His only contribution!
GROTON, Conn. (AP) — The USS Jimmy Carter entered the Navy's fleet Saturday as the most heavily armed submarine ever built, and as the last of the Seawolf class of attack subs that the Pentagon ordered during the Cold War's final years.
Really - Just ask North Korea -
(CNN) -- North Korea has accused Japan of aspiring to rule a "Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere" beginning with an invasion of Korea with the assistance of the United States.
Rodong Sinmun, North Korea's state newspaper, said Sunday the Japanese had joined with the United States' "vicious hostile policy" toward North Korea and that the "military threat" they perceive from the Koreans "is a far-fetched allegation fabricated by themselves."
The paper's comments followed a day of talks in Washington between U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and their Japanese counterparts on the two countries' security relationship.
Didn't you know that the Japanese have such a "large" military that North Korea should fear them - give me a break - more "Pyongyang games".
I have already blogged an interesting story about Jimmy Carter conspiring with the enemy (Russia),
here, but
The Spoons Experience has a much deeper look at the Jimmy Carter.
I am considering, after some research, discussing how our greatest alley in the Middle East, Iran, became one of our worst enemies in less then four years of the Carter presidency... Then maybe we can look at how Carter's giving up the canal and military spending cuts further weakened this great Nation...we could go on and on about how this man "the Great American" was the worst president of my lifetime and perhaps ever, but what would be the point - I think many democrats already are aware of this and others are simply in denial.
David Brooks has an interesting idea of a new "Ross Perot" rising out of worry over federal deficits - strange idea, maybe, but he has some interesting points. Some snippets:
There's going to be another Ross Perot, and this time he's going to be younger. There's going to be a millionaire rising out of the country somewhere and he (or she) is going to lead a movement of people who are worried about federal deficits, who are offended by the horrendous burden seniors are placing on the young and who are disgusted by a legislative process that sometimes suggests that the government has lost all capacity for self-control.
[...]
We may as well be blunt about the driving force behind all this. The living and well organized are taking money from the weak and the unborn. Over the past decades we have seen a gigantic transfer of wealth from struggling young families and the next generation to members of the AARP. In 1990, 29 percent of federal spending went to seniors; by 2015 roughly half of all government spending will go to those over 65. This prescription drug measure is just part of that great redistribution.
But what can't last won't last. Before too long, some new sort of leader is going to arise, especially if we fail to reform Social Security this year. He's going to rail against a country that cannot control its appetites. He's going to rail against Republicans who promise to be virtuous - but not just yet. He's going to slam Democrats who loudly jeer at Republican deficits but whose own entitlement proposals would make the situation twice as bad. He's going to crusade against the interest groups who are so ferocious on behalf of their members that they sacrifice the future. [Read here]
USA Today has a shocking new development - NOT - where have they been, this is nothing new in the "Pyongyang game" that has lasted half a century... Just keep reporting even if there is nothing new to report.
BEIJING (AP) — North Korea no longer wants to negotiate with the United States and four other nations in an effort to ease the ongoing standoff over Pyongyang's nuclear program, China's state news agency said Saturday.
The official Xinhua News Agency, citing an anonymous North Korea Foreign Ministry spokesman, said the official reiterated the communist regime's Feb. 10 decision to indefinitely suspend its participation in six-party nuclear disarmament talks. Those parties are the United States, the two Koreas, China, Russia and Japan.
Can you believe the time and money "brilliant [?]" educators are putting in to this "war over words"? Just as the original protest over President Lawrence H. Summers' comments totally disregarded the question; "is what he said factual?" for the "bigger [liberal] issue", "does it offend", this new round of debate disregards the same question for the concern "could this damage the University's reputation?" whoopee do!
I tell you want damages your University's reputation and demonstrates why liberal academia elites don't earn my attention; your total disregard of facts, truth, and educating choosing instead to worrying about "not offending" and "your reputation".
CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Feb. 18 - A mood of uncertainty settled over Harvard University on Friday in the aftermath of President Lawrence H. Summers's release of the transcript of his contentious remarks last month about the shortage of women in the sciences and engineering.
Many people were parsing and debating the often dense and rambling 7,000-word transcript, a long-awaited document that quickly became a must-read on campus.
A group of professors and students was collecting names on letters supporting Dr. Summers. Another group of professors, who had criticized Dr. Summers's leadership style at a tense faculty meeting on Tuesday, was continuing to discuss the matter.
Scholars normally immersed in research and teaching were preoccupied with questions about the leadership of the university, to which many of them have devoted their adult lives. [Read more if you really want to]
Thomas Sowell demonstrates the bias of media by comparing the investigation of the two candidates', in the recent Presidential campaign, military records... Some highlights:
One document whose authenticity is not likely to be questioned by the mainstream media is the honorable discharge on Senator John Kerry's web site. Yet who in the major media has investigated why that honorable discharge is dated during the Carter administration, when Kerry's military service ended years earlier?
This is the same media that spent months investigating George W. Bush's military record and, even after key allegations were revealed to be based on forgeries, continued publicizing rumors and innuendoes. They didn't stop even after the President signed Form 180, opening all his military records to the public.
But who in the major media has asked why John Kerry would need to be issued an honorable discharge during the Carter administration, years after leaving the navy, unless his original discharge was less than honorable?
One of Jimmy Carter's first acts as President was to issue an order granting amnesties to draft dodgers who had fled the country during the Vietnam war and also allowing an upgrading of military discharges that had been less than honorable.
There is more to this than simply a strange date on an honorable discharge. The covering memo refers to U.S. Code Title 10, sections 1162 and 1163. Anyone who bothers to read those sections will discover that they are about unusual circumstances for issuing discharges from the military services. [Read more here]
David Limbaugh puts Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld testiness in perspective - I know I would be testy if I had idoits using 20/20 hindsight.
Is it any wonder Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was a little testy -- if you can even call it that -- during his testimony before the House Armed Services Committee this week?
If the media and a slew of armchair quarterback politicians had persistently derided you like they have Secretary Rumsfeld, blaming you for every negative turn in the war and crediting you with none of its achievements, how warm and fuzzy would you feel toward them?
Almost every time Mr. Rumsfeld opens his mouth in public, people accuse him of arrogance, rudeness, evasiveness and insubordination to people who aren't even his superiors. Day after day, week after week, month after month, this brilliant, sagacious man is treated like a punching bag by people who couldn't hold his briefcase. We are talking about a man who is in his late sixties, independently wealthy, professionally accomplished beyond the wildest dreams of his detractors, and who has nothing personally to gain through his position.
PORTLAND, Oregon (AP) -- Howard Dean, the newly minted leader of the Democratic Party, and former Pentagon adviser Richard Perle made clear their opposing views on the war in Iraq during a debate marred by a protester who tossed a shoe at Perle.
Perle had just started his comments Thursday when a protester threw a shoe at him before being dragged away, screaming, "Liar! Liar!"
Tell me again why everyone was or is so worried about our military damaging religious buildings in Iraq?
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - At least four people were killed and 22 wounded in an attack near a Shi'ite mosque in southern Baghdad on Friday, hospital and police sources said.
Survivors said a man wearing a suicide belt blew himself up in the mosque in the Doura district of southwestern Baghdad, a hospital official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said.
WASHINGTON - Congress on Thursday passed legislation that would transfer most large, multistate class action lawsuits to federal court, fulfilling one of President Bush’s second-term goals.
The aim of the bill was to protect businesses and stop lawyers from reaping huge profits by filing suits in carefully selected state courts.
The legislation, given final congressional approval by the House on a 279-149 vote, would ban state courts from hearing large multistate class action lawsuits. Such courts have been known for issuing multimillion-dollar verdicts like they did against tobacco companies.
FrontPage Magazine has some interesting information that begs more attention from the Main Stream Media (MSM), but don't hold your breath.
Remember the old conservative charge that many of the Democrats here in America were playing footsie with the Soviets? Some Republicans even said the Russians viewed the Democrats as their favorite party.
[...]
Soviet diplomatic accounts and material from the archives show that in January 1984 former President Jimmy Carter dropped by Soviet Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin's residence for a private meeting.
Carter expressed his concern about and opposition to Reagan's defense buildup. He boldly told Dobrynin that Moscow would be better off with someone else in the White House. If Reagan won, he warned, "There would not be a single agreement on arms control, especially on nuclear arms, as long as Reagan remained in power."
Using the Russians to influence the presidential election was nothing new for Carter.
Schweizer reveals Russian documents that show that in the waning days of the 1980 campaign, the Carter White House dispatched businessman Armand Hammer to the Soviet Embassy. [Read more here]
These articles might dispute the democrats claim of a bad economy.
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- U.S. weekly initial jobless claims fell 2,000 last week, touching a four-year low of 302,000 claims, the Labor Department reported Thursday.
The four-week average of new claims dropped by 4,000 to stand at 311,750, the lowest since Nov. 4, 2000. Read the full report.
Economists surveyed by MarketWatch had been expecting claims to rise to 316,000. See Economic Calendar.
The number of people collecting unemployment benefits fell by 14,000 to 2.72 million, as of the week ended Feb. 5. The insured unemployment rate, meanwhile, fell 0.1 percentage point to 2.1 percent in the same week.
The jobless claims data show anew improvement in the nation's labor market conditions. Layoffs, represented by initial claims, have declined about 13 percent over the past year, from about 360,000 a year ago.
You can read another Reuters article about "jobless claim falling" and "import prices going up"
here. Then yesterday USA Today reported that counstruction jumped which is another good sign.
WASHINGTON — New home and apartment construction jumped nearly 5% in January to the highest level in nearly 21 years, bolstered by historically low mortgage rates, the Commerce Department said Wednesday.
U.S. housing starts reached 2.16 million units on a seasonally adjusted annual basis in January. That's up from 2.06 million the previous month and is a nearly 12% increase from January 2004.
Housing permits, an indicator of future activity, rose nearly 2% to a 2.1 million seasonally adjusted annual rate. The housing-starts figure was the highest since February 1984.
The robust figures surprised economists. Many had predicted a dip in activity during January and expect the record-setting housing market — one of the brightest spots in the economy — to cool this year, partly in response to Federal Reserve interest rate increases.
La Shawn Barber has a no holds barred look at Howard Dean's new position and his latest [racist] comments - oh, I am sorry, racist only if a Republican had said it.
“You think the Republican National Committee could get this many people of color in a single room?,” Dean asked to laughter. “Only if they had the hotel staff in here.”
Go
here and read it.
Pete Du Pont explains better than I could "Why do Dems oppose Social Security reform?"
socialism versus individualism:
In 1945 Clement Attlee led the British Labour Party to victory over Winston Churchill's Conservative Party. He then proceeded to socialize much of the British economy, for he believed that "the creation of a society based on social justice . . . could only be attained by bringing under public ownership and control the main factors in the economic system." Labour's goal was to get rid of the waste and irrationality that, in the socialist view, doomed market economies to failure.
Fast forward six decades, and you hear an Attlee echo--Sen. Hillary Clinton telling a California audience last summer that taxes must rise because "We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good."
American socialist Noam Chomsky made the same argument concerning Social Security: that allowing people to invest in markets is a bad thing, for "putting people in charge of their own assets breaks down the solidarity that comes from doing something together, and diminishes the sense that people have responsibility for each other."
So the 2005 Social Security argument is an old and familiar one: government decisions versus individual ones, government control of assets versus individual ownership. In short, socialism versus individualism. [Read more here]
You cannot pick up a paper or watch television and not hear something about an Iraqi insurgent attack on an Iraqi official - what are they trying to prove except that "terrorist" apply describes them. I mean they only mission, I use mission loosely because otherwise it would mean their was some kind of military strategy involved something they are incapable of, is to instill fear and so far they have failed - unless you count members of the American Democratic Party. Their [the insurgents] war is against freedom whoever might be bringing it, advocating it, or defending it - to bad the liberals don't get it and thank God our President does.
BAGHDAD (AP) — Gunmen shot dead an Interior Ministry intelligence officer in a southern Baghdad neighborhood on Wednesday, police said.
Attackers opened fire on 1st Lt. Ghazi Hoshi as he was getting into his car to go to work in Dora, said Falah Mohamadawi, a police detective in the district.
In another attack in the northern city of Mosul, gunmen seriously wounded a police colonel and killed his driver, medical officials at a hospital where the casualties were brought said.
Rich Lowry has some great questions for the AARP.
The AARP recently announced that it is taking its campaign against President Bush's proposed Social Security reform to the nation's youth, hoping to broaden its target audience from the credulous elderly to the credulous young. Thus, the AARP further cements its status as the country's foremost lobby against reform. So inquiring minds should have a few questions for AARP CEO William D. Novelli, the architect of the group's crusade to keep young people from having personal retirement accounts as part of Social Security:
--Since Bush has said that any proposal won't affect anyone 55 years of age or older, what possible reason -- other than sheer ideological hostility -- do you have to oppose reforming the system?
That is one good question go
here to read the rest.
It took what, one hundred and forty years for the women in America to vote - how long before America had women poloticians. Can this be seen as anything but progress?
KABUL, Afghanistan — President Hamid Karzai is preparing to appoint Afghanistan's first female provincial governor, in another step toward reviving women's rights that had been trampled by the hard-line Taliban government.
It is about time that Microsoft came out with an updated Internet Explorer - of course, they were forced somewhat with the growing interest in Firefox and the suspicion Google will be coming out with a browser... I really don't care what motivated them but they need to improve on IE 6.0, I have tried Firefox and think it has some neat features but I despise some of the quirks and having to grab a new plug-in every time I go to a new webpage, etc. Besides I am an old dog and am comfortable with IE - actually started using it when if first was released because I felt it was better then Netscape and have even beta tested some releases... Anyway the latest beta will probably be released this summer - seems they are not waiting for "Longhorn" as originally reported.
Stories
here and
here.
I am not sure - either John Kerry is defiantly going to run in 2008 already starting his campaign or he is delusional and is still conducting the 2004 campaign. I am under the impression that it is the latter and it is sad. Mr. Kerry newest "campaign" speech concentrates on his plans for security improvements and the military - you know the plan never introduced. I have already blogged about John Kerry's denial
here.
WASHINGTON - Former Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, who lost to President Bush in an election focused on national security, said Tuesday the country would be "far better off" with his proposals for Iraq and the military.
This is really sad; gracious concession was simply too much to hope for. This reiterates one of the many problems I had with John Kerry - along with his lack of core values his self-loving is sickening - since his fifteen minutes of fame Mr. Kerry simply cannot stand being out of the limelight. Mr. Kerry goes on to say "Americans accepted that I could be the commander in chief" - "What they were unwilling to do was shift commanders in midstream" - what was I saying about self-loving, these two statements are simple denial of the facts and wishful thinking.
