better Democratic strategy for middle east

A strategy of offshore balancing would be less ambitious than President Bush's grand plan to spread democracy throughout the Middle East, but it would be much better at protecting actual U.S. interests.

The United States would station its military forces outside the region. And "balancing" would mean we'd rely on regional powers like Iran, Iraq and Saudi Arabia to check each other.

Washington would remain diplomatically engaged, and when necessary would assist the weaker side in a conflict. It would also use its air and naval power to respond quickly to unexpected threats. But—and this is the key point—---America would put boots on the ground only if the local balance of power seriously broke down and one country threatened to dominate the others.

Offshore balancing would protect America and Americans better than the current Republican "bring it on --crusader" behavior.

our "friends" Saudia Arabia

Saudi Arabia's king said in an interview published Saturday in a Kuwaiti newspaper that the price of oil, now at around $54, should be $75 a barrel to stabilize the oil markets. How hypocritical since in July when oil was $147 a barrel , he was no where to be heard.

Obamaism

We had, I think, a decisive win,” Mr. Obama said. “I don’t think that there’s any question that we have a mandate to move the country in a new direction, and not continue the same old practices that have gotten us into the fix that we’re in.”
But he quickly noted that Mr. McCain, too, had won millions of votes, and he said it was important to maintain “a sense of humility and a recognition that wisdom is not the monopoly of any one party.”
“I think what the American people want more than anything is just common-sense smart government,” Mr. Obama said. “They don’t want ideology. They don’t want bickering. They don’t want sniping. They want action, and they want effectiveness.”

understanding our economy

Currently, the wealth effect is reversing. As stock and home values drop, Americans are scrambling to increase savings and curb spending. Down goes consumer spending. The plausible math is daunting.

Since September 2007, Americans' personal wealth has dropped about $9 trillion, says economist Nigel Gault of IHS Global Insight. A common estimate is that every dollar's change in wealth causes people to change their spending by 5 cents.

If so, the hit to consumer spending would be $450 billion ($9 trillion times .05). The effect and deflation could last over several years.

Sen Shelby, Republican hypocrite

Read today:
It's no great mystery why Alabama politician, Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby, Republican, in the pocket of foregn care companies (Mercedes/Toyota/Honda/Hyundai) who is so against assisting the US Auto Industry, went to such dramatic anti-free-market measures to secure Mercedes Benz to locate in Alabama--they did it for the betterment of their state through job creation and increased tax revenues.

Is that so different than what would occur by providing financial aid to help rescue the domestic auto industry? Such aid would save millions of jobs and millions of dollars in lost tax revenue.

Unlike the giveaways Alabama bestowed upon the foreign automaker in question, United States taxpayers would be reimbursed with interest (as they were when Chrysler received government aid in the early 1980s) for their investment in what is clearly a critically important industry for America's present and future.

economics 101- its China

There is a consensus forming that Washington needs to spend its way out of this recession, to ensure that it doesn't turn into a depression. Economists of both the left and right agree that a massive fiscal stimulus is needed and that for now, we shouldn't be worrying about deficits.

But in order to run up these deficits—which could total somewhere between $1 trillion and $1.5 trillion, or between 7 and 11 percent of GDP—someone has to buy American debt. The only country that has the cash to do so is China.

Holding 10 percent of all U.S. existing public debt, the government of the People's Republic of China has become Washington's largest creditor, foreign or domestic. It is America's banker.

read today: on religion

Qur'an "The Koran Interpreted":

Pg 100 "marry such women as seems good to you, two, three, four..."
Pg 105-06: "Men are the managers of the affairs of women for that God has preferred in bounty one of them over another ... And those you fear may be rebellious admonish; banish them to their couches, and beat them."
Pg 130 & 139: "They are unbelievers who say, 'God is the Messiah, Mary's Son.' "
Pg 121: "take not the unbelievers as friends instead of the believers;"
Pg 136: "take not Jews and Christians as friends; they are friends of each other. Whoso of you makes them his friends is one of them. God guides not the people of the evildoers."
Pg 205: "It is not for any Prophet to have prisoners until he make wide slaughter in the land."
Pg 207: "slay the idolators wherever you find them, and take them, and confine them, and lie in wait for them at every place of ambush."
Pg 213: "So let not their possessions or their children please thee; God only desires to chastise them in the present life, and that their souls should depart while they are unbelievers."
Pg 222: "O believers, fight the unbelievers who are near you, and let them find in you a harshness;"
Pg 32: "Leave is give to those who fight because they were wronged."
Pg 128-29: "Now, if the hypocrites do not give over ... We shall assuredly urge thee against them and then they will be thy neighbors there only a little; cursed they shall be, and wheresoever they are come upon they shall be seized and slaughtered all -"
Pg 220: "When you meet the unbelievers, smite their necks, then, when you have made wide slaughter among them, tie fast the bonds; then set them free, either by grace or ransom, ... And those who are slain in the way of God ... He will admit them to Paradise,"
Pg 271: "take not my Enemy and your enemy for friends, offering them love, though they have disbelieved ... If you go forth ... secretly loving them ... whosoever of you has done that, has gone astray from the right way."
Pg 271: "between us and you enmity has shown itself, and hatred forever, until you believe in God alone."

compared to these verses:

Matthew 5:21-22 "You have heard that it was said to those of old, 'You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.' (22) But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, 'You fool!' will be liable to the hell of fire.
Matthew 5:44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you
Luke 6:28-29 Bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. (29) To one who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also, and from one who takes away your cloak do not withhold your tunic either.
Luk 6:35 But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil.
Rom 13:10 Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.
Gal 5:14 For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

politics: last word on what happened

McCain, with his reputation for independence, was supposed to restore the GOP's competitiveness among swing voters. But to win the GOP nomination, McCain embraced Bush's right-wing core economic and foreign policies and then selected, in Sarah Palin, a running mate who waged the culture war with a zeal that made Bush and Karl Rove look squeamish. Also in critical areas, moderate republicans bolted the party.

republicans almost destroyed our country

Never has one generation spent so much of its children's wealth in such a short period of time with so little to show for it as in the recent republican years. These republicans have foisted onto future generations a huge financial burden to finance our current tax cuts for the rich, its wars and now its need for bailouts.

Just paying off those debts will require significant sacrifices. When you add the destruction of wealth that has taken place in just the last two months in the markets to the need for more bailouts, you understand why this is not going to be a painless recovery.

We are all going to have to pay. Never before has there been such a large wealth transfer from the future to the present, thanks to these republicans.

Repblican Party left me years go

I read the following today and while I desagree on Reagan, it expresses my situation and observations:

"Eight years of “conservative” government has brought us a doubled national debt, ruinous expansion of entitlement programs, bridges to nowhere, poster boy Jack Abramoff and an ill-premised, ill-waged war conducted by politicians of breathtaking arrogance.

As a sideshow, it brought us a truly obscene attempt at federal intervention in the Terry Schiavo case.

So, to paraphrase a real conservative, Ronald Reagan, I haven’t left the Republican Party. It left me.

Thanks, anyway, for the memories, and here’s to happier days and with any luck, a bit less fresh hell. (written by Wm F. Buckley"s son)" Chris--what took you so long?

Obama vs. McCain

In state after state during the primaries, McCain drew heavily on the votes of independents, moderates and Republicans who were unhappy with Bush.

But instead of carrying on as the un-Bush who defied conservative orthodoxy, McCain embraced the right for fear of losing it. He chose Sarah Palin as his running mate, which has finally earned him cries of approval from the GOP base but sent moderate voters scurrying Obama's way.

And as the campaign closed, the McCain tragedy became a farce starring Joe the Plumber and casting personal attacks on Obama. McCain was left hoping that a hidden cadre of voters who fear an Obama victory would defy the pollsters tomorrow and save him.

rich gain more under republicans

The share of after-tax income going to the top 20 percent and the top 1 percent in 2005 was the highest on record since the Congressional Budget Office began analyzing the data in 1979.

Some of this is due to the structure of the Bush tax cuts, which -- as Mr. McCain pointed out at the time they were enacted -- disproportionately favored the wealthiest Americans.

Mr. Obama's proposal to roll back the top bracket tax cuts and to bolster the bottom with refundable credits is an effort to address this inequity.

It is patriotic, as Democratic vice presidential candidate Joseph R. Biden Jr. said, for the rich to pay more for a country that has helped them gain more.

It is"good for everybody," as Mr. Obama told Joe Wurzelbacher, when you spread the wealth around. These represent, in fact, a rather mainstream view -- and not a bad governing philosophy for the country in its current straits.

observed bias by TV pundits

Have you noticed? TV pundits like Blitzer and Matthews tend to give republicans more time to espouse their views and above all, most of the time, give republicans the last word.

vote, vote and vote

If you voters don't turn out and thus give it to the Republicans for another 4 and possibly 8 years, then you deserve what you are going to get, and that is more of the same.

What republicans have done to us

Nearly one in five U.S. mortgage borrowers owe more to lenders than their homes are worth, and the rate may soon approach one in four as housing prices fall and the economy weakens, a report on Friday shows.

Seven hard-hit states -- Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada and Ohio -- had 64 percent of all "underwater" borrowers, but just 41 percent of U.S. mortgages.
Foreclosure filings rose 71 percent in the third quarter to a record 765,558, according to RealtyTrac.

Meanwhile, the Commerce Department said gross domestic product fell at a 0.3 percent rate in the third quarter. Some experts expect the worst U.S. recession since the early 1980s.