$700 BILLION + $140 BILLION - WHAT NEXT?

Honestly, I am disappointed to put it mildly at the "bill" that we have to pay for. And if we thought $700 Billion was the figure, we are wrong. The Senate added $140 Billion pork to it and it totals so far at $840 Billion. And last week, $25 Billion went to Ford, GM and Chrysler - read it here www.usnews.com

I heard today that the $840 Billion bailout will eventually be turning into $2 Trillion.

I called my U.S. RI Representative this morning to share my feelings with the pork and the bailout. But it's a done deal now.

If Osama bin Laden wanted the USA to cause collapse of our own economy with the planes crashing into buildings via the USA reaction - then you could say the surge in Iraq isn't working. You know, do this terrorrist act, knowing the USA would want to flex its power by bulging its military might, go to war, spend so much money that they have to borrow billions of dollars, therefore going into debt. The spending mentality of the USA being known by bin Laden - knew that eventually the US Americans would damage themselves by weakening the economy from within and bin Laden can just watch the economic decay unfold. This point was made by Garry Shandling, October 3 on Real Time with Bill Maher.

The cost of the Iraq war is ever increasing and you can see it on my sidebar.

We need to stop being reactionaries to what happens and start planning ahead. But we instead as a nation have our heads somewhere else besides sitting tall on our shoulders.

I began wanting to be positive in this post. But I have to say I am disappointed in the bill that was rammed through Congress even though I think We The People made it known that we are not happy with this bill. And yes, my candidate decided to vote for the bill. I am still for Barack Obama and Joe Biden, but I am not happy with this idiotic bill.

John McCain and Sarah Palin are not the right candidates for the country.

We are crashing and burning. And Osama bin Laden must be feeling really happy that we are.

And this idea that we have to have Victory in Iraq according to some unknown standard while we are failing within our borders is bordering on insanity.

Okay, now for the positive thoughts.

As I introduced Senator John Kerry at the Newport Obama Office this last March, I stated that John Kerry was a man of integrity. And that he brought us Barack Obama. And for that we are grateful. I still am satisfied with the Democratic Presidential and Vice Presidential candidates that we have running. Goodness knows, that to have to walk into this national state of a mess requires brains, a calm demeanor and someone who is comfortable in his own skin.

When I volunteered in January in New Hampshire for the Obama campaign, my belief was that We The People must get engaged in our country and our government. A candidate cannot deliver what we do not get behind and actively support. This is what I believe Barack Obama also believes. I took this from the top of his website:

We get the government we deserve. We ARE the oversight to our government. And it will not change unless we change and get out of our apathetic attention to what our elected politicians are doing and get involved, engaged. It is time. The revolution needs to be that we get involved.

Bob Woodward said tonight on Real Time:

"IT'S TIME FOR A GREAT PRESIDENT
WE REALLY NEED ONE
LET'S HOPE"

.........................................................

.........................................................
This Little Light of Mine
Live in Dublin
Bruce Springsteen With The Sessions Band

..................................

.........................................................
Barack Obama - Speech at 2004 DNC Convention

.........................................................

.........................................................
Barack Obama - Together, We Cannot Fail

www.barackobama.com

VOTE OBAMA - BIDEN 2008

NOVEMBER 4, 2008

Our next President takes office

January 20, 2009

HOW DO YOU LIVE WHEN YOU RUN OUT OF MONEY?

I wouldn’t want to be President of the United States of America. Ever. But more, now, than before Bushed ucked it up. The outstanding public debt as of 16 Oct 2007 is nine TRILLION, forty-eight BILLION, nine hundred twenty nine million, six hundred fifty one thousand, eight dollars and fifty four cents. That looks like this: $ 9 , 0 4 8 , 9 2 9 , 6 5 1 , 0 0 8 . 5 4

The National Debt has continued to increase an average of
$1.42 billion PER DAY since September 29, 2006!

“The U.S. budget deficit is financed by borrowing. More and more of that money comes from China, now the United States' second-largest lender, after Japan. China's investment in U.S. government debt has more than tripled in the past five years, from $71 billion in 2000 to $242 billion in 2005. ….Congress and the president have been unwilling to raise taxes or make deep spending cuts. The only alternative is to borrow.”
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/prem/200510u/nj_schneider_2005-10-25

China! Do we really want Bank China to be in control? What are we thinking!?! Are we thinking? Who is minding “The Store”? It’s GW Bush and robbing us in more than one way. Imagine if the government suggested spending one-fourth of this amount of money on the education of our children. We would have said “no”. Imagine if the government suggested to spend one-fourth of this money to help our children who are “at risk”. We would have said “no”. Imagine if the government had suggested spending a small portion of this money to reimburse the Social Security accounts. We would have said “no”. Right? Imagine if the government had suggested repaying the Indian Trust Funds that have been robbed from by the very government agencies that were to protect the funds – we would have said “no”. Why are we willing to let our government to invest in the Iraq war and not spend our tax money on what would really invest in our country’s people? And the $12 BILLION that was LOST by sending it in cash to Iraq on wood pallets – how much did you read or hear about that?!
“We had to pay Iraqis in cash,” Mr. Bremer said of the money, most of which came from Iraqi oil sales. “Delay would have been demoralizing and unfair to millions of Iraqi families.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/07/washington/07bremer.html?n=Top%2FReference%2FTimes%20Topics%2FPeople%2FB%2FBremer%2C%20L.%20Paul%20III What of the demoralizing and unfairness to millions of USA citizens?!!

I don’t understand the apathy of the country that we call United States of America. However, I think it would be more appropriately called the Divided States of America. We let this insanity to go on via George Bush and keep going through our lives. It is outrageous that we don’t get angry about the debt. In my town it is annually a contentious subject that our taxes are raised by the town by $350. And where is the same reaction to the federal runaway spending on a war that has had a moving “target” continually?

FOLLOW THE MONEY (OIL): TWELVE BENCHMARKS

1. January 2003: The Wall Street Journal reported that representatives from Exxon Mobil Corp., ChevronTexaco Corp., ConocoPhillips and Halliburton, among others, were meeting with Vice President Cheney's staff to plan the post- war revival of Iraq's oil industry.

2. March 2003: Iraqi Oil Ministry was one of the few structures the invading forces protected from looters in the first days of the war.

3. April 2003: During the initial assault on Baghdad, soldiers set up forward bases named Camp Shell and Camp Exxon.

4. May 22, 2003: President Bush signed Executive Order 13303 providing full legal immunity to all U.S. oil companies doing business in Iraq in order to facilitate the country's "orderly reconstruction."

5. November 2003: McKee (ConocoPhillips executive who is overseeing Iraqi oil industry) quietly ordered a new plan for Iraq's oil. The drafting would be overseen by a "senior adviser," Amy Jaffe, who ....now works for James Baker, the former Secretary of State, whose law firm serves as counsel to both ExxonMobil and the defense minister of Saudi Arabia. The plan, written by State Department contractor BearingPoint, was guided, says Jaffe, by a handful of oil-industry consultants and executives.

6. March 2004: Iraq's interim constitution, the Transitional Administrative Law (TAL) passed in March 2004 by Iraq's Governing Council, sets forth that Coalition Provisional Authority laws, regulations, and orders are to remain in force after the transfer of sovereignty unless a duly enacted piece of legislation rescinds or amends them.

7. August 30, 2005: Bush says U.S. troops would continue fighting in Iraq in order to protect the country's vast oil fields, which he said would otherwise fall under the control of terrorist extremists.

8. February 2006-June 2006: USAID contracts with Bearing Point to draft Iraq’s oil law to provide "legal and regulatory advice in drafting the framework of petroleum and other energy-related legislation, including foreign investment".

9. March 15, 2006: Gen. John Abizaid, the Army general overseeing U.S. military operations in Iraq said the United States may want to keep a long-term military presence in Iraq to bolster moderates against extremists in the region and protect the flow of oil.

10. July 2006: U.S. Government and oil companies get a copy of the draft oil law. In September 2006 the Internation Monetary Fund and World Bank receive their copy.

11. February 2007: "Draft Hydrocarbon Law" was submitted first to the Iraqi Cabinet and then to the Iraqi Parliament (Council of Representatives) by the Cabinet.

12. April -May 2007: Defense Secretary Robert Gates and U.S. Vice President Cheney each travel separately to Baghdad to push political benchmarks and specifically the oil law.

From a Study of U.S. Influence on Iraqi Oil, by Erik Leaver, Carol and Ed Newman, Fellow Institute for Policy Studies June 4, 2007. Click above title to read full article and complete bibliography of sources. http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/23353

And yet we won’t vote for any candidate who would admit that taxes will be raised. Are we rational?

Are we afraid of the truth?

BETRAYED BY BUSH AND CONGRESS

Senator Sam Brownback (R) gave a history lesson today in the Senate, complete with several maps about Iraq. It was a good lesson for a congressman. Senator Joe Biden (D) followed him with an emotional delivery why he agreed with Brownback although both Brownback and Biden said it was not in their Presidentail candidacy’s best interest to be working together to come up with a political solution for the mess we got ourselves into by invading Iraq. But that is what they were presenting, a political solution to Iraq. Personally, I thought Biden really did a good job extending his Presidentail campaigning on C-span with this plan. I couldn’t vote for Brownback as President, but these two made me feel better about being a USA citizen. They made sense. They didn’t sound brainless. And I have heard nothing close to this sanity from Mr. Bush, the President of the Divided States of America.

A link to an article on Biden and Brownback’s bill:
http://biden.senate.gov/newsroom/details.cfm?id=283817&&

Today, there was a tie, 47 to 47, to start bringing our troops home. Our Rhode Island US Senator Jack Reed and Carl Levin worked together on this.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/21/AR2007092100134.html

Bush ignores us. Congress ignores us. And yet type in http://www.senate.gov/ And you will find a page that celebrates the US Constitution that is titled “We the People, Celebrating the Constitution” and begins with this:

Written in 1787, ratified in 1788, and in operation since 1789, the United States Constitution remains a vital and living document. Having been strengthened by amendments, the Constitution serves as both guide and protector of U.S. citizens and their elected officials. To encourage all Americans to learn more about the Constitution, Congress in 2005 established Constitution Day, to be celebrated each year on or near September 17th, the date in 1787 when delegates to the Convention signed the Constitution.

I feel like I am living a time warp. Our President says “freedom is on the march” and that he wants to bring democracy to others around the world. However everything about him and his focus - has done nothing but chip away at our democracy and our liberties. Freedom – use it or lose it. We need to get angry at the undermining of our
once Constitutional rights and let it motivate us into active engagement. While we are not paying attention – we are losing our Constitution. The Patriot Act is our new Constitution. Our US government has thrown out the Geneva Convention.

“The Third Geneva Convention was convened in 1929 and resulted in specific protections for prisoners of war. The Fourth Geneva Convention was signed in 1949. This convention reaffirmed the requirements of the first three conventions and provided protections for civilians during wartime.” *

Requirements of the Geneva Conventions as they relate to the treatment of Prisoners of War (POWs): *http://usmilitary.about.com/od/deploymentsconflicts/l/blgenevaconv.htm

The Constitution made “We the People” partners of this country's government. An equal partner. But this administration doesn’t care what we think. And congress is betraying us, too.

I feel like screaming.

Bush is a disaster. I am embarrassed that he is President. I detest him. He has taken this country into debt. We have financed this Iraq invasion by borrowing from a country that historically has a record of oppressing its people and imprisoning and torturing those that are dissidents. China. And yet Bush said yesterday that he receives an A for not raising our taxes. But he has taken us so far in debt that we are weakened as a nation.

But no one talks about that. My brother made t-shirts when George HW Bush was campaigning for President and the shirt said a GHW Bush quotation “Read my lips, No New Taxes”. George W Bush is just like his father in this. NO NEW TAXES, but Billions of new dollars of debt. That’s what we’ve got.

>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:
Bush may boost spending request for Iraq war

Reuters
Friday, September 21, 2007; 12:10 PM

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Bush administration may increase the amount of money it is seeking for the Iraq war for the 2008 fiscal year that begins October 1, the White House said on Friday.

The White House outlined a request for around $147 billion for fiscal 2008 for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But the administration is reviewing those figures and is considering giving Congress an updated request.

"I would expect it to be higher, I can't tell you what the number will be," White House spokesman Tony Fratto said.

The Washington Post has reported the administration may increase its request by up to $50 billion, which would bring the total request to nearly $200 billion.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/21/AR2007092100643.html

>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:>:

War Costing $720 Million Each Day, Group Says

By Kari Lydersen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, September 22, 2007; Page A11”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/21/AR2007092102074.html