MEINE SACHEN

[dothedd]

Unions: Destroying America, Unearthing the Beast

History has a habit of repeating itself, and yet our politicians seem to ignore it. As you can see, the unions destroyed the American auto industry, and yet the Democrats want to do away with the secret ballot and replace it with a card check system so the unions can increase in all industries. There is no doubt that this is what they wish to do while destroying the auto industry by the unions is still fresh in their minds. Can you just imagine the retail industry, food industry, medical industry, gas stations, and all sorts of industries being controlled and destroyed by the unions? I doubt very much if even that would cause dismay to the Democrats. They would just want to bail out those unions and keep the circle of nefarious actions in place.

CONTINUED:

forgottoask.com/unions-destroying-america-unearthing-the-beast/

[dothedd]

Niall Ferguson Harvard History Professor tells it like it is!

Harvard's Niall Ferguson Schools Her on Muslim Brotherhood and Caliphate



Someone didn’t do his/her homework and allowed brilliant Harvard historian Niall Ferguson to deviate from the script he was handed at MSNBC. This is surely a one-off and a mistake they won’t allow to be repeated. I urge you to enjoy this precious video now, before the dumbstruck folks on Morning Joe recover and MSNBC has it taken down.

[tyfighter3]

Nobody had any comebacks on him what so ever. It was GREAT.

[dothedd]

Morning Ty,

Been up most of the night setting in my "safe room". BAD weather, very BAD WEATHER and more on the way, so they say.

Didn't you just love Niall Ferguson ... I think they were in shock that he had the facts and all they had was the script handed to them by the network.

Thanks for posting your thread! I have some news to post before I can focus on it. GO NOG!

Looks like GOLD is up. Too much bad news worldwide for it to go very far south anytime soon.

Have a GREAT day!

barb

[dothedd]

Angels........
............as explained By Children.

I only know the names of two angels, Hark and Harold.
Gregory, age 5


Everybody's got it all wrong. Angels don't wear halos anymore. I forget why, but scientists are working on it
-Olive, age 9


It's not easy to become an angel! First, you die. Then you go to Heaven, and then there's still the flight training to go through. And then you got to agree to wear those ang el clothes.
-Matthew, age 9


Angels work for God and watch over kids when God has to go do something else.
-Mitchell, age 7

My guardian angel helps me with math, but he's not much good for science. ;
-Henry, age 8

Angels don't eat, but they drink milk from Holy Cows!!!
-Jack, age 6

Angels talk all the way while they're flying you up
to heaven. The main subject is where you went wrong before you got dead.
Daniel, age 9


When an angel gets mad, he takes a deep breath and counts to ten.
And when he lets out his breath again, somewhere there's a tornado.
-Reagan, age 10

Angels have a lot to do and they keep very busy. If you lose a tooth, an angel comes in through your window and leaves money under your pillow. Then when it gets cold, angels go south for the winter.
-Sara, age 6


Angels live in cloud houses made by God and his son, who's a very good carpenter.
-Jared, age 8


All angels are girls because they gotta wear dresses and boys didn't go for it.
-Antonio, age 9

My angel is my grandma who died last year. She got a big head start on helping me while she was still down here on earth.
-Ashley ~ age 9


Some of the angels are in charge of helping heal sick animals and pets. And if they don't make the animals get better, they help the child get over it.
- Vicki , age 8


What I don't get about angels is why, when someone is in love, they shoot arrows at them.
- Sarah , age 7

..No One Say's it Better Than A Child.......

[dothedd]

ANALYSIS - Japan crisis a blow to GE, reactor design an issue


BOSTON | Thu Mar 17, 2011 3:20am IST

BOSTON (Reuters) - The crisis at a Japanese nuclear plant that uses General Electric Co built reactors following last week's disastrous earthquake and tsunami is a reputational black eye that could badly hurt its efforts to grow its nuclear business.

But the largest U.S. conglomerate does not face much direct legal risk due to Japanese laws channeling liability to plant operators and the government, rather than equipment suppliers, and a drop in demand for nuclear reactors could boost demand for gas turbines, coal plants and other GE-made equipment.

"You do have reputational damage any time you have a company like GE associated with a massive disaster, a nuclear incident, that is a terrible thing. But from a strict liability perspective, the issues are extremely limited," said Steven Winoker, an analyst at Bernstein Research.

GE wholly built one of the six reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant that has been in a state of crisis since being hit by a massive earthquake and tsunami last week, and it built two others jointly with Toshiba Corp. Toshiba built two on its own and Hitachi Ltd built one.

Failures at the plant sent low levels of radiation 150 miles (241.4 km) south to Tokyo this week, triggering shock across the population and prompting the head of Russia's state nuclear corporation to say a "worst case scenario" was approaching.

"This is an incredibly fluid situation," said James Acton, associate in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "The plant is so far beyond what it was designed to do. The only thing predictable is the unpredictability of all this."


DESIGN CRITICIZED

The design of the GE-built reactor, and particularly the Mark I containment unit that is supposedly designed to ensure that radioactive material did not escape, has drawn criticism.

One unusual characteristic of the Fukushima facility involves the spent fuel pools -- where fuel rods are held to cool down after they are moved from the reactor but before they are sent to long-term storage. At the Fukushima site, the fuel pools stand over the the reactors, which means there is a possibility they can spill radioactive material onto the reactors if there is a major accident, one expert said.

"It was done for convenience at a time 40 years ago when convenience as a design criteria was more significant than the safety issues," said Robin Grimes, head of the center for nuclear engineering at Imperial College in London. "It's the only reactor built in that way that I know of. It was a poor decision and we are living with the results of that poor decision. It's a really odd design."


Former GE engineer David Bridenbaugh, who resigned 35 years ago over concerns that the containment system was not strong enough, this week told reporters it had "not been designed to withstand the loads" of a large-scale accident.

Still, he acknowledged that Friday's magnitude 9 earthquake and tsunami went beyond the risks engineers had anticipated.

"I feel sorry for the guys over there trying to handle that thing," said Bridenbaugh, who is now retired, said in a phone interview on Tuesday.

"On the other hand you can't say the Fukushima situation is a direct result of the Mark 1 containment. It is a direct result of the earthquake, tsunami and the fact the Mark 1 containment is less forgiving than some of the other reactor versions."


GE's competitors in the nuclear industry include France's Areva, Toshiba and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.


GE SAYS HAS MODIFIED DESIGNS

For its part GE, which has installed 90 nuclear reactors worldwide and is also the world's largest maker of electric turbines and jet engines, said it has updated existing reactors to improve their safety.

"Over the past four decades, the Mark I has been modified in the form of retrofits to address technology improvements and changing regulatory requirements," GE said in a statement on its GEReports.com Web site.

Sixteen nuclear power plants in the United States operate reactors with a similar containment system.

GE shares have lost 5 percent of their value since the quake, amid a broad drop driven by investor worry over the Japan situation.

Some GE analysts and shareholders described the selling as overdone, given that GE's nuclear business -- which is now housed in a joint venture with Hitachi, represents a small part of its portfolio.

The GE-Hitachi nuclear joint venture generates about $1 billion in annual revenue through maintenance on existing plants and fuel sales. GE has not built a new nuclear power plant in more than a decade -- indeed one reason it joined forces with Hitachi in 2007 was because Hitachi had more current experience in plant construction.

"It's emotional at this point, I think, as opposed to financial, said Peter Klein, portfolio manager at Fifth Third Asset Management, who holds GE shares. "This is a negative in an otherwise expanding worldwide economy."

[dothedd]

What You Need to Know About the Market This Spring

By David Sterman

Created 03/16/2011 - 14:40

The stage is being set for the next bull market as the United States moves onto firmer footing. Read on to learn what you need to know about the market this spring.

As impressive as the stock market looked when it is was rising ever higher in 2009 and 2010, recent trading action has been even more impressive. Sure, the S&P 500 has gone nowhere for the past six weeks, but it has hung in there despite a series of shocks that would have derailed a more fragile stock market. Rising oil prices? The earthquake in Japan? Tensions in the Middle East? The seeming intractability of the European economic crisis? Nothing can dent the armor. This bull is robust.

But it's also important not to get complacent. The market has been resilient thus far, but with the foundation taking so many hits, it may not take much more to cause the edifice to tumble. When that happens, stocks are finally likely to pull back in a meaningful fashion. Not necessarily a snarling bear market, mind you, but perhaps a 10% to 20% correction.

The good news: that could set the stage for the next bull market as the United States moves onto firmer footing. So what could finally knock the legs out from under this current bull market?
Budget wrangling gets more heated. Congress is working on continued stopgap funding bills as the two parties remain far apart on some very important issues. At some point, the appetite for more short-term funding bills may vanish and we may see another government shutdown as we had in 1995.

The market would be disrupted by such a move, as investors hate uncertainty. Yet an opposing outcome may also be true. If bipartisan legislators finally make headway and come up with a budget fix, investors will soon realize that a combination of lower spending and higher taxes is a real drag for the economy. Deficits are loathsome, but they have stimulated the economy as the government spends more than it takes in. Deficit cutting means the government is pulling money out of the economy.

[Read: 17 Shocking Statistics About the National Debt You'll Wish You Didn't Know]
Troubling inflation numbers. There's a building debate about whether food and energy should be used to assess monthly price trends. Some consider these "non-core" items to play too important a role in consumer behavior to be ignored. And if recent agriculture and oil price trends are any indication, expect to see a spike in inflation in coming months, at least when these "non-core" items are included.

For many investors, the specter of rising prices would signal an end to the era of ultra-low interest rates. Economists predict the Federal Reserve will start raising rates next January, but if the U.S. economy looks healthier in coming reports, that start date could happen sooner. Investors look ahead and they'd prepare for the start of rate hikes before they actually happen.

[Read: 3 Simple Ways Everyone Can Hedge Against Inflation]
The end of QE2. The Fed's massive $600 billion bond buyback program has been great -- for investors. Some believe that was the primary catalyst for the strong stock gains posted from September 2010 through the end of January 2011, as freed-up cash went into stock purchases. That program is almost completed and now the Fed has to decide when to withdraw that $600 billion from the economy. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke has signaled that he's in no hurry, but many investors may not wait around, noting that all QE2-related gains have already been made anyway.

[Read: A Primer on Quantitative Easing: What Is It and Will It Save the Economy?]
China, Japan and the Gulf. Events in any of these areas could alter the course of global trade and U.S. investors would surely be affected. China is trying to cool down a heated economy but also faces pressures that may cool the economy even faster than government planners would like. Social pressures remain just below the surface but may erupt if the Chinese economy sharply slows.

Japan's devastating earthquake is presumed to have a minimal effect on the rest of the world, as evidenced by the fact that the S&P 500 fell just 0.6% on Monday, March 14. Yet, Japanese institutions play such a key role in global financial markets -- including the United States -- and if funds get withdrawn to shore up rebuilding efforts, then the liquidity impact could create a vortex for the U.S. market.

Lastly, major OPEC players are maintaining output right now, but any further political destabilization among key regional players could create even more upward pressure on oil prices. The U.S. economy may be hard-pressed to handle $120 or $130 oil.

[Read: 10 Facts About China You Won't Believe (But You Should)]
Despite the gloomy nature of these scenarios, the U.S. economy is likely to be quite stronger than a few years ago. That's why a market correction may not be long-lasting. But in the near-term, there are many reasons to be cautious about U.S. stocks and you may want to take profits in some of your most profitable investments.

[dothedd]

His name was Fleming, and he was a poor Scottish farmer. One day, while trying to make a living for his family, he heard a cry for help coming from a nearby bog. He dropped his tools and ran to the bog.

There, mired to his waist in black muck, was a terrified boy, screaming and struggling to free himself. Farmer Fleming saved the lad from what could have been a slow and terrifying death...

The next day, a fancy carriage pulled up to the Scotsman's sparse surroundings. An elegantly dressed nobleman stepped out and introduced himself as the father of the boy Farmer Fleming had saved.

'I want to repay you,' said the nobleman. 'You saved my son's life.'

'No, I can't accept payment for what I did,' the Scottish farmer replied waving off the offer. At that moment, the farmer's own son came to the door of the family hovel.

'Is that your son?' the nobleman asked.

'Yes,' the farmer replied proudly.

'I'll make you a deal. Let me provide him with the level of education my own son will enjoy If the lad is anything like his father, he'll no doubt grow to be a man we both will be proud of.' And that he did.

Farmer Fleming's son attended the very best schools and in time, graduated from St. Mary's Hospital Medical School in London, and went on to become known throughout the world as the noted Sir Alexander Fleming, the discoverer of Penicillin.

Years afterward, the same nobleman's son who was saved from the bog was stricken with pneumonia.

What saved his life this time? Penicillin.

The name of the nobleman? Lord Randolph Churchill .. His son's name?

Sir Winston Churchill.

Someone once said: What goes around comes around.

Work like you don't need the money.

Love like you've never been hurt.

Dance like nobody's watching.

Sing like nobody's listening.

Live like it's Heaven on Earth.



May you alway walk in sunshine.
May you never want for more.
May Irish angels rest their wings right beside your door.




May your pockets be heavy and your heart be light.
May good luck pursue you each morning and night.




May the road rise to meet you,
May the wind be always at your back,
May the sun shine warm upon your face,
The rains fall soft upon your fields and,
Until we meet again,
May God hold you in the palm of His hand.

[tyfighter3]

Here is some sunshine for you Barb. 4 stocks that every body should own, BEXP, NOG, WLL, CLR.

[dothedd]

TY...

I got back into NOG at an opportune time as you suggested. GE, NOG, and NVAX are currently my only longs.

I've been flipping GLD, PNC and FSLR. I'm out and waiting for re-entries.

What a nightmare in Japan!!! THE WORLD'S IN CHAOS! It's not looking good for the next generations. These are the times I am glad I don't have children. I know you too must be concerned.

I'm going to send you a couple of e-mail links via hotmail, so be looking for them this afternoon.

HAPPY INVESTING!

barb

[dothedd]

Tokyo Warns About Water, Japan Bids to Calm Radiation Fears

By Pavel Alpeyev and Jason Clenfield - Mar 23, 2011 2:38 PM ET

Levels of iodine-131 in Tokyo’s tap water jumped to 210 Becquerels per kilogram yesterday morning, the city official said. The recommended limit is 300 for adults and 100 for infants. Photographer: Tomohiro Ohsumi/Bloomberg

Intake water is stored in a tank at Tokyo Metropolitan Water Works Bureau's Asaka Water Purification Plant, in Asaka City. Photographer: Tomohiro Ohsumi/Bloomberg

Shelves sit emptied of bottled water at a convenience store in Tokyo, on March 13, 2011. Photographer: Haruyoshi Yamaguchi/Bloomberg

An aerial photograph of the earthquake-damaged Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power complex in Fukushima prefecture, Japan. Tokyo’s tap water may be unsafe for infants though Japan’s government offered assurances that radiation from a disabled nuclear facility detected in the food chain doesn’t pose a health threat.

Radioactive iodine levels taken yesterday at a treatment facility in Katsushika ward were double the recommended limit for babies, a city official said in a televised briefing. The water would pose a health risk if drunk over the long term, such as a year, he said. Tokyo’s population is estimated to be about 13 million people.

Disclosures of rising contamination, coupled with assurances that risks are minimal, underscore the government’s struggle to contain the ripple effects of a magnitude-9 earthquake and tsunami on March 11 that crippled a nuclear facility north of Tokyo. Japanese stocks extended declines after Tokyo issued the water advisory, with the Nikkei 225 (NKY) Stock Average falling 1.7 percent to close at 9,449.47 yesterday.

“It’s hard to tell people they’re ingesting radiation in any way that won’t provoke a panic,” said Jeff Kingston, director of Asian Studies at Temple University’s Tokyo campus. “But the government has been far more transparent than in any case I can recall.”

More Leaks Possible
The Health Ministry advised against eating leafy vegetables, broccoli and cauliflower produced near the stricken Dai-Ichi power plant, located 220 kilometers (135 miles) from Tokyo. The degree of contamination detected isn’t harmful, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said at a Tokyo briefing. While parents shouldn’t use tap water to mix baby formula, it can be drunk safely by adults and children, he said.

In Vienna, International Atomic Energy Agency spokesman Graham Andrew told reporters there is “no overall significant risk to human health” for most of Japan. Risks for workers at the Fukushima plant site remain “acute,” radiation expert Rethy Chen said.

Engineers were evacuated from the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors yesterday after grayish smoke was seen rising from one of the buildings, said Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman for the Japan Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency. There have been no reports so far of increased radiation levels, he said.

Tokyo Electric Power Co., the plant operator, is attempting to restore electricity to the reactors, which need a constant flow of coolant to prevent nuclear fuel from overheating and emitting radiation. The maximum reading reported so far at the site is 500 millisieverts per hour, meaning a worker in the vicinity would receive the maximum recommended lifetime dose in 30 minutes.

Fallout in Iceland
Changing weather systems will drive radiation released from the Fukushima plant inland on March 25 and 26, Austria’s Meteorological and Geophysics Center said, citing a United Nations group’s data. Wind is carrying radioactive cesium and iodine nuclides over the Pacific Ocean. Radiation detection instruments have found fallout as far away as Iceland, though in trace amounts that don’t threaten human health, the center said.

Shoppers in the basement of the Marunouchi Building next to Tokyo station crowded around big-screen televisions to listen to news on the water advisory. One woman in the Meidi-ya supermarket filled a basket with bottled water.

Levels of iodine-131 in Tokyo’s tap water rose to 210 Becquerels per kilogram (2.2 pounds), the Tokyo city official said. The recommended limit is 300 for adults and 100 for infants.

Empty-Handed
“One of my friends sent me a text message about the news of water contamination and told me not to let my baby drink tap water,” Chiho Hasunuma, 26, who has a 5-month-old infant, said by phone. “Then my mother rushed to supermarkets and convenience stores to find mineral water as we didn’t have any stock at home, but she came back empty-handed.”

At Onahama port, Fukushima, about 50 kilometers south of the nuclear facility, some Tepco workers are getting their first hot meals and bed rest since the quake aboard a docked schooner.

Kenji Kawada, a 52-year-old engineer with 30 years of service at the company, said there was a sense at the site that the situation was improving. “Everyone is working very hard,” he said.

The death toll from Japan’s worst postwar disaster climbed to 9,452 yesterday, with 14,715 people missing, according to the National Police Agency in Tokyo. The earthquake and tsunami devastated the country’s northern coastline and forced several hundred thousand people to evacuate.

Shipments Halted
Five kinds of radioactive materials released by damaged fuel rods were detected in the adjacent sea, including iodine- 131, cesium-134 and cobalt, according to Tepco. Radiation in food is measured in Becquerel, a gauge of the strength of radioactivity in those materials. The prescribed safe limit for I-131 in vegetables is set at 2,000 Becquerels per kilogram and 500 per kilogram for radioactive cesium.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan ordered a halt to shipments of leafy vegetables from Fukushima prefecture. He also stopped shipments of milk and parsley from neighboring Ibaraki.

“There is definitely a public perception aspect to it,” said Slim Dins dale, a food safety consultant based in Norwich, England. “With radiation, you can’t see it, you can’t smell it and it’s known to cause cancer.”
www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-22/nuclear-plant-s-fuel-rods-damaged-leaking-into-sea-tokyo-electric-says.html

[dothedd]

Madison’s Abandoned Nuclear Power Plant at Marble Hill

by Tony K. on December 21, 2009

Is there a neuclear power plant in Madison Indiana?

Short answer is yes, but it was never fully operational. After spending billions of dollars, the nuclear power facility was shut down. Local residents feared a nuclear disaster could happen here in Madison. The project was killed and the nuclear plant is now a ghost facility. Watch the video then keep reading for the full story about what happened to the power plant.

The Marble Hill Story, Told by Indiana Public Radio

madisonindiana.us/madisons-abandoned-nuclear-power-plant/

NO NEW NUKES!

[dothedd]

Marxism in America Lt. Gen. (Ret.) W.G. "Jerry" Boykin Tuesday, March 3, 2015

www.morningstartv.com/oak-initiative/marxism-america

[dothedd]

Cha Ching!!!

LightPath Technologies Inc. (LPTH)

[jarhead1976]

Mar 23, 2011 17:21:24 GMT -5 dothedd said:

Marxism in America Lt. Gen. (Ret.) W.G. "Jerry" Boykin Tuesday, March 3, 2015

www.morningstartv.com/oak-initiative/marxism-america

Karma, dothedd that was an excellent video for an open society..

[dothedd]

Thanks, JH ... I thought so too!

Below is a link to an interesting website I found while Googling another subject:

www.japanfocus.org/-Andrew-DeWit/3501

Peruse the top ten articles; some interesting items you don't learn in the classroom.

Hope you're having a good day, and thank you for dropping by!



Karma for you for finding your way to NOVAVAX!

[dothedd]

P.S. This site looks fabulous in PowerBoard Blue ....

[dothedd]

Things That Are Not In the U.S. Constitution

www.usconstitution.net/constnot.html

[dothedd]

US Department of State - Diplomacy in Action

2009 Human Rights Report: Introduction

BUREAU OF DEMOCRACY, HUMAN RIGHTS, AND LABOR
2009 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices
March 11, 2010

Introduction to the 2009 Country Reports
2009 was a year of contrasts. It was a year in which ethnic, racial, and religious tensions led to violent conflicts and serious human rights violations and fueled or exacerbated more than 30 wars or internal armed conflicts. At the same time, it was a year in which the United States and other governments devoted greater attention to finding ways to acknowledge and combat these underlying tensions through showing leadership in advancing respect for universal human rights, promoting tolerance, combating violent extremism, and pursuing peaceful solutions to long-standing conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere. As President Obama said in his June speech at Cairo University, we should be defined not by our differences but rather by our common humanity, and we should find ways to work in partnership with other nations so that all people achieve justice and prosperity.

2009 also was a year in which more people gained greater access than ever before to more information about human rights through the Internet, cell phones, and other forms of connective technologies. Yet at the same time it was a year in which governments spent more time, money, and attention finding regulatory and technical means to curtail freedom of expression on the Internet and the flow of critical information and to infringe on the personal privacy rights of those who used these rapidly evolving technologies.

Today, all governments grapple with the difficult questions of what are appropriate policies and practices in response to legitimate national security concerns and how to strike the balance between respecting human rights and fundamental freedoms and ensuring the safety of their citizens. That said, during the past year, many governments applied overly broad interpretations of terrorism and emergency powers as a basis for limiting the rights of detainees and curtailing other basic human rights and humanitarian law protections. They did so even as the international community continued to make tangible progress in isolating and weakening the leadership in violent extremist and terrorist groups such as al-Qa’ida.

This report explores these and other trends and developments and provides a specific, detailed picture of human rights conditions in 194 countries around the world. The U.S. Government has compiled these reports for the past 34 years pursuant to a requirement placed on the U.S. executive by law in part to help the U.S. Congress inform its work in assessing requests for U.S. foreign military and economic assistance, as well as to set trade policies and U.S. participation in the multilateral development banks and other financial institutions. The reason for publishing this report is to develop a full, factual record that can help U.S. policymakers to make intelligent and well-informed policy decisions. It has also been increasingly used by policymakers abroad and has become a core reference document for governments, intergovernmental organizations, and concerned citizens throughout the world.

Note: A very interesting read on the following link:

www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2009/frontmatter/135936.htm

[dothedd]

Office of the Attorney General – State of New York

www.ag.ny.gov/media_center/2010/nov/nov30a_10.html

[dothedd]

The Effect of Police Officer Confidence on Officer Injuries and Excessive Force Complaints

June 12, 2000

Introduction
The fundamental mission of government is the protection of its citizens. As the most visible arm of government, law enforcement officers are on the front line in the fight to protect citizens from harm, and to preserve public order. To attain this goal, society grants police officers authority unique in civil government, that of controlling the behavior of their fellow citizens. In the most direct way, and on a daily basis, police officers are engaged in the control and management of the behavior of other members of society.

Continued:
www.sashley.com/articles/effectofpoliceofficerconfidence.htm

[dothedd]

LIBERAL MYTH NO. 1:
The Jews stole the land from the Palestinians.

REFUTATION:
No, they didn't. After the Romans cleared out and decimated the mighty cities built by Jews like King Herod, Palestine was an arid, sparsely populated backwater that was eventually claimed (for land bridge reasons) by the Ottoman Empire, then by the British Empire. Jews have lived in the region continuously for well over 2,000 years. The British found themselves overseeing an indigenous population made up of Jews and Arabs-and sometimes Arab Jews. All were referred to as "Palestinians."

Ownership of the land was a patch work. Much of the land was owned by absentee landlords who lived in places like Egypt, and farmed by local Arab Palestinians. This may have made many Palestinians believe it was "their land," but sorry, that just wasn't the case. As the Zionist movement gained traction in the early 1900s, Jews around the world contributed to a fund to buy up tranches of land, and much of the land for the future Jewish state envisioned by the early Zionists was acquired this way.

Once again, the poor Arabs living on and farming the land may not have been happy to give up the land they lived on, but it was not "stolen from them," because they didn't own it to begin with.

[dothedd]

Housing Policies Backfire
By PAUL SPERRY, INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY
Posted 03/31/2011 06:01 PM ET

Blacks and Hispanics have lost much of the housing gains they made during the Clinton and Bush administration campaigns to boost minority homeownership, new census numbers show.

As a result, the "mortgage gap" between minorities and whites is almost as wide as it was two decades ago, when Washington launched a crusade to close it.

The black homeownership rate plunged in 2010 to a 13-year low of 45% from a housing bubble peak of 49%. The share of Latinos owning a home fell to 48% from a high of 50%. While also down, the rate for whites stood at 74%. Analysts expect rates to keep falling in 2011 and beyond.

"We're definitely heading back down to the bottom, especially when you look at minorities," said Melissa Kresin, a Census Bureau researcher. With home foreclosures and vacancies up again this year, "it's not looking great."

Sadly, affordable-housing policies have backfired on the groups they were designed to help.

In 1995, President Clinton unveiled his National Homeown ership Strategy to push black homeownership above 50%. After he pressured banks and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to ease lending rules for low-income minorities, black ownership rates shot up to record levels.

The media at the time attributed the growth to the "first real enforcement of the Community Reinvestment Act," an anti-discrimination law regulating mortgage lending. "Our homeownership strategy will not cost the taxpayers one extra cent," Clinton promised during a White House ceremony attended by Acorn officials.

From Lima To A Loan

President Bush poured fuel on the subprime fire that Clinton lit with his own program tar geting Hispanic immigrants. In 2001, he challenged the housing industry to help add 5.5 million minority homeowners over the decade. He worked to "dismantle barriers" to Latinos qualifying for mortgages, such as bilingual education and a lack of down payments.

"You can imagine somebody newly arrived from Peru looking at all that print and saying, 'I'm not sure I can possibly understand that,'" Bush said. He urged Fannie and Freddie to continue Clinton-era programs "to help deserving families who have bad credit qualify for home loans."

Due in large part to these policies, minorities accounted for nearly half the growth in homeownership from 1995 to 2005, a Harvard University study found.

The artificially induced demand fed a subprime bubble that eventually burst. As home prices cratered, minority ownership rates proved unsustainable.

By pushing uncreditworthy minorities into homes they ultimately could not afford, the government did them no favors. The "revolution in affordable housing," as HUD called it in 2004, made victims of the very people it was intended to help — the underprivileged.

[dothedd]

Friday, April 1st 2011 - 00:03 UTC

G20 leaders closer on agreeing greater global role for Chinese currency

G20 leaders have moved towards agreeing that China's currency should have a wider role in global finance. The G20 is to study whether to include the Chinese Yuan within the basket of currencies that make up the IMF Special Drawing Right.

The Special Drawing Right, or SDR, is a quasi currency used within the IMF by its member countries. Some economists believe the SDR could one day become a global reserve currency alongside the US dollar.

Speaking on Thursday at the G20 summit in Nanjing, French President Nicolas Sarkozy suggested that given the importance of emerging economies such as China to global growth, their currencies should be added to the SDR basket.

“Without rules and supervision, the world runs the risk of being condemned to increasingly serious and severe crises,” said President Sarkozy. “It is clear that we must evolve toward a more flexible exchange rate system that will allow us to withstand shocks,” he added.

His comments were backed by US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner who said he supported a change to SDR composition.

“Over time, we believe that currencies of large economies heavily used in international trade and financial transactions should become a part of the SDR basket,” he said.

However, Mr Geithner said that for this to happen, governments would have to loosen their control of currencies.

“To achieve this objective, the concerned countries should have flexible exchange rate systems, independent central banks and permit the free movement of capital flows,” he said. Mr Geithner said tight control of currency pricing by some countries was hurting the global economy.

French finance minister Christine Lagarde also suggested that any move to include the Yuan within the SDR basket would involve conditions being placed upon the Chinese authorities.

“We discussed the conditions that apply to belonging to the SDR basket and in particular we focused on the convertibility and flexibility of the currency and the relative independence of the central bank,” she said.

The US and other developed nations have been critical of China's exchange rate policy.

There have been repeated calls for China to let the value of the Yuan appreciate against the US dollar. It has been accused of keeping the value of the yuan artificially low in order to help its exporters. Beijing has maintained that a sudden appreciation of its currency will be detrimental not only for its export sector but for its overall economy.

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ONE MAN'S OPINION:

April 4, 2011

The big news Friday was a 200,000 increase in non-farm payrolls. The unemployment rate actually declined in the face of new people entering into the job market, rather than people giving up on finding a job.

While this was welcome news, it was offset by the fact that wages were flat. Subtract consumer inflation, and wages actually fell in real terms. The situation is even worse if you properly weight energy and food inflation, which the Bureau of Labor Statistics doesn't. (We think food and energy inflation matters more than housing prices, since most people only buy a house once every decade or two whereas rising food and gasoline prices are a steady drain on the wallet.)

Nor do we think consumers will feel less pinched for some time. Not only will oil and food prices continue to rise, but we also see more inflationary pressure coming from China. China's five-year plan will see rural and lower-class incomes rise substantially. The country plans to lessen the gap between rich and poor in a big way (even though the inequalities in China are already less than in the U.S.). And China has proven quite good at realizing its plans.

This, of course, is not the way things are supposed to happen. Traditionally, inflation begins with the American worker demanding higher wages. Rising wages create an upward spiral in wages and prices, which we call inflation.

Today, the Chinese worker, not the American worker, is the driving force behind the inflation cycle. It is rising Chinese wages that will make consumer products more expensive in the US. Moreover, the Chinese worker will stay in charge as long as American consumer spending remains low and, consequently, so does U.S. growth. In turn, that will lead to a lower U.S. dollar and even higher inflation.

Our government could do something about this, if it were willing to tolerate inflation. We could try to support the American consumer and build new industries. Yes, we have high debt. And yes, that debt will continue to increase if our government starts investing in industry. On the other hand, debt will not start to shrink in any meaningful way unless tax revenues rise (so the government can eliminate its deficit). Austerity alone won't do it. And the only way for tax revenues to rise is if people in general start earning more money.

We're not trying to be political here. We just recognize that, to succeed, America must not put itself at a disadvantage compared to developing nations like China. We need new industries like alternative energy that will support growth.

Of course, raising salaries and benefits for workers would certainly be inflationary. But we face brutal choices in today's world. There is no perfect solution, but there may be one that involves less pain and sets the stage for the good times to return.

If we continue down the road which seems popular at the moment, that of fiscal discipline, we risk setting off a deflationary outcome in which consumer spending crashes, business starts to contract, and we get another recession.

The alternative is to let inflation out of the bag. The Fed would continue with QE2, followed by QE3, QE4, and however many other QEs it takes to put consumers on a strong footing. Inflation would certainly rise, but that would also let the government pay off its debts with dollars that are worth less. We don't quite know how this cycle would end, but we suspect it would leave the country in a better position to take advantage of the next big opportunity.

Let's look at these two scenarios - deflation and inflation - in a little detail, and consider how you might prosper regardless what happens.

We've had both these 'flations before. Deflation was the theme of the 1930s, while inflation was the theme of the 1970s. Which was worse depends entirely on who you are asking.

From the viewpoint of the average wage earner, the 1970s was the lesser of the two evils. Sure, government spending was high then and commodity prices rose, but the economy still grew. Jobs were available. The system retained enough flexibility by the end of the decade that Fed Chairman Volker was able to slay inflation in the early 1980s. The economy was strong enough to tolerate his engineered recession.

By contrast, wage earners in the 1930s had a terrible time. Unemployment reached devastating levels. The average family struggled to survive. Starvation actually became a serious problem in the U.S.

However, if we switch our viewpoint to that of a typical bank executive, our understanding of these two decades changes greatly. The 1970s were a catastrophe for banks and for the very wealthy, since inflation eroded the value of most financial assets. Stocks, bonds, and cash lost value in real terms. It was also a very bad decade for business, since it drove up costs.

On the other hand, the 1930s were a great time to be rich. Stocks made decent gains. Bonds went on a tear, allowing investors to have their cake and eat it too. Not only were bonds safer than stocks, but they produced bigger returns. Cash also gained value due to deflation.

If you are reading our missives today in the 2010s, our guess is that you are either better off financially than the average person, or you at least hope to be. So you might assume that deflation is the best choice, since it will help your portfolio.

That's not necessarily true. First of all, you can make great returns in an inflationary environment if you buy the right investments (more on this in a second). Secondly, the other problem with the deflation of the 1930s is that it left the government with very little flexibility. Despite all the government spending after 1937, the American economy remained on its knees. The thing that really got it moving again was the effort to wage World War 2. The sacrifices that war required and the massive industrialization that took place led to a boom in prosperity that benefited our country for more than a generation.

Today, we are facing the worst of all worlds. We seem to be favoring policies which will keep the consumer under stress and feed the forces of consumer deflation (ironically, through higher, otherwise inflationary commodity prices).

Our biggest worry is how we will pull ourselves out of this mess in time for the next decade. We have no plans to build any new industries, which is the only way the next generation will get ahead.

By contrast, the Chinese are building like crazy. They are rolling out with alternative energies, including nuclear. (They are promoting the idea of nuclear by saying they can create pebble bed reactors which will be much safer. How true that is, we don't know.)

At any rate, China will not shrink at anything that will promote growth. It knows it has no choice. America, on the other hand, still thinks that growth is inevitable, so it is failing to nurture it properly


NATIONAL DEBT CLOCK:


www.usdebtclock.org/

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China's Ghost Cities - It's said there are around 64 Million empty apartments in China...

www.sbs.com.au/dateline/story/watch/id/601007/n/China-s-Ghost-Cities.

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Obama's budget would deeply cut farm subsidies
The White House wants to cap direct payments to farmers — which go mainly to producers of core commodities, regardless of market prices — and limit who is eligible to receive the subsidies.

By P.J. Huffstutter, Los Angeles Times

February 14, 2011, 7:30 p.m.
President Obama's 2012 budget plan calls for the elimination of more than $5 billion in public support for agricultural programs, including subsidies to the wealthiest U.S. farmers.

On Monday, Obama signaled that his administration wants to shift federal dollars away from farm programs, setting up a battle between the White House and legislators from agricultural states. It will also test the political will of some Republican and "tea party" lawmakers from rural districts who have vowed to trim federal spending.

It's a hot-button issue that draws uncomfortable political battle lines: Should lawmakers deeply cut farm subsidy programs that help ensure a steady domestic supply of food, but that critics say are rife with waste and largely benefit large agribusiness corporations?

Or should they cut back food assistance for the poor — cuts that could also hurt some small farmers and struggling segments of the agricultural community?

All this comes as federal deficits are ballooning and the nation's agricultural sector is booming. Net farm income for some growers increased 27% or more last year thanks to high commodity prices and healthy export markets, according to the White House budget office.

For the White House, that places farmer subsidies that date to the Great Depression on the chopping block.

Under the president's proposed budget, tighter limits would be placed on direct payments to farmers, which would be expected to save nearly $2.6 billion over the next 10 years; and payments to insurance companies that take part in the federally backed crop insurance program would be reduced by $1.8 billion. (The latter cut was already made last year by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as part of an agreement made with the insurers.)

The White House wants to cap direct payments to farmers — which flow mainly to producers of corn, soybeans, cotton and other core commodities, regardless of market prices — at $30,000 per farm. It also wants to limit who is eligible to receive those subsidies.

Currently, a farmer can earn as much as $500,000 in non-farm adjusted gross income and still qualify. The administration is proposing reducing that ceiling to $250,000, phased in over a three-year period.

According to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, the change would affect about 30,000 of the 1.2 million people who currently receive direct-payment farm subsidies.

Some of the other proposed cuts would affect conservation programs for wetlands and farmlands; rural housing loan and grant programs; and the agency's Food Safety and Inspection Service, which monitors meat, egg and dairy facilities. Such budget cuts would reflect "efficiencies that can be obtained," rather than affect food safety, Vilsack said during a news conference Monday.

In contrast, the president's budget calls for USDA spending on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or so-called food stamps, to grow 15% from 2010 levels. In November, a record 43.6 million people — more than 1 in 8 Americans — took part in the program for food aid, according to USDA data.

Such programs can help farmers. In recent years, for example, the dairy industry, which has struggled to recover from slumping milk prices, was able to unload some of its hefty cheese surplus to federally backed food bank programs.

Vilsack pointed out Monday that his agency had already taken a hard budgetary hit. Last year, the administration pushed through a plan that cut

$6 billion over the next 10 years in funding for the federal crop insurance program, a multibillion-dollar program that helps farmers recover after natural events devastate their fields.

Vilsack cautioned that even in challenging times, lawmakers must be careful not to harm one of the nation's few economic bright spots.

Cuts to direct farm subsidies have proved tough to get through Congress. Large agribusiness companies contribute heavily to the political campaigns of lawmakers on key committees. And the American farmer has long been seen as a cultural icon to be protected.

President George W. Bush tried to scale subsidies back. So did his father. President Clinton swore during his tenure that such direct payments would be quashed. And just last year, Obama, like his predecessors, tried to tighten limits on direct payments to big farmers — with little success.

Last year, when Congress was dominated by the Democrats, bipartisan lawmakers shot down that effort. Instead, they argued, changes in farm supports should wait until a scheduled overhaul of the federal farm bill in 2012.

"The problem is, they've been saying that for decades and nothing really has changed," said Rep. Ron Kind (D-Wis.), whose district is home to numerous dairy farms. "This doesn't help family farmers. It's a huge taxpayer subsidy that's going to a few very big agribusinesses and distorts trade policy."

Indeed, domestic cotton subsidies were at the core of a World Trade Organization fight between Brazil and the U.S., a legal battle the U.S. lost. As a result, the Obama administration last year agreed to pay $147 million a year into a fund that assists cotton farmers in Brazil.

Still, some analysts say the economy and the political shift in Washington could make a difference this time around.

House Republicans, as well as members backed by the tea party, campaigned heavily on the push to rein in the budget deficit. But so far there seems to be more interest among Republicans in Congress in cutting back food programs — such as the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children — than in cutting payments to grain and cotton farms.

"Farm subsidy programs and other programmatic cuts are just a small piece of the puzzle," said Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa). "All agriculture programs should be a part of the overall strategy to lower the federal deficit, but no more or less than other programs."

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COMMENTS:

These cuts will probably, and sadly, bring a necessary end to the independent small farmer. Like many other areas of our country's idyllic past, our economic growth (i.e., technology, capitalism and the attending consumerism) has killed off the old fashioned idea of the farmer....

Fine, I accept this change, and am grateful to the farmers who have struggled to survive. They should be added to a list of those that we (meaning my my taxes as well) are willing to retrain to be viable in today's market place.

I only wish the same type of necessary "economic coldness" was used to get our money back from Wall Street and to trim the fat off all defense spending (not just what the dep't of def says it gets), which along with gov't benefits is the biggest expenditure.

10:31 AM February 15, 2011
Cuts in Farm subsidies will impact the super rich and they might be forced to pay some taxes and that means it will impact their indulgence in buying luxury goods. The super rich own lands in Montana and other states and claim tax deductions and vitually pay nothing or get tons of money from the govt for owning the lands. People like Ted Turner, Charles Schwab, Tom Brokaw, many Hollywood Celebrities,etc will have to start paying taxes if this goes through.

AM February 15, 2011
Why stop at farm subsidies? Let's cut the dept of education (doing more harm than good), the EPA (politically corrupt dept. that pretends to do something), raise the social security retirement age to 70 starting now and cut defense spending by pulling troops from areas where they are no longer needed (Germany, UK, Japan, etc.).

There... I just saved us several hundred billion dollars per year. These solutions are going to be painful, and they are needed. Let's stop being such infants about this and get real. We've lived beyond our means for decades and can no longer do so. Time to grow up and put some big boy pants on.

[dothedd]

Libyan rebels reject cease-fire plan
The opposition council in Benghazi says any diplomatic solution must require Kadafi and his family to relinquish power.

By Ned Parker and Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times

April 11, 2011, 3:46 p.m.
Reporting from Benghazi, Libya, and Houmt Souk,— Libyan rebels delivered an emphatic "no" to an African Union proposal for an end to fighting in their country, insisting that Moammar Kadafi must step down from power as part of any diplomatic solution.

The opposition council's announcement after closed-door talks with an African Union delegation in Benghazi quashed hopes for an early end to the nearly 2-month-old conflict between Kadafi's forces and opposition fighters based in eastern Libya.

South African President Jacob Zuma said late Sunday after meeting with Kadafi in Tripoli, the capital, that the Libyan leader had endorsed the African Union's road map for peace. The proposal includes a cease-fire, the establishment of safe corridors for delivering humanitarian aid, and a dialogue on reforming Libya's political system, over which Kadafi has ruled for more than four decades.

Zuma's comments hinted at a possible diplomatic opening for ending Libya's stalemate, but the head of the opposition's political council, Mustafa Abdul Jalil, summarily dismissed the proposal after the talks.

"The African Union initiative does not include the departure of Kadafi and his sons from the Libyan political scene, therefore it is outdated," Abdul Jalil said in Benghazi, the rebels' de facto capital. "We will not negotiate on the blood of our martyrs. We will die with them or be victorious."

Abdul Jalil said the proposal had been around for more than a month. Rebels also said it was unacceptable because it did not call for Kadafi to withdraw his forces from besieged cities and did not allow protests, which is a key opposition demand.

Kadafi lost control of eastern Libya in February when anti-government demonstrations, inspired by the ouster of the presidents of Egypt and Tunisia, sparked a full-fledged revolt against the autocratic leader.

The eastern rebels were skeptical of the African Union even before the delegation arrived Monday morning. A crowd of more than 2,000 demonstrators greeted the party as it pulled up to the Tibesty Hotel, a dark, pyramid-shaped building in central Benghazi.

Members of the crowd waving rebel flags shouted slogans against Kadafi and made clear their distrust of the delegation, which included the leaders of Mali, Mauritania and the republic of Congo, along with representatives from South Africa, Uganda and Algeria.

Kadafi has long wooed neighboring African states with public-works projects and has hired Africans for his militias, which are now fighting the rebels.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization also greeted news of Kadafi's openness to a cease-fire with suspicion. Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said at a Brussels news briefing that Kadafi's forces had demonstrated that they "did not keep their promises," Reuters news service reported.

A key Western ally agreed with the rebels. Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini told French radio Monday that no deal to end the crisis in Libya could include a future political role for Kadafi or his sons. "Kadafi's children, family cannot take part in the political future of Libya," Frattini said.

As Libya's former colonial ruler, Italy maintains strong economic connections to the country.

Zuma did not travel to Benghazi with the African Union negotiators. As the meeting ended, members of the delegation walked through the hotel hallways with grim faces. Rebel spokesman Abdelhafed Ghoga said the opposition had told the African Union representative that they had evidence of Arab and African fighters working for Kadafi, including some Algerian nationals.

Despite three weeks of Western airstrikes against Kadafi's forces, carried out with the stated goal of protecting civilians, there is no sign that the Libyan leader might fold any time soon. The bombing campaign has stopped his troops from marching on Benghazi but has not helped the opposition advance into western Libya.

Meanwhile, Kadafi's fighters continued to attack the rebel-held western coastal city of Misurata. On Monday, a doctor in the enclave said government fighters had been shelling the city continuously since the early morning.

Among the seven people killed in fighting Monday was a 3-year-old girl, Sakina Mostafa, whose parents brought her body to one of the makeshift field hospitals in the city. Many more were wounded, said the doctor, who asked that his name not be published for security reasons.

"Nobody is supporting civilians but everybody is saying they are supporting civilians," said the doctor. "We don't know how the people promising to help us are helping us."

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Parker reported from Benghazi and Daragahi from Houmt Souk

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KENTUCKY DERBY - May 7, 2011

www.kentuckyderby.com/

RUN FOR THE ROSES...

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