.

 

There’s an old saying, ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned’, and Hillary is at her center a very scorned woman.  Deep down, she’s still smarting from her colossal failure to socialize medicine.  Now with her generation facing massive medical bills, prescriptions, and all the other healthcare and medical services and products that contribute between 15 to 20% of the total US economy as ‘Healthcare’, she’s going to be ultra-determined to conquer her ‘Waterloo’.  Payback’s a b*tch, and she’s arming for it.  Taking the soft, centrist approach is the only way she can have any possibility of selling voters on taking a gamble with her.  America will regret it. 

 

There’s plenty of grist on either side as to whether healthcare needs more or less intervention, but this much is clear;  Hillary will go after it once again if she’s successful in convincing middle-of-road voters (complacent soccer moms, low- and middle-manager types who loathe and envy CEO’s, and wary government employees) to join the ranks of the vehement anti-Bush brigade, the ultra-left feminists, and the cross-section of Hillary’s NY voter block) to swallow her ‘moderate’ stance.  Please don’t be fooled.  She’s gotta do what she’s gotta do to get in the office, then look out.  And not just healthcare, either.

 

Get ready guys, because not only will she right herself in healthcare, she’s going to try and gut everything male-dominated, including gun ownership (good luck, hunters).  This isn’t an NRA rant, but she’s been working on that for nearly as long as Hillary-Care, maybe longer. 

 

It’s going to be another sign of the decline of the US.  Here’s hoping somebody can come in with a real and genuine moderate approach.

 

Hack

 

too many realtors

Too many mortgage lenders, too, it seems.  And that after already massive unwinding in the mortgage lender ranks over the past 2 years.  And with foreclosure rates setting records, and the sub-prime lending market all but imploding, not to mention the horrendous mortgage our country has made fighting a net-meaningless war (in terms of economic benefit, strategic gain, or globally politically stabilizing), we have, as the nation of USA, succeeded in fully ‘leveraging’ (the financial term for taking out as much debt as possible) the future of the country.  And like the sub-prime market, will in the not too distant future be holding a sheriff’s sale on the steps of the court house (in this case, the big one in DC) where upon our creditors (read here:  China, Germany, Canada) can bid for the remaining asset for fractions of a penny on the dollar (as if our currency hasn’t already been completely gutted).  Buy some gold, and some lead while you’re at it.  land ownership will do, as long as it’s out far from the city, and it can sustain a crop.

Compliments of what is arguably the WORST presidency in the history of the nation (or at least as bad as that run from Harding to Hoover back in the 1920’s).

Hack

tough to take 'em seriously

Isn’t it interesting how quickly a politico can ‘duck-n-cover’, especially in an otherwise very trivial case of haircuts?

So what does a person do with a $400 haircut that can’t be done for $50?  $25?  Or even $9.99?

How can any of these people expect their constituents to take them seriously when their haircuts, THEIR HAIRCUTS!!, cost as much in a year as half the gross earnings of their voter block?  And shame on those voters who don’t ask the most basic of questions of these charlatans, that being:

How can you represent me and my needs in Washington DC? 

But then, this is cheap compared to the $2K plus Ms.Hillary (or more accurately, her ‘campaign’) shells out to make her ‘camera-ready’.  Is that what the Democrats learned from JFK, that it’s paramount to look good on TV?  Or was it simply that Dick Nixon looked bad, and JFK could do nothing but look better, comparatively speaking?  Honestly, if a politician wants to ask for your vote, and implores you to allow ‘em to represent you, in DC from your district, your state, or in the world from your country, ask them how being so detached from your daily reality of $10 hair care makes them qualified.

It’s time to bring sanity to US politics, starting with something as seemingly trivial as a simple hair cut.

worth clicking through

Get more from other resources:

http://housingpanic.blogspot.com/

 

There’s not a political machine, party, candidate, or platform that can alter this fiasco.

 

Hillary has it figured out

In a recent story, it seems Hillary now has the answer on how to implement Universal Healthcare (http://apnews.myway.com//article/20070326/D8O3RE081.html).  In her quest to take on approximately 14% of the national economy, she cites lessons learned from the first go-round, plus also noting that health care quality has diminished, more people are without coverage, and ‘the insurers deny coverage’.  State-run medicine will not happen in the US.  It’s puzzling that Hillary is continuing on this crusade.  She’s really not learned anything.  And the reason she’s got almost no real chance at getting elected President.

Hack.

Al Franken!?!?

WHY?

 

Honestly, WHY would rational thinking MN Democrats want to go down this path?  Are the pickings so slim for a viable Democrat to oppose the VERY BEATABLE Norm (Flip-Flop) Coleman that they have to go to a talk radio wonk and washed up comic?  He’s not even a satirist at this point.  There is no talent (as evidenced by the ‘discovery’ he did little or practically no research and not much more writing for his books.  He’s neither witty nor insightful, at best he’s a bit amateur politician and at worst he’s just another Patty Wetterling (ie., a candidate in WAY over their head, put forth into the contender’s role by a small-minded and out-dated caucus system, doomed to lose, not by much, but lose, to an otherwise VERY BEATABLE opponent who has NO BUSINESS being in DC).

 

Good grief people, what are you thinking?

 

Can’t we find anyone to step in, who’s not a ‘witty-type’, but someone who’s straight forward and focused?  Where’s Minnesota’s version of Jim Webb (the newly elected Senator from Virginia)? 

 

Where’s MN’s version of Barack Obama; Someone who can cut through and reach people and be a leader (not a poor comic trying to match witticisms with Rush)?

 

MN, we MUST do better than Al-Flippin’-Franken!!!  Coleman is waiting, WAITING to get plucked.  He’s so beatable it’s almost humorous.

 

His waffling is his biggest flaw, for sure.  His faux ‘Kennedy-esqe’ speech and manner is tired and old.  Pretty wife?  Who cares.  The guy is such a schill, he lost to Jesse Ventura, for heaven’s sake.  He’s been a Bush (actually Chaney) lap dog and liked it when it got him a seat.  His crusade against the UN and Kofi Anan were a joke and a smokescreen.  Now that Bush’s ratings are in the basement, Norm-y has taken to voting contrarian on smaller issues and light agendas, always point up a wet finger to check that moments prevailing political winds.

 

Enough of this guy, let him go have daily lunch with Rod Grams and they together talk about how they both were once a Senator from MN and figure out how they’re going to make in the business world.

 

---Hack

District 6 'Teenie-Bopper'

OMG, what an embarrassment!  Why didn’t Secret Service agents intervene?!?  It’s utterly disgraceful to the office that someone can act so unprofessional and even ‘Star-Struck’ at a SOTU address. 

 

All I can say to the Democrats of MN and District 6 is:

 

You have 21 months to pluck this mindless, school-girlish, low-hanging fruit from office.  This should not be that hard.  Just leave Ms. Wetterling at home, or she’s bound to embarrass us when Pres. Obama delivers his SOTU.

 

 

Keep them away...

As Mr.Obama continues to weigh the consequences and
trials of making a run for the Presidency, here's
hoping that he takes the approach of making this run
as the right person for the job.

Not the right person of color, but the right PERSON,
period.

If Mr.Obama turns this into a racial crusade, or
decides he needs to carry a torch, or allow polarizing
personalities (Sharpton, Jackson, or worst of all,
Oprah) to co-opt their agendas to his candidacy, he
will lose.

Mr. Obama carries an intelligence, common sense, and
eloquence the office sorely needs. He is legitimately
electable, as a person of America, with life
experiences that many citizens can relate to.

As a person who grew up with limited means, facing
obstacles many other Americans face, working to create
his own opportunities, and having the guts, brains,
and sometimes luck to capitalize on them makes him a
person everyone can relate to.

Just don't play the race card or focus on making
history. If he runs as a compelling, intelligent, and
common-sensical person, he has a legitimate chance to
be President. History will take care of itself.

Hack

____________________________________________________________________________________
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crying and whining...

Democrats have to abandon the whiny approach and the narrowly focused candidates and take the broad middle that’s ripe for the taking.  The Republicans have chosen to move further right and be completely taken over by the evangelicals.  The time is now to appeal to middle Americans who are fed up with insane spending on a futile conflict in the Middle East.  The Democrats have a golden opportunity to move to the center and inject common sense and impact domestic policies for generations, IF they can take the same “Morning in America” approach that worked so well for Reagan. 

 

Why take a page from the Reagan admin.?  It’s about separating our nation from troublesome and damaging events overseas (Reagan came in to help clear the messy slate of Iran hostage crisis).  We NEED to get out of Iraq.  We NEED to take the vast sums of national wealth being used for war and use it for R&D and infrastructure development for alternative energy systems for transportation, production, commerce, and home use.  The whole Iraq mess is turning out to be an endless circle of sectarian violence by and between organized and financed criminals who cloak themselves in religion for the purpose of recruiting suicidal youths.  Iraq is sitting on a virtual ocean of oil.  Who cares when automobiles run on corn, soybean, and switchgrass distillates or when electricity is provided by hydro, clean coal, wind, nuclear, and geothermal sources?

 

Time for the Democrats to speak intelligently about America’s post-oil future, to appeal to people who strive for self-determination, and make it the national calling to use the ‘war’ money for research and development.  It can’t get much more middle American than that.

 

MPO

 

MidTerm PostMortem

Dems put a “thumpin’” on Reps and Rep Incumbents.  It looked and sounded like a “vote against” rather than a “vote for”, it’ll be interesting to see how all these fresh faces handle the pressure to actually do what they campaigned to do.  But then, we’re talking about politicians, and even the most noble-hearted will find out just how glacier-paced things are inside the Beltway. 

 

Meanwhile, back home, I think it’s time for some recent candidates to step back and think about where they can make a difference in a forum where they might have a legitimate shot at getting elected, specifically Patty Wetterling.  The DFL has to rotate her out of the mix and suggest maybe she consider a mayor’s job in Sartell, a city council position in St.Cloud, or something far more local.  Honestly, anyone who saw 5 minutes of the TV debates should have come away thinking 2 things:

 

1)                   Bachmann was very beatable

2)                   Wetterling might be a sympathetic figure but she’s “deer-in-headlights” CLUELESS.

 

The other ‘dude’, not a factor (IP’s, you also might want to bring more candidates that are unique, not “Democrat-lite”, seriously.

 

Wetterling might be a ‘nice’ person, and it’s easy for any parent to feel for anyone who’s lost a child, especially in the inexplicably horrific way she lost hers, but while a tragedy might spur people to action, they should consider doing it where they could get something done, and a national office is NOT for someone who might be a sweet Midwestern woman who has endured a great deal but is ill-equipped to deal with national (and especially international) policies.  That should have been obvious in the first 3 minutes of her time speaking during the TV debates.

 

Bachmann was very beatable.  A more capable, intelligent, eloquent, and savvy candidate would have been able to fold, spindle, and mutilate another evangelical bobo, especially with the DC page scandal, the Ted Haggard fiasco (way to go, Teddy, way to stand in there, for your candidates, your flock (fleeced as it is), and worst off, your kids, who now have a HYPOCRITE for a dad; jerk-off!), and anything remotely aligning with “W” and the gang.  Bachmann was low-hanging fruit, and a better candidate would have rendered this hopelessly narcissistic shadow immediately to the 35% / useless category of 2^nd place finishers on Tuesday. 

 

Instead, we had to figure out what to do with an IP candidate who blew “Dem-lite”, an IR candidate literally sitting on a tee, waiting to get tee’d up, and clueless housewife with no business being in the race.

 

Can’t the DEMs find anyone to run, they have to try to play the sympathy card?  Lots of smart, eloquent, and common-sense people ran and won seats for Dems, how come they couldn’t here?

 

We have 2 years to figure out how to put Bachmann back in Washington County where she needs to stay, and find somebody who’s going to be a compelling voice for the 6^th district, not a schill for the tiresome evangelicals or a dundering “gee-whiz, I’m in politics” amateur with no skills.

 

OPM

 

First Muslim elected to House - BFD*

*(BFD stands for Big F*king Deal).

 

Honestly, was there fanfare when the first Jew, Catholic, Black, Woman, Physically-Challenged, etc. person was elected?  OK, maybe, but it’s America here, and anyone of any stripe elected to office will undergo the same scrutiny, meaning that, while Mr. Ellison was able to get himself elected, he will be watched, and in this day and age, things can turn faster than you can say “Carolyn Moseley Braun” and turn a “rising star” into a one-term fluke.  (The link is the most recent info on a true political COMET, and one of the first Oprah puppets.  Oprah got smart and started betting on another horse named Barak Obama, but that’s grist for another post). 

 

So Mr. Ellison, who has gone from a non-descript Catholic kid to “fiery follow of Farrakhan” while attending Wayne St. U, has scrubbed himself clean enough to dupe the gullible white-guilt / limousine liberal crowd, will be going to DC.  It’s funny, the transformation from bland, suburban kid to campus firebrand to Congress.  But then, we’re talking about ultra-liberal 5^th district, which is chuck-full of easily duped white-guilt suburban-reared college kids, “artists”, and the mindless disciples of community “leaders”, where they tend to vote a person in 19+ times for near-40-year terms (term limits, PLEASE!!!). 

 

So what about being the first Muslim.  Well, it’s probably nothing.  Why?  He will get as much done as anyone else who starts to project themselves outside the mainstream, and if you don’t have a caucus, you don’t have squat!  He’ll last exactly one-term if we read too much about him.  Therefore, he’s going to blend into the DC woodwork, be a team player, be more Catholic than Muslim, and do the things that help a career-politician get re-elected 18 more times.  In the 5^th district, that’s the blueprint.

 

POM

Minnesota's Own Dan Quayle

Congratulations to DFL Lt.Gov. Candidate Judi (E85) Dutcher for stepping into the political cow pie, a la Dan Quayle, and botching the E85 query by the rural newsnick. E85, must be a quiz bowl question...good one, Jud-i. When the biggest builder of ethanol plants in the upper midwest, the nation, and maybe even the world, is literally 2 hours west of the Twin Cities, and you don't get E85? and you want to "govern" this state?!? You are the Dan Quayle of MN politics, and since the Lt. Gov. position is probably the most toothless political office in the state, you're going to be OK, win or lose.

---

No banners. No pop-ups. No kidding.
Make My Way your home on the Web - http://www.myway.com

funny if it wasn't so scary

Tell me this guy is the funniest dictator on the face of the Earth right now?

 

 

 

Like some Elvis-impersonator in a cheesy Bangkok Revue…Why hasn’t the US already dispatched of this crackpot? 

 

MPO

 

Oil and Politics ALWAYS mix

Oil prices are acting funny.

 

Why?

 

Well, have you noticed the drop in oil prices? They have plunged from $77 per barrel to about $63 in a matter of weeks.

Have Americans suddenly given up their SUVs? Are all the airlines grounded? Is China saying “no thanks” to the modern age?

 

Nope.

 

In reality, only one thing has changed.  The mid-term elections are approaching......and the Republicans don’t want to blow it.

The Republicans? What am I talking about? For sure, George W. Bush is an old-time oil guy, but the Republicans don’t really control the world’s oil supply, do they?

Not exactly, but they do have lots of influential friends.

 

If you think the world’s power elite play fair......then you’ll certainly dismiss what I’m saying.

You believe that everything’s on the up and up. See all the cards on the table. And take everything at its face value.

If — on the other hand — you have a sneaking suspicion that people sometimes play loose with the truth, then I suggest you read on.

 

What you'll learn today can help you in the months ahead.

 

Protecting common interests

I’m sure you’ve heard talk of the “new world order.”  A shadowy cabal of power brokers, who pull all the most-important strings from Washington to Beijing.

Does this secret society really exist? I don’t think so — not quite in the way that novelists and really out-there conspiracy theorists would tell it.

But — and this is critically important — you’d be naïve to think that life’s fair; and that powerful figures and groups never “get together” to protect their common interests.

Of course they do. Manipulation is key to those in power staying in power.

 

One small example: The Federal Reserve usually assumes a more accommodative stance on interest rates around election time. (Like now, as the Fed has “paused” its hikes.)

Simply put, that benefits the party in power. And while the Fed is supposed to be an independent body, when it comes to power helping power, it’s not. That’s how the world works.

And today, power is helping power to keep the Democrats from gaining control of Congress.

 

Watch gasoline prices

They’re down a bunch in recent weeks and headed still lower in the weeks to come.  The average guy on the street knows little about politics, the inner workings of government or the role of the power elite.

Most of them are just pissed off.  About the mess in Iraq, for sure. But Joe Smith from Sunnydale really mutters when he pulls up to the pump, and gas prices are sitting at $3.35 per gallon. And angry voters take it out on the guys in charge.  The entities that want to keep the Republicans in power — or gain some sort of gridlock, at worst — know that.  They also know that none of the big issues, like Iraq, are going away overnight. But it’s funny how fast oil and gas prices can fall when “they” put their minds to it.

 

Friends in the Middle East

Well, not quite friends, but people with common interests.  It’s a story of two Middle Easts, in truth.  One — the world of stone-age tribal mayhem — gets all the press. The other — as personified by capitalistic boom times in Dubai — gets little.  There are many rich power brokers in the Arab world who fear the terrorist scum as much as we do. And they believe the Republicans, led by George Bush, are better terror fighters than the Democrats.  Saudi Arabia, in particular, is nervous about any change.  Oil and gasoline prices are down, because supplies are up. Saudi Arabia is the world’s biggest producer of crude. To me, it looks like powerful people taking care of common interests.

 

What a coincidence

You’ve probably heard about the “enormous” new oil find in the Gulf of Mexico.  Chevron’s deep field — nearly six miles beneath the ocean — may hold up to 15 million barrels of oil.

Interesting timing on this announcement — pre-election. And another reason why oil and gas prices are — temporarily — down.  Of course, that’s just a coincidence, right? After all, the Republican party and Big Oil hold no common interests. No, of course not — and I taught Tiger Woods everything he knows.  (What they’re not telling you — it’d spoil the pre-election buzz: This find is a drop in the bucket — like a few months supply at today’s global consumption rate.)

 

So what does this mean to you?

First off, don’t take anything at face value.  Oil traders are using this pre-election oil dip as a trading opportunity to take some profits off the table. Long-term, most are still energy bulls.

Secondly, this pre-election “rub my back and I’ll rub yours” power trip is creating new risks and new opportunities in today’s stock market.

 

As a very accomplished political hack (and a former governor of Minnesota) once put it, “Follow the Money.”

 

MPO