Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Monday, September 29, 2008
Ha ...I like Micheal Moore ...the bleeding liberal that he is
Friends, Let me cut to the chase. The biggest robbery in the history of this country is taking place as you read this. Though no guns are being used, 300 million hostages are being taken. Make no mistake about it: After stealing a half trillion dollars to line the pockets of their war-profiteering backers for the past five years, after lining the pockets of their fellow oilmen to the tune of over a hundred billion dollars in just the last two years, Bush and his cronies -- who must soon vacate the White House -- are looting the U.S. Treasury of every dollar they can grab. They are swiping as much of the silverware as they can on their way out the door. No matter what they say, no matter how many scare words they use, they are up to their old tricks of creating fear and confusion in order to make and keep themselves and the upper one percent filthy rich. Just read the first four paragraphs of the lead story in last Monday's New York Times and you can see what the real deal is: "Even as policy makers worked on details of a $700 billion bailout of the financial industry, Wall Street began looking for ways to profit from it. "Financial firms were lobbying to have all manner of troubled investments covered, not just those related to mortgages. "At the same time, investment firms were jockeying to oversee all the assets that Treasury plans to take off the books of financial institutions, a role that could earn them hundreds of millions of dollars a year in fees. "Nobody wants to be left out of Treasury's proposal to buy up bad assets of financial institutions." Unbelievable. Wall Street and its backers created this mess and now they are going to clean up like bandits. Even Rudy Giuliani is lobbying for his firm to be hired (and paid) to "consult" in the bailout. The problem is, nobody truly knows what this "collapse" is all about. Even Treasury Secretary Paulson admitted he doesn't know the exact amount that is needed (he just picked the $700 billion number out of his head!). The head of the congressional budget office said he can't figure it out nor can he explain it to anyone. And yet, they are screeching about how the end is near! Panic! Recession! The Great Depression! Y2K! Bird flu! Killer bees! We must pass the bailout bill today!! The sky is falling! The sky is falling! Falling for whom? NOTHING in this "bailout" package will lower the price of the gas you have to put in your car to get to work. NOTHING in this bill will protect you from losing your home. NOTHING in this bill will give you health insurance. Health insurance? Mike, why are you bringing this up? What's this got to do with the Wall Street collapse? It has everything to do with it. This so-called "collapse" was triggered by the massive defaulting and foreclosures going on with people's home mortgages. Do you know why so many Americans are losing their homes? To hear the Republicans describe it, it's because too many working class idiots were given mortgages that they really couldn't afford. Here's the truth: The number one cause of people declaring bankruptcy is because of medical bills. Let me state this simply: If we had had universal health coverage, this mortgage "crisis" may never have happened. This bailout's mission is to protect the obscene amount of wealth that has been accumulated in the last eight years. It's to protect the top shareholders who own and control corporate America. It's to make sure their yachts and mansions and "way of life" go uninterrupted while the rest of America suffers and struggles to pay the bills. Let the rich suffer for once. Let them pay for the bailout. We are spending 400 million dollars a day on the war in Iraq. Let them end the war immediately and save us all another half-trillion dollars! I have to stop writing this and you have to stop reading it. They are staging a financial coup this morning in our country. They are hoping Congress will act fast before they stop to think, before we have a chance to stop them ourselves. So stop reading this and do something -- NOW! Here's what you can do immediately: 1. Call or e-mail Senator Obama. Tell him he does not need to be sitting there trying to help prop up Bush and Cheney and the mess they've made. Tell him we know he has the smarts to slow this thing down and figure out what's the best route to take. Tell him the rich have to pay for whatever help is offered. Use the leverage we have now to insist on a moratorium on home foreclosures, to insist on a move to universal health coverage, and tell him that we the people need to be in charge of the economic decisions that affect our lives, not the barons of Wall Street. 2. Take to the streets. Participate in one of the hundreds of quickly-called demonstrations that are taking place all over the country (especially those near Wall Street and DC). 3. Call your Representative in Congress and your Senators. (click here to find their phone numbers). Tell them what you told Senator Obama. When you screw up in life, there is hell to pay. Each and every one of you reading this knows that basic lesson and has paid the consequences of your actions at some point. In this great democracy, we cannot let there be one set of rules for the vast majority of hard-working citizens, and another set of rules for the elite, who, when they screw up, are handed one more gift on a silver platter. No more! Not again! Yours,Michael MooreMMFlint@aol.comMichaelMoore.com P.S. Having read further the details of this bailout bill, you need to know you are being lied to. They talk about how they will prevent golden parachutes. It says NOTHING about what these executives and fat cats will make in SALARY. According to Rep. Brad Sherman of California, these top managers will continue to receive million-dollar-a-month paychecks under this new bill. There is no direct ownership given to the American people for the money being handed over. Foreign banks and investors will be allowed to receive billion-dollar handouts. A large chunk of this $700 billion is going to be given directly to Chinese and Middle Eastern banks. There is NO guarantee of ever seeing that money again. P.P.S. From talking to people I know in DC, they say the reason so many Dems are behind this is because Wall Street this weekend put a gun to their heads and said either turn over the $700 billion or the first thing we'll start blowing up are the pension funds and 401(k)s of your middle class constituents. The Dems are scared they may make good on their threat. But this is not the time to back down or act like the typical Democrat we have witnessed for the last eight years. The Dems handed a stolen election over to Bush. The Dems gave Bush the votes he needed to invade a sovereign country. Once they took over Congress in 2007, they refused to pull the plug on the war. And now they have been cowered into being accomplices in the crime of the century. You have to call them now and say "NO!" If we let them do this, just imagine how hard it will be to get anything good done when President Obama is in the White House. THESE DEMOCRATS ARE ONLY AS STRONG AS THE BACKBONE WE GIVE THEM. CALL CONGRESS NOW.
Dow Plunges as much as 705 POINTS!!!!
http://money.cnn.com/2008/09/29/markets/markets_newyork/index.htm?postversion=2008092911
Glad they voted down that BS bailout Bill!!! It would not have worked! It only would've helped the Crooks in the White House get away with the rest of our country's money!!!!
Glad they voted down that BS bailout Bill!!! It would not have worked! It only would've helped the Crooks in the White House get away with the rest of our country's money!!!!
Sunday, September 28, 2008
here goes another bank ...failing
Wachovia bank in talks to be bought: sources
By Paritosh Bansal and Megan Davies2 hours, 20 minutes ago
Wachovia Corp is in talks with rivals to be taken over, sources familiar with the situation said on Sunday, after the U.S. bank's shares fell 27 percent on Friday due to ongoing concerns about its portfolio of illiquid mortgage assets.
Citigroup Inc is among the parties in talks with Wachovia, the two sources said, and one source said Wells Fargo & Co was also in discussions.
The New York Times said the two companies were locked in a bidding war for a possible takeover of Wachovia, citing people involved in the talks. The U.S. government, led by the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department, is also involved in the talks, the newspaper said.
The government is resisting guaranteeing some of Wachovia's assets, as it did for Bear Stearns when it engineered that company's sale to JPMorgan Chase & Co, and is also opposed to taking over Wachovia unless its financial position deteriorates more rapidly.
Talks could go past Sunday night, the newspaper said.
Citigroup and Wells Fargo are unlikely to bid more than a few dollars a share for Wachovia, whose shares closed Friday at $10, the newspaper said. It is unclear whether Wachovia would be sold as a whole or be broken up, or how much Wachovia bondholders might lose in any transaction, it said.
A Wachovia spokeswoman declined to comment. Citigroup and Wells Fargo could not be immediately reached for comment.
Investor concern about Wachovia mounted Friday after JPMorgan said it would take a $31 billion write-down on loans it acquired when it took over Washington Mutual Inc's banking unit on Thursday.
The write-down raised worry that Wachovia might have to take much larger write-downs on a $122 billion portfolio of option adjustable-rate mortgages it largely inherited when it bought California lender Golden West Financial Corp in 2006.
(Additional reporting by Jonathan Stempel; Writing by Michael Erman)
By Paritosh Bansal and Megan Davies2 hours, 20 minutes ago
Wachovia Corp is in talks with rivals to be taken over, sources familiar with the situation said on Sunday, after the U.S. bank's shares fell 27 percent on Friday due to ongoing concerns about its portfolio of illiquid mortgage assets.
Citigroup Inc is among the parties in talks with Wachovia, the two sources said, and one source said Wells Fargo & Co was also in discussions.
The New York Times said the two companies were locked in a bidding war for a possible takeover of Wachovia, citing people involved in the talks. The U.S. government, led by the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department, is also involved in the talks, the newspaper said.
The government is resisting guaranteeing some of Wachovia's assets, as it did for Bear Stearns when it engineered that company's sale to JPMorgan Chase & Co, and is also opposed to taking over Wachovia unless its financial position deteriorates more rapidly.
Talks could go past Sunday night, the newspaper said.
Citigroup and Wells Fargo are unlikely to bid more than a few dollars a share for Wachovia, whose shares closed Friday at $10, the newspaper said. It is unclear whether Wachovia would be sold as a whole or be broken up, or how much Wachovia bondholders might lose in any transaction, it said.
A Wachovia spokeswoman declined to comment. Citigroup and Wells Fargo could not be immediately reached for comment.
Investor concern about Wachovia mounted Friday after JPMorgan said it would take a $31 billion write-down on loans it acquired when it took over Washington Mutual Inc's banking unit on Thursday.
The write-down raised worry that Wachovia might have to take much larger write-downs on a $122 billion portfolio of option adjustable-rate mortgages it largely inherited when it bought California lender Golden West Financial Corp in 2006.
(Additional reporting by Jonathan Stempel; Writing by Michael Erman)
$700 Billion Bail Out... CEO MONEY CAPPED AT $500,000!
I LOVE IT....
//signed//
HATE, HATE, HATE
Discuss....
//signed//
HATE, HATE, HATE
Discuss....
Friday, September 26, 2008
SOMEONE GETS IT...MUST READ
Commentary: McCain has his priorities straight
Story Highlights
Ruben Navarrette: John McCain should be commended for returning to Washington
McCain returned to Congress to work on proposed bailout deal with colleagues
Navarrette: Obama-friendly media quick to dismiss McCain wanting to delay debate
By Ruben Navarrette Jr.Special to CNN
Editor's Note: Ruben Navarrette is a nationally syndicated columnist and a member of the editorial board of the San Diego Union-Tribune. Read his column here
(CNN) -- Talk about a last-minute reprieve. Tonight's presidential debate in Oxford, Mississippi was nearly a casualty of the financial crisis. It's back on schedule.
But hopefully, not back on script. Given all that took place this week, it's obvious that the format of the debate should be immediately revamped to focus not on foreign affairs and national security as planned but on the one subject every American is talking about: the economic crisis.
It would be surreal to watch Barack Obama and John McCain debate what to do in Baghdad or Kabul when the country's attention is fixed on Wall Street.
At some point, the candidates will have to make plain what they would do to fix the crisis, restore Americans' confidence and rally their respective parties in support of a common vision.
It's not enough for them to show that they understand the problem. They have to lead the way to a solution and show that they have the will, courage and strength to get us there.
Earlier this week, McCain abruptly suspended his campaign and requested that the debate be postponed until Congress finishes the heavy lifting of approving a bailout. That put Obama and McCain in a classic Mexican standoff with each trying to look presidential, while attempting to map out a course that would benefit him politically.
Some in the Obama-friendly media were quick to dismiss McCain's move as a political stunt. I don't know. It's not like launching one's candidacy in Springfield, Illinois, in the hopes of conjuring up comparisons to Abraham Lincoln, or moving one's convention speech to a football stadium to accommodate a larger crowd.
I think McCain deserves applause for having his priorities straight. For the past several days, the media and members of both parties have been scaring the daylights out of the American people by calling this the most serious economic crisis since the Great Depression.
This week, President Bush warned that our current situation threatens not just the lending industry but also the entire U.S. economy.
After all the doom and gloom, pundits were then somehow surprised when McCain decided to temporarily suspend his presidential campaign and return to his day job in Congress, where he tried to work out a bailout deal with his colleagues. Well at least most of his colleagues.
Despite having decried the economic crisis in near-apocalyptic terms in an attempt to lay blame on President Bush and, by association, McCain, the junior senator from Illinois didn't feel the urgency to show up for work and try to do what he could to address it. Obama certainly has standing and more than his share of influence. This is, after all, the de-facto leader of the Democratic Party.
Unfortunately, he also looks like someone who is so focused on what he hopes will be his next job that he has lost interest in his current one.
McCain showed real leadership this week. And frankly, if we were more accustomed to seeing that sort of thing from our elected officials, we might be less cynical and better able to recognize it on the rare occasions when it surfaces. iReport.com: Are you planning to watch the debate?
The clock is running down on the Bush administration. It is almost time to hand off the baton. The financial crisis will no doubt become McCain's No. 1 agenda item if he is elected president. Or it will be Obama's No. 1 agenda item if he is elected.
This issue is as difficult as they come. I get that. It requires making sacrifices, wrestling with tough choices and telling Americans the hard and unpleasant truth -- all the things that politicians hate to do.
Too bad. The presidential candidates can't run from this issue any more than the rest of the country can. That's why both of them should have cleared their plate and gotten to work on a solution. But only one did.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the writer.
Story Highlights
Ruben Navarrette: John McCain should be commended for returning to Washington
McCain returned to Congress to work on proposed bailout deal with colleagues
Navarrette: Obama-friendly media quick to dismiss McCain wanting to delay debate
By Ruben Navarrette Jr.Special to CNN
Editor's Note: Ruben Navarrette is a nationally syndicated columnist and a member of the editorial board of the San Diego Union-Tribune. Read his column here
(CNN) -- Talk about a last-minute reprieve. Tonight's presidential debate in Oxford, Mississippi was nearly a casualty of the financial crisis. It's back on schedule.
But hopefully, not back on script. Given all that took place this week, it's obvious that the format of the debate should be immediately revamped to focus not on foreign affairs and national security as planned but on the one subject every American is talking about: the economic crisis.
It would be surreal to watch Barack Obama and John McCain debate what to do in Baghdad or Kabul when the country's attention is fixed on Wall Street.
At some point, the candidates will have to make plain what they would do to fix the crisis, restore Americans' confidence and rally their respective parties in support of a common vision.
It's not enough for them to show that they understand the problem. They have to lead the way to a solution and show that they have the will, courage and strength to get us there.
Earlier this week, McCain abruptly suspended his campaign and requested that the debate be postponed until Congress finishes the heavy lifting of approving a bailout. That put Obama and McCain in a classic Mexican standoff with each trying to look presidential, while attempting to map out a course that would benefit him politically.
Some in the Obama-friendly media were quick to dismiss McCain's move as a political stunt. I don't know. It's not like launching one's candidacy in Springfield, Illinois, in the hopes of conjuring up comparisons to Abraham Lincoln, or moving one's convention speech to a football stadium to accommodate a larger crowd.
I think McCain deserves applause for having his priorities straight. For the past several days, the media and members of both parties have been scaring the daylights out of the American people by calling this the most serious economic crisis since the Great Depression.
This week, President Bush warned that our current situation threatens not just the lending industry but also the entire U.S. economy.
After all the doom and gloom, pundits were then somehow surprised when McCain decided to temporarily suspend his presidential campaign and return to his day job in Congress, where he tried to work out a bailout deal with his colleagues. Well at least most of his colleagues.
Despite having decried the economic crisis in near-apocalyptic terms in an attempt to lay blame on President Bush and, by association, McCain, the junior senator from Illinois didn't feel the urgency to show up for work and try to do what he could to address it. Obama certainly has standing and more than his share of influence. This is, after all, the de-facto leader of the Democratic Party.
Unfortunately, he also looks like someone who is so focused on what he hopes will be his next job that he has lost interest in his current one.
McCain showed real leadership this week. And frankly, if we were more accustomed to seeing that sort of thing from our elected officials, we might be less cynical and better able to recognize it on the rare occasions when it surfaces. iReport.com: Are you planning to watch the debate?
The clock is running down on the Bush administration. It is almost time to hand off the baton. The financial crisis will no doubt become McCain's No. 1 agenda item if he is elected president. Or it will be Obama's No. 1 agenda item if he is elected.
This issue is as difficult as they come. I get that. It requires making sacrifices, wrestling with tough choices and telling Americans the hard and unpleasant truth -- all the things that politicians hate to do.
Too bad. The presidential candidates can't run from this issue any more than the rest of the country can. That's why both of them should have cleared their plate and gotten to work on a solution. But only one did.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the writer.
Ku Klux Klan is having a line this fall! Turn in your info ASAP!
Now that John McCain has decided to attend Friday night's debate, Ole Miss should be able to breathe easy. The presidential debate, after all, is supposed to be Ole Miss' big moment. Hosting the first such forum of the general campaign, administrators hoped, would help the school shed the racial-backwater image that has clung to it since its embattled 1962 integration, when 120 federal marshals could barely hold back the violent riots that left two civilians dead and dozens injured. The fact that the debate participants will include the nation's first black presidential nominee of a major party, Barack Obama, would only add to the symbolism. The high-profile event is a chance "to invite the nation and the world to visit us and see Ole Miss today," says University Chancellor Robert Khayat. "This is a very different place from 1962. I'm confident that they will see that."
That might, however, be very hard to see if, as the University's Daily Mississippian newspaper reported on Sept. 12, the audience of thousands right outside the debate hall watching by simulcast includes some unwelcome guests: the Mississippi White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. The Klansmen won't be wearing robes or hoods or making "a big hoopla," says Imperial Wizard Richard Greene, 46, who refuses to divulge how many members the Mississippi chapter has. Nor will they take advantage of the designated protest zone outside the debate theater to stage one of their typical demonstrations — which include fiery speeches and a cross burning — for fear of causing riots. "We don't want anybody to get hurt," says Greene, who insists physical violence is no longer part of the Klan way of doing things. But Mark Potok, director of the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project, which studies hate groups and extremism in America, disagrees: "That's hogwash," he says, citing a lawsuit underway against a different Klan branch, the Imperial Klans of America, for allegedly assaulting a teenager at a county fair in Kentucky.
The Klan will, however, have pamphlets and membership applications on hand for any audience members who happen to share the Klansmen's views. Some examples of those views: Obama's election "could be the destruction of America," says Greene, who states categorically that he would not vote for a black candidate. Adds the Emperor of the Mississippi White Knights (the group's ritual leader), who asked not to be identified: "Locally, every place that has come under black rule has declined, and has declined sharply." He cited Jackson, Mississippi, and Washington, D.C., as examples. "Not all black people are particularly bad people," the emperor adds. But leadership, he asserts, "is just not in their character...it's just not in their ability." The Obama campaign did not return requests for comment.
But if their rhetoric is still as offensive as ever, the KKK no longer has much electoral influence, even in the Deep South. Clayborne Carson, a Stanford history professor and founding director of the Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute, says he can't think of one recent black politician whose candidacy has been seriously affected by Klan opposition. "They haven't been a significant factor for many years in American politics," he says, calling the White Knights' announcement a "publicity stunt." And many students say the plan for "invisibility" makes the Klan seem weak, not intimidating, and insist that no one on campus has any interest in entertaining the group's views. "Take our indifference," the Daily Mississippian's editorial board wrote in an open letter to the Klan on September 16, "as the ultimate symbol of your failure."
African-Americans now make up about 14% of the students at Ole Miss. Two recent student body presidents were black, as is this year's chair of the alumni association."The KKK, like most racism, is on the way out in Mississippi," says Brent Caldwell, president of the College Democrats at the university. "If [Klan members] come, both black and white students here at the university will protest," adds Black Students' Union president Brittany Smith. "This is not the same Ole Miss as it was 50 or 60 years ago." College Republicans president Tyler Craft agrees. "Is it perfect? I don't think so. Obviously it's not, or else there wouldn't be some small minority claiming that they're coming here as the Klan," he says. "But I think we're heading in the right direction."
Still, there are some cracks in this apparently united front. A quiet but frank minority of students at Ole Miss say racial tensions still exist. They point to the Confederate soldier monument that stands just 100 yards from the statue saluting James Meredith, who led the 1962 integration at age 29. (Meredith himself reportedly told a small group of student journalists that he was not permitted to speak at his own 2006 statue dedication; a University spokesman denies this, saying Meredith declined to speak of his own accord.) These students cite self-segregated fraternity houses, dorms, parties and tailgates as evidence that the campus is not as hungry for change as some students might suggest.
And sometimes, they cite personal experience. As a new freshman last September, Jeremiah Taylor accompanied his white roommate to a fraternity party where he was the only African-American in attendance. He says a partygoer, noticing him, commented, "Oh my God, I can't believe there's a nigger here." When Taylor turned to go, one student threw a beer can at him and some others pushed him down the stairs. In the ensuing weeks, he says many students suggested that by going to "their party" — meaning one for whites only — he had been looking for trouble. "I'm not in the fraternity circle," he says. "I don't know which parties you can go to and which you can't." After a University investigation, the fraternity members were suspended from conducting rush activities for one year and required to do community service and undergo racial sensitivity training.
Not surprisingly, Taylor is one person on campus who worries that some students may be more receptive than they let on to the Klan's message. And indeed, the Emperor of the KKK claims that after the Daily Mississippian published a story containing his email address, the Klan received "a number of inquiries" for new membership — including some from the university's students.
Susan Glisson, the executive director of Ole Miss' William Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation, notes that a smattering of groups working against racial strife have sprung up in recent years, and that any viable candidate for student body president must now include race reconciliation as part of his or her platform. Still, Glisson admits that racial tension "is a substantial problem."
Racial tension, of course, is not unique to Ole Miss — just this Tuesday an Obama effigy was founded hanging from a tree at George Fox University in Oregon, along with graffiti mentioning a scholarship program for minority and low-income programs — and neither are self-segregated parties frats, dorms or social gatherings. Many Ole Miss students, in fact, say their school comes under unfair scrutiny because of its past.
But ultimately, students and administrators say they hope the controversy over the debate will continue to advance the dialogue about race on campus and around the country. As Glisson puts it optimistically, "Bad speech leads to good speech."
LIL WAYNE GETS A BLOG
I never thought Wayne would be a tennis fan.
I also love tennis. I had a lot of people over to my place to watch the Wimbledon final this year, and we went crazy. I love Federer but Nadal is my favorite. He's the man. I love his motivation and his heart is big. He leaves it on the court. And when I found out he still lives with his family despite his success, that was it for me. That's unbelievable right there. That just goes to show you where his heart is at, how much love he has. So we were watching that match, and nobody thought he was gonna win. Everybody was telling me how he hadn't beat Federer on the hard court and he could only do it on clay but I never had any doubts. I knew his heart was gonna do it for him, and it did.
http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?id=3607474&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab2pos2
I also love tennis. I had a lot of people over to my place to watch the Wimbledon final this year, and we went crazy. I love Federer but Nadal is my favorite. He's the man. I love his motivation and his heart is big. He leaves it on the court. And when I found out he still lives with his family despite his success, that was it for me. That's unbelievable right there. That just goes to show you where his heart is at, how much love he has. So we were watching that match, and nobody thought he was gonna win. Everybody was telling me how he hadn't beat Federer on the hard court and he could only do it on clay but I never had any doubts. I knew his heart was gonna do it for him, and it did.
http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?id=3607474&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab2pos2
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Skin Bleaching: Big Business in Africa
Heavy Cost of Light Skin. Here is a preview as well as some of the comments people had to say about this growing issue…
By: Joan Baxter
The use of bleaching creams to lighten complexions seems to have reached epidemic proportions in Mali, despite widespread education campaigns. Women who refuse to bleach often find themselves regarded as second class citizens.
A woman who did not bleach her skin said she is often not offered a chair at baptisms, and is asked to make herself scarce when group photographs are taken at marriages.
How does everyone feel about this…being that it’s a huge issue nowadays?
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Male, 22, Los Angeles, CA
Just sad that any society would have a perception like that.
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Female, Age Private, Kansas City, MO
Self hate just like some in the US….strong feeling for an African country to emulate the beauty standatds of whites…
To read full article visit: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/718359.stm
For full comments on this topic (blackplanet.com)visit this url : http://www.blackplanet.com/forums/thread.html?thread_id=50213
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For more articles on this issue visit:
www.counterpunch.org/mire07282005.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/6232343.stm
For more interesting information visit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonial_mentality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_is_Beautiful
Not enough info (wink)…here are some books:
The Color Complex by Kathy Russell
Don’t Play in the Sun by Marita Golden
Blacker the Berry by Wallace Thurman
You still wanna hear a debate ??????????/
JPMorgan Chase buys WaMu assets after FDIC seizure
By MARCY GORDON, SARA LEPRO and MADLEN READ, AP Business Writers 4 minutes ago
JPMorgan Chase & Co. Inc. came to the rescue of Washington Mutual Inc. Thursday, buying the thrift's banking assets after WaMu was seized by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. in the largest failure ever of a U.S. bank. This is the second time in six months that JPMorgan Chase has taken over a major financial institution crippled by bad bets in the mortgage market.
The deal will cost JPMorgan Chase $1.9 billion, and the bank said in a statement it planned to write down WaMu's loan portfolio by approximately $31 billion. JPMorgan Chase, which acquired Bear Stearns Cos. last March, also said it would sell $8 billion in common stock to raise its capital position.
The FDIC, which insures bank deposits, said it would not have to dip into the insurance fund as a result of the seizure. There had been concerns that the fund, which took a big hit after the seizure of IndyMac Bank, could be depleted by a WaMu seizure.
WaMu "was under severe liquidity pressure," FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair told reporters in a conference call.
"For all depositors and other customers of Washington Mutual Bank, this is simply a combination of two banks," Bair said in a statement. "For bank customers, it will be a seamless transition. There will be no interruption in services and bank customers should expect business as usual come Friday morning."
The government measures bank failures by an institutions's assets; Seattle-based WaMu has roughly $310 billion in assets. The previous record was the failure of Continental Illinois National Bank in 1984, with $40 billion in assets when it closed. IndyMac, seized in July, had $32 billion.
WaMu was searching for a lifeline after piling up billions of dollars in losses due to failed mortgages. WaMu has seen its stock price plummet by 87 percent this year, and it suffered a ratings downgrade by Standard & Poor's earlier this week that put it in danger of collapse.
The Bush administration's proposal for a $700 billion bailout for distressed financial institutions was believed to have given fresh impetus to a buyout and new allure to WaMu. However, it was not immediately known how the bailout, which was still being negotiated in Washington late Thursday, would affect the JPMorgan Chase-WaMu deal.
JPMorgan Chase's chief executive, Jamie Dimon, said in a conference call, said the "only negative" related to the deal was "how to handle some of these bad assets." He did not elaborate.
Besides JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo & Co., Citigroup Inc., HSBC, Spain's Banco Santander and Toronto-Dominion Bank of Canada were all mentioned as possible suitors. WaMu was also believed to be talking to private equity firms.
The FDIC was seeking a buyer will to bear a large burden of WaMu's losses to lessen the impact on the insurance fund.
In a statement, JPMorgan Chase said it was not acquiring any senior unsecured debt, subordinated debt, and preferred stock of Washington Mutual's banks, or any assets or liabilities of the holding company, Washington Mutual Inc.
JPMorgan Chase said the acquisition will give it 5,400 branches in 23 states. JPMorgan Chase said it plans to close less than 10 percent of the two companies' branches; the bank has not yet decided which to close.
In March, the bank acquired the failing Bear Stearns in a deal brokered by the government. It paid $2.3 billion for the company and its stock, bringing its expenditure on both Bear Stearns and WaMu to a total of $4.2 billion.
Washington Mutual ran into trouble after it got caught up in the booming part of the mortgage business that made loans to people with bad credit, known as subprime borrowers.
Troubles spread to other parts of WaMu's home loan portfolio, namely its "option" adjustable-rate mortgage loans. Option ARM loans offer very low introductory payments and let borrowers defer some interest payments until later years. The bank stopped originating those loans in June.
Problems in WaMu's home loan business began to surface in 2006, when the bank reported that the division lost $48 million, compared with net income of about $1 billion in 2005.
At the start of 2007, following the release of the company's annual financial report, then-CEO Kerry Killinger said the bank had prepared for a slowdown in its housing business by sharply reducing its subprime mortgage lending and servicing of loans. Killinger was replaced as CEO on Sept. 8 by Alan H. Fishman, the former president and chief operating officer of Sovereign Bank and president and CEO of Independence Community Bank.
As more borrowers became delinquent on their mortgages, WaMu worked to help troubled customers refinance their loans as a way to avoid default and foreclosure, committing $2 billion to the effort last April. But that proved to be too little, too late.
At the same time, fears of growing credit problems kept investors from purchasing debt backed by those loans, drying up a source of cash flow for banks that made subprime loans.
In December, WaMu said it would shutter its subprime lending business and reduce expenses with layoffs and a dividend cut.
WaMu became one of the first retail banks to seek outside cash in the wake of the credit crisis when it agreed to sell equity securities to an investment fund managed by TPG Capital and to other investors this spring, raising $7.2 billion in fresh capital.
The bank in July reported a $3 billion second-quarter loss — the biggest in its history — as it boosted its reserves to more than $8 billion to cover losses on bad loans.
JPMorgan Chase said the WaMu acquisition would add 50 cents per share to its earnings in 2009, and said it expects to have pretax merger costs of approximately $1.5 billion while achieving pretax savings of approximately $1.5 billion by 2010.
Before Thursday's announcement, there were concerns that the FDIC would have to turn to taxpayers to build up its fund, which has dipped from $52.4 billion at the end of last year to $45.2 billion, mostly because of the costs of IndyMac's failure.
Next month, Bair plans to propose increasing the premiums paid by banks and thrifts to replenish the fund. That plan is likely to be approved by the FDIC board. It is scheduled to be presented at a board meeting on Oct. 7, FDIC spokesman Andrew Gray said Thursday.
By MARCY GORDON, SARA LEPRO and MADLEN READ, AP Business Writers 4 minutes ago
JPMorgan Chase & Co. Inc. came to the rescue of Washington Mutual Inc. Thursday, buying the thrift's banking assets after WaMu was seized by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. in the largest failure ever of a U.S. bank. This is the second time in six months that JPMorgan Chase has taken over a major financial institution crippled by bad bets in the mortgage market.
The deal will cost JPMorgan Chase $1.9 billion, and the bank said in a statement it planned to write down WaMu's loan portfolio by approximately $31 billion. JPMorgan Chase, which acquired Bear Stearns Cos. last March, also said it would sell $8 billion in common stock to raise its capital position.
The FDIC, which insures bank deposits, said it would not have to dip into the insurance fund as a result of the seizure. There had been concerns that the fund, which took a big hit after the seizure of IndyMac Bank, could be depleted by a WaMu seizure.
WaMu "was under severe liquidity pressure," FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair told reporters in a conference call.
"For all depositors and other customers of Washington Mutual Bank, this is simply a combination of two banks," Bair said in a statement. "For bank customers, it will be a seamless transition. There will be no interruption in services and bank customers should expect business as usual come Friday morning."
The government measures bank failures by an institutions's assets; Seattle-based WaMu has roughly $310 billion in assets. The previous record was the failure of Continental Illinois National Bank in 1984, with $40 billion in assets when it closed. IndyMac, seized in July, had $32 billion.
WaMu was searching for a lifeline after piling up billions of dollars in losses due to failed mortgages. WaMu has seen its stock price plummet by 87 percent this year, and it suffered a ratings downgrade by Standard & Poor's earlier this week that put it in danger of collapse.
The Bush administration's proposal for a $700 billion bailout for distressed financial institutions was believed to have given fresh impetus to a buyout and new allure to WaMu. However, it was not immediately known how the bailout, which was still being negotiated in Washington late Thursday, would affect the JPMorgan Chase-WaMu deal.
JPMorgan Chase's chief executive, Jamie Dimon, said in a conference call, said the "only negative" related to the deal was "how to handle some of these bad assets." He did not elaborate.
Besides JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo & Co., Citigroup Inc., HSBC, Spain's Banco Santander and Toronto-Dominion Bank of Canada were all mentioned as possible suitors. WaMu was also believed to be talking to private equity firms.
The FDIC was seeking a buyer will to bear a large burden of WaMu's losses to lessen the impact on the insurance fund.
In a statement, JPMorgan Chase said it was not acquiring any senior unsecured debt, subordinated debt, and preferred stock of Washington Mutual's banks, or any assets or liabilities of the holding company, Washington Mutual Inc.
JPMorgan Chase said the acquisition will give it 5,400 branches in 23 states. JPMorgan Chase said it plans to close less than 10 percent of the two companies' branches; the bank has not yet decided which to close.
In March, the bank acquired the failing Bear Stearns in a deal brokered by the government. It paid $2.3 billion for the company and its stock, bringing its expenditure on both Bear Stearns and WaMu to a total of $4.2 billion.
Washington Mutual ran into trouble after it got caught up in the booming part of the mortgage business that made loans to people with bad credit, known as subprime borrowers.
Troubles spread to other parts of WaMu's home loan portfolio, namely its "option" adjustable-rate mortgage loans. Option ARM loans offer very low introductory payments and let borrowers defer some interest payments until later years. The bank stopped originating those loans in June.
Problems in WaMu's home loan business began to surface in 2006, when the bank reported that the division lost $48 million, compared with net income of about $1 billion in 2005.
At the start of 2007, following the release of the company's annual financial report, then-CEO Kerry Killinger said the bank had prepared for a slowdown in its housing business by sharply reducing its subprime mortgage lending and servicing of loans. Killinger was replaced as CEO on Sept. 8 by Alan H. Fishman, the former president and chief operating officer of Sovereign Bank and president and CEO of Independence Community Bank.
As more borrowers became delinquent on their mortgages, WaMu worked to help troubled customers refinance their loans as a way to avoid default and foreclosure, committing $2 billion to the effort last April. But that proved to be too little, too late.
At the same time, fears of growing credit problems kept investors from purchasing debt backed by those loans, drying up a source of cash flow for banks that made subprime loans.
In December, WaMu said it would shutter its subprime lending business and reduce expenses with layoffs and a dividend cut.
WaMu became one of the first retail banks to seek outside cash in the wake of the credit crisis when it agreed to sell equity securities to an investment fund managed by TPG Capital and to other investors this spring, raising $7.2 billion in fresh capital.
The bank in July reported a $3 billion second-quarter loss — the biggest in its history — as it boosted its reserves to more than $8 billion to cover losses on bad loans.
JPMorgan Chase said the WaMu acquisition would add 50 cents per share to its earnings in 2009, and said it expects to have pretax merger costs of approximately $1.5 billion while achieving pretax savings of approximately $1.5 billion by 2010.
Before Thursday's announcement, there were concerns that the FDIC would have to turn to taxpayers to build up its fund, which has dipped from $52.4 billion at the end of last year to $45.2 billion, mostly because of the costs of IndyMac's failure.
Next month, Bair plans to propose increasing the premiums paid by banks and thrifts to replenish the fund. That plan is likely to be approved by the FDIC board. It is scheduled to be presented at a board meeting on Oct. 7, FDIC spokesman Andrew Gray said Thursday.
I know we think it .....but don't say it!!!
State Rep. proposes voluntary sterilization for poor
Posted:
Female sterilization to curb poverty
Representative John LaBruzzo
BATON ROUGE, LA (WAFB) - Blood pressure is rising in the public debate over a plan by one Louisiana representative offering what some might call a bizarre way to fight poverty.
Representative John LaBruzzo of Metairie wants to pay poor people to get sterilized and reward rich people for having children. His proposal is already fueling heated debate.
"How can these people qualify for food stamps with $40,000 cars that I can't afford and I'm paying taxes?" LaBruzzo asks. Since hurricanes Gustav and Ike, LaBruzzo says his constituents have been calling him, angry about people they say rely on the government for handouts. "We need to deal with this before it explodes," he says
So, he is toying with his own solution. He has come up with the idea of voluntary sterilization for the poor. As a reward, they would get $1,000 from the state government. "If we don't break generational welfare trend, lot of people feel taken advantage of, then another problem on our hands." LaBruzzo is also thinking about proposing tax incentives for people not on welfare to encourage them to have children. "So many people on the other side of the political spectrum are pro-choice. Well, let's give these people the ability to choose."
At this point, this is all in the planning phase. LaBruzzo has not filed an official bill. Julie Mickelberry with Planned Parenthood is hoping he'll find a more viable solution. "I think he needs to look at the root of the problems. Go back to addressing issues of education about unintended pregnancy and opening healthcare access and don't think have done enough of that in Louisiana," she says.
Mickelberry says LaBruzzo's ideas are more like bribery, not a long-term solution. "I know there are over 500,000 women in need of contraceptive services. We know 22% uninsured, so we need to be addressing those issues," she adds. "Some people do think reasonable option and think at least look at it," LaBruzzo says.
He is still gathering welfare data from Baton Rouge to determine whether his ideas would work. He says if it proves feasible, then he will file a bill in the upcoming legislative session.
Posted:
Female sterilization to curb poverty
Representative John LaBruzzo
BATON ROUGE, LA (WAFB) - Blood pressure is rising in the public debate over a plan by one Louisiana representative offering what some might call a bizarre way to fight poverty.
Representative John LaBruzzo of Metairie wants to pay poor people to get sterilized and reward rich people for having children. His proposal is already fueling heated debate.
"How can these people qualify for food stamps with $40,000 cars that I can't afford and I'm paying taxes?" LaBruzzo asks. Since hurricanes Gustav and Ike, LaBruzzo says his constituents have been calling him, angry about people they say rely on the government for handouts. "We need to deal with this before it explodes," he says
So, he is toying with his own solution. He has come up with the idea of voluntary sterilization for the poor. As a reward, they would get $1,000 from the state government. "If we don't break generational welfare trend, lot of people feel taken advantage of, then another problem on our hands." LaBruzzo is also thinking about proposing tax incentives for people not on welfare to encourage them to have children. "So many people on the other side of the political spectrum are pro-choice. Well, let's give these people the ability to choose."
At this point, this is all in the planning phase. LaBruzzo has not filed an official bill. Julie Mickelberry with Planned Parenthood is hoping he'll find a more viable solution. "I think he needs to look at the root of the problems. Go back to addressing issues of education about unintended pregnancy and opening healthcare access and don't think have done enough of that in Louisiana," she says.
Mickelberry says LaBruzzo's ideas are more like bribery, not a long-term solution. "I know there are over 500,000 women in need of contraceptive services. We know 22% uninsured, so we need to be addressing those issues," she adds. "Some people do think reasonable option and think at least look at it," LaBruzzo says.
He is still gathering welfare data from Baton Rouge to determine whether his ideas would work. He says if it proves feasible, then he will file a bill in the upcoming legislative session.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Saints G Nesbit suspended for drug violation
He must have gotten confused and thought he was the cowboys. What else is going to happen. This team is jinxed.
http://www.miamiherald.com/sports/football/wires/story/698610.html
http://www.miamiherald.com/sports/football/wires/story/698610.html
It must be skim milk in dem titties
Ewl....http://www.clickondetroit.com/foodne...27/detail.htmlVERMONT -- People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals sent a letter to Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, cofounders of Ben & Jerry's Homemade Inc., urging them to replace cow's milk they use in their ice cream products with human breast milk, according to a statement recently released by a PETA spokeswoman."PETA's request comes in the wake of news reports that a Swiss restaurant owner will begin purchasing breast milk from nursing mothers and substituting breast milk for 75 percent of the cow's milk in the food he serves," the statement says.PETA officials say a move to human breast milk would lessen the suffering of dairy cows and their babies on factory farms and benedfit human health."The fact that human adults consume huge quantities of dairy products made from milk that was meant for a baby cow just doesn't make sense," says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. "Everyone knows that 'the breast is best,' so Ben & Jerry's could do consumers and cows a big favor by making the switch to breast milk."Read PETA's letter to Ben Cohen and Jerry GreenfieldSeptember 23, 2008Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, CofoundersBen & Jerry's Homemade Inc.Dear Mr. Cohen and Mr. Greenfield,On behalf of PETA and our more than 2 million members and supporters, I'd like to bring your attention to an innovative new idea from Switzerland that would bring a unique twist to Ben and Jerry's.Storchen restaurant is set to unveil a menu that includes soups, stews, and sauces made with at least 75 percent breast milk procured from human donors who are paid in exchange for their milk. If Ben and Jerry's replaced the cow's milk in its ice cream with breast milk, your customers-and cows-would reap the benefits.Using cow's milk for your ice cream is a hazard to your customer's health. Dairy products have been linked to juvenile diabetes, allergies, constipation, obesity, and prostate and ovarian cancer. The late Dr. Benjamin Spock, America's leading authority on child care, spoke out against feeding cow's milk to children, saying it may play a role in anemia, allergies, and juvenile diabetes and in the long term, will set kids up for obesity and heart disease-America's number one cause of death.Animals will also benefit from the switch to breast milk. Like all mammals, cows only produce milk during and after pregnancy, so to be able to constantly milk them, cows are forcefully impregnated every nine months. After several years of living in filthy conditions and being forced to produce 10 times more milk than they would naturally, their exhausted bodies are turned into hamburgers or ground up for soup.And of course, the veal industry could not survive without the dairy industry. Because male calves can't produce milk, dairy farmers take them from their mothers immediately after birth and sell them to veal farms, where they endure 14 to 17 weeks of torment chained inside a crate so small that they can't even turn around.The breast is best! Won't you give cows and their babies a break and our health a boost by switching from cow's milk to breast milk in Ben and Jerry's ice cream? Thank you for your consideration.Sincerely,Tracy ReimanExecutive Vice President
Cornball of the Year - Reggie Bush Ready To Wed Kim Kardashian!
Reggie Bush Ready To Wed Kim Kardashian!
Written By Gyant
http://www.sohh.com/2008/09/gyant-scoop-b-7.html
Reggie Bush intends on marrying Kim Kardashian [Ray-J's sex tape jump-off]. At least that's what he just publicly announced.
NFL star, Reggie Bush and Kim Kardashian hear wedding bells in their future. At least that's what Reggie thinks. In a recent interview with nfl.com, the somewhat reclusive [I have no idea what position he plays] New Orleans Saint's player opened up about his relationship with the reality show celeb. Here's what he had to say when asked about his relationship with Kim:
How is it going with girlfriend Kim Kardashian?
"Great," he said. "Great girl. Great friend."
Is marriage to her in the plans?
"Yes," he replied.
When?
"Don’t know. But it’s coming."
Children?
"Definitely. Absolutely. I look forward to being a father."
Let's just hope that Reggie is smart enough to make Kim sign an iron-clad prenup. Though I don't know her personally, I have definitely heard about homegirl and her ways.
Written By Gyant
http://www.sohh.com/2008/09/gyant-scoop-b-7.html
Reggie Bush intends on marrying Kim Kardashian [Ray-J's sex tape jump-off]. At least that's what he just publicly announced.
NFL star, Reggie Bush and Kim Kardashian hear wedding bells in their future. At least that's what Reggie thinks. In a recent interview with nfl.com, the somewhat reclusive [I have no idea what position he plays] New Orleans Saint's player opened up about his relationship with the reality show celeb. Here's what he had to say when asked about his relationship with Kim:
How is it going with girlfriend Kim Kardashian?
"Great," he said. "Great girl. Great friend."
Is marriage to her in the plans?
"Yes," he replied.
When?
"Don’t know. But it’s coming."
Children?
"Definitely. Absolutely. I look forward to being a father."
Let's just hope that Reggie is smart enough to make Kim sign an iron-clad prenup. Though I don't know her personally, I have definitely heard about homegirl and her ways.
Did the refs aid Denver again?
Monday, 10:31 p.m.
According to ProFootballTalk.com and ESPN reports, New Orleans coach Sean Payton has informally complained to the NFL regarding an apparent blown call made late in the Broncos-Saints game on Sunday, with Denver winning, 34-32. According to the reports, Broncos LB Jamie Winborn was never called for offsides during the Saints' potential game-winning drive -- an infraction that would have given New Orleans the ball for a longer period.
If the refs missed the Winborn call, it would mean the Broncos have benefited from questionable officiating to pull out consecutive victories at home.
According to ProFootballTalk.com and ESPN reports, New Orleans coach Sean Payton has informally complained to the NFL regarding an apparent blown call made late in the Broncos-Saints game on Sunday, with Denver winning, 34-32. According to the reports, Broncos LB Jamie Winborn was never called for offsides during the Saints' potential game-winning drive -- an infraction that would have given New Orleans the ball for a longer period.
If the refs missed the Winborn call, it would mean the Broncos have benefited from questionable officiating to pull out consecutive victories at home.
Monday, September 22, 2008
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Friday, September 19, 2008
Boys Will Be Boys,’ an Excerpt - Dallas Cowboys
Boys Will Be Boys,’ an Excerpt
By Toni Monkovic
Tags: Cowboys
With a little help from HarperCollins, here’s a slice of “Boys Will Be Boys: The Glory Days and Party Nights of the Dallas Cowboys Dynasty.”
For a Q&A with Jeff Pearlman, the author, go here.
My first road game with Dallas, we walk into the hotel lobbyand there are four hundred people waiting—grown men, beautiful women, kids. It’s a circus and a rock concertrolled into one. My first road game with the Rams, the only people waiting are the bellhops.
—Jim Price, Cowboys tight end
What happens when a team wins a Super Bowl?
Lunacy.
Absolute lunacy.
Prior to the thrashing of Buffalo, most members of the Dallas Cowboys were mere football players—admired to some degree, but far from household names (outside of Troy, Emmitt, Michael . . . and maybe Nate Newton — he of the 360-pound Shamu physique). But would anyone have recognized, say, Jay Novacek or Tommie Agee or Alvin Harper or Tony Casillas were they strolling down Emerald Lane on a sunny weekend afternoon? The NFL is not the NBA, where players are the brand—endorsed, publicized, and plastered atop billboards. No, in professional football anonymity reigns supreme.
In the aftermath of Super Bowl XXVII, however, the Cowboys became the most omnipresent group of athletes the country had seen since 1987, when the New York Giants beat Denver for the title and promptly had five players release autobiographies (one has not lived until he reads Simms to McConkey: Blood, Sweat, and Gatorade).
Cowboy players made paid appearances at supermarket openings and at shopping malls; at dance clubs and at roller rink birthday parties. They did radio spots, hosted TV specials, served as MCs. Jimmy Johnson wrote a “tell-all” book that told little. Tom Vanderveer, mayor of Troy, Texas, announced that the city council was considering changing the town’s name to “Troy Aikman.”
In what surely goes down as one of the most questionable decisions of his otherwise wondrous career, Aikman, along with Novacek, special teams coach Joe Avezzano, and former Cowboys Randy White and Walt Garrison, formed a country music group, The Boys. Their album, Everybody Wants to Be a Cowboy, mixes horrific songs and horrific singers into one uniquely horrific package. The first single, “Oklahoma Nights,” was sung by Aikman, whose vocal stylings are reminiscent of a cat choking on a lug nut.
Of all the events that merged to form Cowboy Mania, the one that remains most curious is the rise of Kenny Gant, a third-year defensive back from Albany State who led all nonstarters with 54 tackles during the ’92 season and tied for the team lead with 3 interceptions. Though Gant excelled on special teams and as a nickel back, he was little more than an average NFL player. “Truthfully, I just wanted to hang on,” he says. “When I was drafted I went to a Wendy’s in Albany, Georgia, to celebrate with a hamburger. I was small-scale like that.”
What Gant did possess, however, was perfect timing.
During practices early in the 1992 season, Gant noticed that Kevin Smith, his fellow defensive back, would celebrate a good play by bending an arm at the elbow and holding it up to his helmet. Smith termed it “the Shark Fin,” and said the defensive backs at Texas A&M, his alma mater, used it to show off. “In practice all of us started flashing the fin, just sorta goofing around,” says Gant. “But it wasn’t like there was anything to it.” That is, until the fifth game of the ’92 season, when Gant sprinted down the field on a punt, charged Seattle’s Robb Thomas, and hammered him with a forearm to the head. As Gant leapt to his feet, he bent his right arm, held it to his noggin, and swayed it back and forth while bobbing his rear end. The Texas Stadium crowd roared with delight.
After the game Gant was surrounded by reporters, intrigued by the newest dance sensation. Gant smiled. He was a fun-loving guy who enjoyed jogging onto the practice field wearing only a jock or riding naked through the locker room in the laundry cart or hopping over a fence to sneak onto safety Bill Bates’s ranch for a quiet evening of fishing or hitting the clubs with teammates. Now, there was the Selachimorpha thing. “I just had my shark fin up,” he told the press with a chuckle. “We weren’t letting nothing get by.”
A craze had arrived. In the aftermath of the Super Bowl, Gant’s celebrity reached a whole new level. He was now, officially, “The Shark.” There were Shark Dance posters. Shark Dance T-shirts. A local player hangout, the Cowboy Sports Café, served the Sharkbite— a blue-tinted Long Island Iced Tea. Gant would visit a shopping mall and hear people holler his name while making a fin. “I’d be in restaurants eating and I’d look up from my food and some guy or some kid would be doing the Shark Dance,” says Gant. “It’s funny how one day you’re anonymous and the next day you’re huge. I loved it.”
A couple of months after the Super Bowl, Gant was hired by a Dallas attorney to appear at a pool party for son’s thirteenth birthday. Gant arrived in a suit and tie and performed his Shark Dance to the delight of the approximately thirty youths in attendance. He then turned to the father and asked to borrow a pair of swim trunks.
“Kenny,” the man said, “you don’t have to . . .”
The Shark insisted.
“I had on a pair of this guy’s nut-huggers,” laughs Gant, “and I jumped right in.”
The strangest request came from the Jewish family that hired Gant to appear at their son’s bar mitzvah. A deeply religious Pentecostal from the decidedly non-Jewish town of Lakeland, Florida, Gant grew up attending church on Sundays, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, serving as a drummer in the congregation’s band, and watching in awe as many around him spoke in tongues. Brad Mitzvee? What the heck was a Brad Mitzvee?
“Man, was that fun,” says Gant. “I helped light the candles, I wore a yarmulke, I did the Shark Dance, I line-danced. I got paid but I would have done it for free.”
Beyond the Shark appearances and country albums and Brad Mitzvees, what best symbolized the Cowboys’ rise from contenders to superstars was the Hoopsters, the team’s offseason “charity” basketball squad. Formed in the early 1970s by wide receiver Drew Pearson, the Hoopsters’ initial mission was to travel the state of Texas promoting the Cowboys, rewarding fans for their undying support during the season and making some cash on the side. The Hoopsters would come to town, play the River Oaks Volunteer Fire Department or the Lubbock Police Department or the faculty of Atlee Parr High School and donate most of the proceeds to charity. The games would be competitive, but never crossed the line.
Any lingering philanthropic intentions dissipated in the mid-1980s, when a linebacker named Eugene Lockhart took charge of the Hoopsters and ran the operation less like a goodwill tour and a bit more like a Hollywood agent. The Hoopsters began demanding exorbitant appearance fees for their participation. Instead of COME OUT AND SEE THE COWBOYS RAISE MONEY FOR A GOOD CAUSE! promotional signs should have read COME OUT AND SEE THE COWBOYS RAISE MONEY FOR A GOOD CAUSE— MINUS THE $30,000 WE’VE GOTTA PAY THEM TO BE HERE, THE FOOD WE’RE REQUIRED TO SUPPLY, AND THE FIRST- CLASS HOTEL SUITES THEY PROBABLY WANT, TOO. “Lockhart was not a good guy,” says Anthony “Paco” Montoya, who managed the Hoopsters and worked as a gofer for several players through the 1990s. “He was a bully who did things the wrong way.”
In 1988, a basketball-loving rookie named Michael Irvin led a Hoopsters revolt, literally wrestling control of the team from Lockhart in an Odessa, Texas, hotel room. “When it was over there was lots of broken furniture,” says Montoya, “and the Hoopsters had a new leader.”
Yet the sex-seeking, money-hungry, fame-addicted wide receiver was hardly a Saint. Irvin had no trouble putting the Hoopsters to his own use, whether that meant demanding a $10,000 personal appearance fee for a two-hour “charitable” basketball game or securing perks that would have put the Rat Pack to shame. On May 10, 1993, the Hoopsters were scheduled to play a Friday night exhibition at Baylor University that was to raise money for the resurrection of Paul Quinn College, a small, traditionally black school. As the game was set to begin, an organizer informed Irvin that he did not have the $25,000 check the Hoopsters required. Instead of staying and, say, playing for less money to entertain the 240 spectators, Irvin, Harper, Kevin Smith, Jimmie Jones, and the rest of the Cowboys bolted. Such behavior came as no surprise to Rodney Dodd, president of the Little Dribblers in Fairfield, Texas, who had presented the Hoopsters with a $5,600 check for a March 5 appearance. Less than a week before the game, Dodd was told the fee had increased to $7,000, plus expenses. “I called [Irvin] back and told him we didn’t want them,” said Dodd at the time. “To this day we’ve never seen our fifty-six hundred dollars.”
Unlike the old Hoopsters of Pearson and Everson Walls, Irvin’s priorities were money, winning, and postgame sexual pursuits. Whether playing a bunch of beefy marines at a military base or a flabby gaggle of middle-aged teachers in a dimly let gymnasium, the Hoopsters had to win. That’s why, in a May 1991 game against the staff of a Dallas radio station, KKDA-AM, Irvin became so incensed by a questionable foul call that he allegedly grabbed the referee—an unpaid volunteer named Willie Summerling— and showered him with obscenities. When Summerling warned Irvin to dial back his antics, the player slugged him in the mouth, knocking loose a dental plate. There were two thousand spectators in attendance, many of them children.
With the Cowboys’ on-field successes came increased Hoopster requests. They flew to Mexico City for a game, flew to Las Vegas for another. They played the Redskins in Washington, engaged in two or three mini-brawls, and left with a hard-fought 3-point triumph. “Once we played these soldiers in Killeen and we needed an escort out of the stadium,” says Kevin Smith. “The other team wanted to fight some Cowboys to prove their manhood, and as time ran out I hit a three-pointer for the win. That was pretty darn sweet.”
Though players generally joined the Hoopsters in the spirit of camaraderie, what proved to be the greatest perk— especially in the shadow of the ’92 season— was a dazzling postgame buffet of booze, marijuana, cocaine, and sex. Whether the Hoopsters won or lost, following each contest they headed either for the hottest nightspot in town or to their hotel, which would be transformed into Club Hoopsters. Though the Cowboys were a big deal in Dallas, they were larger- than- life in smaller towns across the state and country, where a visit from the Super Bowl champions was akin to a return of Elvis. Kids turned out to see their sports heroes. Men turned out to see their sports heroes too. But women— well, mounds of women came out to gain a firsthand physical experience. “It didn’t matter if you were a dope dealer, a Channel 5 TV reporter, a judge on the U.S. District Court,” says Newton. “You weren’t getting the women the Cowboys were.”
If you were hot, you might get to spend the night with a player. If you were sexy, you might even end up on the Hoopsters’ private airplane. If you were two lesbians looking to put on a show, you might be allowed to fly the jet. “That’s when it really got crazy,” says Montoya, who traveled with the team. “To call those flights ‘off the hook’ doesn’t do anything justice. I don’t think there’s a word for what went on. We filled those planes with more women than we did players, and they were willing to do anything.”
Anything?
“Absolutely anything.”
It was here, 30,000 feet above the ground, that Alvin Harper earned the nickname “Freaky Harp.” Though married to Jamise, his college sweetheart from the University of Tennessee, Harper never met a groupie, a stripper, a cheerleader he wouldn’t have sex with. In a feat that left teammates stunned, Harper was banned from the Men’s Club of Dallas for having sex in a phone booth. To be a Cowboy star in the 1990s and have someone demand you leave his strip joint— well, that took work.
On the Hoopsters’ chartered airplane, there were no bouncers, no wives, no coaches. Just loose women looking to party with the Super Bowl champions. Cowboy players would have sex in the main cabin, sex in the bathrooms. Irvin, the ringleader of all things erotic, would direct various arrangements— women on women, two women on a teammate, three women on a teammate. “There was nothing Mike couldn’t think of,” says Montoya. “He had quite the imagination.”
“I’ll tell you one thing,” says Clayton Holmes, a defensive back and Hoopsters guard. “If you were employed by the Cowboys, it didn’t take much to get whatever it was you craved. And we craved a lot.”
By Toni Monkovic
Tags: Cowboys
With a little help from HarperCollins, here’s a slice of “Boys Will Be Boys: The Glory Days and Party Nights of the Dallas Cowboys Dynasty.”
For a Q&A with Jeff Pearlman, the author, go here.
My first road game with Dallas, we walk into the hotel lobbyand there are four hundred people waiting—grown men, beautiful women, kids. It’s a circus and a rock concertrolled into one. My first road game with the Rams, the only people waiting are the bellhops.
—Jim Price, Cowboys tight end
What happens when a team wins a Super Bowl?
Lunacy.
Absolute lunacy.
Prior to the thrashing of Buffalo, most members of the Dallas Cowboys were mere football players—admired to some degree, but far from household names (outside of Troy, Emmitt, Michael . . . and maybe Nate Newton — he of the 360-pound Shamu physique). But would anyone have recognized, say, Jay Novacek or Tommie Agee or Alvin Harper or Tony Casillas were they strolling down Emerald Lane on a sunny weekend afternoon? The NFL is not the NBA, where players are the brand—endorsed, publicized, and plastered atop billboards. No, in professional football anonymity reigns supreme.
In the aftermath of Super Bowl XXVII, however, the Cowboys became the most omnipresent group of athletes the country had seen since 1987, when the New York Giants beat Denver for the title and promptly had five players release autobiographies (one has not lived until he reads Simms to McConkey: Blood, Sweat, and Gatorade).
Cowboy players made paid appearances at supermarket openings and at shopping malls; at dance clubs and at roller rink birthday parties. They did radio spots, hosted TV specials, served as MCs. Jimmy Johnson wrote a “tell-all” book that told little. Tom Vanderveer, mayor of Troy, Texas, announced that the city council was considering changing the town’s name to “Troy Aikman.”
In what surely goes down as one of the most questionable decisions of his otherwise wondrous career, Aikman, along with Novacek, special teams coach Joe Avezzano, and former Cowboys Randy White and Walt Garrison, formed a country music group, The Boys. Their album, Everybody Wants to Be a Cowboy, mixes horrific songs and horrific singers into one uniquely horrific package. The first single, “Oklahoma Nights,” was sung by Aikman, whose vocal stylings are reminiscent of a cat choking on a lug nut.
Of all the events that merged to form Cowboy Mania, the one that remains most curious is the rise of Kenny Gant, a third-year defensive back from Albany State who led all nonstarters with 54 tackles during the ’92 season and tied for the team lead with 3 interceptions. Though Gant excelled on special teams and as a nickel back, he was little more than an average NFL player. “Truthfully, I just wanted to hang on,” he says. “When I was drafted I went to a Wendy’s in Albany, Georgia, to celebrate with a hamburger. I was small-scale like that.”
What Gant did possess, however, was perfect timing.
During practices early in the 1992 season, Gant noticed that Kevin Smith, his fellow defensive back, would celebrate a good play by bending an arm at the elbow and holding it up to his helmet. Smith termed it “the Shark Fin,” and said the defensive backs at Texas A&M, his alma mater, used it to show off. “In practice all of us started flashing the fin, just sorta goofing around,” says Gant. “But it wasn’t like there was anything to it.” That is, until the fifth game of the ’92 season, when Gant sprinted down the field on a punt, charged Seattle’s Robb Thomas, and hammered him with a forearm to the head. As Gant leapt to his feet, he bent his right arm, held it to his noggin, and swayed it back and forth while bobbing his rear end. The Texas Stadium crowd roared with delight.
After the game Gant was surrounded by reporters, intrigued by the newest dance sensation. Gant smiled. He was a fun-loving guy who enjoyed jogging onto the practice field wearing only a jock or riding naked through the locker room in the laundry cart or hopping over a fence to sneak onto safety Bill Bates’s ranch for a quiet evening of fishing or hitting the clubs with teammates. Now, there was the Selachimorpha thing. “I just had my shark fin up,” he told the press with a chuckle. “We weren’t letting nothing get by.”
A craze had arrived. In the aftermath of the Super Bowl, Gant’s celebrity reached a whole new level. He was now, officially, “The Shark.” There were Shark Dance posters. Shark Dance T-shirts. A local player hangout, the Cowboy Sports Café, served the Sharkbite— a blue-tinted Long Island Iced Tea. Gant would visit a shopping mall and hear people holler his name while making a fin. “I’d be in restaurants eating and I’d look up from my food and some guy or some kid would be doing the Shark Dance,” says Gant. “It’s funny how one day you’re anonymous and the next day you’re huge. I loved it.”
A couple of months after the Super Bowl, Gant was hired by a Dallas attorney to appear at a pool party for son’s thirteenth birthday. Gant arrived in a suit and tie and performed his Shark Dance to the delight of the approximately thirty youths in attendance. He then turned to the father and asked to borrow a pair of swim trunks.
“Kenny,” the man said, “you don’t have to . . .”
The Shark insisted.
“I had on a pair of this guy’s nut-huggers,” laughs Gant, “and I jumped right in.”
The strangest request came from the Jewish family that hired Gant to appear at their son’s bar mitzvah. A deeply religious Pentecostal from the decidedly non-Jewish town of Lakeland, Florida, Gant grew up attending church on Sundays, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, serving as a drummer in the congregation’s band, and watching in awe as many around him spoke in tongues. Brad Mitzvee? What the heck was a Brad Mitzvee?
“Man, was that fun,” says Gant. “I helped light the candles, I wore a yarmulke, I did the Shark Dance, I line-danced. I got paid but I would have done it for free.”
Beyond the Shark appearances and country albums and Brad Mitzvees, what best symbolized the Cowboys’ rise from contenders to superstars was the Hoopsters, the team’s offseason “charity” basketball squad. Formed in the early 1970s by wide receiver Drew Pearson, the Hoopsters’ initial mission was to travel the state of Texas promoting the Cowboys, rewarding fans for their undying support during the season and making some cash on the side. The Hoopsters would come to town, play the River Oaks Volunteer Fire Department or the Lubbock Police Department or the faculty of Atlee Parr High School and donate most of the proceeds to charity. The games would be competitive, but never crossed the line.
Any lingering philanthropic intentions dissipated in the mid-1980s, when a linebacker named Eugene Lockhart took charge of the Hoopsters and ran the operation less like a goodwill tour and a bit more like a Hollywood agent. The Hoopsters began demanding exorbitant appearance fees for their participation. Instead of COME OUT AND SEE THE COWBOYS RAISE MONEY FOR A GOOD CAUSE! promotional signs should have read COME OUT AND SEE THE COWBOYS RAISE MONEY FOR A GOOD CAUSE— MINUS THE $30,000 WE’VE GOTTA PAY THEM TO BE HERE, THE FOOD WE’RE REQUIRED TO SUPPLY, AND THE FIRST- CLASS HOTEL SUITES THEY PROBABLY WANT, TOO. “Lockhart was not a good guy,” says Anthony “Paco” Montoya, who managed the Hoopsters and worked as a gofer for several players through the 1990s. “He was a bully who did things the wrong way.”
In 1988, a basketball-loving rookie named Michael Irvin led a Hoopsters revolt, literally wrestling control of the team from Lockhart in an Odessa, Texas, hotel room. “When it was over there was lots of broken furniture,” says Montoya, “and the Hoopsters had a new leader.”
Yet the sex-seeking, money-hungry, fame-addicted wide receiver was hardly a Saint. Irvin had no trouble putting the Hoopsters to his own use, whether that meant demanding a $10,000 personal appearance fee for a two-hour “charitable” basketball game or securing perks that would have put the Rat Pack to shame. On May 10, 1993, the Hoopsters were scheduled to play a Friday night exhibition at Baylor University that was to raise money for the resurrection of Paul Quinn College, a small, traditionally black school. As the game was set to begin, an organizer informed Irvin that he did not have the $25,000 check the Hoopsters required. Instead of staying and, say, playing for less money to entertain the 240 spectators, Irvin, Harper, Kevin Smith, Jimmie Jones, and the rest of the Cowboys bolted. Such behavior came as no surprise to Rodney Dodd, president of the Little Dribblers in Fairfield, Texas, who had presented the Hoopsters with a $5,600 check for a March 5 appearance. Less than a week before the game, Dodd was told the fee had increased to $7,000, plus expenses. “I called [Irvin] back and told him we didn’t want them,” said Dodd at the time. “To this day we’ve never seen our fifty-six hundred dollars.”
Unlike the old Hoopsters of Pearson and Everson Walls, Irvin’s priorities were money, winning, and postgame sexual pursuits. Whether playing a bunch of beefy marines at a military base or a flabby gaggle of middle-aged teachers in a dimly let gymnasium, the Hoopsters had to win. That’s why, in a May 1991 game against the staff of a Dallas radio station, KKDA-AM, Irvin became so incensed by a questionable foul call that he allegedly grabbed the referee—an unpaid volunteer named Willie Summerling— and showered him with obscenities. When Summerling warned Irvin to dial back his antics, the player slugged him in the mouth, knocking loose a dental plate. There were two thousand spectators in attendance, many of them children.
With the Cowboys’ on-field successes came increased Hoopster requests. They flew to Mexico City for a game, flew to Las Vegas for another. They played the Redskins in Washington, engaged in two or three mini-brawls, and left with a hard-fought 3-point triumph. “Once we played these soldiers in Killeen and we needed an escort out of the stadium,” says Kevin Smith. “The other team wanted to fight some Cowboys to prove their manhood, and as time ran out I hit a three-pointer for the win. That was pretty darn sweet.”
Though players generally joined the Hoopsters in the spirit of camaraderie, what proved to be the greatest perk— especially in the shadow of the ’92 season— was a dazzling postgame buffet of booze, marijuana, cocaine, and sex. Whether the Hoopsters won or lost, following each contest they headed either for the hottest nightspot in town or to their hotel, which would be transformed into Club Hoopsters. Though the Cowboys were a big deal in Dallas, they were larger- than- life in smaller towns across the state and country, where a visit from the Super Bowl champions was akin to a return of Elvis. Kids turned out to see their sports heroes. Men turned out to see their sports heroes too. But women— well, mounds of women came out to gain a firsthand physical experience. “It didn’t matter if you were a dope dealer, a Channel 5 TV reporter, a judge on the U.S. District Court,” says Newton. “You weren’t getting the women the Cowboys were.”
If you were hot, you might get to spend the night with a player. If you were sexy, you might even end up on the Hoopsters’ private airplane. If you were two lesbians looking to put on a show, you might be allowed to fly the jet. “That’s when it really got crazy,” says Montoya, who traveled with the team. “To call those flights ‘off the hook’ doesn’t do anything justice. I don’t think there’s a word for what went on. We filled those planes with more women than we did players, and they were willing to do anything.”
Anything?
“Absolutely anything.”
It was here, 30,000 feet above the ground, that Alvin Harper earned the nickname “Freaky Harp.” Though married to Jamise, his college sweetheart from the University of Tennessee, Harper never met a groupie, a stripper, a cheerleader he wouldn’t have sex with. In a feat that left teammates stunned, Harper was banned from the Men’s Club of Dallas for having sex in a phone booth. To be a Cowboy star in the 1990s and have someone demand you leave his strip joint— well, that took work.
On the Hoopsters’ chartered airplane, there were no bouncers, no wives, no coaches. Just loose women looking to party with the Super Bowl champions. Cowboy players would have sex in the main cabin, sex in the bathrooms. Irvin, the ringleader of all things erotic, would direct various arrangements— women on women, two women on a teammate, three women on a teammate. “There was nothing Mike couldn’t think of,” says Montoya. “He had quite the imagination.”
“I’ll tell you one thing,” says Clayton Holmes, a defensive back and Hoopsters guard. “If you were employed by the Cowboys, it didn’t take much to get whatever it was you craved. And we craved a lot.”
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Barack ODrama
'People thought I looked a bit like him': Brazilian politician Henrique dos Anjos has changed his name to Barack Obama Walk into a polling station in Belford Roxo, an impoverished city on the fringes of Rio de Janiero, on October 5 and you will be faced with an historic choice. You could vote for Alcides Rolim, the Workers' Party mayoral candidate promising a "city for all" or Elizeu Pitorra, a local communist who believes it is "time for a change". Most voters, however, will probably opt for Barack Obama, a 39-year-old Brazilian who, until recently, was known as Claudio Henrique dos Anjos.Welcome to Obama-mania, Brazil-style. Few countries have embraced the idea of the US's first black president as enthusiastically as Brazil, a country with one of the largest Afro-descendant populations on Earth yet where black faces remain a minority in politics. Obama T-shirts are everywhere while chat shows and newspaper columns are filled with talk of the 47-year-old Illinois senator.Now even Brazil's politicians are lining up for their piece of the pie. Due to a quirk of Brazilian law, candidates are allowed to run under the name of their choice. As a result, at least six Brazilian politicians have officially renamed themselves "Barack Obama" in a bid to get an edge over their rivals in October's municipal elections. "In truth it was an accident," says Belford Roxo's Obama, an IT consultant who is bidding to become the city's first black mayor. "I'd been on the television wearing a suit and people thought I looked a bit like him so they started calling me Barack Obama. They'd see me in the street and shout: 'Hey! Barack!" So I decided to register it."Like his illustrious American counterpart, who has relatives in Kenya, Brazil's Obama also has one foot in Africa. His grandfather was the descendant of slaves. He admits he has also been looking to his namesake's speeches for inspiration. "I say the same things. I talk about political renewal, change, about transforming the city."Despite their similarities the two Obamas have yet to meet although the Brazilian Obama says that as mayor he would "extend an invitation" to the real Obama to dine in Belford Roxo. "It would be great if he could come and see our reality," he beams. "Just imagine."
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Josh Howard Doesn't Celebrate the National Anthem
http://deadspin.com/5050396/the-national-anthem-josh-howard-doesnt-celebrate-that-s
This has to be one of the dumbest dudes in the city. Right up there with T.O. and Romo.
Monday, September 15, 2008
awww...skeet...skeet.....wack
By PATRICIO G. BALONAStaff WriterDELTONA -- A Deltona father ended up in jail today after beating his daughter's teenage boyfriend who he caught naked in the girl's bedroom, sheriff's officials said.Raul Colon, 45, didn't even know his daughter had a boyfriend -- or that the youngster had been sneaking into the home for more than a year. So when he heard noises coming from his daughter's room this morning and saw a stranger naked, standing on the girl's bed, he swung a metal pipe he had taken from the garage, hitting the 15-year-old, a sheriff's report said.Colon was charged with aggravated battery on a child but was out of jail this afternoon on $10,000 bail, a booking officer said. No one picked up the phone at Colon's residence today.According to the report, Colon heard the noise in his daughter's room when he got up at 4 a.m. to let his dog out, as he does every morning.Colon told deputies he chased Lucas Contreres through the kitchen, living room and through the front door and out into the street and called 9-1-1.Colon's daughter later told deputies that she had been seeing Contreres for 18 months but did not tell her father about the relationship. Contreres had sneaked in thorough a bedroom window at 3 a.m. this morning to have sex with her, the 15-year-old girl told deputies.Conteres was found at Florida Hospital Fish Memorial in Orange City where he got staples to close cuts on his head. His injuries were not life threatening, deputies said.Contreres told deputies a similar account to Colon's. He said Colon came into the room and started swinging at him with the metal pipe. He jumped out of the bed and began running through the home to get away from Colon. Once outside, he jumped on his bike and went home. His sister later took him to the hospital, deputies said.Although Contreres' father said he wasn't sure if he wanted to press charges, deputies took Colon to jail anyway.
The Great Depression II is coming. Are you prepared?
The future looks very bleak by Leon Fisher, Unknown Newsleonjfisher@webtv.net March 26, 2007 The crash of the US economy has begun. Although the reasons for the now-accelerating economic fiasco have been in place for decades, the chickens are only now coming home to roost. The murder weapons used to kill the economy are "free trade," outsourcing, illegal immigration, special work visa programs, and unrestrained government spending, which have all contributed to the death of what was just a few decades ago the economic powerhouse of the world.The balance of trade between most of our trading partners in this so called system of "free trade" is completely lopsided. For instance, the flood of products which are imported to the US just from China alone, in contrast to US exports to China, has created a trade deficit in the trillions of dollars. This sort of one-way trade is unsustainable, and if nothing drastic is done to address this situation, America's economy will be reduced to that of a third world country.The first indicators of economic collapse have already manifested themselves in the housing industry, and the big three American auto makers. Teetering on bankruptcy, they will be the first of the large economic dominos to fall, and the rest will follow in short order. As a consequence, something on the scale of another Great Depression may be a possibility.America has been scammed big-time over the years. The corporate wheelers and dealers, with the complicity of their bought and paid for political whores in Washington, have sold the American working man down the river, and the general welfare of the entire country as well.Reacting to mounting criticism of the present economic status quo, the corporate crooks and their political hit men blame the miserable economic situation on their victims -- the greedy American worker, the communist labor unions, the demand of Americans to have clean air and water, and worst of all the bunker mentality of the American people to put up fences against free trade, protectionism. This unenviable anti business situation, they say, was instrumental in forcing harried U.S. corporations to locate elsewhere in more business friendly areas of the world.Because these same corporations own most of the mass media in America, very little if any blame at all is placed upon the multi billion dollar corporations whose decisions, based entirely on greed, have set off these disastrous events in the first place.Coinciding with the mounting economic problems of the nation is that of a growing threat to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness by a group of unelected conspirators who have seized control of Americas highest political office. This group of traitors, with Bush crime family member and usurper of the Office of President, George Walker Bush, has ceaselessly undermined the authority of the Constitution and laws of the United States.Since the installation of this cabal, a series of events have unfolded not seen since Hitler's burning of the Reichstag. The attack on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington DC, followed by the anthrax threat to Congress, was carefully contrived to give the Bush Cabal the support necessary to begin military operations to secure the resources of the Mideast, and to pass the PATRIOT Act and other draconian legislation, bestowing upon this illegal regime the power to spy, arrest, and torture anyone, including American citizens, they deem as enemy combatants.With the economy failing, and the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan continuing with no end in sight, the newly-elected Congress sits on its hands, unwilling to act. Nor are they moving to remove the 9/11 conspirators and war criminals from the White House.This is not only a bleak scenario for the American people but for the entire world as well. Emboldened by the timidity of the new Congress, the Bush cabal is moving ahead with their plans for war with Iran, which will not be long in coming.Although I would like to end my remarks on a positive note, at this moment I do not see anything good happening in the near future. Despite the growing disenchantment and suspicion of Bush and his policies, he and his cabal are still in firm control of the Country.Further, it is foolish to think that after Bush leaves office, the next occupants of the White House will set things straight. This is not going to happen.The fact of the matter is that our Government is no longer in charge of matters, but operates as a rubber stamp for those parasitic entities which have infiltrated into the core of government. In reality, policy in Washington is not determined by the wants and needs of the American people, but by the whim of the wealthy and powerful elite whose seemingly inexhaustible riches and thirst for more riches supercedes everything else. These corrupt and treasonous individuals within the halls of power will stop at nothing, including war and murder, in order to attain their diabolical ends.We should also not delude ourselves that an economic collapse will somehow quicken the removal of the cancer which is hastening the demise of our Republic. Just as they have used the threat of terrorism to cow the people, so will they use economic failure to justify a further tightening of the screws. It is going to be a long hard struggle to rid ourselves of this evil, make no mistake about it.
Rogers: Dollar To Lose World Reserve Status
Rogers: Dollar To Lose World Reserve StatusPaul Joseph WatsonPrison PlanetMonday, September 15, 2008With the greenback plummeting after the news of Lehman Brothers’ bankruptcy, top investor Jim Rogers predicts that the dollar will lose its status as the world reserve currency status and has resolved to buy more gold despite a recent fall in the price of the commodity.Rogers, who correctly predicted China’s resurgence as an economic superpower back in the 80’s as well as crude oil surpassing $100, says the global economy is in a recession that is going to get much worse while inflation will continue to skyrocket.“Some countries lie about it. But, inflation in all countries is going to get worse. The next decade is going to see lot more inflation, which is not good,” Rogers told the India Business Standard.“Frequently, since the prices of the commodities go up before the inflation numbers, one can stay ahead of inflation. But, if you get it wrong you might do worse. So, investing in those commodities, which are going to go up first or selecting the right commodities, is the key to stay ahead of the inflation and make a lot of money.”Turning to the dollar, Rogers dismissed the greenback as a “flawed currency” that would continue to deteriorate for two to three decades, adding that he would seek to use the dollar’s recent rally as an opportunity to get out of the currency completely.“I do not want to own any US dollars. Also, I would not urge you to buy US dollars. (The) dollar is going to loose its status as world reserve currency,” said Rogers.“Some of the OPEC countries have already started and no longer take dollar, like Venezuela no longer accepts the dollar. Other countries are already looking and may be taking a package of basket of currencies instead of the dollar. I am not the only one who knows the dollar is in trouble. Anybody who watches the TV knows that the dollar is in trouble,” he added.Rogers also said that the bull market in oil has at least another ten years to run and that oil prices will only go higher.Speaking on the subject of commodities, Rogers recommended sugar, coffee and cotton and also said that he would be buying more precious metals.“I am trying and want to buy some gold. However, whether this is the low in the gold, I have no idea, but if gold goes lower, I will add some more. Gold is something I do not plan to sell. Gold is something I will gift to my children,” concluded Rogers.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Bear plays in waves brought by Ike
Reminds me of that Kanye West bear.
http://www.wfaa.com/video/index.html?nvid=282017&shu=1
http://www.wfaa.com/video/index.html?nvid=282017&shu=1
Friday, September 12, 2008
Thursday, September 11, 2008
The SIMP Of The Year
At First I thought it could get no worst than the homo leader of the Dallas Cowards...and his simpin ...but this is the worst ...where the fugg is his homeboys ...somebody needs to put his ass in rehab
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sl1W90GoH-4&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sl1W90GoH-4&feature=related
Palin interview with Charlie Gibson
What the hell is she talking about?
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=5747205&page=1
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=5747205&page=1
Sad to say, but Young's problems were predictable
I LOVE IT...good read
I'm going to do my best to avoid turning this into an I-told-you-so column.
But the truth is, I told you before the 2006 draft that Vince Young was primed for NFL failure. He entered the league with an attitude, mindset and supporting cast totally unprepared to survive the pressure, challenge and responsibility that goes along with the most prestigious and difficult job in all of sports.
When I explained all of this in 2006, my naive and misguided critics called me an Uncle Tom. Yeah, they ripped me for attempting to issue a young black kid a warning about what awaited him in The League and the attitude he would need to cope and excel.
Some people foolishly think it's every black media member's job to assist in the mental and emotional crippling of black youth. We're supposed to blow rainbows up the asses of every black athlete who "makes it" and assure him/her that anyone who utters a word of criticism is a jealous bigot or irrational sellout.
So, no, I'm not surprised Vince Young tried to quit in the middle of Sunday's game after throwing a second interception and hearing boos from Titans fans frustrated by his inability to read a defense or throw accurately. I'm not all that shocked that two days later Jeff Fisher called the police and asked them to hunt down his inconsistent quarterback. I'm not surprised the Titans team psychologist is apparently worried that Vince Young is suffering depression.
And I'm really not surprised that Vince Young's mother told The Tennessean that her baby boy needs a little space and a lot of love and support.
The question is, when Young rebounds from his emotional abyss and recovers from his knee injury, what kind of love and support are we going to give him? Are the people who already love Young going to replant their heads in Young's rear end and their hands in his wallet? Or will a few people within Team Vince do the right thing and level with him about what he needs to do to make it in the NFL as a quarterback?
Vince Young, like a lot of young African-American men, desperately needs to hear the truth from the people who love him. Too often we pave the road to failure for black boys by believing the cure for bigotry — and there is still plenty of bigotry in America — is the ability to recognize it in (and blame it for) everything. That cure has more negative side effects than most of the drugs trumpeted by the pharmaceutical companies in television commercials. That cure serves as a convenient crutch, and turns a talent such as Vince Young into a quitter the moment adversity strikes. That cure helped land Michael Vick in jail.
Everyone told Vince Young and Michael Vick the NFL would be easy. They'd revolutionize the QB position with their legs, and they could pop bottles, roll with a posse and pretend to be Jay-Z in their spare time.
It just doesn't work. Not for Young or Vick. Not for Matt Leinart. Not for anyone who wants to star at the position and avoid the boo-birds.
No one revolutionizes the starting quarterback position. The position revolutionizes the person playing it. Just ask Donovan McNabb. He figured it out and changed his game. Over the objection of idiots, McNabb developed his skills as a pocket passer. He concentrated on becoming a student of the game. If he can stay healthy over the next three or four years, McNabb will surpass Warren Moon as the best black quarterback ever to play the game.
Unfortunately, there are still people, especially black people, who don't appreciate McNabb. They think he let "us" down by de-emphasizing his athleticism, and they criticize him for being cozy with his organization the way Peyton Manning is with the Colts and Brady is with the Patriots.
McNabb doesn't get to enjoy the luxury of being a company man the way other franchise QBs in their prime do.
But McNabb has never threatened to quit or asked out of a game because the Philly fans were too rough. McNabb understands that in some instances the scrutiny of a black quarterback might be a tad more intense than that of a white one. He also understands that the best way to combat it isn't whining. It's performance. It's work ethic. It's professionalism.
It's not a coincidence that McNabb comes from a supportive, two-parent household.
I bring that up not to castigate Vince Young and his mother. I don't even know the story of Young's upbringing.
I raise the issue to point out that in modern professional sports — with the astronomical players' salaries — ownership and management examine the upbringing of the athletes and factor that into their decision-making.
Vick's failure, Young's potential failure and the guaranteed money they were given will make ownership more reluctant to anoint another kid from the 'hood a franchise quarterback straight out of college.
It's not about color. It's about fitting the profile of someone who can handle all that goes along with being an NFL quarterback. If I'm an owner, I spend my quarterback dollars on young men who were raised by strong fathers. It wouldn't be an infallible system, but on average I bet I'd hit more winners than if I turned over the leadership of my team to a kid who isn't used to having a strong male authority figure.
As black people, we need to ask ourselves whether we are doing a good job preparing our boys for positions of immense leadership, responsibility and scrutiny.
Talk to Whitlock
You are going to get criticized playing quarterback. If your instinct is to dismiss the criticism as racist, maybe you shouldn't play the position. If you are surrounded by people who spend every waking minute telling you that you can do no wrong and that everyone who criticizes you is a bigot, then maybe you shouldn't play quarterback.
The position requires thick skin and genuine self-confidence. If you need four or five male groupies with you at all times, a half million dollars of jewelry around your neck and wrists and a dozen tattoos to feel confident, then maybe you should play wide receiver or start rapping.
The average NFL fan has no idea how much time a franchise spends working on self-esteem issues with a typical player. You think these guys are self-assured. Many of them are not. They self-medicate with booze, drugs, steroids, bling, women and attention-getting stunts such as name changes.
Remember when Terrell Owens' assistant claimed he had 25 million reasons to live? It was an accidental moment of clarity and honesty. Too many players have their whole sense of self-worth tied up in their contracts.
It doesn't take much to crack a man with no real identity, especially if he's grown accustomed to having all of his shortcomings rationalized.
I'm going to do my best to avoid turning this into an I-told-you-so column.
But the truth is, I told you before the 2006 draft that Vince Young was primed for NFL failure. He entered the league with an attitude, mindset and supporting cast totally unprepared to survive the pressure, challenge and responsibility that goes along with the most prestigious and difficult job in all of sports.
When I explained all of this in 2006, my naive and misguided critics called me an Uncle Tom. Yeah, they ripped me for attempting to issue a young black kid a warning about what awaited him in The League and the attitude he would need to cope and excel.
Some people foolishly think it's every black media member's job to assist in the mental and emotional crippling of black youth. We're supposed to blow rainbows up the asses of every black athlete who "makes it" and assure him/her that anyone who utters a word of criticism is a jealous bigot or irrational sellout.
So, no, I'm not surprised Vince Young tried to quit in the middle of Sunday's game after throwing a second interception and hearing boos from Titans fans frustrated by his inability to read a defense or throw accurately. I'm not all that shocked that two days later Jeff Fisher called the police and asked them to hunt down his inconsistent quarterback. I'm not surprised the Titans team psychologist is apparently worried that Vince Young is suffering depression.
And I'm really not surprised that Vince Young's mother told The Tennessean that her baby boy needs a little space and a lot of love and support.
The question is, when Young rebounds from his emotional abyss and recovers from his knee injury, what kind of love and support are we going to give him? Are the people who already love Young going to replant their heads in Young's rear end and their hands in his wallet? Or will a few people within Team Vince do the right thing and level with him about what he needs to do to make it in the NFL as a quarterback?
Vince Young, like a lot of young African-American men, desperately needs to hear the truth from the people who love him. Too often we pave the road to failure for black boys by believing the cure for bigotry — and there is still plenty of bigotry in America — is the ability to recognize it in (and blame it for) everything. That cure has more negative side effects than most of the drugs trumpeted by the pharmaceutical companies in television commercials. That cure serves as a convenient crutch, and turns a talent such as Vince Young into a quitter the moment adversity strikes. That cure helped land Michael Vick in jail.
Everyone told Vince Young and Michael Vick the NFL would be easy. They'd revolutionize the QB position with their legs, and they could pop bottles, roll with a posse and pretend to be Jay-Z in their spare time.
It just doesn't work. Not for Young or Vick. Not for Matt Leinart. Not for anyone who wants to star at the position and avoid the boo-birds.
No one revolutionizes the starting quarterback position. The position revolutionizes the person playing it. Just ask Donovan McNabb. He figured it out and changed his game. Over the objection of idiots, McNabb developed his skills as a pocket passer. He concentrated on becoming a student of the game. If he can stay healthy over the next three or four years, McNabb will surpass Warren Moon as the best black quarterback ever to play the game.
Unfortunately, there are still people, especially black people, who don't appreciate McNabb. They think he let "us" down by de-emphasizing his athleticism, and they criticize him for being cozy with his organization the way Peyton Manning is with the Colts and Brady is with the Patriots.
McNabb doesn't get to enjoy the luxury of being a company man the way other franchise QBs in their prime do.
But McNabb has never threatened to quit or asked out of a game because the Philly fans were too rough. McNabb understands that in some instances the scrutiny of a black quarterback might be a tad more intense than that of a white one. He also understands that the best way to combat it isn't whining. It's performance. It's work ethic. It's professionalism.
It's not a coincidence that McNabb comes from a supportive, two-parent household.
I bring that up not to castigate Vince Young and his mother. I don't even know the story of Young's upbringing.
I raise the issue to point out that in modern professional sports — with the astronomical players' salaries — ownership and management examine the upbringing of the athletes and factor that into their decision-making.
Vick's failure, Young's potential failure and the guaranteed money they were given will make ownership more reluctant to anoint another kid from the 'hood a franchise quarterback straight out of college.
It's not about color. It's about fitting the profile of someone who can handle all that goes along with being an NFL quarterback. If I'm an owner, I spend my quarterback dollars on young men who were raised by strong fathers. It wouldn't be an infallible system, but on average I bet I'd hit more winners than if I turned over the leadership of my team to a kid who isn't used to having a strong male authority figure.
As black people, we need to ask ourselves whether we are doing a good job preparing our boys for positions of immense leadership, responsibility and scrutiny.
Talk to Whitlock
You are going to get criticized playing quarterback. If your instinct is to dismiss the criticism as racist, maybe you shouldn't play the position. If you are surrounded by people who spend every waking minute telling you that you can do no wrong and that everyone who criticizes you is a bigot, then maybe you shouldn't play quarterback.
The position requires thick skin and genuine self-confidence. If you need four or five male groupies with you at all times, a half million dollars of jewelry around your neck and wrists and a dozen tattoos to feel confident, then maybe you should play wide receiver or start rapping.
The average NFL fan has no idea how much time a franchise spends working on self-esteem issues with a typical player. You think these guys are self-assured. Many of them are not. They self-medicate with booze, drugs, steroids, bling, women and attention-getting stunts such as name changes.
Remember when Terrell Owens' assistant claimed he had 25 million reasons to live? It was an accidental moment of clarity and honesty. Too many players have their whole sense of self-worth tied up in their contracts.
It doesn't take much to crack a man with no real identity, especially if he's grown accustomed to having all of his shortcomings rationalized.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
unreal
Deelishis and Orlando’s daughter Orlandria
Here’s the article about Deelishis’ impending marriage to her beau Orlando Gordon set for next summer:Flavor of Love 2 winner Deelishis (real name London Charles) is now engaged to be married. The reality star turned (she owns her own jean line) will join her boyfriend, 27-year-old Orlando Gordon in holy matrimony on July 19, 2009, according to Sister 2 Sister magazine.DEELISHIS ON HER PROPOSAL: “He and I were sitting around the house watching movies. Around 5, I went into the kitchen to grab something to eat and I came back in the bedroom and he was sitting there with this little box and he said, ‘What are you doing for the rest of your life?’ I was very shocked and surprised.”Deelishis said she and her hubby-to-be thought about eloping to avoid any media attention….what sort of media attention is beyond me….but instead decided to celebrate their union with their family and friends…and soon began making plans for a very large bridal party that will consist of 35 members including 15 bridesmaids and groomsmen. Of her engagement party, which was held at Orlando’s nightclub (he also handled all the arrangements…food, decorations, music, etc. by his lonesome), Deelishis said:“He had these flowers that were everywhere, and these vases had these orchids and roses and lilies. It was beautiful. For most of the party I was in tears. I just cried because I couldn’t believe how beautiful it was. Then I just kept staring at this man, who, I knew we would have a long-lasting relationship but I never thought he would fall into of feeling as though he needed to make me his bride.”Mrs. Orlando Gordon’s bridesmaids include SWV member Taj Johnson, former Flavor of Love 2 contestant Shay ‘Buckeey’ Johnson, model Toccara Jones, video vixen Angel Lola Luv plus Deelishis’ two sisters and relatives from Orlando’s side of the family. Orlando’s 3-year old daughter, Orlandria….yes, Orlandria, has been given the title as flower girl, while Deelishis’ 9-year-old daughter, Jasmine, will play her role as a junior bridesmaid. Deelishis said in choosing the members of her bridal party….particularly her bridesmaids, she wanted ladies ‘who respect what marriage is, who respects my decision, who aren’t going to be catty and who will keep this union tight.’
Alas ...the truth
Biden: Hillary a Better Pick Than MeEmailShareSeptember 10, 2008 5:17 PMABC News' Matthew Jaffe Reports: Barack Obama's vice-presidential nominee Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., Wednesday said that Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, might have been a better pick for the position than him.At a rally in Nashua, New Hampshire, a man in the audience told Biden how glad he was that Obama picked him over Hillary "not because she's a woman, but because look at the things she did in the past.""Make no mistake about this," Biden responded. "Hillary Clinton is as qualified or more qualified than I am to be vice president of the United States of America. Let’s get that straight. She’s a truly close personal friend, she is qualified to be president of the United States of America, she’s easily qualified to be vice president of the United States of America and quite frankly it might have been a better pick than me. But she’s first rate, I mean that sincerely, she’s first rate, so let’s get that straight."Spokesman Ben Porritt offered this response from the McCain camp: "Barack Obama’s most important decision of this election and Biden - the candidate he selects - suggests himself that he wasn’t the right man for the job and that Hillary Clinton would have been a better choice. Biden certainly has a credible viewpoint on this."
Rev. Wright has a Busit Baby....... Here we go again
Rev. Jeremiah Wright was involved with this woman sexually which allegedly influenced her to lose her job and husband:
He almost wrecked Barack Obama’s presidential dreams, and now firebrand pastor Jeremiah Wright has helped destroy a Dallas church worker’s marriage - and her job. Elizabeth Payne, 37, said she had a steamy sexual affair with the controversial, racially divisive man of the cloth while she was an executive assistant at a church headed by a popular Wright protégé. “I was involved with Rev. Wright, and that’s why I lost my job and why my husband divorced me,” Payne said.
In April, Payne organized a series of Texas public appearances by Wright, 67. Weeks before, Obama had disavowed his preacher of 20 years after Wright’s anti-government rants came to light. “Liz was by Rev. Wright’s side day and night during those days,” a church source said. Payne’s husband, Fred Payne, 64, said he learned of the affair in late February, when he discovered e-mails between his wife and Wright. “There must have been about 80 of them, back and forth,” he said. “Wright said things like he was going to leave his wife for Elizabeth.”
“I was downright mad about this bull- - - -,” said Fred, who said he is “in the oil and gas business,” belongs to a hunting club and makes his own bullets in his garage.
“People wouldn’t be happy to know that my wife was sleeping with a black man.” Elizabeth Payne said she has been banished by Haynes and the flock at Friendship-West.
“I’m not a member of the congregation anymore; I’m not even allowed on the premises,” she said. Wright became an embarrassment for Obama after videos of the preacher’s old sermons emerged
SMH, women coming to the “Reverend” to get saved and all he was giving her is some pipe. Hypocrites, I tell ya. We are glad he went and sat his attention-seeking punk ass down and didn’t damage the Obama brand too much more.
He almost wrecked Barack Obama’s presidential dreams, and now firebrand pastor Jeremiah Wright has helped destroy a Dallas church worker’s marriage - and her job. Elizabeth Payne, 37, said she had a steamy sexual affair with the controversial, racially divisive man of the cloth while she was an executive assistant at a church headed by a popular Wright protégé. “I was involved with Rev. Wright, and that’s why I lost my job and why my husband divorced me,” Payne said.
In April, Payne organized a series of Texas public appearances by Wright, 67. Weeks before, Obama had disavowed his preacher of 20 years after Wright’s anti-government rants came to light. “Liz was by Rev. Wright’s side day and night during those days,” a church source said. Payne’s husband, Fred Payne, 64, said he learned of the affair in late February, when he discovered e-mails between his wife and Wright. “There must have been about 80 of them, back and forth,” he said. “Wright said things like he was going to leave his wife for Elizabeth.”
“I was downright mad about this bull- - - -,” said Fred, who said he is “in the oil and gas business,” belongs to a hunting club and makes his own bullets in his garage.
“People wouldn’t be happy to know that my wife was sleeping with a black man.” Elizabeth Payne said she has been banished by Haynes and the flock at Friendship-West.
“I’m not a member of the congregation anymore; I’m not even allowed on the premises,” she said. Wright became an embarrassment for Obama after videos of the preacher’s old sermons emerged
SMH, women coming to the “Reverend” to get saved and all he was giving her is some pipe. Hypocrites, I tell ya. We are glad he went and sat his attention-seeking punk ass down and didn’t damage the Obama brand too much more.
The Large Hadron Collider turned on today
Largest particle collider conducts successful test
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/09/10/lhc.collider/index.html
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080910/ap_on_sc/big_bang
Mike
updated 1 hour, 14 minutes ago
The quest for short term solutions to the problems of now is inexorably linked to the shallow minds that constrain progress. The findings of these "boys" with their expensive "toys" have the potential of unlocking sec ...more
The quest for short term solutions to the problems of now is inexorably linked to the shallow minds that constrain progress. The findings of these "boys" with their expensive "toys" have the potential of unlocking secrets that could sustain our long-term survival, and those without the education nor knowledge to dispute this should remain on the sidelines and watch. less
Matthew
updated 1 hour, 14 minutes ago
This device could possibly bring us closer to understanding how the known universe was formed. How anyone can call this a waste of money is beyond me. Perhaps the most important element of humanity is our need and des ...more
This device could possibly bring us closer to understanding how the known universe was formed. How anyone can call this a waste of money is beyond me. Perhaps the most important element of humanity is our need and desire to understand the world around us. I see a lot of false dilemma arguments, and religion inspired pseudoscience arguing against this machine but nothing of any substance. less
rich
if the scientists say they know it is safe it follows that they are aware of the outcome of this machine. And, if that is the case, they must know what is going to happen and hence, why do they need to do the experiment in the first place. The truth is they do not know what is going to happen but their scientific quest and drive has overcome the rational need for the safety of this planet. I did not really believe all the 2012 hype before i realised what was going on at CERN. This is the very thing that all ancient civilisations have warned of.
john
updated 1 hour, 14 minutes ago
Hey Captain hopefully the next time terror strikes here it kills someone in your family then hopefully ome of you liberals will finally un derstand .I didnt hear you libs bitching when slick willy was running our mili ...more
Hey Captain hopefully the next time terror strikes here it kills someone in your family then hopefully ome of you liberals will finally un derstand .I didnt hear you libs bitching when slick willy was running our military all over the place.this is a grossw waste of money that if backfires could wipe us all out.grow up idiot
Josh
updated 1 hour, 14 minutes ago
I highly recommend you do some further research into what the LHC is capable of and the possibilities it represents other then what this article says alone. The potential for scientific, technological and medical advances that are brought about by this machine is staggering! No test of this nature has ever been conducted on this scale and to this effect (realize these two factors are everything in regard to measuring the results of a test, too small a scale or too little of an effect and you have nothing to gather data from) and the only theory even mentioned here is possible black holes.Read up on it. You will be amazed at what the worldwide scientific community is expecting from this thing. Was Space Exploration a waste? Answers to that quesiton vary to this day based on personal opinion. Has our understanding of our existence advanced exponentionally because of it? No doubt.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/09/10/lhc.collider/index.html
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080910/ap_on_sc/big_bang
Mike
updated 1 hour, 14 minutes ago
The quest for short term solutions to the problems of now is inexorably linked to the shallow minds that constrain progress. The findings of these "boys" with their expensive "toys" have the potential of unlocking sec ...more
The quest for short term solutions to the problems of now is inexorably linked to the shallow minds that constrain progress. The findings of these "boys" with their expensive "toys" have the potential of unlocking secrets that could sustain our long-term survival, and those without the education nor knowledge to dispute this should remain on the sidelines and watch. less
Matthew
updated 1 hour, 14 minutes ago
This device could possibly bring us closer to understanding how the known universe was formed. How anyone can call this a waste of money is beyond me. Perhaps the most important element of humanity is our need and des ...more
This device could possibly bring us closer to understanding how the known universe was formed. How anyone can call this a waste of money is beyond me. Perhaps the most important element of humanity is our need and desire to understand the world around us. I see a lot of false dilemma arguments, and religion inspired pseudoscience arguing against this machine but nothing of any substance. less
rich
if the scientists say they know it is safe it follows that they are aware of the outcome of this machine. And, if that is the case, they must know what is going to happen and hence, why do they need to do the experiment in the first place. The truth is they do not know what is going to happen but their scientific quest and drive has overcome the rational need for the safety of this planet. I did not really believe all the 2012 hype before i realised what was going on at CERN. This is the very thing that all ancient civilisations have warned of.
john
updated 1 hour, 14 minutes ago
Hey Captain hopefully the next time terror strikes here it kills someone in your family then hopefully ome of you liberals will finally un derstand .I didnt hear you libs bitching when slick willy was running our mili ...more
Hey Captain hopefully the next time terror strikes here it kills someone in your family then hopefully ome of you liberals will finally un derstand .I didnt hear you libs bitching when slick willy was running our military all over the place.this is a grossw waste of money that if backfires could wipe us all out.grow up idiot
Josh
updated 1 hour, 14 minutes ago
I highly recommend you do some further research into what the LHC is capable of and the possibilities it represents other then what this article says alone. The potential for scientific, technological and medical advances that are brought about by this machine is staggering! No test of this nature has ever been conducted on this scale and to this effect (realize these two factors are everything in regard to measuring the results of a test, too small a scale or too little of an effect and you have nothing to gather data from) and the only theory even mentioned here is possible black holes.Read up on it. You will be amazed at what the worldwide scientific community is expecting from this thing. Was Space Exploration a waste? Answers to that quesiton vary to this day based on personal opinion. Has our understanding of our existence advanced exponentionally because of it? No doubt.
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