Mormon Prophecy Behind Glenn Beck's Message

This comes from an article by Dana Milbank of the Washington Post, however he posted this piece at Huffington.

But before I post it, I want to share with you what I learned years ago. At the church I attended we did a study of cults and other religions. One of the ones we talked about in depth was the Mormons.

We did this because there is a strong presence and history of the Mormons here. Mostly we have the RLDS now, and the Restoration Branch of the LDS, however we (the state) did play a huge role in sending them off to Utah.

One of the things we talked about was the huge presence of Mormon's in businesses and in government and how it is growing. People do not realize how huge the "Corporation of Mormonism" is. They own most of at least 4 states, between government representatives and just land and business.

So, when I read this piece by Milbank it brought back what I had learned and what scares the Evangelical Christians when it comes to Mormonism. There is a belief they will take over the entire process of the Federal Government in time. This ties into what Milbank wrote.

From the Huffington Post, please go read the entire piece it is worth your time:

I

n one of his first appearances on Fox News, Glenn Beck sent a coded message to the nation's six million Mormons -- or at least those Mormons who believe in what the Latter-day Saints call "the White Horse Prophecy."

"We are at the place where the Constitution hangs in the balance," Beck told Bill O'Reilly on November 14, 2008, just after President Obama's election. "I feel the Constitution is hanging in the balance right now, hanging by a thread unless the good Americans wake up."

Some of the emphasis is mine... but I wanted to make sure you saw this line:

The Constitution is hanging by a thread.

According to Milbank, this is the Call to Arms, so to speak. He goes on to say:

The phrase is often attributed to the Prophet Joseph Smith, founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or Mormon Church. Smith is believed to have said in 1840 that when the Constitution hangs by a thread, elders of the Mormon Church will step in -- on the proverbial white horse -- to save the country.

"When the Constitution of the United States hangs, as it were, upon a single thread, they will have to call for the 'Mormon' Elders to save it from utter destruction; and they will step forth and do it," Brigham Young, Smith's successor as head of the church, wrote in 1855.

He goes on to show how other members of the Mormon Church have backed Beck up when talking.

Was it just a coincidence in wording, or was Beck, a 1999 Mormon convert, speaking in coded language about the need to fulfill the Mormon prophecy? A conversation on Beck's radio show ten days earlier would seem to rule out coincidence. Beck was interviewing Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah, also a Mormon, when he said: "I heard Barack Obama talk about the Constitution and I thought, we are at the point or we are very near the point where our Constitution is hanging by a thread."

"Well, let me tell you something," Hatch responded. "I believe the Constitution is hanging by a thread."

Days after Beck's Fox show started in January 2009, he had Hatch on, and again prompted him: "I believe our Constitution hangs by a thread."

I thought this part was very interesting, however since I don't listen to Beck I had never thought much of it.

In addition to the coded allusions to the White Horse Prophecy, he often brings Mormon theology into his broadcasts (he touts the thinking of late church president Ezra Taft Benson and he frequently promotes the work Mormon conspiracy theorist Cleon Skousen) but without identifying them with the LDS church.

Then he uses history to teach us more...

Before the Mormons went west, Smith traveled to Washington seeking help for his oppressed followers and received nothing but frustration. Rather than turning on the government, however, "They considered themselves the last Real Americans, the legitimate heirs of the pilgrims and Founding Fathers," Pat Bagley wrote in the Salt Lake Tribune. "And, they believed, the very survival of the Constitution depended on the Saints. From Smith on, LDS leaders prophesied the Constitution would one day hang by a thread, only to be saved by Mormons."

A compilation of church leaders' statements over the years by the journal BYU Studies shows this strain of thinking. Though there are doubts about whether Smith actually wrote the phrase "hang by a thread," his successors left no doubt about the theology behind it. Orson Hyde, a Smith contemporary, wrote that Smith believed that "the time would come when the Constitution and the country would be in danger of an overthrow; and said [Smith]: 'If the Constitution be saved at all, it will be by the elders of this Church.'"

As you can see, this should be worrying. It is one thing for the Christian right to try to take over, at least they are out in the open about it... But the Mormons are trying to do it while not bringing public attention to what they plan.

Milbank finishes this piece by saying this:

But there is a Beckian twist in his version of the prophecy. Unlike the church leaders' versions, Beck's vision carries the possibility of a bloody end. On the night of Feb. 24, 2009, Beck outlined this prospect for his viewers. People who "don't trust the government," he said, would "see the government as violating the Constitution, and they will see themselves as defenders of the Constitution. Not a good mix. Then they take matters into their own hands."

It was Glenn Beck in a nutshell: White Horse Prophecy meets horsemen of the apocalypse.

I firmly believe the words of Beck carry with them a danger and a chilling reach to violence. Note the other TeaBaggers who have also called for violence. Angle, asking for 2nd amendment remedies, taking out Harry Reid... all those are attributed to her. Then there is the candidate who says he confused his names the other day, calling for the assassination of Obama, not once but several times, then later saying he meant Osama... Yeah right.

We know the likes of SP, she who will not be named on this blog, who is also advocating violence and wishes for End Times to happen soon. Matter of fact, all the so called Religious Right have done the same. They all want the world to end so they can be lifted up to Heaven with their Jesus.

I must say, their Jesus and my Jesus are two very different people.

So what do you think.. Does Dana Milbank have a point. He has just published a book about Beck, called
Tears of a Clown: Glenn Beck and the Tea Bagging of America, a fitting title don't you think? I am going to have to get this book. Then I will let you know what I think.

Let me know how you feel about this, and again, just another thing to worry about from the Right WingNuts of America.

Sen. Ted Kennedy's Widow Weighs In, Maybe We Should Listen!

Today in the Washington Post Op-Ed section there is a particularly poignant piece, at least for me. I often think of Ted Kennedy when we are hearing these Senator's argue and fuss. When the lies are being told and when the "comity of the body" is being disturbed.

When so many this week were calling on the Senate to "kill the bill" and start from scratch, I couldn't help but wonder to myself, "What would Teddy say or do?". Now, I think we know.

My late husband, Ted Kennedy, was passionate about health-care reform. It was the cause of his life. He believed that health care for all our citizens was a fundamental right, not a privilege, and that this year the stars -- and competing interests -- were finally aligned to allow our nation to move forward with fundamental reform. He believed that health-care reform was essential to the financial stability of our nation's working families and of our economy as a whole.

Still, Ted knew that accomplishing reform would be difficult. If it were easy, he told me, it would have been done a long time ago. He predicted that as the Senate got closer to a vote, compromises would be necessary, coalitions would falter and many ardent supporters of reform would want to walk away. He hoped that they wouldn't do so. He knew from experience, he told me, that this kind of opportunity to enact health-care reform wouldn't arise again for a generation.

In the early 1970s, Ted worked with the Nixon administration to find consensus on health-care reform. Those efforts broke down in part because the compromise wasn't ideologically pure enough for some constituency groups. More than 20 years passed before there was another real opportunity for reform, years during which human suffering only increased. Even with the committed leadership of then-President Bill Clinton and his wife, reform was thwarted in the 1990s. As Ted wrote in his memoir, he was deeply disappointed that the Clinton health-care bill did not come to a vote in the full Senate. He believed that senators should have gone on the record, up or down.

Ted often said that we can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. He also said that it was better to get half a loaf than no loaf at all, especially with so many lives at stake. That's why, even as he never stopped fighting for comprehensive health-care reform, he also championed incremental but effective reforms such as a Patients' Bill of Rights, the Children's Health Insurance Program and COBRA continuation of health coverage.

The bill before the Senate, while imperfect, would achieve many of the goals Ted fought for during the 40 years he championed access to quality, affordable health care for all Americans. If this bill passes:

-- Insurance protections like the ones Ted fought for his entire life would become law.

-- Thirty million Americans who do not have coverage would finally be able to afford it. Ninety-four percent of Americans would be insured. Americans would finally be able to live without fear that a single illness could send them into financial ruin.

-- Insurance companies would no longer be able to deny people the coverage they need because of a preexisting illness or condition. They would not be able to drop coverage when people get sick. And there would be a limit on how much they can force Americans to pay out of their own pockets when they do get sick.

-- Small-business owners would no longer have to fear being forced to lay off workers or shut their doors because of exorbitant insurance rates. Medicare would be strengthened for the millions of seniors who count on it.

-- And by eliminating waste and inefficiency in our health-care system, this bill would bring down the deficit over time.

Health care would finally be a right, and not a privilege, for the citizens of this country. While my husband believed in a robust public option as an effective way to lower costs and increase competition, he also believed in not losing sight of the forest for the trees. As long as he wasn't compromising his principles or values, he looked for a way forward.

As President Obama noted to Congress this fall, for Ted, health-care reform was not a matter of ideology or politics. It was not about left or right, Democrat or Republican. It was a passion born from the experience of his own life, the experience of our family and the experiences of the millions of Americans across this country who considered him their senator, too.

The bill before Congress will finally deliver on the urgent needs of all Americans. It would make their lives better and do so much good for this country. That, in the end, must be the test of reform. That was always the test for Ted Kennedy. He's not here to urge us not to let this chance slip through our fingers. So I humbly ask his colleagues to finish the work of his life, the work of generations, to allow the vote to go forward and to pass health-care reform now. As Ted always said, when it's finally done, the people will wonder what took so long.

This was written by Victoria Reggie Kennedy, the widow of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), is an attorney.

The emphasis is mine, because I thought they were very striking sentences we should all take note of. As I have said all along.. No this isn't perfect, but we can build on it.. Let's get this passed, get it into law and then we can add to it and make it better. That's how all big legislation is handled.. that's how this needs to be done too.

My Comments on the Comments

A commenter told me he was disappointed in Pres. Obama and his list is included. I wanted a chance to refute his claims as to why he was disappointed and see what it was and if I could make him happier. Here is his list.. I will try to answer them after.. Please leave anything you would like to add in the comments.. Thanks all.


• Obama was anti-Iraq war when Bush started it, but he has been way too slow shutting it down.

He is still Anti-Iraq war and is following his time line and the time line he was given by the commanders and by the SOFA. Actually I believe they are going to be out sooner than they planned even so. It does take time to move men and equipment out of battle. It would be nice to be able to just say "Come Home" and they all magically appear.. but it doesn't work that way...

• Obama has expanded the foolish Afghanistan war. What are we accomplishing there?

This was something he said he was going to do.. There is nothing here that is new or not stated all along. Why are you surprised over this. He ALWAYS said he would do this. It was his intent all along to escalate the war in Afghanistan. He never hinted, stated or implied anything to the contrary.

• Obama has not shut down Gitmo, and has continued Bush rendition policies. A detainee has recounted recent torture under the Obama administration. Obama has continued Bush detention and torture policies.

No, he hasn't continued the torture policies. That is just not true. He is shutting down Gitmo and if he had been allowed to do it it would have been done. Congress is the one who blocked him, by refusing to grant him the money needed to get it closed. To lay all this on the President is just wrong. As for renditions, yes, but they weren't just Bush policies, those have been in place since Eisenhower.. They are policy going back years and years. Nothing is going to change them, I am afraid. Now they are just more in the open.

• Obama has been way too wimpy in this health care reform fight. He ought to tell the Blue Dogs to get on board or else, the way Bush or LBJ would have done. There's one instance where he should have followed Bush's example. I'm afraid his bipartisan stance is going to allow the Republicans to win.

Did you read my earlier post at all?.. He is doing much better than LBJ did when he passed Medicare. To say he is doing better is trying to rewrite History and is just plain wrong. LBJ got a mediocre bill passed and then with add ons later we got a decent bill that made Medicare what it is today. To say he has been way too wimpy is just being silly and rather obtuse.

• His economic recovery gave billions -- trillions to the banks without helping the little guy at all. The banks responded by tightening the screws on their credit card customers and giving huge tax paid bonuses to their top execs.

His economic recovery?? That started under BUSH... here we go rewriting history again. Remember that was in September of 2008, and there was nothing that Barack Obama could do except vote for or against it, he was still candidate Obama at that time. Since then yes, after the election he has had a little hand in some of this, and most of his policies have been geared toward Main Street.

Where's the Change We Can Believe In? Obama is even distancing himself now from Eric Holder's prosecution of Bush's War Criminals. He opposed publication of more torture photos. Bush's people did things we executed Nazis and Japanese for. Obama would rather let it slide. I am puzzled by Obama. He is a Constitutional scholar. I just don't get it.

This last one, I answered at your blog but will do it again here, Yes, Pres. Obama has distanced himself from AG Holder and the prosecution of any and all war crimes. That is considered Separation of Powers and is defined in the Constitution. He should do that. To do anything less than that would be to become more like Bush and that's not what we want. That's what Bush did.. was to circumvent the Constitution and politicize the Attorney General's Office, yet you are asking him to do just exactly that. Sorry, but that's not what I voted for and that's not what I would want him to do.

I hope I answered your questions and helped you some. I am not the only one who feels this President has done well so far and is getting a bum rap. There are several others who feel the same way.

I think there are a lot of people who are jumping on the Obama has failed bandwagon very early in this presidency. And for some reason they are on the left side of politics. Frank Schaeffer sees the same thing. Here is his take on it:

The Left Is Also Obama's Problem
Can the left learn to keep its mouth shut once in a while? Does the American left know how to win wars or just skirmishes? Does the left want change or does it demand perfection? You can't have both in this life.

No one has been a tougher critic of the Republican Party, the Religious Right and various wing nuts out to destroy the Obama presidency than me. Few ordinary Americans (that I know of) have taken more heat (and hate) for their support of the President than me either. Former right wing religious right leaders like me are never forgiven for joining the reality-based community!

Believe me, with my old "friends" on the right I don't need more enemies! (Just check out Fox News smearing of me last week with insanely out-of-context clips on the O'Reilly Factor lifted and edited from Maddow interviewing me.) So I'm hesitant to knock the left. I guess I don't like the idea of all sides pissed off with me at once. But in the light of how and why the debate over health care is being dominated by the loony right maybe the left is partly to blame for the stalemate on health care reform.

Last week the New York Times noted a lack of enthusiasm on the part of Obama's former foot soldiers when it comes to rising to the occasion and pouring on the support for health care reform. ("Health Debate Fails to Ignite Obama's Grass Roots," August 15.) Why the lack of enthusiasm?

It's because the left has made the classic mistake of going for a whole loaf and therefore risking getting nothing. The left has proved itself as impatient as the right and just as shortsighted, given that the lefty sniping at the Obama administration started almost from day one. And now after barely six months in office the people who worked so hard to get him elected have seemingly lost their enthusiasm for another fight on behalf of Obama.

What sapped the yes-we-can optimistic, hope-filled bedrock supporters' will? Who sapped it?

There is a connection between sniping from the left -- the drip, drip, drip of criticism, the demand for instant perfection, be it from those taking shots Obama's economic policy and claiming that the President is in the hip pocket of Wall Street -- and those saying he cut some sort of evil deal with pharmaceutical companies, and the lop-sided "debate" on health care. The right didn't sap anyone's will who voted for Obama. The left shot itself in the foot.

It seems to me that Obama's critics on the left just don't understand governing. If Franklin Roosevelt had had this quality of "support" from his bedrock constituency there would have been no New Deal and we would have never entered the war to defeat fascism. In fact today's left seems to have a death wish of exercising the "right" to snarky frivolity when it's time to get serious.

The American left has a choice: follow our moderately progressive Democrat president and support him when he most needs it most, or allow our whole project to be derailed by the far (increasingly fascist) right. If it is derailed, sure -- the Republicans played a part. But so did the know-it-all left, all because the left's pontificators -- including those right here in the Huffington Post -- would rather be heard than humbly offer their support to our President (or anyone else) and see change actually happen.

Why?

It strikes me that the left suffers from a sort of crazy First Amendment knee-jerk twitch comparable the the right's sick Second Amendment twitch! The right thinks it must collect guns, the left thinks it must express opinions, and damn the real world consequences. Hey, so Obama fails! Well at least I got my say!

The right is irredeemably sick. The left is just silly. Together the silly and the sick may just do us in. If Limbaugh gets his Obama-must-fail wish, look in the mirror.

On the right the election literally broke their racist brains. This is now the day of the old angry white men once again. And how has the left responded? Did we circle the wagons and hang tough with our young black president? No everyone waded in.

The open question is this: Is the left going to be dominated by its talkers or get on with governance that can only happen with near infinite patience and loyal support? Does the left know how to follow a leader and get something done?

Q: "You mean I have to behave like a regular citizen once in a while and let the people I elect do their job?!"

A: If our self-styled free thinkers decide loyalty is beneath them and have forgotten how to compromise and live in the real world, a few election cycles from now the left is going to find itself reduced to screaming down their far right opposition at town hall meetings.

We have a great president. We have a chance for real change and we'd better use it. Sarah Palin and company are waiting in the wings.

My old friends on the far right are counting on the stupidity of right wing white America to believe their lies. They are also counting on the left being so in love with the sound of its own voice that the left can't govern.

How different things would be right now had everyone who voted for President Obama stuck by him and his administration with total determination, and waited until he had a chance to implement -- and test -- his programs, before wading in with the nit-picking.

The left faces the implacable and loony right. The chips are down. Support the President.

And once again, from one of my favorite bloggers, Bob Cesca, and if you don't read him you really should.. he says this.. and this was a couple of weeks ago:

The Republicans, talk radio and Fox News are fabricating off-the-wall lies practically on a daily basis. The Healther crazies are mobilized by corporate lobbyists. Blue Dogs are holding up progress. The corporate press is all but signing the death sentence for Healthcare Reform 2009. And the public option? Jesus H, I long for the days when we were just fighting for that -- now it looks like we'll be lucky to get any sort of healthcare reform in general.

So what do we do when these enemies are so well defined and screaming out for razor-sharp counterattacks?

Why, we're liberals and progressives. We attack each other, of course!

For example, four of the eight Recommended Diaries on Daily Kos are screeds attacking the administration. I don't know quite what to make of this dynamic, but the overall narrative seems skewed and misguided right now. I can say for certain that, whether justified or not, there's a time and a place for everything, and, right now, there are a clear set of opposition targets and they're ripe for the picking.

Adding... To clarify, I don't have any problem with being critical of the Obama administration or holding him accountable. I've gone down that road many times. And I will probably flip my shit if he signs a healthcare reform bill without the public option. However, what drives me insane is this exaggerated whiny "he's betraying us!" or "he's just like Bush!" horseshit.

Bob goes on in that post to site this list, which comes from a commenter at DailyKos called jonnie rae..

He stabilized the markets, so 401Ks are starting to slowly come back and we are not about to meltdown anymore.

Unemployment numbers are coming down dramatically from when he took over.

GDP went from 6.5 shrinkage to 1 shrinkage since he has been in office.

Tens of thousands of state employees still have jobs, and services are maintained because of his stimulus.

He ended torture.

He IS closing Gitmo.

95% of Americans are receiving a tax DECREASE.

He provided unemployment, food stamps and a 65% reduction in Cobra for those who lost their jobs.

He set new emissions standards.

He protected wilderness land set for oil leases.

He got Pakistan to agree to fight the Taliban, which Bush never could. The top leader was taken out this week.

He nominated and got confirmed the first latina Supreme Court Justice in history.

He signed Equal Pay for Equal Work, Children's Health Bill and Credit Card Reform.

He has a first time home owner's credit, a modification of mortgage plan in place. (This needs work, but it is in place)

He has made it easier for students to get college loans. (UMass just gave a 1500 rebate to all students because of the stimulus money.)

He has improved America's image around the world, especially with Muslim countries.

He got the 2 NK journalists out.

He got the non-proliferation treaties going again, and he will chair the next meeting. Already an agreement exists to reduce Russia's and US's arms.

A significant amount of the bailout money is being paid back. This is a good thing.

He has taken on healthcare, the most difficult thing to pass in the US. I am not completely happy with how he is doing it, but he is doing it.*

He ended the abstinence only thing. And the law that said a pharmacist could refuse to give birth control pills to women if they so chose.

He is sticking to the timetable to withdraw troops from Iraq.

He got funding for the useless bomber cut.And those heliocoptors. He plans to make more weapons' cuts.

He has cut 2 trillion from the budget over the next ten years.

He has taken on energy, the second most difficult thing to pass in the US and it has already passed the House.

He saved the American auto industry. (Cash for clunkers is doing great too, both for the industry and jobs, and for the environment.)

He is building a green economy for the US. First steps in the stimulus, others in the energy bill.

More jobs will be created in transportation when rest of stimulus kicks in in 2010.

He is facing complete disrespect and vilification from the media and the wingnuts,getting more than 30 death threats per day,and still goes on, calmly and with determination and intelligence.

* He has no champions in the Senate, only a small group of obstructionists who seem to have been given all the power by Harry Reid. The insurance industry has convinced people that he is Hitler; and this is only the beginning. If Pharma gets into it, what do you think will happen to healthcare? They have way more money than the insurance companies. You want him to fight all the corporate interests which actually OWN this country, including the Senate and Congress,and you want him to do that virtually alone? The left has attacked him almost from day one. The right is throwing the kitchen sink right now.

Now, if this isn't enough there is also this article from the Washington Monthly and Steve Benen who quotes E.J. Dionne and they are talking about how Pres. Obama is not getting the credit he deserves for the financial crisis and how he handled it.

It is a great read and you should check it out. They lay it out that Bush got credit for how he handled 9-11 even though he mis-handled it before hand.

He also quotes Ezra Klein who states that because Pres. Obama didn't let the crisis get out of hand and stopped it before it went out of control people don't realize exactly what he did.

Those are my thoughts and some thoughts of others around the web.. let me know what you think. Tell me and we can fix this together..

Washington Post's Newest Gamble, Men in Tights

I don't know what to say about this other than YUCKY! This has to be one of the most disgusting pieces of trash I have seen in a while. Well it isn't really a piece of trash.. just disgusting and useless..

Watch:



For one I can't stand Dana Milbank. He is about the most worthless writer that Washington Post has. Chris Cillizza is a little better, and his appearances on MSNBC are most tolerable.

But, you don't have to take my word for it. I am not the only one who is panning this video. Digby and Crooks & Liars are both shooting it down too.

TPM just calls it an experiment. I would say it is an experiment and it failed..lol

It is just strange, 2 grown men playing dress up and making fun of others...not sure how that is going to work out for them.

Eugene Robinson Wins Pulitzer Prize

Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson captured the prize for commentary for his writing about the campaign that led to Barack Obama's election.

Robinson, a former city editor, foreign correspondent and assistant managing editor for the Style section, told the Post newsroom that he was particularly pleased to have won for his coverage of "the biggest political event of my lifetime, and one that has personal meaning for me." A number of his columns offered a black journalist's reflections on Obama's campaign.

The New York Times won five Pulitzer Prizes today, including one for revealing the prostitution scandal that forced Eliot Spitzer to resign as New York governor.

Scandal played a role in a number of awards, such as the local reporting prize that went to the Detroit Free Press for disclosing the steamy text messages that led to the resignation and jailing of the city's mayor, Kwame Kilpatrick.

Smaller newspapers fared better than in previous years, with the Las Vegas Sun winning the coveted public service award for reports on the death of construction workers, and the East Valley Tribune of Mesa, Ariz., sharing the local reporting prize for examining how one sheriff's focus on immigration enforcement endangered investigations of other crimes. The St. Petersburg Times won two awards, one for national reporting for fact-checking competing claims during the presidential campaign, and the other for feature writing by Lane DeGregory for her reports on the adoption of a neglected girl.

In addition, Mark Mahoney won the editorial writing prize for the Post-Star of Glen Falls, N.Y.

The awards, administered by Columbia University, serve as a reminder of exemplary journalism during a difficult period in which newspapers have been slashing staff and news space and some have shut down or been threatened with closure.

Bettina Boxall and Julie Cart, who won the explanatory reporting award for coverage of the growing menace of wildfires, work for the Los Angeles Times, which is part of the bankrupt Tribune Co. Steve Breen won the editorial cartooning prize for the San Diego Union-Tribune, which was recently sold to a private equity firm. And the Free Press won after cutting back home delivery to three days a week.

Among the other New York Times awards, David Barstow won for investigative reporting for scrutinizing how the Pentagon attempted to coopt retired military officers who became television commentators. The Times staff won for reporting on the U.S. challenge in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Holland Carter won for criticism, and Damon Winter for feature photography. The Times won the breaking news reporting prize for its Spitzer coverage.

Patrick Ferrell of the Miami Herald won the Pulitzer for breaking news photography.

Repost of Torture Op-Ed from Dec. 1, 2008

I posted this Dec. 1, 2008. I think it is almost as appropriate today as it is today, maybe more. The writer of this op-ed was a soldier who was in Iraq and was involved in interrogations.

He tells the story best by telling it himself. His words are powerful and strong. I have more that I wrote about him and his conclusions that I will post later.


This is an OpEd from today that helped me decide what to write about. It is another version of a story about torture. This is from someone who stood his ground, and refused to do what others did. He is to be commended for it. Yet he has to now write under an assumed name and hide himself in fear of retaliation, but the article he wrote is really interesting.

I'm Still Tortured by What I Saw in Iraq

By Matthew Alexander
Sunday, November 30, 2008; B01



I should have felt triumphant when I returned from Iraq in August 2006. Instead, I was worried and exhausted. My team of interrogators had successfully hunted down one of the most notorious mass murderers of our generation, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq and the mastermind of the campaign of suicide bombings that had helped plunge Iraq into civil war. But instead of celebrating our success, my mind was consumed with the unfinished business of our mission: fixing the deeply flawed, ineffective and un-American way the U.S. military conducts interrogations in Iraq. I'm still alarmed about that today.

I'm not some ivory-tower type; I served for 14 years in the U.S. Air Force, began my career as a Special Operations pilot flying helicopters, saw combat in Bosnia and Kosovo, became an Air Force counterintelligence agent, then volunteered to go to Iraq to work as a senior interrogator. What I saw in Iraq still rattles me -- both because it betrays our traditions and because it just doesn't work.

Violence was at its peak during my five-month tour in Iraq. In February 2006, the month before I arrived, Zarqawi's forces (members of Iraq's Sunni minority) blew up the golden-domed Askariya mosque in Samarra, a shrine revered by Iraq's majority Shiites, and unleashed a wave of sectarian bloodshed. Reprisal killings became a daily occurrence, and suicide bombings were as common as car accidents. It felt as if the whole country was being blown to bits.

Amid the chaos, four other Air Force criminal investigators and I joined an elite team of interrogators attempting to locate Zarqawi. What I soon discovered about our methods astonished me. The Army was still conducting interrogations according to the Guantanamo Bay model: Interrogators were nominally using the methods outlined in the U.S. Army Field Manual, the interrogators' bible, but they were pushing in every way possible to bend the rules -- and often break them. I don't have to belabor the point; dozens of newspaper articles and books have been written about the misconduct that resulted. These interrogations were based on fear and control; they often resulted in torture and abuse.

I refused to participate in such practices, and a month later, I extended that prohibition to the team of interrogators I was assigned to lead. I taught the members of my unit a new methodology -- one based on building rapport with suspects, showing cultural understanding and using good old-fashioned brainpower to tease out information. I personally conducted more than 300 interrogations, and I supervised more than 1,000. The methods my team used are not classified (they're listed in the unclassified Field Manual), but the way we used them was, I like to think, unique. We got to know our enemies, we learned to negotiate with them, and we adapted criminal investigative techniques to our work (something that the Field Manual permits, under the concept of "ruses and trickery"). It worked. Our efforts started a chain of successes that ultimately led to Zarqawi.

Over the course of this renaissance in interrogation tactics, our attitudes changed. We no longer saw our prisoners as the stereotypical al-Qaeda evildoers we had been repeatedly briefed to expect; we saw them as Sunni Iraqis, often family men protecting themselves from Shiite militias and trying to ensure that their fellow Sunnis would still have some access to wealth and power in the new Iraq. Most surprisingly, they turned out to despise al-Qaeda in Iraq as much as they despised us, but Zarqawi and his thugs were willing to provide them with arms and money. I pointed this out to Gen. George Casey, the former top U.S. commander in Iraq, when he visited my prison in the summer of 2006. He did not respond.

Perhaps he should have. It turns out that my team was right to think that many disgruntled Sunnis could be peeled away from Zarqawi. A year later, Gen. David Petraeus helped boost the so-called Anbar Awakening, in which tens of thousands of Sunnis turned against al-Qaeda in Iraq and signed up with U.S. forces, cutting violence in the country dramatically.

Our new interrogation methods led to one of the war's biggest breakthroughs: We convinced one of Zarqawi's associates to give up the al-Qaeda in Iraq leader's location. On June 8, 2006, U.S. warplanes dropped two 500-pound bombs on a house where Zarqawi was meeting with other insurgent leaders.

But Zarqawi's death wasn't enough to convince the joint Special Operations task force for which I worked to change its attitude toward interrogations. The old methods continued. I came home from Iraq feeling as if my mission was far from accomplished. Soon after my return, the public learned that another part of our government, the CIA, had repeatedly used waterboarding to try to get information out of detainees.

I know the counter-argument well -- that we need the rough stuff for the truly hard cases, such as battle-hardened core leaders of al-Qaeda, not just run-of-the-mill Iraqi insurgents. But that's not always true: We turned several hard cases, including some foreign fighters, by using our new techniques. A few of them never abandoned the jihadist cause but still gave up critical information. One actually told me, "I thought you would torture me, and when you didn't, I decided that everything I was told about Americans was wrong. That's why I decided to cooperate."

Torture and abuse are against my moral fabric. The cliche still bears repeating: Such outrages are inconsistent with American principles. And then there's the pragmatic side: Torture and abuse cost American lives.

I learned in Iraq that the No. 1 reason foreign fighters flocked there to fight were the abuses carried out at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. Our policy of torture was directly and swiftly recruiting fighters for al-Qaeda in Iraq. The large majority of suicide bombings in Iraq are still carried out by these foreigners. They are also involved in most of the attacks on U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq. It's no exaggeration to say that at least half of our losses and casualties in that country have come at the hands of foreigners who joined the fray because of our program of detainee abuse. The number of U.S. soldiers who have died because of our torture policy will never be definitively known, but it is fair to say that it is close to the number of lives lost on Sept. 11, 2001. How anyone can say that torture keeps Americans safe is beyond me -- unless you don't count American soldiers as Americans.

After my return from Iraq, I began to write about my experiences because I felt obliged, as a military officer, not only to point out the broken wheel but to try to fix it. When I submitted the manuscript of my book about my Iraq experiences to the Defense Department for a standard review to ensure that it did not contain classified information, I got a nasty shock. Pentagon officials delayed the review past the first printing date and then redacted an extraordinary amount of unclassified material -- including passages copied verbatim from the Army's unclassified Field Manual on interrogations and material vibrantly displayed on the Army's own Web site. I sued, first to get the review completed and later to appeal the redactions. Apparently, some members of the military command are not only unconvinced by the arguments against torture; they don't even want the public to hear them.

My experiences have landed me in the middle of another war -- one even more important than the Iraq conflict. The war after the war is a fight about who we are as Americans. Murderers like Zarqawi can kill us, but they can't force us to change who we are. We can only do that to ourselves. One day, when my grandkids sit on my knee and ask me about the war, I'll say to them, "Which one?"

Americans, including officers like myself, must fight to protect our values not only from al-Qaeda but also from those within our own country who would erode them. Other interrogators are also speaking out, including some former members of the military, the FBI and the CIA who met last summer to condemn torture and have spoken before Congress -- at considerable personal risk.

We're told that our only options are to persist in carrying out torture or to face another terrorist attack. But there truly is a better way to carry out interrogations -- and a way to get out of this false choice between torture and terror.

I'm actually quite optimistic these days, in no small measure because President-elect Barack Obama has promised to outlaw the practice of torture throughout our government. But until we renounce the sorts of abuses that have stained our national honor, al-Qaeda will be winning. Zarqawi is dead, but he has still forced us to show the world that we do not adhere to the principles we say we cherish. We're better than that. We're smarter, too.

howtobreakaterrorist@gmail.com


Matthew Alexander led an interrogations team assigned to a Special Operations task force in Iraq in 2006. He is the author of "How to Break a Terrorist: The U.S. Interrogators Who Used Brains, Not Brutality, to Take Down the Deadliest Man in Iraq." He is writing under a pseudonym for security reasons.

Put Down The Pitch Forks says Steven Pearlstein in WaPo OpEd

Steven Pearlstein writes in todays Washington Post about the AIG anger sweeping the country and DC and how we need to channel it into something productive. He also points out we need to take some of the blame on ourselves.

I think he has a good point. We all share in this. No, we didn't take the bonuses. But some of us did, take the mortgages AIG was doling out. I know a lot of these people say they were duped, but come on, if you go to buy a house worth $500,000 and you only make $30,000 you know you can't afford it.

Here is what he had to say:

We're angry. We're frustrated. We feel cheated and abused. We're not going to take it anymore.

But then again, we don't have much choice, do we? Sure, we can demand that a few more heads roll on Wall Street, or at the Treasury, or that a few hundred million are clawed back from financiers who never deserved it. But the reality is that no matter what we do now, tens of trillions of dollars in wealth have been lost. All that's left is simply an elaborate exercise in settling up the accounts.

At the end of the day, the thing to get outraged about is not the $440 million in bonuses at AIG or the $10 million that Citigroup is spending to redesign its shrunken executive suite. These may seem like princely sums, but they are almost insignificant compared with the real outrage: the hundreds of billion dollars of taxpayer funds that have been put at risk to keep AIG and Citi from failing and taking the whole financial system down with them. Let's keep our attention on the elephant rather than the pimples on its behind.

I realize that collective expressions of public anger can serve a useful purpose. At times like these, it feels good and is a way for a political system to let off some steam before a more dangerous explosion occurs. More importantly, it builds political momentum for sweeping reform of the regulatory apparatus while scaring the bejeezus out of people on Wall Street, who will now think long and hard the next time they get the urge to take excessive risks with other people's money.

But there's a danger in letting this outrage get to the point that it undermines the effort to contain the financial crisis. And with Congress now rushing to pass legislation taxing away the bonuses of every banker at every bank or financial institution that takes government money, that point seems to have been reached.

A few things to keep in mind.

First, as I've said in the past, this isn't about fairness. There's nothing remotely fair about using taxpayer money to rescue a free-market financial system from the mistakes of the financiers. But the reality is that we can punish the bankers or we can save the banking system, but we can't do both at the same time.

Nor is it fair, as The Great Santelli has declared on CNBC, that homeowners who have paid their bills and have been careful not to take on too much credit are now being asked to provide relief to homeowners who have not. Unfortunately, the price of righteous indignation is a wave of foreclosures, a further decline in home values and billions of dollars of additional loan losses at banks that are already on government life support. Given the financial and economic hits they have already taken, that's a price that most "innocent" homeowners and taxpayers would probably prefer not to pay.

During a financial crisis, fairness is a luxury we cannot afford. During the 1930s, bankers and financiers lost everything, but the outcome -- a decade-long depression -- was hardly fair to the ordinary American. The key question is not whether something is fair, but whether it helps get us through this mess faster and at a lower cost.

At the moment, the Treasury is working (and working and working) on ways to entice private capital back into the banking and shadow-banking system by offering government financing and guarantees against losses. Every dollar of private capital that can be attracted back into the system is a dollar that the Treasury won't have to borrow or the Federal Reserve won't have to print. And only with the return of private capital will the government be able to get back the rescue money it has committed.

But how eager do you think private equity and hedge funds will be to invest those billions of dollars if they fear that their participation will subject them to front-page accusations, congressional inquiries and public outrage over how much they might be paying for bonuses or employee travel or office decoration? Will they participate if they think that Congress, in a moment of populist pique, will try to tax back their profits if they earn more than originally expected?

As the financiers see it, there's a big difference between the government that sets tough terms for participation in its financial rescue programs and a government that is a fickle and unreliable partner, that tries to micromanage their businesses and changes the rules of the game with every zig and zag of public opinion. That may be an exaggerated view, but it is the financiers' view and one we need to be mindful of, since at this point we need their money and cooperation as much as they need ours.

A final point on outrage: We need to save some of it for ourselves. While it was Wall Street that got rich by peddling new ways for Americans to live beyond their means, the decision to do so was ours. It was we who ran up the credit card bills, we who drew down the equity in our homes and we who refused to tax ourselves for the government services we demanded. Wall Street bankers may have been the pushers, but it was we Americans who became addicted to the easy credit.

Is this a request for forgiveness or an explanation of a screwup?

The Chairman and CEO of AIG, who was appointed by the Bush Administration in Sept. 2008, wrote an Op-Ed in todays Washington Post. I am not exactly sure if it is a request for forgiveness or an explanation of their screw up... lol

Edward Liddy, who is the newest head of AIG has a tough job, no doubt about it. But, if as he says he feels like the bonuses should have been renegotiated, then why didn't he do that when he took over?

I may be naive, but I still don't think blaming Pres. Obama and Tim Geithner is the answer here. Yes, maybe they should have been a little more aware of all this, but also, I think since the Fed has been the lead in this, doesn't Bernanke hold the major responsibility in it. Wasn't it under his watch this all started and still continues?? Why didn't he do something about the contracts when he started this mess last year??

I haven't a clue. I just know it is another mess that we are left with, and it will be interesting to see what the hearings will bring today. If you would like to read Liddy's letter to the American People, (or at least I suppose that is what it is supposed to be) you can access it here.

I just think we all need to continue to think a little. Yes, I am angry about this entire mess, but remember, you have to play the cards you are dealt sometimes, and Pres. Obama was dealt a mess. This is just one of them. Until he can draw some new cards this is one of the ones he has to deal with. We just have to support him and his choice of Treasury Secretary Geithner.

As I have said before, I think Tim Geithner is getting a bum rap. Remember everyone thought he was a great pick, until he didn't give them what they wanted. Now they don't like him anymore.

RNC and Their Dishonest Take on President Obama's First Month

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

From the mind of the RNC.org web site... here is their review of the first month of President Obama. Of course they tell us all the time, they are not going to criticize him, nor are they going to say anything against him because he is so popular with the people. Yeah, right. I believe all that... don't you??

I don't even know where to start with this crap. First of all, I will start with the very first thing they have on their list. The "Slash Earmarks". I have been hearing this all week. President Obama, when he was running for President, promised and stated over and over, that he would REFORM earmarks. He never once said he would ELIMINATE THEM.

Eliminating them was always McCain's big thing.. he was going to use his Sharpie and make them famous or some stupid crap. But then Senator Obama, only said he wanted to eliminate the WASTEFUL spending, and REFORM the way the earmark process worked, to get it out of the dark back room type process and get it into the light of day. His pledge was to take it back to the level of 1994, around "Slash Earmarks: During the years when Republicans controlled Congress, earmarks grew from $7.8 billion in 1994 to $29 billion in 2006. In the past two years, the Democratic Congress has cut earmarks nearly in half, to $17.2 billion in 2008. Obama and Biden are committed to returning earmarks to less than $7.8 billion a year." That comes from the "Blueprint for Change" page 9. They say it is page 20, but it isn't. unless you count the pages differently than they were on my computer.


Obama's First Month Has Been Marked By Wasteful Spending, Failed Bipartisanship, And Questionable Ethics

President Obama Promised To Slash Earmarks And Stop Wasteful Spending:

President Obama Pledged To "Slash Earmarks." "Slash Earmarks: ... In the past two years, the Democratic Congress has cut earmarks nearly in half, to $17.2 billion in 2008. Obama and Biden are committed to returning earmarks to less than $7.8 billion a year." (Obama For America, Blueprint For Change, www.barackobama.com, p. 20, Accessed 2/19/09)

President Obama: The Stimulus Has No Earmarks. "'I am confident that by the time we have the final package on the floor that we are going to see substantial support, and people are going to see this is a serious effort. It has no earmarks. We are going to be trimming out things that are not relevant to putting people back to work right now,' Obama said." (Douglass K. Daniel, "GOP Leader Doubts Stimulus Bill Will Pass Senate," The Associated Press, 2/2/09)

But President Obama Just Signed An Economic Stimulus Package Full Of Wasteful Spending:

Despite Promises, The Stimulus Is Not Free Of Money For Special Interests. "The compromise stimulus bill adopted by House and Senate negotiators this week is not free of spending that benefits specific communities, industries or groups, despite vows by President Obama that the legislation would be kept clear of pet projects, according to lawmakers, legislative aides and anti-tax groups." (Dan Eggen and Ellen Nakashima, "Despite Pledges, Package Has Some Pork," The Washington Post, 2/13/09)

Nancy Pelosi's Mouse... FALSE... there is NOTHING in the plan for the damn mouse.. geeze how many times does that have to be proven a lie.


The Bill Even Includes $30 Million For Salt Marsh Harvest Mice In San Francisco. "Lawmakers and administration officials divulged Wednesday that the $789 billion economic stimulus bill being finalized behind closed doors in Congress includes $30 million for wetlands restoration that the Obama administration intends to spend in the San Francisco Bay Area to protect, among other things, the endangered salt marsh harvest mouse. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi represents the city of San Francisco and has previously championed preserving the mouse's habitat in the Bay Area." (S.A. Miller, "Pelosi's Mo use Slated For $30m Slice Of Cheese," The Washington Times, 2/12/09)

And President Obama Campaigned On The Promise Of Bipartisanship And Said He Wanted Republicans To Vote For His Stimulus Package:

"Obama Has Said He Plans To Work With Republicans To Cut Through Partisan Gridlock That Often Blocks Legislative Progress." (Sabrina Eaton, "Ohioan An Early Obama Critic," [Cleveland] Plain Dealer, 1/29/09)

President Obama Wanted Not Only "Quick Congressional Action" But Also "Significant Numbers Of Republicans" To Vote For The Stimulus. "In pursuit of his twin goals of reviving the economy and transforming the political climate in Washington, President-elect Barack Obama not only wants quick congressional action on his mammoth stimulus package but also wants significant numbers of Republicans to join in voting for it." (James Puzzanghera and Christi Parsons, "Obama Aims For Quick Economic Stimulus, Bipartisan Support," Chicago Tribune, 1/6/09)

This is a lie, Sen. Mark Begich of AK stated several times and you can go to my blog roll and go to Immoral Minority, there is a video of him and Sen. Lisa Murkowski talking and they both say it was a bipartisan bill. He is a Democrat, she is a Republican. There are tax cuts in this bill, there are other things in this bill which was put in by the republicans. Just an out and out lie. AGAIN.

But The Stimulus Package Was Not Bipartisan; House Republicans Were Not Even Allowed At The Table When The Bill Was Written:

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA): We Won The Election, We Wrote The Bill. "Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) parried GOP assaults on Democrats' $825 billion stimulus package Thursday and refused to slow the bill down to give more time for Republican input. 'Yes, we wrote the bill. Yes we won the election, but that doesn't mean we don't want sustainability or Republican support,' Pelosi said." (Steven T. Dennis, "Pelosi Defends Democrats' Vetting Of Stimulus Plan," Roll Call, 1/22/09)

Democrats Rolled Over House Republicans And "Yielded No More Than Necessary" In The Senate To Pass The Stimulus Package. "In the case of the stimulus bill, Democrats used their solid majority to roll over House Republicans and yielded no more than necessary to garner three critical GOP votes in the Senate." (Janet Hook, "Bipartisanship Faces Stiff Test," Chicago Tribune, 2/16/09)

For President Obama, "Urgency Trumps Bipartisanship." "But with the economy in crisis and the stimulus his top priority, [President Obama] also made clear that urgency trumps bipartisanship." (Todd J. Gillman, "Selling The Stimulus Bill President Discovering That Bipartisanship Has Its Limits," The Dallas Morning News, 2/10/09)

And President Obama Pledged Transparency And Openness Before Signing Legislation:

During The Campaign, President Obama Promised To Give The American Public 5 Days To Review Legislation Before Signing Any Bill. "Sunlight Before Signing: Too often bills are rushed through Congress and to the president before the public has the opportunity to review them. As president, Obama will not sign any non-emergency bill without giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days." (Obama For America Website, www.barackobama.com, Accessed 2/19/09)

All these bills are online if you want to see them, all you have to do is look. I have seen all of them for days and have even posted them right here on my site. So to say they aren't available is just false. You just have to look and read.

But The Obama Administration Has Failed To Allow The Public 5 Days To Review Legislation It Has Signed:

According To The Nonpartisan PolitiFact, President Obama Did Not Provide 5 Days Before Signing His First Bill, The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. "But the first bill Obama signed into law as president -- the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act -- got no such vetting. In fact, the Congressional Record shows that the law was passed in the Senate on Jan. 22, 2009, passed in the House on Jan. 27, and signed by the president on Jan. 29. So only two days passed between the bill's final passage and the signing." (Angie Drobnic Holan, "Obama Signs First Law Without Web Comment," St. Petersburg Times' "PolitiFact," www.politifact.com, 1/29/09) ( yes, they say they are, but they are holding Pres. Obama to a standard they have never held another President. They even say they are. So, I think maybe they are just a little partisan. As in.. me thinks they protest too much.)

President Obama's Second Bill Signing Occurred Hours After Passed By Congress. "For his second bill, Obama signed an expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program, which provides health coverage for low-income children. He signed it on Feb. 4, 2009, just hours after it was finalized in Congress." (Angie Drobnic Holan, "Still No 'Sunlight Before Signing,'" St. Petersburg Times' "PolitiFact," www.politifact.com, 2/4/09)
And During The Campaign, Obama Said Lobbyists Wouldn't Dominate His White House Or Work For Agencies They Used To Lobby:

During His Campaign, President Obama Promised To "Stop The Revolving Door That Lets Onetime Lobbyists Go To Work For The Federal Government." "[O]n the campaign trail, Obama vowed to stop the revolving door that lets onetime lobbyists go to work for the Federal Government and oversee contracts that could harm -- or help -- their former employer." (Mark Thompson, "Obama's Lobbyist Ban Meets A Loophole: William Lynn," Time, 1/27/09)

William Lynn, was requested to be waivered by Robert Gates. I have talked about this before. I think it is worth noting that no one really ever points this out. Yes, there were some, that President Obama might have slipped through, but this one was entirely Bob Gates at the Pentagon. He was the one who asked for and pushed for this waiver saying that he couldn't work without him, since Pres. Obama wanted Gates to stay, he bowed down to this. I am not giving the President a pass, just saying there is some blame to be put around the bend here.

President Obama Signed An Executive Order Banning Lobbyists From Working For Agencies They Used To Lobby. "And one of the first things the new President did in office was seemingly make good on that promise, signing an Executive Order barring former lobbyists from joining his Administration to work at agencies they recently lobbied." (Mark Thompson, "Obama's Lobbyist Ban Meets A Loophole: William Lynn," Time, 1/27/09)

But President Obama Has Appointed Numerous Former Lobbyists:

President Obama Has Appointed At Least 21 Former Federal Registered Lobbyists, Including Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. "A USA TODAY review of Obama hires shows that 21 have registered as federal lobbyists, although most have not done so within the past two years. They include White House aide Cecilia Munoz, who lobbied last year for the National Council of La Raza, and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, who lobbied in 2007 for a national teachers union." (Fredreka Schouten, "Geithner Names Ex-Lobbyist As Treasury Chief Of Staff," USA< /st1:country-region> Today, 1/27/09)

Little disingenuous don't you think.

President Obama Appointed Former Raytheon Lobbyist William Lynn As Deputy Secretary Of Defense. "This year President Barack Obama is putting Raytheon's recently departed top lobbyist in charge of the Pentagon's day-to-day management. ... Not surprisingly, Obama's good-government backers were less than pleased to see the President, only a few days after signing the blanket ban, issue a waiver permitting William Lynn to serve as Deputy Secretary of Defense." (Mark Thompson, "Obama's Lobbyist Ban Meets A Loophole: William Lynn," Time, 1/27/09)

In Addition To These Issues, President Obama Has Had Difficulties Appointing People To Fill Top Positions In His Administration:

"But Mr. Obama Lost Four Nominees To Tax And Other Issues And The Pace Of Appointments Slowed." (Peter Baker, "Obama Team Has Billions To Spend, But Few Ready To Do It," The New York Times, 2/17/09)

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner Failed To Pay Taxes While Working For The International Monetary Fund. "Timothy Geithner didn't pay Social Security and Medicare taxes for several years while he worked for the International Monetary Fund, and he employed an immigrant housekeeper who briefly lacked proper work papers." (Jonathan Weisman, "Geithner's Tax History Muddles Confirmation," The Wall Street Journal, 1/14/09)

Health And Human Services Secretary Nominee Tom Daschle Withdrew His Nomination After Reports That He Had Failed To Pay Taxes. "Former Sen. Tom Daschle has withdrawn his nomination to head the Department of Health and Human Services, according to a statement Tuesday from the White House. ... Daschle, the former Senate majority leader, apologized Monday for failing to pay his taxes in full. He said earlier he was 'deeply embarrassed' for a series of errors that included failing to report $15,000 in charitable donations, unreported car service and more than $80,000 in unreported income from consulting." (Ed Henry and Kristi Keck, "Daschle Withdraws As HHS Nominee," CNN, 2/3/09)

Nancy Killefer Withdrew Her Nomination For Tax Problems Dating Back To 1995. "They knew about Nancy Killefer's tax problem from 1995, yet they nominated her for a post in the office of management and budget anyway. This morning she withdrew." (Sam Donaldson, Op-Ed, "Sam On What Nominees' Withdrawal Says About Obama," ABC News, 2/3/09)

Commerce Secretary Nominee Bill Richardson Withdrew His Nomination After Reports That State Contracts In New Mexico Were Under Investigation. "First, they knew about Gov. Bill Richardson's potential problem in the New Mexico investigation into state contracts, but they nominated him to be commerce secretary anyway. Weeks later, of course, Richardson withdrew." (Sam Donaldson, Op-Ed, "Sam On What Nominees' Withdrawal Says About Obama," ABC News, 2/3/09)

Sec. of Treasury Tim Geithner Under Attack

Timothy Geithner is getting a bum rap.

When he was introduced in November last year everyone applauded and said it was a brilliant pick.

STOCKMARKETS soared on Friday November 21st when investors learned that Barack Obama would nominate Timothy Geithner as his Treasury Secretary.

That was from the Economist, and it goes on to say "Timothy Geithner is a seasoned crisis manager with a temperament to match that of Barack Obama". From the same article.

The 494-point (6.5%) jump in the Dow Jones Industrial Average is more a statement about investors’ anxiety over the unsettled state of economic policymaking. News of the Treasury nominee holds out the prospect of a more coherent and forceful approach to the crisis. The current treasury secretary, Hank Paulson, is reworking the $700 billion bail-out plan on the fly, policymakers are struggling over a new approach to foreclosures, the status of the mortgage agencies, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, is in limbo, and Congress has just sent the carmakers, teetering close to insolvency, home empty handed. The two months before Mr Obama is sworn in seem like an eternity.

So, as you can see, on Nov. 22, 2008 the Economist felt that Tim Geithner was a great choice.

Here's what ABC News had to say on their web site on Nov. 21, 2008 regarding the Geithner pick:

Pending Senate approval, Geithner will take over one of the most important cabinet positions as the country struggles through a financial crisis and what could be a lengthy recession.

Stocks soared late this afternoon when news reports first started to surface that Geithner's nomination will be made official Monday. The Dow Jones industrial average ended the day up 494.13 points, or 6.5 percent.

It was very good news after two dismal days on Wall Street. Obama's Treasury picks seems to have pleased many investors who are apparently happy with Geithner's familiarity with the markets.

If you examine the life story of Geithner you may think he and Obama are brothers, separated at birth.

So, once again you see a very favorable review.

It was the same with the International Herald Tribune, the world view of the NY Times.

Now, I am hearing from my TeeVee Machine a different story. This morning the Joke of the Morning, and we all know who he is... keeps repeating he wants to fire him. Also, it's too bad he is dead. Of course, I don't put a lot of credence in what Joke says, but a lot of people do, or so I guess.

I think we have to start talking about this and doing a counter plan. I really believe there is a plan to talk the markets and the economy down. Think about it for a minute.

Do you ever hear ANY republican or conservative say anything good about the economy or the stock market?? Do you ever hear them say it is going to get better??

But they all keep saying that Pres. Obama has to be positive and talk up the economy. It is his fault the market is down. It is Tim Geithner's fault the banks are not doing better. He made a terrible presentation of the bank plan.

Larry Kudlow wants him to resign. Who is Larry Kudlow?? One of the loud talkers on CNBC, where so many people go to get their stock market and financial advice. Oh, and now he has announced he will probably challenge Sen. Chris Dodd for his Senate seat. As a republican.

Kudlow is also one of the people who is pushing the Santelli rant. We all know who Santelli is.. the reporter/trader who stood in the middle of the floor in the Chicago Board of Trade and challenged Pres. Obama. Then went on G.Gordon Liddy's radio show and said Robert Gibbs "threatened" him. He was scared, he claimed and his kids were afraid to go to school. Right...

Jim Cramer is another one. He constantly complains and blames Geithner and Pres. Obama for everything. Even though the entire worlds economy is faltering. It is Pres. Obama and Geither's fault.

Not long after Sec. Geithner unveiled his Bank Rescue plan here, he left and went to Rome where he met with the other leaders in the G-7. There he revealed to them the plan and discussed what he had in mind for the banks and how to help our economy.

It was well received and went over very well. However our media has never really reported on it. From the Washington Post:

Going into the meeting, Canadian Finance Minister James M. Flaherty called the U.S. financial rescue "less than clear," echoing comments made by financial chiefs in France and Germany. Afterward, many of the officials appeared reassured, saying that Geithner provided clear answers to their questions.

Several officials said Geithner was particularly helpful in explaining how the various elements of the administration's initiatives tie together as well as how he plans to combine public funds with private resources to get more bang out of every rescue dollar the governments spends.

"What Tim Geithner wanted to do is set out the framework in which he's operating," Britain's Chancellor Alistair Darling said in an interview. "But he's made it very clear that he sees the urgency of this." Darling told a group of reporters: "It's quite clear that the new American administration is getting into its stride, it wants to make a real difference not just for Americans but for the wider world."

These articles are there, but sometimes you have to dig for them. Maybe it isn't that his plan was not detailed enough here as our so called financial experts have said, maybe it is that they didn't want it to be.

Maybe it is not what they wanted, because if it all works out like Pres. Obama and Tim Geithner and all the rest of his team have put it together and have planned, then the Democrats will have won again and it will be the end of Reaganomics and the end of the so called "conservative" tax cuts.

Bloomberg also wrote that his answers were clear and detailed and they were happy with everything they heard.

Geithner answered questions from G-7 officials “very clearly,” Finance Minister Christine Lagarde told reporters in Rome yesterday. “On paper it looks great,” said Lagarde. “The essential thing is now to implement it.”

More details on a public-private partnership to buy banks’ illiquid assets will be delivered in coming weeks, a U.S. official said in Rome on condition he not be named.

Geithner’s plan to tackle the U.S. credit crisis also includes additional injections of capital into financial institutions and as much as $1 trillion to promote new lending to consumers and businesses.

So, we have to do something to help the President and Sec. Geithner. I think they are under attack from the right wing nut jobs.

We have to stay positive, we have to talk it up. We have to keep our eyes on the ball and start looking and searching for these positive stories and not just reading these negative stories that are in the forefront.

I think Sec. Tim Geithner will be fine, if we give him a chance and if we can get these jerks from the right wing to leave him alone. Remember they have had free rein for 8 years. Their very existence is threatened, so they have to attack, and that is exactly what they are doing.

Bubba says we need to have Hope..Gives Obama an A

Yep, Bill Clinton says Pres. Obama is doing fine...he just needs to give us a little bit of his home town... Hope...lol Well, I always thought he did.. guess I get the wrong message...lol

But, Bubba as they always called him says that the President needs to start giving us more hope...other than that he gives him an A and says he is doing everything else just right.

So, keep up the good work, President Obama...you got the stamp of approval from the last two Democratic Presidents. Sorry, ABC doesn't allow the embedding of their videos so you will have to click on the link to see their interview and/or read the article with Pres. Clinton. It is good.

And for the other, probably my favorite president. Jimmy Carter. I think he is so underrated and does not get the credit he should. This is such a gentle and great man and deserves way more credit than he ever got.

Here is his interview with KO on the 13th. Talking about the peace accords and his advice and how he thinks Pres. Obama is off to a great start also.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

So, with the pat on the back from both of these two presidents what more could he want?? He has all of us behind him, he has these two good men behind him. Who cares what Wall Street thinks, Steven Pearlstein in the Washington Post I think said it best about them by saying that until they back trailer loads of money up to Wall Street they are going to do just exactly this. And I have a feeling if that's what they are waiting on.. they may be waiting a while.

Letter to the Members of Congress from Steven Pearlstein

Here is a wonderful piece written by Steven Pearlstein in the Washington Post. He is addressing it to all the members of Congress, both in the House and the Senate.. I sure hope they read it..but I thought it was worth it for all of us to read it. So here it is:

As long as we're about to spend gazillions to stimulate the economy, I'd like to suggest we throw in another $53.5 million for a cause dear to all business journalists: economic literacy. And what better place to start than right here in Washington.

My modest proposal is that lawmakers be authorized to hire personal economic trainers over the coming year to sit by their sides as they fashion the government's response to the economic crisis and prevent them from uttering the kind of nonsense that has characterized the debate over the stimulus bill during the last two weeks.

At a minimum, we'd be creating jobs for 535 unemployed PhDs. And if we improved government economic policy by a mere 1 percent of the trillions of dollars we're dealing with, it would pay for itself many times over.

Let's review some of the more silly arguments about the stimulus bill, starting with the notion that "only" 75 percent of the money can be spent in the next two years, and the rest is therefore "wasted."

As any economist will tell you, the economy tends to be forward-looking and emotional. So if businesses and households can see immediate benefits from a program while knowing that a bit more stimulus is on the way, they are likely to feel more confident that the recovery will be sustained. That confidence, in turn, will make them more likely to take the risk of buying big-ticket items now and investing in stocks or future ventures.

Moreover, much of the money that can't be spent right away is for capital improvements such as building and maintaining schools, roads, bridges and sewer systems, or replacing equipment -- stuff we'd have to do eventually. So another way to think of this kind of spending is that we've simply moved it up to a time, to a point when doing it has important economic benefits and when the price will be less.

Equally specious is the oft-heard complaint that even some of the immediate spending is not stimulative.

"This is not a stimulus plan, it's a spending plan," Nebraska's freshman senator, Mike Johanns (R), said Wednesday in a maiden floor speech full of budget-balancing orthodoxy that would have made Herbert Hoover proud. The stimulus bill, he declared, "won't create the promised jobs. It won't activate our economy."

Johanns was too busy yesterday to explain this radical departure from standard theory and practice. Where does the senator think the $800 billion will go? Down a rabbit hole? Even if the entire sum were to be stolen by federal employees and spent entirely on fast cars, fancy homes, gambling junkets and fancy clothes, it would still be an $800 billion increase in the demand for goods and services -- a pretty good working definition for economic stimulus. The only question is whether spending it on other things would create more long-term value, which it almost certainly would.

Meanwhile, Nebraska's other senator, Ben Nelson (D), was heading up a centrist group that was determined to cut $100 billion from the stimulus bill. Among his targets: $1.1 billion for health-care research into what is cost-effective and what is not. An aide explained that, in the senator's opinion, there is "some spending that was more stimulative than other kinds of spending."

Oh really? I'm sure they'd love to have a presentation on that at the next meeting of the American Economic Association. Maybe the senator could use that opportunity to explain why a dollar spent by the government, or government contractor, to hire doctors, statisticians and software programmers is less stimulative than a dollar spent on hiring civil engineers and bulldozer operators and guys waving orange flags to build highways, which is what the senator says he prefers.

And then there is Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), complaining in Wednesday's Wall Street Journal that of the 3 million jobs that the stimulus package might create or save, one in five will be government jobs, as if there is something inherently inferior or unsatisfactory about that. (Note to Coburn's political director: One in five workers in Oklahoma is employed by government.)

In the next day's Journal, Coburn won additional support for his theory that public-sector employment and output is less worthy than private-sector output from columnist Daniel Henninger. Henninger weighed in with his own list of horror stories from the stimulus bill, including $325 million for trail repair and remediation of abandoned mines on federal lands, $6 billion to reduce the carbon footprint of federal buildings and -- get this! -- $462 million to equip, construct and repair labs at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"What is most striking is how much 'stimulus' money is being spent on the government's own infrastructure," wrote Henninger. "This bill isn't economic stimulus. It's self-stimulus."

Actually, what's striking is that supposedly intelligent people are horrified at the thought that, during a deep recession, government might try to help the economy by buying up-to-date equipment for the people who protect us from epidemics and infectious diseases, by hiring people to repair environmental damage on federal lands and by contracting with private companies to make federal buildings more energy-efficient.

What really irks so many Republicans, of course, is that all the stimulus money isn't being used to cut individual and business taxes, their cure-all for economic ailments, even though all the credible evidence is that tax cuts are only about half as stimulative as direct government spending.

Many, including John McCain, lined up this week to support a proposal to make the sales tax and interest payments on any new car purchased over the next two years tax-deductible, along with a $15,000 tax credit on a home purchase. These tax credits make for great sound-bites and are music to the ears of politically active car salesmen and real estate brokers. Most economists, however, have warned that such credits will have limited impact at a time when house prices are still falling sharply and consumers are worried about their jobs and their shrinking retirement accounts. Even worse, they wind up wasting a lot of money because they give windfalls to millions of people who would have bought cars and houses anyway.

What adds insults to injury, however, is that many of the senators who supported these tax breaks then turned around and opposed as "boondoggles" much more cost-effective proposals to stimulate auto and housing sales, such as having the government replace its current fleet of cars with hybrids or giving money to local housing authorities to buy up foreclosed properties for use as low-income rental housing.

Personal economic trainers would confirm all this. Until they're on board, however, here's a little crib sheet on stimulus economics:

Spending is stimulus, no matter what it's for and who does it. The best spending is that which creates jobs and economic activity now, has big payoffs later and disappears from future budgets.

He really gives them hell, and tells it like it is. Like I said I hope some of them saw it and listened to it, but from what I heard this morning on the shows, they didn't...

The Prez is Pizzed Off Part 2...

Washington Post Op Ed today the President takes to the pages of the paper to tell the people how he feels and remind us he won the election last year by a large margin.

In other words ENOUGH IS ENOUGH people... back off..get over these tax cuts crap and on with the business of getting my recovery plan passed and out to the people.

I think he is speaking to Democrats and Republicans both here. Remember he said he wanted no pork, just a clean bill that will help put people back to work. Yes, there will be some tax cuts in it but not the bloated crap they republicans want in there.

Last night I was posting some of the stuff the Senate was playing with as they were going back and forth. It was changing every 5 to 10 minutes as they were voting on bills. Some were being passed some weren't. And there was no method to there madness.

Here is some of what the Prez has to say:

By now, it's clear to everyone that we have inherited an economic crisis as deep and dire as any since the days of the Great Depression. Millions of jobs that Americans relied on just a year ago are gone; millions more of the nest eggs families worked so hard to build have vanished. People everywhere are worried about what tomorrow will bring.
What Americans expect from Washington is action that matches the urgency they feel in their daily lives -- action that's swift, bold and wise enough for us to climb out of this crisis.
Because each day we wait to begin the work of turning our economy around, more people lose their jobs, their savings and their homes. And if nothing is done, this recession might linger for years. Our economy will lose 5 million more jobs. Unemployment will approach double digits. Our nation will sink deeper into a crisis that, at some point, we may not be able to reverse.

So, as you see he is wanting us to hurry, but get it right. Well not us, but the congress. And yes us, because they work for us, even if they forget. So, again, I am saying, call, write, email your senator, congress man or woman, even your governor and urge them to contact each other to get this legislation called the Recovery and Reinvestment Act passed. They must vote for it. Not against it.

Even if they are Republicans, you must call them, Especially if they are Republicans. They are threatening a filibuster to stop this bill, and if they do that, then let them suffer the consequences. Because I am sure they will.

It is good reading for your early morning...nice to have coffee with...to start your day with. And it is sure to set the hair of the Republican's on fire.. It certainly did the Morning Joke...He was about to have a heart attack when MEEKa read it to him...

100 Survivors Rescued in Gaza From Ruins Blocked by Israelis

Update to story about Gaza medics discovering horror of strike which killed 70

From Washington Post

100 Survivors Rescued in Gaza From Ruins Blocked by Israelis

Relief Agencies Fear More Are Trapped, Days After Neighborhood Was Shelled

By Craig Whitlock and Reyham Abdel Kareem
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, January 9, 2009; A01



JERUSALEM, Jan. 8 -- Emergency workers said they rescued 100 more trapped survivors Thursday and found between 40 and 50 corpses in a devastated residential block south of Gaza City that the Israeli military had kept off-limits to the International Committee of the Red Cross for four days.

Relief agencies said they feared more people remained in the rubble of several shattered houses in the Zaytoun neighborhood. Red Cross officials said that they began receiving distress calls from people in the houses late Saturday but that they were blocked by the Israeli military from reaching the area until Wednesday.

"There are still people under demolished houses -- we are sure of it," said Khaled Abuzaid, an ambulance driver for the Red Cross who treated survivors at the site Wednesday and Thursday. "But without water or electricity, we are sure they will die."

In an interview at al-Quds Hospital, a Red Cross medical center in Gaza, Abuzaid said rescue workers found 16 bodies Wednesday in a large room of a house in Zaytoun: seven women, six children and three men, all members of the al-Samuni family.

Most had sustained trauma injuries from shelling, but many had gunshot wounds as well, he said. Four children, weak but alive, were found lying under blankets, nestled next to their dead mothers, Abuzaid said. Red Cross officials had said earlier that 12 adult bodies had been found in the house but otherwise corroborated Abuzaid's account.

Abuzaid said he was part of a crew of 10 paramedics and other rescue workers who reached Zaytoun on Wednesday afternoon, during a three-hour break in combat operations in Gaza during which relief agencies were allowed to deliver supplies and medical care to stricken Gazans.

He said Israeli soldiers told the crew of Red Cross and Palestinian Red Crescent workers in advance that they were forbidden to take cameras, radios or cellphones to the site. It is standard practice for crews to carry such equipment on rescue missions.

The Red Cross has accused the Israeli military of repeatedly refusing to grant permission for ambulances to go to Zaytoun, even though soldiers were stationed outside the damaged houses and were aware people were wounded inside. In a statement issued early Thursday, the agency called the episode "unacceptable" and said the Israeli military had "failed to meet its obligation under international humanitarian law to care for and evacuate the wounded."

The Israeli military said it was investigating but declined to respond to specific allegations by the Red Cross. "This is a complaint, and we have to check it," said reserve Brig. Gen. Ilan Tal, an Israeli military spokesman.

The United Nations also pressed Israel to investigate the Red Cross allegations. John Holmes, chief of U.N. humanitarian aid programs, called the Zaytoun deaths "a particularly outrageous incident." "What they found was absolutely horrifying," he said at a news conference in New York.

B'Tselem, the Israeli human rights group, said residents of Zaytoun who had been trapped in other houses have given similar accounts of how Israeli soldiers were aware of their plight but refused to allow rescue workers into the neighborhood. "What these family members say consistently is that the IDF was close by," said Sarit Michaeli, a spokeswoman for the group, referring to the Israel Defense Forces. "This wasn't some remote area. The soldiers certainly were about and were aware of their position."

Access to Zaytoun, near a major north-south road that bisects Gaza, remained highly restricted Thursday. Red Cross and Red Crescent crews were allowed back to the site during another three-hour break in the fighting, evacuating 103 people who had been trapped for days without food and water, according to Anne-Sophie Bonefeld, a Red Cross spokeswoman in Jerusalem. Other relief officials said the people rescued Thursday were crammed inside three houses on the same block as the Samunis' house.

Two surviving members of the Samuni family said dozens of their relatives in the area had been rounded up by the Israeli military early Sunday and ordered to stay inside a handful of houses while soldiers conducted operations door-to-door. They said some people died in the shelling, which left a gaping hole in the roof of the Samuni home.

Their accounts could not be independently corroborated. Survivors of the fighting in Zaytoun remained scattered at hospitals across Gaza, and Red Cross officials said they were trying to account for their whereabouts and medical condition. The Israeli military has barred foreign journalists from entering Gaza.

"It was horrible," said Shifaa Samuni, 70, who was detained in the family's house but fled with her grandson Monday afternoon after the killings. She said two of her sons and three daughters-in-law were among the dead.

"Look how much I lost," she said at al-Quds Hospital, where she was receiving treatment for minor injuries, including wounds to her hands. "Why? We did nothing. We are a peaceful family."

Ahmad Talal Samuni, 23, said the neighborhood came under heavy shelling and helicopter gunfire Saturday night. He said that when tanks approached, two of his uncles and their families, who lived nearby, rushed over to seek refuge in his home, about 45 people all told. The next morning, he said, fighting resumed and soldiers came to the house.

"They told us not to leave -- not by using loudspeakers, but by shooting," he said in a telephone interview from Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, where he was tending to other relatives. "The soldiers were shooting in the air and they told us to go east, in the direction of Salah Din Street."

The soldiers ordered the family into a large concrete house owned by another relative, Ahmad Samuni said. By then, about 70 people were gathered inside, he recalled. "The soldiers told us not to leave. . . . We were hungry. There was no milk for the babies, no medicine for the ill children."

Shortly before dawn Monday, three Samuni men decided to leave the house so they could gather other relatives and bring them back, said Meysa Fawzi Samuni, 19, a member of the family who survived the fighting and gave an extensive interview to B'Tselem. The group provided a written version of her statement to The Washington Post, but she could not be reached to independently confirm her account.

Meysa Samuni told B'Tselem that an explosion struck the doorway of the house as the three men prepared to leave, killing one of them. Moments later, a larger explosion on the roof rocked the house. She said she fell to the floor, covering her infant daughter with her body.

"Everything filled up with smoke and dust, and I heard screams and crying. After the smoke and dust cleared a bit, I looked around and saw 20-30 people who were dead, and about 20 who were wounded," Meysa Samuni said in her statement.

She said she was only slightly injured; her baby also survived but lost three fingers in the explosion.

After about 15 minutes, Meysa Samuni said she, her brother-in-law Musa and his two young sisters, Islam, 5, and Isra, 2, fled and knocked on the door of another relative's home nearby.

Israeli soldiers had already occupied the house, she said, and were guarding about 30 Palestinians inside, several of whom had been blindfolded.

Meysa Samuni said the soldiers seized Musa, tying his hands and blindfolding him. Another soldier gave first aid to Meysa and her infant, bandaging their hands and checking their pulses. The Israelis said the mother and daughter could leave.

"They ordered us to leave the house and we walked along the street about 400-500 meters" -- about a quarter-mile -- "until we found an ambulance," which took them to Shifa Hospital, where she later met a few relatives who had escaped the shelling on the house, she said in her statement. "As far as I know, the dead and the wounded who were under the ruins are still there."

Abdel Kareem reported from Gaza City. Special correspondent Samuel Sockol in Jerusalem contributed to this report.