Steve

Everyone's polling numbers are down. People are disgusted with all of Washington. Some media focus on Obama's ratings and almost always forget to mention that the Republican led Congress has numbers so low we have to go back to the '70s to find a correlation. Didn't Bush have fairly low numbers in his re-election as well? Low numbers for any candidate is troubling but sometimes doesn't tell the whole story.

http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/03/01/10549926-calif-teacher-resigns-after-leaving-family-for-student Modesto police are investigating if there’s a criminal case against a former high school teacher who resigned his job to move into an apartment with an 18-year-old girl he met while teaching. James Hooker, 41, was placed on administrative leave Feb. 3 by Modesto City Schools and resigned less than three weeks later, according to a report at the Modesto Bee. The newspaper reports that the man, who had taught business and computer classes, left his wife and children, to move in with Jordan Powers, an Enochs High School senior whom he met when she was a freshman at the school. One of Hooker's children also attends the same high school. This guy is BRAVE!! lol. If it was my daughter, I'd be whooping someone's ass. He should wait at least till after she graduates. Same school as his kids?! Wow!

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/power-players-abc-news/republicans-already-lost-192340271.html Have the Republicans Already Lost? Yes, it's only February. Eight months from election day. And so it's true that it is ridiculous to suggest this race is really over. But as of this moment, it does not look good for the Republican party caught up in a messy primary battle that often looks more like a circular firing squad. And as ABC News Political Director Amy Walter points out, Mitt Romney's ugly win in Michigan last night didn't help matters. Sure, a win is a win. But the Romney campaign's greatest strength has been eviscerating opponents, not making a strong case for Mitt Romney. "They figure out what the weakness is of their top opponent, they go in there spend a lot of money and do a lot of negative ads, and exploit whatever that weakness is. The problem with that is they don't' ever build themselves up," Walter says. The Republican primary battle in Michigan was so ugly, ABC's Rick Klein points out, that this critical battleground state seems to have tilted back to the Democrats. All the talk of the auto bailout, opposed by each of the Republican candidates, and the divisive social issues, did damage to the party in Michigan and perhaps more broadly as well, Klein says. "Now you've got Ohio coming up (on Super Tuesday next week). You've got another state that's a lot like Michigan. If the same kind of battle happens over the next week, then they have to worry about another big state potentially tipping to the Democrats." The Obama campaign benefits from the protracted Republican primary, but also from an improving economy. As Yahoo! News' David Chalian points out, that not only helps the president but also steals the thunder from Romney's main campaign theme. "If Mitt Romney is Mr. Fix It on the economy, but the guy who's sitting in the Oval Office is actually fixing the economy right now, then where does Mitt Romney go from there?" All that being said, election day is still a long eight months away. A lot could happen in the economy, in international news, here at home and, of course, on the campaign trail that could impact all of this. I am not comfortable with major media organizations calling elections early like this. I know its their right, I just think its bad journalism. Its well known that too many Americans are sheep. Even though I prefer Obama, I like as fair of an election as possible without undue influence.

http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/bank-america-proposes-bank-fees-capitalism-used-174008927.html #1 Flat, Across the Board Fee: Some customers in those three states are currently paying a monthly across the board fee of between $6 and $9 to use Bank of America's checking services. #2 Conditional Fee: At the same time, some customers in those test-states are being charged a range of fees between $9 and $25 for a checking account, but have been given the option to avoid the additional cost if they keep a minimum balance or opt in to using other Bank of America services. That may prove a little more difficult in the post-Dodd Frank era, as many banks look to replace certain revenue streams that were squashed by the controversial banking regulation. JP Morgan Case (JPM) and Well Fargo (WFC) have already charge various fee to use their checking account services, which tend to otherwise be money-losers for the banks. There is one issue, though, that Aaron has with this new practice of banks nickel and diming consumers for everything. "The problem I have is that we bailed them out -- as taxpayers we bailed them out," he says. "This is how they prepay me for bailing them out?" Problem is that the banks, Visa and Mastercard has made it IMPOSSIBLE to function in society with cash. You MUST have a bank and a card with a logo to do anything in society. They get Congress to make laws and rules that give us no choice to use them and then fee us to death. Banks can do all the fees they want but only IF the playing field is cleared for non bank financial institutions like Credit Unions, etc. The Banking industry owns Obama and the Republicans as well.

Wow! Great story! http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/driven/janitor-turned-owner-rescues-failing-ohio-factory-195149281.html Janitor Turned Owner Rescues Failing Ohio Factory

http://news.yahoo.com/president-obama-koran-apology-calmed-things-down-205012238--abc-news.html All this talk about Obama opologizing I hope is just election cycle banter. He did the right thing. Some of us have this notion that America does no wrong and when we do, we come up with excuses such as overall we do good so any mistakes should be overlooked no matter how tragic. Bottom line is we aren't wanted there. We really do have to walk on culutral/religious eggshells in Afghanistan to be there. The Afghanis are not accustomed to having foreign troops with so much influence so they are looking for any excuse to riot and kill. The Republicans that go on about not apologizing if they were in his position would cost even more American lives to be lost and give the Taliban ammo to turn the people against us. This is a no brainer.

HH, we missed you around here. Hope all is well. My conserative brother is dumbstruck with me. Thinks I'm smoking the wacky tobaccy. Anyway, Republicans are more hypocritical in that they are always touting their love and respect for our soldiers and have no problem taking away benefits. Dems do it obviously but its the Repubs that have the reputation (because they tout themselves as such) and yell from the rooftops about our fighting men. It was a Republican president who had our soldiers ill equipped and overworked in two wars and the Repubs in Congress went along with it. As for them not voting for Obama, the military has always supported Republicans more than Dems. If universities can be accused of fostering liberalism, it can then be argued that he military environment does the same for conservatism. One man's class warfare is another man's conept of sharing responsibility for each other. Its not class warfare when conservatives start demonizing immigrants and using welfare as a wedge issue between socio-economic and ethic groups though? lol. C'mon HH, I can get you out of Slytherin house and in with us good guys in Gryffindor (you won't understand unless you're a Harry Potter fan ) Leave the zeros and get with the heroes. Leave the right wing and get with a right thing.

A poll would also reveal a good number of Americans believe Elvis and bin Laden are still alive and the moon landing was faked. Heck, a scary number still think he's a practicing muslim. This will backfire. If he's kept off the ballot or they force the President to do some jumping through hoops, it will provide a lot of sympathy for him. Lets face it, birthers will NEVER be satisfied with any proof and they can and will find some nutty 'expert' to confirm their suspicions. I could find an expert to say I'm a white female if I look hard enough.

Obama keeps racking up foreign affair accomplishments (N. Korea below). I recall one of the big things we were all warned about was his lack of experience in this area and he would be way over his head. I've always thought foreign policy stuff was largely over-stated in terms of policy. Many of our foreign policy stances are not based on reason and logic but politics at home (Cuba, Israel) and businesses with an interest (Iran). http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/envoy/u-announces-diplomatic-breakthrough-north-korea-152331635.html

No one is going to choose to war on America. Its foolish. Countries or more likely groups like al qaida do so when they are provoked. The trick is not entering wars in the first place. At the risk of sounding unpatriotic, our wars in the last 20 years were preventable. The first gulf war should be remembered in the history books as the oil companies war. The arab league should have fought that one. They were universally against Iraq. The second war with Iraq was totally avoidable and not in hindsight either. With regards to Afghanistan what emboldened bin Laden was us having a military base on the holy lands. We shouldn't have been there in the first place. We were high there to protect the house of Saud. We shouldn't be involved any thing that requires those high numbers of troops. I guarantee you a Republican president urged on by the military/industrial complex would have sent troops to the Arab spring uprisings. Military aid, technology and helping from a distance is the way to go as Obama proved. The only thing I would be for in terms troops on the ground and this would have to be a coalition is humanitarian causes such as Rwanda where you have genocide. And that would be a UN matter and I'd give the Chinese a chance to be world cop and see how it suits them. We are in no condition to be the world's cop with troops housed all over the world. Our economic and politic power should be enough for most things. All this sabre rattling and threats from the Republican candidates about Iran is asanine. A military strike against Iran over its nuke program is one of the worst ideas in the anals of bad ideas...and they are fool enough to let Israel drag them into that mess as well with the Saudis behind the scenes urging us on to ease their own fears about Iran. We act like we have some universal right to the Hormuz. We shouldn't be so dependent on oil in the first place and if the Iranians are fool enough to risk the ire of the other mid east countries by f*cking with it, let them be the bad guy. Its not up to us to gurantee the rest of the world access to oil. China has a voracious apetite for the stuff, let them take our place. We need to take care of ourselves right now.

All social contracts both implicit and implied are no longer sacrosanct. Greece is the extreme case but America is certainly the same. Long held social constructs such as pensions even for public employees are now negotiable and can be changed despite what was agreed to when the contracts were signed. Japan used to have lifetime employment if you worked for Toyota for example. It was a cornerstone of their labor customs. No longer. I fear the result of all this is that people will no longer have any faith in any institutions. You may argue they shouldn't in the first place but the truth is we were all raised to believe in it. I may be accused of being melodramatic but I think its the start of the breakdown of society. What made most western societies prosper and advance were certain laws, customs and such that were followed and believed with almost religious belif. For example, English common law that protected everyone and gave the pauper an equal footing against a Prince. In America culturally we don't trust the government but there were some things that we regarded as sacrosanct and those are being violated. People, i fear, will lose all faith in the government as well as institutions. I know to some extent I have. I have the same fears my grandparents did about financial institutions during the great depression. I have a decreasing faith in currency. Not only to retain its value but the very concept of it as having any value.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/27/warren-buffett-corporate-taxes_n_1304432.html

Sadly, no surprise. Notice how Congress never seems to have any of their benefits cut? Its both parties as well that cut military benefits, etc. Hard to see why the military is chosen for cuts. I know the budget is bloated but the soldier related things shouldn't be on the table for cuts.

The follow up to Santorum's comment by the President was that a HS diploma isn't enough in this day and age, not just college but some sort of post HS training even its vocational, apprenticship, certification, etc. Hard to argue with that. The world has changed. I'm no big fan of either party, just try and support what makes sense. Also, the comment that college changes students to some sort of ideology goes out the window since millions of people who are both conservative and liberal went to college, often the same school. Your ideology is a sum of your life experience, logic, reasoning, etc. not just the 4 years from 18-21 in college.

Fair point Dean. I don't mind people joining the military to get money for college, get trained, etc. and they have no intention of making a career out of it. No problem with me. However, they must realize that fighting in a war is a possibility. What I didn't like during both wars were the attitudes of some that basically said 'i didn't sign up for this'. More use of being dishonorably discharged should be applied to some of them. Anyway, I'd love to see combat vets well taken care of.

Maybe he's trying too hard to cater to the base of the party but Santorum is increasingly looking like a looney idiot on the upside and downright scary, religious nut reactionary on the down side. He's making Mitt look mainstream frankly.

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/republican-candidates-avoid-direct-outreach-michigan-muslims-arab-134539124.html Muslims and Arab Americans in Michigan aren’t getting attention from Republican presidential candidates ...outside the largest mosque in the country, the Islamic Center of America, as the parking lot filled with worshipers at Friday prayers. Outside, four people passed out flyers in support of Ron Paul, which included Arabic and English translations of Paul's campaign message. The other Republican presidential candidates have all but ignored Muslim voters in Michigan, which holds its primary on Tuesday. As many Muslims here see it, the rhetoric and proposals of the candidates have repelled even longtime Republicans in their community. That's one reason why Paul, a candidate who has questioned American aid to Israel and whose non-interventionist foreign policy has gained wide support among Arab voters, received an endorsement Friday from the Arab American News, a Dearborn-based newspaper published in Arabic and English. "The Arab American News ... sees Dr. Paul's refreshing, forthright foreign policy philosophy as one of his greatest strengths at a time when the specter of a potentially catastrophic war looms over festering, misunderstood and misreported conflicts in the Middle East," the paper's editors wrote on Friday. "His positions are perhaps the best hope for even a remotely balanced policy in the troubled region that we've seen in decades." Arab Republicans in the Detroit area say they are planning to announce a joint endorsement of Paul with about 150 mostly Muslim business leaders. In interviews with Yahoo News, those signing onto the pending endorsement expressed dismay with candidates like Newt Gingrich, who refers to Palestinians as an "invented people"--Arab Americans here jokingly call Gingrich "the invented candidate"--and Rick Santorum, for his hawkish stance on Iran and his stalwart defense of Israel. "They've come out against practically every position that the Arabs in the community support," said Nasser Beydoun, the former head of American Arab Chamber of Commerce in Dearborn. "I don't think Republicans are focused on immigrants in general or Arab Americans. They're too busy catering to the fringes of the party."

That's a shame. If anything cut the fat elsewhere and use some of those savings to increase benefits for vets, etc. Anyway, BOTH parties have been fcking over the military. The Republicans do the most flag waving and are more hyprocritical.

Not sure if I like this. http://news.yahoo.com/pressure-builds-civilian-drone-flights-home-150120049.html Congress has told the FAA that the agency must allow civilian and military drones to fly in civilian airspace by September 2015. This spring, the FAA is set to take a first step by proposing rules that would allow limited commercial use of small drones for the first time. Potential civilian users are as varied as the drones themselves. Power companies want them to monitor transmission lines. Farmers want to fly them over fields to detect which crops need water. Ranchers want them to count cows. Journalists are exploring drones' newsgathering potential. The FAA is investigating whether The Daily, a digital publication of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp., used drones without permission to capture aerial footage of floodwaters in North Dakota and Mississippi last year. At the University of Nebraska, journalism professor Matt Waite has started a lab for students to experiment with using a small, remote-controlled helicopter. "Can you cover news with a drone? I think the answer is yes," Waite said. The aerospace industry forecasts a worldwide deployment of almost 30,000 drones by 2018, with the United States accounting for half of them. "The potential ... civil market for these systems could dwarf the military market in the coming years if we can get access to the airspace," said Ben Gielow, government relations manager for the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International, an industry trade group. The hungriest market is the nation's 19,000 law enforcement agencies. Customs and Border Patrol has nine Predator drones mostly in use on the U.S.-Mexico border, and plans to expand to 24 by 2016. Officials say the unmanned aircraft have helped in the seizure of more than 20 tons of illegal drugs and the arrest of 7,500 people since border patrols began six years ago. Several police departments are experimenting with smaller drones to photograph crime scenes, aid searches and scan the ground ahead of SWAT teams. The Justice Department has four drones it loans to police agencies.

I saw it too and was utterly depressing. I didn't read the book but a friend did. He said the ending was different. The kid took a leap of faith and went with some guy. Not the family guy that the movie had where you were reasonably sure he would be taken care of. The one thing that this and a few other movies of similar themes did was not tell you how the world went into this post apocolypse nightmare. The movie didn't allude to any specific type of thing. There was a french movie similar to this as well in some post apocolyptic world and they didn't tell you how it ended either. Doesn't matter if you think about it. The Denzel Washington film 'Book of Eli' I think is the name was in a similar vein. All I know is if I knew the end was coming like that, I'd buy all the guns, ammo, etc. I can and hole up somewhere fairly warm but isolated. I'll try and get a group of people, young guys who can handle themselves, ex Navy Seal, survivalists, etc. and some women in their 20s (you know why...hehehe). Dogs as well. They'll be able to hear danger a while away. Underground fortress, lamps that I could grow plants with. Rabbits and other animals that reproduce rapidly. Okay, I've given this some thought...lol.

Why gas prices are so high...

f*cking rediculous. http://news.yahoo.com/penn-judge-muslims-allowed-attack-people-insulting-mohammad-210000330.html

The same was done in '08. As I've always posted, I don't like the involvement of churches or religious groups in politics and the election process. However, its been that way for a while. Dems, of all colors and faiths have always gone to the large black churches and allowed to speak from the pulpit on Sunday morning by invite of the pastor. Clintons have done it big time back in the day and Bill has done the same exact thing Obama has done. Not saying its right. I'm vehemntally opposed to it. However, unfortunately its nothing new. The only difference is this time its a Black guy. Republicans do the same with the huge white fundamental churches. Many conservatives at all levels of government have spoken before the congregation of these churches and at times used the pulpit to also warn people about 'immigration', a buzz-word to scare them about latinos and 'welfare' a buzz word to scare them about minorities, mainly blacks.

This is scary http://finance.yahoo.com/news/u-could-pressure-north-korea-tomorrow-quit-100-094000585.html

http://beta.local.yahoo.com/news-gas-prices-25-cents-one-week-stations-pass-mark.html Gas Prices Up 25 Cents In One Week, Some Stations Pass $5 Mark We are one of the world's biggest oil producers and that's what's so ironic about oil prices. Going back to the '73 oil embargo we have learned how oil prices can help cause recessions or at least make it worse but we continue to and willfully base our economy on it. We don't try and ween ourselves off it because the oil industry has so much power. The Republican answer is to drill more in places we said no to otherwise. The fact is no matter how much we have drilled domestically in new places oil prices keep going up and we keep being dependent on the prices that occur on it from faraway countries. New oil fields around the world are being discovered all the time. Russia has tons of oil and natural gas for example they keep finding. However, we keep seeing prices go up and up and up. Its a sick joke that we as a people keep falling for.