hippiechick wrote: 
Out of curiosity, if "neither they, nor anyone else connected with Solyndra, have done anything remotely criminal" as stated in the article, then why did they feel the need to plead the 5th? Over my life I've had businesses succeed and businesses fail, but can't imagine what legal act I could have taken that would be incriminating enough for me to refuse to admit I took it.

The Phony Solyndra Scandal

 oldviolin wrote: 

I am not voting against him by expressing criticism of him...  a lot of criticism against him is valid—  but the Republican party offers no legitimate alternative at this point in history...

I will vote for Obama for sure, but also I will not hesitate to hold his feet to the fire...

 

 romeotuma wrote: 
Just be sure to vote for him before you vote against him...

 romeotuma wrote: 


Matt Taibbi has always been a favorite and this only increases my respect for a real truth seeker.c

Obama still be my hero...


Obama and Jobs: Why I Don't Believe Him Anymore
by Matt Taibbi
RollingStone
September 6, 2011

But I remember following Obama on the campaign trail and hearing all sorts of promises before union-heavy crowds. He said he would raise the minimum wage every year; he said he would fight free-trade agreements. He also talked about repealing the Bush tax cuts and ending tax breaks for companies that move jobs overseas.

It's not just that he hasn't done those things. The more important thing is that the people he's surrounded himself with are not labor people, but stooges from Wall Street. Barack Obama has as his chief of staff a former top-ranking executive from one of the most grossly corrupt mega-companies on earth, JP Morgan Chase. He sees Bill Daley in his own office every day, yet when it comes time to talk abut labor issues, he has to go out and make selected visits twice a year or whatever to the Richard Trumkas of the world.

Listening to Obama talk about jobs and shared prosperity yesterday reminded me that we are back in campaign mode and Barack Obama has started doing again what he does best - play the part of a progressive. He's good at it. It sounds like he has a natural affinity for union workers and ordinary people when he makes these speeches. But his policies are crafted by representatives of corporate/financial America, who happen to entirely make up his inner circle.

I just don't believe this guy anymore, and it's become almost painful to listen to him...

 

 hippiechick wrote: 

President Obama will outline his vision for a balanced approach to reducing our deficit and living within our means. The President will also announce his recommendations to the Joint Committee on Deficit Reduction. Watch live beginning at 10:30 a.m. EDT athttp://wh.gov/live.

Obama Against the Nihilists
by George Packer
The New Yorker
September 9, 2001

It was a clever speech, a reminder of two things that had gone understandably forgotten through President Obama's awful summer: he's capable of passionate feeling, and he can also be politically dextrous. The feeling was indignation on behalf of the country's unemployed, underemployed, foreclosed, stretched to the limit. Not sympathy or feeling their pain-Obama doesn't do that well and didn't try last night, because it's really beside the point. As Mark Schmitt points out in the New Republic, polls show that "people no longer care that he cares. They're fed up with gestures, empathy, or good ideas that get blocked in the political process—all they want is results." No, what the President expressed was a fairly unquiet anger at Washington's—meaning Congress'—failure to act on those Americans' behalf.

That was also the politically dextrous move. Having spent the summer futilely negotiating on the Republicans' terms, he's now calling them out to negotiate on his, trying to turn disastrous economic circumstances to his advantage by presenting the choice before the country in a simple way: do something or do nothing. He didn't waste much time arguing against the Republican idea of solving all problems by cutting taxes and regulations. He just cited it and moved on, hoping that the public will see that it's beside the point, an ideology without relevance to the facts, as the country descends into another recession. The rhetoric of the speech was all pragmatic: these are the facts—do something about them, or do nothing.

 romeotuma wrote:
There's irony for you!  If he had prosecuted the crimes, he would have dealt a crushing blow to the network that's attempting the current coup against him now.

Obama Team Feared Coup If He Prosecuted War Crimes
by Andrew Kreig
Justice Integrity Project

President-Elect Obama's advisors feared in 2008 that authorities would revolt and that Republicans would block his policy agenda if he prosecuted Bush-era war crimes, according to a law school dean who served as one of Obama's top transition advisers.

University of California at Berkeley Law School Dean Christopher Edley, Jr., left, the sixth highest-ranking member of the 2008 post-election transition team preparing Obama's administration, revealed the team's thinking on Sept. 2 in moderating a forum on 9/11 held by his law school (also known as Boalt Hall). Edley sought to justify Obama's "look forward" policy on Bush-era lawbreaking that the president-elect announced on a TV talk show in January 2009.

But Edley's rationale implies that Obama and his team fear the military/national security forces that he is supposed to be commanding. It suggests also that Republicans have intimidated him right from the start of his presidency even though voters in 2008 rejected Republicans by the largest combined presidential-congressional mandate in recent U.S. history. Edley responded to our request for additional information by providing a description of the transition team's fears, which we present below as an exclusive email interview. Among his important points is that transition officials, not Obama, agreed that he faced the possibility of a "revolt."

 

 kestrel wrote: 
Your sister is Maxine Waters?

 romeotuma wrote: 
well..................since the article mentions my sister, I guess it's OK!  but don't let it happen again

What Happened to Obama?
By DREW WESTEN
August 6, 2011

Drew Westen is a professor of psychology at Emory University and the author of "The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation."

In similar circumstances, Franklin D. Roosevelt offered Americans a promise to use the power of his office to make their lives better and to keep trying until he got it right. Beginning in his first inaugural address, and in the fireside chats that followed, he explained how the crash had happened, and he minced no words about those who had caused it. He promised to do something no president had done before: to use the resources of the United States to put Americans directly to work, building the infrastructure we still rely on today. He swore to keep the people who had caused the crisis out of the halls of power, and he made good on that promise. In a 1936 speech at Madison Square Garden, he thundered, "Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me - and I welcome their hatred."

Obama like FDR? Not at all, it turns out.

 kurtster wrote: 

Or, like most everyone else, we assume the worst of others. Going along to get along. Ho hum.

 bloodnok wrote: 
Good enough, that was the other possibility.

But of course, there is no poking fun with that one.

Carry on, amigo.

 kurtster wrote: 



....but no offense taken.

Let's clear things up before unquiet minds totally unhinge at the mystery of the missing nuggler. Posted 2 days ago to the proprietor:

Bill

This is nuggler & I have lost my access to membership somehow & cannot log in.

Or maybe you've withdrawn it. I know I've been warned & I know I haven't exactly taken the warning but for me to be sworn to silence considering what continues to transpire, would be an impossibility. So if you have withdrawn my membership I would understand & honor your decision but I ask that you at least inform me. If you haven't withdrawn it may I request that you hook me back up.

In the interim I re-registered under bloodnok as a temporary measure. If it is your decision to be rid of me I shall cancel that & you will hear of me no more. Otherwise I'd be grateful if you reconnected my nuggler account.

Sincerely
N


Hope that sets minds at rest.

 katzendogs wrote: 

Yes sir.  There is ton's of honest passion, intellegence, insight from experience to be found here.

 romeotuma wrote: 
GFY