Cknolls

QUOTE(FlaSoxxJim @ Apr 27, 2006 -> 02:17 PM) You want to thank them for doing their patriotic duty too, eh? CIA, NSA, and similar agency employees take an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States, not to stick their heads in the sand when the actions of the administration controvert the Constitution. The people with questionable morals are the agency officials who knew about rendition with intent to torture and domestic warrrentless spying and didn't think it was their place to question it. I'm dizzy from you're spinning.

Do you think someone needs a diaper change? Even MSNBC Contributor Doesn't Want to Watch MSNBC 04/28 02:43 AM Washington Post reporter Jim VandeHei provoked quite a discussion yesterday by "officially complaining" that the White House TVs are always tuned to Fox News: During a briefing led by White House spokesman Scott McClellan as President Bush was traveling to New Orleans, Louisiana, the Washington Post's Jim VandeHei asked why the White House televisions always seemed to be tuned to Fox News and if it was possible to have them tuned instead to CNN. "It's come to my attention that there's been requests — this is a serious question — to turn these TVs onto a station other than Fox, and that those have been denied," VandeHei told McClellan, who is soon to be replaced by former Fox anchor and self-described conservative Tony Snow. "My question would be, is there a White House policy that all government TVs have to be tuned to Fox?" VandeHei asked. "Never heard of any such thing," McClellan responded. "My TVs are on four different channels at all times." VandeHei noted that McClellan has four televisions in his office, and clarified that he was referring to the ones that reporters can see. "They're always turned to Fox, which a lot of people consider a Republican-leaning network." VandeHei noted that the televisions are paid for with taxpayer dollars. "And my understanding is that you guys have to watch Fox on Air Force One. Is that true?" McClellan said it was the first he had heard such a claim, and that it was not true. "In fact, I've watched other channels on here," he said. "I've never known anyone that's raised a complaint about a request from back here to watch a different channel," McClellan added. VandeHei replied, "I'm officially raising it, and officially complaining about it." McClellan then asked whether VandeHei had tried to have the change made. "I was told — the quote was, 'No,' when I asked for CNN," the reporter said. A few quick points: First, if White House officials watch Fox News instead of its cable competitors, that just makes them like everyone else in this country. Second, "a lot of people" consider CNN to be a Democrat-leaning network and wouldn't be suprised to learn that it's the channel that White House reporters prefer. Third, Jim VandeHei is a frequent MSNBC contributor, but he would still rather watch CNN. I wonder if that will come up next time he's on Hardball

QUOTE(Athomeboy_2000 @ Apr 27, 2006 -> 01:27 PM) Ok, so let's do the math.... Long DIstance Driving $3 per gallon / 30 MPG (regular gas) = $0.10 per mile $2.8 per gallon / 25.5 MPG (with E85) = $0.11 per mile City Driving $3 per gallon / 17 MPG (regular gas) = 0.176 per mile $2.8 per gallon / 14.45 MPG (with E85) = $0.19 per mile hmmm..... actually costs slightly more to use E85. Hey, the farmers are happy.

QUOTE(Rex Kickass @ Apr 27, 2006 -> 12:54 AM) No, I'm asking the Vice President to produce the executive order showing his authorization to declassify material. If he has the authority to do it, he should prove it. Without it, he's just leaking intelligence. And i'm asking Priest, Risen and Lichtblau to tell me who leaked classified material to the Toast and Slimes respectively.

QUOTE(Athomeboy_2000 @ Apr 27, 2006 -> 12:06 PM) How much does a gallon of E85 cost you? Just curious how it compares to regular gas. Gas City is one station I know of that sells E85 and it is .20 cheaper than regular unleaded.

QUOTE(southsideirish71 @ Apr 27, 2006 -> 10:58 AM) Too bad we care too much about Cariboo, 4 eskimos, a seal, 2 polar bears and a slab of ice in Alaska, because I hear they have oil up there also. Plus a pipeline to bring it home. But santa would be mad if Rudolf had to fly over an oil rig. OMG The poor cariboo Actually the caribou have increased dramatically since the pipeline was built. As for an extra million barrels of oil a day.... who needs that?

QUOTE(Texsox @ Apr 27, 2006 -> 10:13 AM) What are you blaming Carter for? A bad military plan? Maintenance on the choppers? Weather? Soldiers failing to execute the plan? A helicopter clipping a C-130? The second guessing could be, was this the best approach? A miitary or diplomatic solution. Adding additional, and greater, violence into the equation should be weighed carefully and I believe it was. After holding off on a military strike, the decision was made to go ahead. I think that was a good decision at the time. After the mission was aborted, due to a sudden sandstorm, a helicopter clipped a C-130 taking off, resulting in the deaths of eight servicemen. I find it hard to blame the President for that. I believe we had out best possible people involved, the Air Force and Marines and am saddened for the eight servicemen who died in the mission. I don't think the Presidents decides who participates, plus it was a volunteer mission. In the end, the Algiers Accords resulted in the release of the hostages, alive. I think it is unfair to say unharmed, because anyone held hostage for 444 days, will be harmed. Sadly, we are better prepared today for this type of event. We have worked more missions and battles in the desert, have better technology, better resources in Arab countries, better understanding of the terrorist mind. Yet, hostages are killed regularly in that corner of the world. Perhaps, in hindsight, we did a much better job in 1979 than we thought. Ask the CIA how good their resources are in the Arab countries.

Anyone read this pile of crap? Bad Targeting CIA Director Porter Goss has been busy chasing press leaks. It's easier than improving U.S. intelligence. Wednesday, April 26, 2006; Page A24 IF CIA OFFICIALS leaked information about the agency's secret prisons to The Post's Dana Priest, then the American public owes them a debt of gratitude. We don't know who the sources were for Ms. Priest's Pulitzer Prize-winning work, though we assume there were many. (The news and editorial departments here operate separately, and they don't share such information.) Last week a CIA officer on the verge of retirement, Mary O. McCarthy, was fired for speaking to Ms. Priest and other journalists, though she says she did not provide classified information about the secret prisons. Anyone who talked from inside the CIA violated the agency's rules, if not the law. But they also upheld the public interest. The Bush administration is holding a number of terrorism suspects incommunicado in secret prisons abroad without due process or even notification of the International Committee of the Red Cross, and some detainees have been subjected to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. This is a gross violation of international law and American values, and it's essential to our democracy that such an exceptional policy be subject to public debate. Maybe disclosure of the prisons damaged national security -- the CIA has offered no evidence of that -- but it's hard to imagine what could be more damaging than the existence of the system itself. CIA Director Porter J. Goss appears to have dismissed Ms. McCarthy to send a message to others who leaked to the press. That's a questionable use of his authority. We don't question the need for intelligence agencies to gather or keep secrets, or to penalize employees who fail to do so. Leaks that compromise national security, such as the deliberate delivery of information to foreign governments, must be aggressively prosecuted. But the history of the past several decades shows that leaks of classified information to the U.S. media have generally benefited the country -- whether it was the disclosure of the Pentagon Papers during the Vietnam era or the more recent revelations of secret prisons and domestic spying during the war on terrorism. Those who leak to the press often do so for patriotic reasons, not because they wish to damage national security. The press itself has a record of protecting information that would endanger lives or ongoing operations; The Post, for example, withheld the locations of the CIA prisons from Ms. Priest's story. Previous CIA directors refrained from hunting down leakers for the simple reason that they had more urgent priorities. Which bring us to Mr. Goss. He has taken no disciplinary action against CIA personnel identified by his inspector general as having played a part in the failure to prevent the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. He has taken no action against CIA interrogators known to have participated in the torture and killing of foreign detainees, or against those who knowingly violated the Geneva Conventions in Iraq. He has driven a host of senior managers from the agency. Now he would have the country believe that one of the CIA's biggest problems -- worthy of an unprecedented internal investigation he personally oversaw -- is unauthorized leaks to the press. His setting of priorities seems unlikely to improve the CIA's success rate in judging foreign programs of weapons of mass destruction or preventing the next terrorist attack. © 2006 The Washington Post Company This is hilarious. I wonder why nobody signed this editorial? So the CIA should tell Al-Qaeda where the supposed prisons are?

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Apr 26, 2006 -> 12:18 PM) I'll grant you that in theory you should be correct, and for the most part you are...we're just sort of splitting hairs compared to what the folks in Saudi Arabia are earning, but the fact is that the bolded statement just isn't correct. It's been proven again and again and again over the last few years that as oil prices have gone up, the oil company profits have gone up. I understand this is different from revenues and revenues should go up as the price goes up, but the fact is that profits have gone up as well. In fact, when you just read some random press report about the profits of any oil company in any quarter, they include something like this: I understand the position you're trying to argue, and it makes sense from a hypothetical and economic standpoint. The oil company shouldn't want oil prices to go up, because they should be able to sell more oil and earn a higher profit at lower oil prices. However, that's simply just not what the last 5 years have taught us. As oil prices have gone up, the growth in oil demand has in fact started to slow a little bit, but the rate of increase of oil company profits has been divorced from the growth in sales. The only thing it has correlated with is the increase in price. And the more the price has gone up, the higher their profits have gone. As far as I can tell, I can account for nothing other than the price which would have driven the massive increases from profits on the $10 billion scale in roughly 2001 to profits on the $100 billion scale in 2005. Subsidies haven't been raised nearly that much, demand has not grown that much, there haven't been major innovations or mergers which would come close to accounting for that. The only variable left in this whole mess is the price, and everything we've seen since 2001 suggests that as the price of oil goes up, the profits of oil companies go up. Yes, revenues go up as well, but that's to be expected. What shouldn't be expected is the increase in profits. Demand has grown that much. In that time, China has gone from an oil exporter to the 2nd largest oil importer. That is some sizable demand being supplied, no.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 09:55 PM) Doesn't make it right. There's a reason why those things are inadmissable in court. But hey, I guess if you're the federal government, you're big enough that if you fire the correct person 75% of the time, you're getting enough of the bad guys. She signes a release not to speak to the press as a CIA employee. She admitted to speaking to the Post several times. She violated her agreement. SHE GONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Apr 25, 2006 -> 08:07 AM) That makes a little more sense. 1.34T over 20 years is roughly 67B per year, which is still bigger than I thought it would be. But you stated 2T as if it were for a single year, which didn't make sense to me. 67B a year is indeed quite a bit. Maybe the feds should use some of that 67 billion a year to incentivize energy companies to develop alternative sources of energy, as Kap suggested. I concur whole-heartedly.

October 26, 2005 State and Federal Treasuries "Profit" More from Gasoline Sales than U.S. Oil Industry by Scott A. Hodge and Jonathan Williams High gas prices and strong oil company earnings have generated a rash of new tax proposals in recent months. Some lawmakers have called for new “windfall profits” taxes—similar to the one signed into federal law in 1980 by President Jimmy Carter—that would tax the profits of major oil companies at a rate of 50 percent. Meanwhile, many commentators have voiced support for the idea of increasing gas taxes to keep the price of gasoline at post-Katrina highs, thereby reducing gas consumption. However, often ignored in this debate is the fact that oil industry profits are highly cyclical, making them just as prone to “busts” as to “booms.” Additionally, tax collections on the production and import of gasoline by state and federal governments are already near historic highs. In fact, in recent decades governments have collected far more revenue from gasoline taxes than the largest U.S. oil companies have collectively earned in domestic profits. (Click here for previous analysis of state, local and federal gas taxes.) According to data compiled by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration, the domestic profits of the 25 largest oil companies in the U.S. have been highly volatile since the late 1970s. As illustrated in Figure 1, between 1977 and 1985, the oil industry recorded relatively high profits—averaging nearly $33 billion per year, after adjusting for inflation. These good times were followed by ten years of relatively flat profits, averaging just $12.3 billion per year. In 1996, profits began to rise again but have been anything but stable, ranging from $9 billion to nearly $42 billion per year. Between 1977 and 2004, the industry’s domestic profits totaled $643 billion, after adjusting for inflation. Figure 1. State and Federal Taxes on Gasoline Production and Imports Exceed Oil Industry Profits in Most Years Source: Bureau of Economic Analysis, U.S. Energy Information Administration In contrast, federal and state taxes on gasoline production and imports have been climbing steadily since the late 1970s and now total roughly $58.4 billion. Due in part to substantial hikes in the federal gasoline excise tax in 1983, 1990, and 1993, annual tax revenues have continued to grow. Since 1977, governments collected more than $1.34 trillion, after adjusting for inflation, in gasoline tax revenues—more than twice the amount of domestic profits earned by major U.S. oil companies during the same period. As illustrated in Table 1, since 1977, there have been only three years (1980, 1981, and 1982) in which domestic oil industry profits exceeded government gas tax collections. In the remaining years, gasoline tax collections consistently exceeded oil industry profits, reaching a peak in 1995 when gas tax collections outpaced industry profits by a factor of 7.3. Table 1. State and Federal Gasoline Taxes Compared to Major U.S. Oil Companies’ Domestic Profits, 1977-2004 (figures in billions of 2004 dollars) Year Oil Profits Federal Taxes State Taxes Total Taxes 1977 $26.8 $13.7 $29.0 $42.7 1978 $27.5 $13.0 $28.1 $41.1 1979 $34.9 $11.4 $25.2 $36.7 1980 $41.0 $9.4 $22.0 $31.4 1981 $41.4 $8.5 $21.0 $29.5 1982 $35.8 $8.0 $20.6 $28.6 1983 $30.2 $15.0 $22.0 $37.0 1984 $28.7 $16.2 $23.5 $39.6 1985 $29.3 $15.6 $24.6 $40.2 1986 $9.0 $15.9 $25.7 $41.5 1987 $14.0 $15.0 $27.4 $42.4 1988 $16.9 $15.6 $28.1 $43.8 1989 $14.5 $14.5 $28.3 $42.8 1990 $18.6 $14.5 $29.1 $43.5 1991 $11.0 $21.1 $29.7 $50.8 1992 $10.1 $20.9 $30.8 $51.7 1993 $10.6 $20.9 $31.4 $52.3 1994 $10.8 $27.1 $32.1 $59.3 1995 $7.9 $26.3 $31.9 $58.1 1996 $18.9 $26.8 $32.0 $58.9 1997 $18.8 $26.0 $32.6 $58.6 1998 $9.0 $27.1 $33.1 $60.3 1999 $16.8 $26.5 $33.6 $60.1 2000 $34.9 $25.7 $33.3 $59.0 2001 $35.1 $24.9 $33.6 $58.5 2002 $16.2 $24.5 $33.9 $58.4 2003 $31.7 $24.6 $33.4 $58.0 2004 $42.6 $24.2 $34.2 $58.4 Total $643.0 $533.0 $810.1 $1,343.1 Source: Bureau of Economic Analysis, U.S. Energy Information Administration

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 05:16 PM) Please do. Since the entire federal budget is between one and two trillion dollars, I find it very hard to believe that gas tax receipts alone are that much. 1.34 trillion dollars over 20 years. pretty staggering. I have the source at work. Will post it tomorrow.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 01:45 PM) I honestly could give less of a damn what the unions would think of it. Unions are important presences, but not because businesses have to cave to them. They are just a check against poor standards and treatment. The unions representing many of the gov't workers are dealing in jobs that are REALLY easy to fill with someone new. We aren't talking about highly specialized skilled labor here. I agree. But have you read up on th Air traffic controllers union lately. Our buddy Slick Willy gave them collective bargaing rights. JACKASS. Watch how they rape the taxpayer.

QUOTE(Rex Kickass @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 05:57 PM) Alright, well then I guess we need Rove and Libby to be brought up on the same charges because we know that they were involved in leaking the identity of CIA operatives. You mean analyst.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 01:47 PM) They have made a lot, but nothing compared to the oil company profits. Add up the profits of the big energy giants in this country alone and you get close to $100 Billion in profits. Are you telling me the state and local governments are getting that kind of money out of just gas tax? Even if that is the case, that just bolsters the argument for spending more on alternate energy sources with the extra revenue. Fed state and local taxes from gasoline is over 1 trillion dollars and I believe closer to 2 Trillion dollars over the same time span. I will try to find a source.

Today's Post never mentions that McCarthy donated $7000 to Kerry and the Dem party. Think they just missed that detail by accident when they had 5 top-notch journalists working the one story. Hardly.

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 06:25 AM) So what is the URL for your blog chronicling the lies of the evening news? The irony is while the left is fixated on Fox News, you never hear them questioning the "MSM" do you? Do you see liberal blogs that talk about the truth in the evening news? Nope guess what, they accept what they want to hear as fact, and don't question it either. The difference is that once again, the focus isn't there, its only the latest thing that Fox News, or Rush Limbaugh said. Can anyone cite a story in N.Y. Times or the Wash. Post about the illegal use of Michael Steele's SSN to run credit checks on him by the Dem Sen. Campaign Comm. haeded by none other than Chuck Schumer. This is one example where the MSM's failure to report a story could be considered bias. Does anyone think that the Post and the Times would have been silent if the RSCC stole a black Dem candidates SSN and did credit checks on him?

QUOTE(My Dixie Normus @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 11:58 AM) Friday, the Chicago Trib reported that just 6 in 100 Chicago Public H.S. freshmen will go on to get a college degree. Also, 67% of Chicago 4th graders test below grade level in reading. The Fed spends 53 billion on public education every year. A good place to start would be to blow up the Dept. of Education. The only remaining element should be a national test, written in English, that qualifies you to move out of 4th, 8th and 12th grade. Dep't of education is the biggest waste of money outside of the energy and interior dept's.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 11:23 AM) I don't agree that it is an awful idea. Its not that I am naive to the fact that government spending can represent an enormous boost to the economy - its that the long run factors are more important to me than the short run. Our increasing debt, our unwillingness to address waste in any real way, a desire by recent administrations to overspend... its going to be a repeating pattern, unless something changes. In my view, a balanced budget requirement of some sort is the best solution. Here are two other ideas: 1. Want to stop waste? Want government agencies to perform at private industry standards? Then why not do what companies do? Have private consulting firms (Accenture and the like) do a real and complete audit for ALL government agencies, to see where the money goes. Set the budgetary AND performance goals based on the reports. Reward agencies for efficiency, fire manager at agencies still being wasteful. 2. Want to eliminate pork? Time for a Truth in Legislation Act. One bill = one subject. Every bill sent to the floor for a vote gets an OMB/GAO (or private firm again) review of the text. Anything in the bill not directly related to the subject matter of the bill is shaved off, and would have to be passed seperately. Exception would be made, of course, for annual budgets. How do you think the unions will respond to the results of these audits. My guess is they will use the reports for toilet paper.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 08:16 AM) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Except maybe the Fed Gas Tax. That would be good politically, but I think its a mistake economically. Speaking of gas taxes. Guess who has made the most from high oil prices???? Gov't.... Fed State and Local... Don't hear any b****ing about this.

QUOTE(Rex Kickass @ Apr 23, 2006 -> 03:21 PM) It seems that the Democratic Party may actually have learned something in the last couple years, they seem to be introducing a simple agenda and message to share with voters to talk about what they stand for. Howard Dean: Raise the Minimum Wage Fairness for the Middle Class Ban Lobbyist Largesse Give All Cargo a Security Inspection Fix Medicare Drug Plan Transition in Iraq. Rahm Emmanuel: Make College Education affordable. Fix the Budget Acheive Energy Independence Spur innovation in the Sciences Universal Health Care John Kerry: Tell the truth. Fire incompetent people. Find Osama bin Laden/Secure our ports of entry. Bring the troops home from Iraq. Respect the Rule of Law. Protect our Civil Rights. Kerry's first point is almost surreal.

QUOTE(Rex Kickass @ Apr 23, 2006 -> 03:21 PM) It seems that the Democratic Party may actually have learned something in the last couple years, they seem to be introducing a simple agenda and message to share with voters to talk about what they stand for. Howard Dean: Raise the Minimum Wage Fairness for the Middle Class Ban Lobbyist Largesse Give All Cargo a Security Inspection Fix Medicare Drug Plan Transition in Iraq. Rahm Emmanuel: Make College Education affordable. Fix the Budget Acheive Energy Independence Spur innovation in the Sciences Universal Health Care John Kerry: Tell the truth. Fire incompetent people. Find Osama bin Laden/Secure our ports of entry. Bring the troops home from Iraq. Respect the Rule of Law. Protect our Civil Rights. You forgot Teddy K's 21 points.

QUOTE(Rex Kickass @ Apr 24, 2006 -> 09:19 AM) Then you aren't paying attention. Examples?

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,192640,00.html