Usa Thread

[Flashermac]

No, it means he will do anything to get reelected. In other words, he is a politician - not an ideologue.

[Steve]

The ideologues in the race or rather the ones I believe to be are Ron Paul, Michelle Bachman, Cain and possibly Huntsman. The rest are politicians. The latter would more or less fall on their swords over their core ideological beliefs.

 

Those are my guesses. I reserve the right to be wrong about some of them. Paul and Cain are the most committed I think. Cain scares me as much as Bachman does. Often businessmen can come into a campaign and make some sense initially (Perot). However, Cain gives me the impression he's a fringe right candidate who really has no idea how to run the country or what to do. Bachman speaks in plattitudes and broad strokes but has no specifics. Her main platform is pointing out what's wrong. Cain would be a divisive person not open to any sort of compromise and a president has to. Businessmen are used to being in total control with boards that rubber stamp every action. Bloomberg is one of the few that have done well but he spend the majority of his working life working for someone else. He left Saloman Brothers to start a firm when he was fairly mature. Trump never did. Perot started his firm at a young enough age where he wasn't used to being challenge as well.

[Flashermac]

<< Bachman speaks in plattitudes and broad strokes but has no specifics. Her main platform is pointing out what's wrong. >>

 

Shades of Perot ...

 

<< Businessmen are used to being in total control with boards that rubber stamp every action. >>

 

Shades of Thaksin!

[Flashermac]

TSA Creator Says Dismantle, Privatize the Agency

 

 

by Audrey Hudson

 

 

They’ve been accused of rampant thievery, spending billions of dollars like drunken sailors, groping children and little old ladies, and making everyone take off their shoes.

 

But the real job of the tens of thousands of screeners at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is to protect Americans from a terrorist attack.

 

Yet a decade after the TSA was created following the September 11 attacks, the author of the legislation that established the massive agency grades its performance at “D-.â€

 

“The whole program has been hijacked by bureaucrats,†said Rep. John Mica (R. -Fla.), chairman of the House Transportation Committee.

 

“It mushroomed into an army,†Mica said. “It’s gone from a couple-billion-dollar enterprise to close to $9 billion.â€

 

As for keeping the American public safe, Mica says, “They’ve failed to actually detect any threat in 10 years.â€

 

“Everything they have done has been reactive. They take shoes off because of [shoe-bomber] Richard Reid, passengers are patted down because of the diaper bomber, and you can’t pack liquids because the British uncovered a plot using liquids,†Mica said.

 

“It’s an agency that is always one step out of step,†Mica said.

 

It cost $1 billion just to train workers, which now number more than 62,000, and “they actually trained more workers than they have on the job,†Mica said.

 

“The whole thing is a complete fiasco,†Mica said.

 

In a wide-ranging interview with HUMAN EVENTS just days before the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, Mica said screeners should be privatized and the agency dismantled.

 

Instead, the agency should number no more than 5,000, and carry out his original intent, which was to monitor terrorist threats and collect intelligence.

 

The fledgling agency was quickly engulfed in its first scandal in 2002 as it rushed to hire 30,000 screeners, and the $104 million awarded to the company to contract workers quickly escalated to more than $740 million.

 

Federal investigators tracked those cost overruns to recruiting sessions held at swank hotels and resorts in St. Croix, the Virgin Islands, Florida and the Wyndham Peaks Resort and Golden Door Spa in Telluride, Colo.

 

Charges in the hundreds of thousands of dollars were made for cash withdrawals, valet parking and beverages, plus a $5.4 million salary for one executive for nine months of work.

 

Other over-the-top expenditures included nearly $2,000 for 20 gallons of Starbucks Coffee, $8,000 for elevator operators at a Manhattan hotel, and $1,500 to rent more than a dozen extension cords for the Colorado recruiting fair.

 

The agency inadvertently caused security gaps by failing for years to keep track of lost uniforms and passes that lead to restricted areas of airports.

 

Screeners have also been accused of committing crimes, from smuggling drugs to stealing valuables from passengers' luggage. In 2004, several screeners were arrested and charged with stealing jewelry, computers and cameras, cash, credit cards and other valuables. One of their more notable victims was actress Shirley McClain, who was robbed of jewelry and crystals.

 

One of the screeners confessed that he was trying to steal enough to sell the items and buy a big-screen television.

 

In 2006, screeners at Los Angeles and Chicago O'Hare airports failed to find more than 60% of fake explosives during checkpoint security tests.

 

The sometimes rudder-less agency has gone through five administrators in the past decade, and it took longer than a year for President Obama to put his one man in place. Mica’s bill also blocked collective bargaining rights for screeners, but the Obama administration managed to reverse that provision.

 

Asked whether the agency should be privatized, Mica answered with a qualified yes.

 

“They need to get out of the screening business and back into security. Most of the screening they do should be abandoned,†Mica said. "I just don’t have a lot of faith at this point,†Mica said.

 

Allowing airports to privatize screening was a key element of Mica’s legislation and a report released by the committee in June determined that privatizing those efforts would result in a 40% savings for taxpayers.

 

“We have thousands of workers trying to do their job. My concern is the bureaucracy we built,†Mica said.

 

“We are one of the only countries still using this model of security," Mica said, "other than Bulgaria, Romania, Poland, and I think, Libya."

 

 

My link

[cavanami]

...and they continue to trample on the US Bill of Rights...

 

Arrest at Ground Zero Proves Free Speech is Dead

 

A disturbing video from the 10th anniversary of 9/11 shows a man being arrested for simply speaking out on the streets of New York City. Not speaking inside the tightly controlled pit where only those with media credentials were permitted for the event, but in the neighboring blocks of downtown Manhattan on public streets...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lIU9j_qwzOE

[Steve]

For more than 20 years, tech tycoon William H. Millard was one of the world's most elusive tax exiles, leaving financial footprints in Singapore, Ireland and other locales while racking up an unpaid tax bill of more than $100 million.

 

The 79-year-old founder of the ComputerLand Corp. retail chain was last seen by tax authorities on the remote Pacific Island of Saipan, where he lived, in August 1990. A few years after selling his company, the man once listed as one of the richest people in America suddenly vanished.

http://finance.yahoo.com/career-work/article/113483/william-h-millard-missing-ceo-reappers-after-20-years-wsj

 

Its getting almost impossible to disappear and never heard from again. The reason is its almost impossible to go anywhere without leaving some sort of electronic footprint. Its gettting almost impossible to travel on fake passports with all the safeguards and biometrics and such. The off shore banks are now working with the American government. Not many safe bank havens any longer. Globalization, enhanced security due to the terror threat, etc. has it very hard. One can probably still disappear into the rural areas of se asia or south america but you'll have to live a somewhat simple, spartan life and carry your money with you.

[Flashermac]

Obama faces skepticism from swing voters: poll

 

 

 

(Reuters) - President Barack Obama faces deep skepticism from swing voters who see the Republican party as more in tune with their concerns about government spending, according to a poll released on Tuesday.

 

These undecided voters, who could determine whether Obama wins re-election next year, believe Republicans are more serious about reducing budget deficits and more aligned with them ideologically, according to the centrist Democratic think tank Third Way.

 

The poll focused on voters who had backed Obama in the 2008 presidential election but voted for Republican candidates in the 2010 congressional elections. They make up about 20 percent of the electorate in the handful of hotly contested states that will likely dictate the outcome of the 2012 election.

 

Some 59 percent of these voters haven't decided whether they will vote for Obama or his Republican opponent, the poll found.

 

Obama and his fellow Democrats could win their support by emphasizing economic growth and painting Republicans as beholden to conservative Tea Party activists, said Third Way's Jim Kessler.

 

"Obama needs to pull himself and his party closer to them and push the GOP farther away," Kessler said in an interview.

 

Obama is pushing a $450 billion job-creation bill in an effort to boost the economy and drive down the 9.1 percent unemployment rate as he faces low approval ratings and deep economic unease among voters.

 

Many economists say higher government spending now would boost growth in the sputtering economy while lawmakers work on a long-term plan to tame the national debt.

 

Swing voters do not agree with this view, the poll found. Half of those surveyed said reducing the deficit or scaling back regulations would be the most effective way to create jobs, while only 16 percent said that increased spending on construction and innovation would be the best approach.

 

Those views line up with those held by congressional Republicans. However, swing voters largely back Obama's call to raise taxes on the wealthy to help reduce deficits, the poll found.

 

The poll interviewed 400 swing voters in 12 battleground states on August 16. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 6.4 percentage points.

 

Those surveyed were not asked about their support for Obama versus specific Republican presidential candidates.

 

 

My link

[Bangkoktraveler]

Ron Paul is sounding better all the time.

 

I listened to Hanity rant and rave at how the USA is going to kick the ass of all of the 'terrorist'.

 

Whereas Ron Paul claims USA policy created the problem...... like when we put troops in Saudia Arabia, etc.

 

The USA should study history. If they did - they would understand what is needed to get peace..... but they will not. History repeats itself.

[Steve]

bin Laden's original beef wasn't Israel. He didn't care about the Palestinians and adopted their cause AFTER 911. Saudi Arabia hosts the two most holiest cities in Islam, Mecca and Medina. bin Laden and his followers at the time thought it was sacrilege to have non moslem troops stationed on holy soil.

 

The Saudis wanted us there as well. Had we not been there the whole mess could have been avoided. Also, we didn't even learn after the '94 bombing of the world trade center. That was what it was about. We knew about the hijackers taking flying lessons and didn't investigate it thoroughly. We didn't need the Patriots Act or Homeland Security to stop the bombers and we didn't need it after.

 

Its all bs. I don't agree with everything Ron Paul advocates but I agree with enough of it to want to give him a shot.

[Steve]

Government gone wild

http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=xOAgT8L_BqQ&feature=player_embedded