Soros: Obama’s Econ. Policy Too Much Like Bush

abc NEWS

By ALICE GOMSTYN

ABC NEWS Business Unit

June 30, 2009

Prominent Billionaire, Obama Backer George Soros Continues Criticism of President’s Economic Policies, Says Won’t Participate in Administration’s Asset-Buying Program

One of President Barack Obama’s most prominent Wall Street backers gives him high marks on just about everything except his approach to Wall Street.

Billionaire investor George Soros today said that Obama is “doing very well except in the recapitalization of banks and the reorganization of the mortgage market.”

Soros, the chairman of Soros Fund Management, said he was pleased with the administration’s handling of education, health care and global warming.

But, he said, “I’m afraid that it’s too much continuity between the Obama administration and the Bush administration as far as the management of the financial system is concerned,” Soros said this morning at a breakfast discussion hosted by the Wall Street Journal.

Soros also predicted that fears of inflation would drive up interest rates and “choke off” economic recovery. …

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=7966233&page=1

Let us revisit a comment:

“But, he said, “I’m afraid that it’s too much continuity between the Obama administration and the Bush administration as far as the management of the financial system is concerned,” Soros said this morning at a breakfast discussion hosted by the Wall Street Journal”.

The real continuity suggests that January 21st, 2008 followed closely behind January 20th of 2008.

America’s presidential links continued – the 44th President of the United States of America took office as the 43rd President of the United States of America left office.

Mr. Bush’s “management” of America’s financial system may someday be fully exposed but today, there are still many questions. Did Mr. Bush recognize the GREAT RECESSION that occurred on his watch or did he not?

The Bush administration sounded a financial alarm but only after EVERYBODY was “hunkered” down because of the Great Recession. President Bush finally recognized that working Americans had been damaged by an “economic down-turn” and he supported a stimulus for the American people. It certainly was way too late for “trickle down” effect.

The only “faint” resemblance between President Bush’s financial plan and President Obama’s financial plan was in the stimulus area. President Bush, to the “chagrin” of many of his supporters, suggested extending help to the American population in a manner that did not “trickle down”. Giving help directly to Americans in need is not a HIGH PROFILE neoconservative action.

While the Democrats went after fixing what was broken, the neocons hardly admitted anything was broken – with the exception of General Motors. And Tennessee was out-front “TELLING AMERICA” about the “poorly managed” auto industry while American homeowners wrestled with “ADJUSTABLE RATE MORTGAGES”. How easy is it to budget for an adjustable rate mortgage?

While President Bush would de-regulate the financial industry, President Obama would regulate the financial industry. There was no “policy continuity” between Bush’s de-regulate and Obama’s regulate.

Technorati Tags: obama econ policy,bush,continuity,financial system,great recession,stimulus,auto industry,adjustable rate mortgages,de-regulate financial industry

Iran President Tells Obama to Back Off

Iran

Mahmoud Ahmedinejad Warns That U.S. Comments on Unrest Closes Off Possibility of Talks

abc NEWS

By LARA SETRAKIAN

June 25, 2009

Iran President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad warned U.S. President Barack Obama about his condemnation of state violence against protesters, suggesting it would shut down the possibility of talks between the two states.

“Don’t repeat a defeated and lost experience,” he said, comparing Obama to his predecessor, President George W. Bush. “You are making a mistake.”

Ahmedinejad, who is celebrating his disputed re-election, is backed by Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in insisting the protests are illegal. Opposition figurehead Mir Hossein Mousavi released a statement through his Web site on Thursday challenging that view, saying the protests are legal and urging supporters to continue. …

http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=7932217&page=1

Israel

The Jerusalem Post

Our World: Obama’s losing streak and us

By CAROLINE GLICK

Jun 15, 2009

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s speech Sunday evening at Bar-Ilan University had one goal: To get US President Barack Obama off of Israel’s back. …

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1244371106195&pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull

The Middle East(Iran & Israel) And Common Ground

Two arch-foes of the Middle East may have, at last, found “common ground” - President Barack Obama.

Perhaps those two foes are telling America that they can solve their own problems and America should “BACK OFF”. America should not even comment on “current events” happening in those two nations. Iran’s unrest did not violate other countries embassies(this time) and Israel’s expanding land grab should have been anticipated by those who planted the  Zionist nation in the Middle East – away from Europe.

So, its not their fault.

It is not the fault of those two nations. It’s the fault of “outside agitators”. An “outside agitator” wants one nation to cease it expansionist land grabbing and another nation to reflect on the political unrest of its citizens. Those two nations are not at fault.

It could be the fault of “less qualified minorities” if they were currently available for “fault duty” – but “less qualified minorities” are already engaged shouldering the fault for the GREAT RECESSION. The GREAT RECESSION is a heavy “fault” to bear.

So, if the two Middle East nations are to settle their own differences without “outside agitators” , then perhaps those two nations should give the world a chance to, once again consider building “FALL-OUT SHELTERS”. The concept of winning a nuclear war may not be a dead concept – especially for “new kids” to the nuclear club. For the “new kids” in the nuclear club(the IAEA may be unaware), SUICIDE may be an acceptable outcome to confrontational politics.

Technorati Tags: iran,ahmedinejad,obama,state violence,current events,comments,arch-foes,common ground,nuclear club,less qualified minorities

Commentary: Don’t get outraged at Sanford

CNN.com

By Peter Bregman
Special to CNN

Editor’s note: Peter Bregman is chief executive of Bregman Partners Inc., a global management consulting firm, and the author of “Point B: A Short Guide to Leading a Big Change”. He writes a weekly column, How We Work, for HarvardBusiness.org.

NEW YORK (CNN) — “Daddy,” my 7-year-old daughter, Isabelle, asked me this morning at breakfast, “Who is Mark Sanford, and why is he on the news?”

I received two phone calls about Sanford on Wednesday afternoon. One was from a liberal Democrat who was outraged. “What a hypocrite!” he said. The caller asked whether I knew what he had said about a case of an unfaithful congressman. “He said, ‘He lied under a different oath, and that’s the oath to his wife.’ And all that family values stuff! C’mon.”

The other was from a conservative Republican. “It’s terrible what’s happening to Sanford.” He told me, “He’s a good guy. The press is tearing him apart! They’re lingering on all the sordid details. Give the guy a break.”

Here’s what’s interesting: When I asked each of them about the impeachment of Bill Clinton, they flip-flopped. The liberal Democrat was angry at the press, and the conservative Republican was disgusted with the former president. …

http://www.cnn.com/2009/LIVING/06/25/bregman.sanford/index.html

This author’s headline did not lead me to believe that a reference to  Bill Clinton would be made. However that reference was made and the results of that reference produced what many would have expected. There was a flip-flop.

Perhaps bias was the foundation for one of the flip-flops but factoring in the press during the neocon’s celebration of an impending impeachment of  Ex-President Bill Clinton is warranted. It has been said that it was the press and the neocons who pushed for Bill Clinton’s impeachment. Nobody Marched To Impeach Bill Clinton!

And what ABOUT the Republican’s “FAMILY VALUES” campaign? The family values list is getting to be as long as the list the Democrats called the “Culture of Corruption”. From stalls in men’s rooms to Congressional pages and and so on goes the family values list. It sure does seem like if the right OPPORTUNITY comes along, neither “family values” nor “core values” will stand the way of that OPPORTUNITY.

Technorati Tags: family values,core values,bill clinton,republicans,neocons

How American Taxpayers Could Lose $9 Billion

What Is the Real Cost to Taxpayers of the Federal  Bank Bailout?

abc NEWS

By MATTHEW JAFFE

WASHINGTON, June 25, 2009

The government loaned hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars to help struggling banks, but giving out cash is always easier than getting it back — and now taxpayers could end up shortchanged by as much as $9 billion. …

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Economy/story?id=7919201&page=1

America’s business landscape is now littered with fallen  businesses. Could a value be placed on those lost jobs and businesses? Was the Great Recession free? Is America’s treasury now robust? Did America’s income decline?

There is no such thing as getting out of a recession FREE. That is one reason why responsible leaders of a country try hard to avoid getting into a recession. But denying you are in a recession when you are – solves nothing and looks bad.

Who shoulders the cost of recovering from a GREAT RECESSION?

1. Chimpanzees
2. Gorillas
3. Robots
4. Tax Payers

Pretend the latter day neocons were using money from your own personal bank account in order to fund their various worldwide terror fighting activities. You likely would have spoken up in 2003 when Iraq was in the sights of the neocon’s war machine. You may have continued your attempt at “micromanaging” when America’s terror fighters visited Georgia(next door to Russia) promising money to Georgia in Georgia’s fight against Russia.

You likely would have been keenly aware that after your bank account was depleted – you had a serious problem. You would likely NOT get out of that depleted bank account condition – free. THE MONEY THAT WAS GONE – WAS GONE! And YOU have to put it  back. Monkeys can’t. And neither can gorillas but gorillas  can balk if they want to.

Politicians do sometimes speak of finding new sources of revenue – but in reality all sources of revenue resolve to YOU.  YOU are the only source of revenue. And even banks need YOU, the human being, to help start economic recovery from a GREAT RECESSION.

It is way too late to start preaching about America’s spending. That should have happened  back when:

U.S. costs of Iraq, Afghan wars top $900 billion: report

BBC uncovers lost Iraq billions

Did Bush cause the financial crisis?

A stitch in time may have saved nine

Technorati Tags: american taxpayers,$9 billion,federal bank bailout,americas business landscape,fallen businesses,denying recession,neocons,new source of revenue,great recession

Statistics Defy Israeli Settlement Stance

Migrants Flock To West Bank Even Though Israel Claims Construction Only For Families Already There

CBS News.com

MAALEH ADUMIM, West Bank, June 24, 2009

(AP) Israelis moving to the West Bank accounted for more than a third of settler population growth in recent years, government statistics show, undercutting Israel’s argument that it is continuing settlement construction only to accommodate growing families already living there.

The so-called “natural growth” rationale for building on land the Palestinians claim for a future state has vaulted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu into an unusually vocal and public clash with the Obama administration, which has come out strong against continued settlement expansion.

Settlement construction had been expected to be the focus of a meeting in Paris on Thursday between Netanyahu and America’s top Mideast envoy, George Mitchell, a longtime settlement critic. But the meeting was abruptly postponed, and an Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject, said Israel sought more time to iron out differences with the U.S. administration, including over settlements.

Opponents say the government invokes “natural growth” as a cover to build thousands of houses across the West Bank, including hundreds that Palestinian laborers are building in Maaleh Adumim, a major settlement outside Jerusalem.

“The Israelis are playing a game of deception by what they call natural growth,” said Yasser Abed Rabbo, a senior aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. …

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/06/24/world/main5110114.shtml?tag=cbsContent;cbsCarousel

The United Nations and its Western establishment set-up this problem for the Middle East in 1947-48. It should be the job of the United Nations to “tend” to the problem it caused but that does not seem to be the case. The apparent “impotence” of the UN may also be bleeding over into a possible “no comment” on North Korea’s ship of arms.

It was no real problem for the UN when America’s neocons were in power(24 years). The neocons acted somewhat like a United Nations proxy. And nobody complained because nobody  “messed” with America’s strongest man on earth.

The League of Nations was the predecessor to the United Nations. So far, a United Nations’ successor has not  been named. Is the current UN model designed for easy deadlock? Is it really difficult to get consensus out of the United Nations?

Food, hunger and similar issues can find a companionate United Nations but any war by any country in any part of the world seems to have a friend in high places at the United Nations – thus thwarting UN action.

It looks like North Korea is not the only United Nations challenger. The Zionists started their challenge in 1947-48 by kicking the UN out of Palestine. Every other “authority” was also kicked out leaving the Palestinians to fend for themselves. The victims of massive land theft were tagged as terrorists.

The white hat wearers dusted off their hats, adjusted their hats to the proper head angle and rode off into the sunset – quickly.  the Zionist terrorists put on their halos, adjusted the brightness and put on a big smile. And the TELL AMERICA press told America about Arab terrorists.

And to this day, strange “ruminations” emanate from the Zionist camp:

A published Internet post admonishes the President of the United States of America to “get off the  back” of the Zionists.

If Adolf Hitler were alive today, he might just find comfort in the location(outside of Europe) and the form of government the Zionists created. It could be ok if  Aryan was replaced with Jewish – outside of Europe.

Technorati Tags: israeli settlement stance,migrants,west bank,united nations,north korea,zionists

DHS To Kill Domestic Satellite Spying

Napolitano To Nix Bush Administration Program, Funded In Obama Budget

CBS News.com

Washington

June 22, 2009

(AP) Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano plans to kill a program begun by the Bush administration that would use U.S. spy satellites for domestic security and law enforcement, a government official said Monday.

Napolitano recently reached her decision after the program was discussed with law enforcement officials, and she was told it was not an urgent issue, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk about it.

The program was announced in 2007 and was to have the Homeland Security Department use overhead and mapping imagery from existing satellites for homeland security and law enforcement purposes. …

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/06/22/politics/main5104893.shtml?tag=cbsnewsTwoColLowerPromoArea

Rest assured that your bathroom privacy was exempt from neocon spying.

But everything else was fair game. “All your Johari rooms/window panes was belong to US”.

Johari window

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

An empty Johari window, with the “Rooms” arranged clockwise, starting with Room 1 at the top left

A Johari window is a cognitive psychological tool created by Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham in 1955 in the United States, used to help people better understand their interpersonal communication and relationships. It is used primarily in self-help groups and corporate settings as a heuristic exercise.

When performing the exercise, the subject is given a list of 55 adjectives and picks five or six that they feel describe their own personality. Peers of the subject are then given the same list, and each pick five or six adjectives that describe the subject. These adjectives are then mapped onto a grid.

Charles Handy calls this concept the Johari House with four rooms.

Room 1 is the part of ourselves that we see and others see. Room 2 is the aspect that others see but we are not aware of. Room 3 is the most mysterious room in that the unconscious or subconscious bit of us is seen by neither ourselves nor others. Room 4 is our private space, which we know but keep from others.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johari_window

If there appears to be paranoia in an administration’s terror policy, would not inviting terrorist to “bring it on” seem out of place? America has had real encounters with terrorists and terror fighters. Both took something out of Americans.

Technorati Tags: dhs,domestic satellite spying,napolitano,bush administration,obama budget,homeland security,johari window

Who Patrols Your Internet Ports?

If you want to identify a  caller/patroller of your Internet ports, there is a procedure that has the possibility of identifying the caller.

The source of your interest could appear at your Internet ports this way:

I thought I would try to find out who IP address 174.136.247.101 belongs to. Asking Arin Whois produced this result:

It is common to see an “abuse@” reference on most websites. If you believe you have been “hacked”, you can send a message to the webmaster. The two comment lines toward the bottom of the above picture provided the “abuse@” information.  I sent my “abuse@” message to:

suave-abuse@suavemente.net

and received this response:

This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification

Delivery to the following recipient failed permanently:

     suave-abuse@siaveemte.net

Technical details of permanent failure:
DNS Error: Domain name not found

Next I “asked” the google search engine to show me info on suavemente, inc.

Below is the first item in the returned list:

Linux and BSD Dedicated Server & Colocation – Otay Mesa Data …

Nov 10, 2006 … Otay Mesa Data Center, INC. is headquartered on the Otay Mesa Border in San Diego, California and provides co-location, dedicated servers, …

www.suavemente.net/ – Cached – Similar

The word “colocation” was used in the description of another visitor to my Internet ports years ago. And that too, was the kind of “port patrolling” that caught one’s eye. That visitor started at my port zero(0) and incremented by one(1) all the way up to where I stopped counting. After all, one’s computer contains some 65,000 ports that are exposed to the Internet.

What is the likely-hood that Internet ports will ever come under the rule of law?

There is a ton of relatively cheap information available to the Internet port hacker. Both good guys and  bad guys hack Internet ports. If bad guys hack, UGLY guys can’t be far behind. So, who is left to “lobby” for “improving the surfing experience” of the “average” Internet user?

Technorati Tags: internet ports,hacker,ip address,abuse@,rule of law,good guys,bad guys,ugly guys

Mossad-Taliban whistleblower killed in Pakistan

PRESS TV

Jun 23, 2009

A tribal leader who earlier defected from Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud and revealed the militants group’s ties with the US and Israel has been shot dead.

The assassination of Qari Zainuddin comes days after he revealed that their comrade was pursuing a US-Israeli agenda across the violence-wracked country.

Zainuddin, a 26-year-old rising tribesman who had called Mehsud “an American agent” was killed by a gunman in northwestern town of Dera Ismail Khan on Tuesday.

Zainuddin, who broke away from Mehsud, was also increasingly critical of Mehsud’s use of suicide bombings targeting civilians.

In an interview with local media the defector said that Mehsud had established strong links with Israeli intelligence services, which were destabilizing the nuclear armed country. “These people (Mehsud and his men) are working against Islam.”

Mehsud, a warlord in his late 30s, has claimed responsibility for dozens of devastating string attacks on both civilians and security forces throughout the feared region.

Insurgents have stepped up their attacks on civilian and religious centers in major cities across Pakistan, which has fueled anti-Taliban sentiments among the Pakistani people.

The US invaded Afghanistan more than seven years ago to allegedly eradicate insurgency and arrest Taliban and al Qaeda leaders.
The US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 has resulted in the spread of violence into neighboring Pakistan. Taliban militants have turned the restive tribal belt between the two neighbors into a scene of daily violence…

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=98839&sectionid=351020401

Technorati Tags: taliban,us,israel,assassination,us-israeli agenda

Drug Industry Agrees To Health Overhaul

Pharmaceutical Companies Will Spend $80 Billion Over Next Decade To Improve Drug Benefits For Seniors

(AP) The pharmaceutical industry agreed Saturday to spend $80 billion over the next decade improving drug benefits for seniors on Medicare and defraying the cost of President Barack Obama’s health care legislation, capping secretive negotiations with the White House and key lawmakers.

The deal, expected to be announced later in the day, marked a major triumph for Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., as well as the administration. The chairman of the Senate Finance Committee has been negotiating with numerous industry groups for weeks as he tries to draft legislation that meets Obama’s goal of vastly expanding health coverage, has bipartisan support and does not add to the deficit.

Under the deal, which several officials confirmed, drug companies would pay as much as half of the cost of brand-name drugs for lower and middle-income seniors in the so-called doughnut hole – a gap in coverage that is a feature of many of the plans providing prescription coverage under Medicare.

In addition, the entire cost of the drug would count toward a patient’s out-of-pocket costs, meaning their insurance coverage would cover more of their expenses than otherwise.

Officials said Medicare patients with incomes up to about $80,000 or $85,000 would realize some benefit. …

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/06/20/health/main5100305.shtml?tag=stack

The “business friendly” atmosphere of the previous administration(neocon) left many users of business services and business products trying to cope.

Some American users of pharmaceutical products ventured to Canada in an attempt to buy prescription drugs at a lower price than they could buy at home. Apparently, some in the pharmaceutical industry did not consider that act “business friendly” and news accounts told of threats of loss of product to those Canadian businesses if they did not cease their “business unfriendly” act of selling to Americans, in Canada, at Canadian prices. Perhaps the attempted prescription drug consumer was taking the idea of “global economy” too far.

The pharmaceutical industry backed a neocon solution to the problem of “through the roof” prescription drug prices. It was called Medicare Part D. The birth pains of Medicare Part D were as intense as the birth pains of other neocon “brain-children”.

There were operational complaints from pharmacists and seniors. It seemed that not all the “stakeholders” had been properly introduced to the new functional feature of Medicare called Medicare Part D. And there were comments on the “accuracy” of the statistical data that was used to help justify part D.

It is good that America is taking a new look at the plight of those Americans who are “bound” to the pharmaceutical industry.

Technorati Tags: drug industry,health overhaul,pharmaceutical,medicare patients,business friendly,medicare plan d,stakeholders

Commentary: Obama must speak out on Iran

CNN POLITICS.com

June 19, 2009

By Ruben Navarrette Jr.

Special to CNN

Editor’s note: Ruben Navarrette Jr. is a member of the San Diego Union-Tribune editorial board, a nationally syndicated columnist and a regular contributor to CNN.com.

SAN DIEGO, California (CNN) — With Iran suffering a political earthquake, allow me to put in a good word for meddling.

I realize there will always be those Americans who recoil at the idea of U.S. military intervention or economic sanctions — or, for that matter, even just tersely worded statements from the White House — because, they insist, the United States should not interfere with the domestic affairs of other countries.

Since when? The United States has, for decades, interfered with the destinies of other nations – in Asia, Africa, Latin America and elsewhere.

In fact, just recently, President Obama took to interfering in the Middle East by scolding Israel for its treatment of Palestinians and its settlements in the West Bank.

Yet now, in a real disappointment to anyone who values freedom, Obama has declared his reluctance to “meddle” in the aftermath of the disputed Iranian presidential election even as hundreds of thousands of protesters put themselves at risk on the streets of Tehran. …

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/06/19/navarrette.obama.iran/index.html

What America knows:

There was an election in Iran. Likely, someone won and someone lost.

What America does not know:

America does not know who won the election in Iran

Whose side would the author of this article weigh-in on – the winner or the loser? How could the author tell who won?

Sometimes it it better to be quiet and have people think something rather than to speak out and have people know something – RIGHT?

ISRAEL:

The relationship between America and Israel is quite different from the relationship between America and Iran. Most of the world should know that. America was involved with the BIRTH of Israel which coincided with the death of Palestine.

Does the World know more about Zionist treatment of the Palestinians than it knows about the last election in Iran?

Yes!

What does the author mean by interfering with  “destinies” of other nations?

Destiny is likely in the “eye of the beholder”?

Did America “interfere” with the “destiny” of the world during WWII? Was Ireland “destined” to experience the potato famine.

Noun: destiny destunee

1. An event(or a course of events) that will inevitably happen in the future

WordWeb

The author said:

Since when? The United States has, for decades, interfered with the destinies of other nations – in Asia, Africa, Latin America and elsewhere.

Since a decade is ten years, the plural could put one square in the ruler-ship of the neocons. Twenty-four years of neocon “management” of America would fall within the decades assertion. And the neocons did indeed  interfere in other nations’ affairs.

But Barack Obama is not a neo-conservative and he did not interfere in Iraq, Afghanistan and Iran. Barack Obama did not tell Iran to “come clean” on its nuclear program. One might think that anyone demanding someone else reveal secrets would not be harboring secrets of their own. The neocons threw a lot of stones.

Obama has spoken out on Iran. He deplores violence in the streets of Iran. He would have the same feelings where ever violence against civilians happened. But what he has not done is ASSIGN BLAME for wrong-doing in the Iranian election. Obama is not “shooting from the hip”. Perhaps this author, like the neocons may want him to do just that. America has already endured too much of that behavior.

Technorati Tags: obama,iran,meddle,what america knows,what america does not know,interfering with destinies,assign blame