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A Girls's Best Friend

According to the Daily Telegraph – Chaz jumped from his rescuers’ car and into the arms of Mr Barr, who struggled to hold back tears. Apparently Jen’s sister (the girl on the ground with her feet in the air) said:

He’s an amazing boy.

Jen – good to see you back on the page and good to see your sister’s ok too!

Hugs all around.

😉

947 replies on “A Girls's Best Friend”

763
HusseinWorm

It’s one thing for the Labor party to be self-righteous cretins, but why is the AB friggin’C pandering to it with this bullshit?

That’s the bit I don’t get.

As for Conroy getting past the ‘test’, well, I think he’s got buckley’s, especially when you look at who is actually in the trial…and who is NOT! LOL

Is the entire thing one big handjob? Make the noises, go through the motions, but then throw up the hands and say ‘we tried’?

No matter, it will be the final outcome.

gaffhook

So you would preference the Liberals above Labor over the internet censorship issue?

If you wouldn’t, then I doubt anyone on the left would – I wouldn’t.

Thus, such threats are pointless – and Labor knows that.

Obama’s $634B, 10-year health-care plan.
The Obama administration will announce a 10-year, $634 billion reserve fund aimed at expanding health care coverage, an administration source said Wednesday.

The investment, to be rolled out as part of Obama’s budget request on Thursday, is being billed as a down-payment on covering all Americans.

“The goal is still to bring down the cost of care and to get universal coverage,” the source said.

According to the plan, the $634 billion will be paid for by limiting tax breaks for the wealthy and by squeezing new savings and efficiencies from pre-existing government health care programs.

read the whole story on Politico

IN BRAINS WE TRUST

BillO Beavis, Rush Butthead, Yup-Yup Winkers, Bobby “The Exorcist” and Turd B. Rover are having a few quiet beers in a “members only” D.C. titty bar as they ponder the future of the Party of Lincoln whose legacy had recently been purloined by an uppity, queue-jumping, community organiser from Chicago’s Southside.

Rush: Say Bobby, you slayed ‘em with the barbershop quartet necktie last night. Present company excepted, Sarah, but our Party hasn’t had a “fashion god” since “Heck-of-a-Job” Brownie.

The Exorcist: Why thank you, Rush, having that nationwide network audience was awesomely exciting. I needed to make an impression.

BillO: Guys, what the hell is happening to the GOP? It’s almost as if god-fearing, patriotic Americans are not listening to us anymore… since that…..that upstart burst from the political woodpile!

Yup-Yup: Would it help if we just said no to bounties on wolves and to sex education in schools? (winks involuntarily while turning her head slightly to the right.)

Rover: None of this woulda happened when Lee Atwater was running things….

(without warning a squad of heavily armed FBI agents enter the establishment and approach the former W.H. deputy CoS)

Agent: Please step away from the bar, sir! Place your hands behind your head!
Karl Christian Rove, I am arresting you for Contempt of Congress of the United States of America. Anything you say will be used……….

In the grand tradition of ticster farwells.

Fuck you Sol Trujillo…..and please don’t let the door hit your arse on the way out.
I hope you enjoy a painful retirement at our expense and feel miserable and irrelevant with all your fellow Republican thugs over there on the other side of the pond.
P.S.
If you find you can no longer get a job in the US.
Don’t even *dream* of coming back here to try finding more suckerbait. You’ve had your snout in the trough for far too long.
Hope you choke on it.

http://business.theage.com.au/business/trujillo-to-leave-telstra-in-june-20090226-8i9v.html

The GOP’s Anti-Obama Propaganda.
Today’s Republicans are thumbing through Newt Gingrich’s worn playbook of 1993 looking for tips on how to blunt President Barack Obama’s political momentum and flip it to their advantage. In doing so, they also appear to have dug in to what might be called the secret appendix.

The official history of what happened during Bill Clinton’s difficult first two years–which ended in a sweeping Republican congressional victory in 1994–focuses on the GOP’s united resistance to his economic plan and Hillary Clinton’s failed health care reform. But there was a darker side to the political damage inflicted on the early Clinton administration.

Republicans and their right-wing allies disseminated what–in a covert operation–would be called “black propaganda.”- Some exaggerated minor scandals, like the Travel Office firings and Clinton’s Whitewater real-estate deal, while other key figures on the Right, such as the Rev. Jerry Falwell, spread ugly conspiracy rumors linking Clinton to “mysterious deaths”- and cocaine smuggling.

more of this sleazy story on Op Ed News

805
Paddy

Amen, Amen, Amen to that.
Just wonderin what his Gold handshake might be worth.
Fuck him and GBUSH

Chris B,

I find it amusing that a web site that regularly peddles conspiracy theory twaddle about Bush and co murdering witnesses in the Diebold affair by crashing their planes for them publishes a story attacking right-wing conspiracy theory mongers …

807
gaffy, I can’t wait to see just how *big* the parachute number is.
(A quick glance at all the usual sites produces no numbers, just whoops of joy.)
One thing is for sure….The howls of outrage will be loud and long, when the cost of getting rid of that sleazy Mexican bandit is finally revealed.

Hmm………checking around whirlpool.net I see one poster has discovered a very good reason why Sol is buggering off.

He is actually leaving because , after 4 years, his overseas income and assets become part of his Australian income, ie under the ATO rules he has to pay Australian tax on them.

He is leaving 4 years to the day. One year short of his contract.

802
DG
There is such a thing as an informal vote you know.
No doubt you would say that would be a silly waste of a vote.
However it would be no sillier than trying to censor the net and the LNP would be secretly hoping that Conrod goes ahead with it.
Therefore ALP would be less one vote and the LNP would not necessarily gain from a preference.
Too easy, especially if i write Fuck censoring the internet all over the ballot so that the scrutineers can read it and deliver the message back to HQ.

gaffhook,

That would take one vote from Labor.

But a conservative vote for Labor takes one from the Liberals as well as giving one to Labor – thus, it is worth twice your informal vote.

However, I agree that if you got enough people to do that, it might be significant.

But – and this is the issue – it is only a problem for Labor if it risks them losing seats to the Liberals. Are you prepared to see seats fall to the Liberals over this issue?

I should add at this point that I do not think that this is a major issue for Labor – it cannot gain them more than a few thousand votes, surely? So while on the basic maths it might make sense to pursue it – just – it is my horrible feeling that there are many conservatives in the government who actually think that this is good policy, rather than good politics …

Jen,

I do. But I preference Labor over the Liberal Party – except for at the recent ACT election. As such, it is not a threat to Labor. In Tanner’s seat, it would be. But not here.

Obama seeks new wave of regulations.

President Obama outlined broad plans on Wednesday to revamp the nation’s financial system.
Obama is seeking a host of new regulations amid a historic meltdown to prevent a future financial crisis.

“We can no longer sustain 21st-century markets with 20th-century regulations,” Obama said following an Oval Office meeting with his top lieutenants and the chairmen and ranking members of the House and Senate panels overseeing the financial industry.

read more on The Hill

815
DG
If a significant number decided to go first preference for Greens as a protest then Greens may win the seats on ALP preferences and not the LNP.
These things are all hypotheticals that we are chucking around and hopefully that Kerr brother by the name of Wang, who is the comms Minister, may read blogs and get the message that generally we say; Fuck internet censorship!
If push comes to shove i will vote informal and desecrate the ballot paper with the appropriate messages.

Well Gaffy, perhaps Conrod would like a new job as CEO of Telscum.
After a further look around the tubes I see that Sol will be escaping with a “nice little earner” when he departs.
According to Tony Boyd on Business Spectator.

Telstra shareholders are unlikely to begrudge Trujillo his payout of about $3 million, which is one year’s fixed base remuneration. Trujillo earned about $8 million in cash in 2008 and will probably pick up the same this year.

http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/Telstras-leadership-legacy-$pd20090226-PM2QU?OpenDocument&src=sph
(sub req)
LOL
Well the shareholders mightn’t begrudge Sol his bloody bonus, but *I* sure do.
Plus, according to Robert Gottliebsen’s article at the same site.

Telstra held its interim dividend, and also indicated that it will hold the final dividend as well. While this gave Telstra shareholders joy, for the half year ending December 31 Telstra was forced to borrow an additional $1.1 billion, lifting its total debt to $16.4 billion. Telstra’s gearing ratio rose from 55.5 per cent to 58.3 per cent – which is too high in the current environment. Telstra would have liked to have kept its gearing ratio down by offering a dividend reinvestment plan over the last year but the future fund would not be in it so Telstra let its gearing rise.

http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/Telstra-$pd20090226-PLVR4?OpenDocument&src=sph
So Telstra borrows money to keep it’s dividend up and (presumably) makes for a better share price for Sol’s departure.

Then again…perhaps I’m just a cynic. 👿

In one week, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy says he will begin establishing a “commission of inquiry” to investigate the Bush administration’s use of torture and other abuses of power, but House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is objecting to his plan of granting immunity to some witnesses.
In an interview with Rachel Maddow on her MSNBC program Wednesday, Pelosi called Leahy’s investigative plan “a good idea,” but objected to immunity that could prevent prosecutors from holding Bush administration officials accountable for crimes in a court of law.

Pelosi, who refused to hold impeachment hearings when George W. Bush was President, signaled that she now prefers a proposal by House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, who wants a “blue-ribbon panel” to probe the Bush administration but seeks a special prosecutor, too.

read the entire article on Consortium News

As Aussie cultural temple dogs go, paddy, primo pup delivers a pretty savage bite. Reminds me a bit of Messer and Patrick Cook and even Molnar from an earlier age. Can appreciate how he’s moorish, hope you post him whenever he deserves a pat.
🙂
——————————-

Feb 25:
http://news.yahoo.com/comics/mattbors;_ylt=AndRteefX4ewJobLgmcHp0_mcLQF

My, how that man could select a necktie! What is it with GOPpers and their neckties?
http://www.truthdig.com/avbooth/item/20090225_david_brooks_calls_jindals_insane_speech_a_disaster/

Feb 25: Breeders With Attitude!
http://news.yahoo.com/edcartoons/patoliphant;_ylt=AuPY30h7mZeF9mjJKOZx0bjXj5Z4

Reality Cartoons!
Citizen Rupert of the Fourth Estate fights back.
http://www.truthdig.com/cartoon/item/20090225_peachy_keane/

Back-Door Benny Bernanke and Mr. Fed Hanky better watch out!
Looks like the Wall St. Gougers are gonna have some competion this season.
http://www.truthdig.com/cartoon/item/20090225_naming_rights/

Big Abe, MLK and now………wonder if Obi’s got a chariot whisperer? Yes, of course he has. He lives with three of them!
http://editorialcartoonists.com/cartoon/display.cfm/67258

And now at last, to a tumult of applause from the vast crowd, the four white horses of the imperator’s chariot came trotting through the gate, and there was Pompey himself, in the barrel-shaped, gem-encrusted chariot of the triumphator. He wore a gold-embroidered robe with a flowered tunic. In his right hand he held a laurel bough and in his left a scepter. There was a wreath of Delphic laurel on his head, and his handsome face and muscled body had been painted with red lead, for on this day he truly was the embodiment of Jupiter. Standing beside him was his eight-year-old son, the golden-curled Gnaeus, and behind him a public slave to whisper in his ear that he was only human and all this would pass.

830
Excellent news KL
I particularly enjoyed this snippet from your link.

This week Senator Conroy said there was “a very strong case for blocking” other legal content that has been “refused classification”. According to the classification code, this includes sites depicting drug use, crime, sex, cruelty, violence or “revolting and abhorrent phenomena” that “offend against the standards of morality”.

Ahhh……yes Senator Conroy.
I was especially struck by that last bit.
“offend against the standards of morality”.

So just who’s fucking morality who that be eh?
Steven Fielding’s perchance?
Or perhaps our dear leader Kevin Rudd’s?

So dear Stephen, you can stick your clapped out Internet filter up your arse, while the voters can enjoy watching your discomfort
via the wonders of Youtube. 😆

829
Well Ecky, it’s always good when Crikey lets the premier puppy loose on the net like today.
(Most days they keep him chained up and only available to the paid subscription.)
But I have to say, that Matt Bors line about the times purifying David Brooks with reverse osmosis wins the elephant stamp today. :mrgreen:

830
KatieLou

He may be saying he is a no vote now until he gets a chance to negotiate in the senate like the stimpac.
He may hold out for the same Porno laws that the ACT have so they can open up in SA. LOL

Always satisfying to see An Amigo depart.
Vale Sol –
And fuck you.
And GWB.
And Jeff Kennett – i haven’t forgotten. :mrgreen:

Tomorrow is predicted to be another “horror day” in our neck of the woods – could be all the authorities are being overly-cautious. Then again…
anyway southerm Ticksters – stay safe , and for our northern bretheren- Don’t Drown.
Sheeesh… thank god Climate Change is just a conspiracy of left-wing Greenie nutters. . Could you imagine if it was true? 😡

Xeno may be a paradox, but he is, (just for now) OUR paradox! LOL

I did, sort of, predict it (at the top of the page), so do I get bragging rights????

Who cares, it’s just good to see that Conroy dill get pickled by the process.

Well paddy dear friend – may Miranda get all that she deserves….
she is a as toxic as a forgotten tampon.
…so fuck her too.
as for the AB effing C : having Miss World as a political commentator on Tony’s Q and A … not to mention Christopher Pyne.
well what can one say other than … FFS .
this is worse than any rubbish served up on commercial television.

Jen,

Isn’t Pyne the same as Lord Dolly D of Baghdad, but without the gravitas?

I can’t stand most of those posers who appear on Q&A. Who want to listen to the “Deputy Shadow Treasurer” on anything. That goes for the all of the Coalition Shadows. But then don’t get me started on Conroy, the minister for non-communications, or the seemingly anti-environment minister.

Oh jen how could you? 😉
I’d actually forgotten about Q&A and was innocently cruising the net instead of watching my beloved A.B.Friggin C.
I’ve just turned it on and have had to reach for the bucket!!
YUCK!!
What a pathetic “gameshow” piece of drivel.
It’s truly sad that we’ve been reduced to this. 🙁
Thank God for the sanity of this little place on the net.

Take care tomorrow and let’s hope the Qld ticsters can send us some of their excess rain.
Cheers from the south
Paddy XX

Cardster-
comparing Whine to Dolly is difficult IMO, although they are both a complete embarrassment to the democratic system that the Ancient Greeks founded. However Poodle is simply inept, whereas Dolly is an integral part of the bloodbath in Iraq and other catastrophes that Mr -Hunt -Who-is-a -Coward and his entourage visited upon the unsuspecting but basically stupid voters that Australians proved to be throughout the 90’s.
Pyne is a WannaBe. No doubt he would have bombed and lied and cheated his way though the same disastors given a chance, but all he got to do was douse old ladies in kerosene in (privatised)appalling aged-care facilities so, as much as he aspires to such lofty heights as Our Alexander was privileged to occupy, he is but a pup.

Paddy – best of luck to you too.
May the winds be kind to us all
. And as for the AByouhavetobejokingC_
may the Albrechtson’s and Windschuttle’s be the cause (because at least at some stage they will be terminated.)
– otherwise we’re all fucked.

Ahhhhhhhh….

Love was in the air at the White House tonight, as the President and First Lady hosted a concert to honor Stevie Wonder, a man whose music they said brought them together.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/02/25/obamas-honor-stevie-wonde_n_170065.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tCeAZ1nQjk
————————

jen, have as cool and damp a day tomorrow as poss. And a dry ‘un for you, Gaffy. Which reminds me of a story I read in a picture story book in my fifth year upon our pale blue dot.

Villagers lived peacefully in a place where a long rope dangled from the sky (don’t ask, it’s a fucken story orright) which the villagers could tug at if they wanted either rain for their crops or fine weather to dry their washing.
All worked well, as it inevitably does early in these master’s apprentice type yarns until the day when one villager wanted to hang out washing to dry and another wanted more rain for crops.
After a full and frank but ultimately fruitless exchange both tugged furiously together and guess what? They yanked the “weather rope” out of sky and henceforth the villagers and all upon the orb remained at the mercy of the elements.
(end of story)

Post script:
Not long afterwards the price of real estate adjacent to rivers and wells experienced a sudden upturn, mills were constructed and those possessed of an entrepreneurial bent prospered while proto-dole bludgers serfed—- a development which formented a great deal of angst amongst work-ethicists.
In other places on earth, custodians of their land learned to share their billabongs in an orderly and peaceful way and sang their way without compass from coast to coast across their great southern land. Sure, they had their disagreements from time to time but they had no words for torture or ethnic cleansing or revenue producing unit.

Ecky – I thought the chick ate the apple and the guy got bitten by a snake and then they both had to put clothes on and be abstinent.
I like your version way better 😉

847
EC
Have printed a copy and will read myself in to a full head of slumber on that. Great stuff.
I shall assume the one hanging out the washing was “tugger” Bolter and the Rain man was “tugger” Turnbuller.
Ain’t it amazing how things change in what some of the specimens of our species are viciously tugging now.
Some are serious victims of the claw!

Actually you had me worried there at one stage Ecky. I was beginning to think that there might be this goose was goin to climb the rope and lay……….ZZZZZZZZZZZ!

Ecky- just read your link
– so romantic it brings tears to my eyes.
I LOVE the Obamas. not sure about you guys but I am definitely getting cynical about love, romance and all the mushy stuff in life – and then I read the between-the-lines conversation reported in that article about Wonder and the Obamas and…
well, all is not lost.
‘Night friends-
xx

Cheers, jen and Gaffy, slumber well.
🙂
———————————–

–Folksy excorcist bedevilled by demons of satire
–“Quayle Reincarnation” gets treatment and then some
–Presidential contender embarrasses GOPper HQ
–Bobby Jindal outs himself in Prime Time as recidivist fuck-wit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeP8UuGJsbY

Hey all, was having a read of the rude one’s latest and in between howls of laughter I thought of you guys, realised I haven’t said hello for a bit so, um, err …helloo 😀

Anyway, you all know where the R one lives so I suggest you go take a peak, it’s a killer 😀

still laughing at the puppy spine bit 😆

Re: the various comments about ‘conspiracies and conspiracy theories’.

No one in America thinks clearly about ‘conspiracies’. There are those who would have you believe ‘conspiracies don’t exist’. That’s twaddle.

Go to FINDLAW or the Cornell Law Library. I haven’t counted, but it’s probably safe to say that there are at least THOUSANDS of Federal statutes having to do with conspiracies of NUMEROUS sorts.

That’s just the FEDERAL laws on the books. Each state will have as many at the state level. Check it out.

Then –there is the case law. SCOTUS, alone, has probably cranked out thousands of pages re: conspiracies over the years. And, if that were not enough, there are the so-called ‘inferior courts’. If each one has turned out 100 cases involving ‘conspiracies’ multiply 100 by the number of Federal courts in the U.S.

Then there is historical precedent. There must be hundreds, perhaps thousands of historians, philosophers and journalists who have referenced conspiracies of one sort or another over the years. A prominent example is Saint Thomas More who denounced what he called a “conspiracy of rich men to procure their commodities in the name and title of the Commonwealth”. That sounds like an apt description of the political process by which K-street and the Military/Industrial Complex wage war upon Iraq. In fact, More was referring to the rich of his era using wealth as leverage to get favors at ‘court’. I rather suspect More knew what he was talking about. For a start, he was more articulate and most certainly brighter than about 99 percent of what this country dares call ‘statesmen’.

Various Popes have also referred to conspiracies. That might have been discounted because Popes are delusional except for the fact that the Catholic Church is considered, by some, to be a conspiracy. Certainly, every Church is conspiratorial if it flouts convention, secular law, and common sense in order to accomplish dubious if not illegal goals.

There is also the case of ORGANIZED CRIME! What was Al Capone, if not a ‘conspirator’? How did ‘crime’ get organized if someone had not entered into a conspiracy with someone else to get some done that was illegal.

Simply if two or more people agree to help each other break the law, you’ve got yourself a conspiracy. What’s so strange about that?

Conspiracies are –simply –how complicated tasks get done. If those tasks are legal and smiled upon, it’s called a corporation and given a tax break. If what gets done is ILLEGAL, it’s called a ‘conspiracy’ and indicted (hopefully!)

Bush is prima facie in violation of US CODES, Title 18, Section 2441. That’s a Federal Statute that prescribes a PENALTY OF DEATH for violations resulting in death. Last time I checked, there would be some 1.5 MILLION such counts that should be formally CHARGED to Bush and his CO-CONSPIRATORS who helped him sell and wage a war crime punishable by death.

To sum it up: history itself is little more than an endless succession of conspiracies.

Now —read up, quick being stupid about conspiracies, or give a rest!

Too much irony:

“I have serious concerns with this budget, which demands hardworking American families and job creators turn over more of their hard-earned money to the government to pay for unprecedented spending increases,” said Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader.

(NY Times)

Yeah, or you could just let the deficits your lot expanded bloat out to financial death! God, they’ve got no shame. Who else will pay? Or should you just try and keep borrowing from the rest of the world ad infinitum?

Meanwhile, over 600,000 Americans applied for unemployment relief last week, new house sales almost disappeared, GM is bleeding to death and needs more public transfusions to limp on, banks are insolvent, and Republicans are criticising Obama?

If it wasn’t tragic, it would be funny.

If you missed Prof Niall Ferguson on Lateline last night, check the netcast. This guy summed it up very well, and put a lot of the blame on central banks (read Alan Greenspan! LOL) who refused to consider runaway asset prices and focused instead on core inflation as the only metric that mattered.

Of course he was told, many times, that this was dangerously myopic, but he’d come out in public and reaffirm his position that it just did not matter as the market would set asset prices! Yeah, we’ve all seen how well they did that! Didn’t we???

Anyway, that’s all finished with a capital “F”, and we ain’t gonna see that kind of ‘hands off’ regulatory framework in the rest of my lifetime, and probably my children’s. This massive failure of oversight will leave a bad taste in the mouth for decades to come.

Anyway, you all know where the R one lives so I suggest you go take a peak, it’s a killer

The Rude pundit is an excellent counterpoint to the notion that swearing is a substitute for poor communication. He (I presume) certainly gets his point across!

859

Yeah, it’s the Rude one in excellent form. I love his Ann Coulter is a Cunt series…been a fan for many years, and his latest offering does not disappoint.

But his conclusion on Jindal is so nice we can quote it:

While Barack Obama once again elucidated liberal ideas in a way that made them sound new and achievable, while he undercut arguments against his agenda in an incisive way that should have Republicans shitting themselves, Jindal simply said that the future is the past. “Americans can do anything” was the line he returned to, the title of his wee little speech.

He’s right. The fact of the matter is that we did something already, back in November. Now we wanna see where it leads. Luckily, Jindal is such a small man in so many ways that he’ll be easy to roll right over.

…ouch!

It’s lovely to see the long suffering Americans who’ve been outraged over the last eight years, finally get to kick the rotting Republican’s corpse.

Yes, it’s funny, and right now they need to laugh just to keep from cryin’.

This one is sure to give the Repugs some ammunition. To counteract the Repugs the Dems will point out that their has been no increase since 1993 and it is all going to benefit the taxpayer by fixing the roads.

Second Commission Stresses Need for Federal Gasoline Tax Increases.
A commission mandated by Congress to study financing for federal surface transportation programs has suggested a 10-cents-per-gallon increase to the gasoline tax.

The 15-member panel representing local government, industry and finance groups is the second of its kind to suggest raising taxes on motor fuels as a short-term fix to keep the federal Highway Trust Fund solvent.

Two commissions were set up by the 2005 surface transportation law (PL 109-59). The first released its report in January 2008, calling for the current 18.4-cent tax to be raised to 40 cents over the next 5 years.

The second panel released its report Thursday morning. In addition to the increase, the commission has called for indexing the tax to inflation.

The federal gas tax has not been increased since 1993. The revenue shortfall from the stagnant tax forced Congress to dip into the general treasury last August to shore up the highway fund.

“The gasoline tax is insufficient at current rates,” said Robert Atkinson, chairman of the commission. “Basically the policy of the United States has been to reduce the fuel tax rate every year.” He said the goal is to get the tax “back to where we were in 1993 in purchasing power.”

full story on CQ Politics

The US housing finances…..
Way back at 719 we had the nice, simple graphical YouTube description.
Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0zEXdDO5JU&e
Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYhDkZjKBEw&e

Now Christopher Joye at Business Spectator does the long, complicated and wordy version.
While it *is* a bit long. (and parts of it make my brain ache!!)
It’s a pretty impressive and informative article about the differences between the US and the Aust systems of housing finance.

The article is far too long to quote here. But the closing paras are probably worth a mention.

My advice to President Obama, Timothy Geithner, Shaun Donovan, and Austin Goolsbee is that merely applying myopic bandages to the symptoms of these problems, and reinvigorating the GSEs, is emphatically not the long-term answer. The entire system of housing finance needs to be transformed to a bank-based balance-sheet focus. At some point, the GSEs should be fully nationalised and, alongside other public housing finance agencies, phased out of the day-to-day private credit infrastructure. Governments have a role to play supplying the public goods of liquidity and price discovery when markets fail – but only when markets fail.

In the long run, the Obama administration needs to create something that has been beyond previous governments: a robust and nationally-integrated private banking infrastructure, which is funded mainly through retail deposits, in order to firmly reposition balance-sheets as the principal repository of housing finance in the US. While there are undeniable diversification benefits to be garnered from securitisation, there is no evidence that the third-party capital available through this process should supplant the savings system.

Anyway, for those ticsters who like tying their brains in financial knots……You know who you are. 🙂
The full article is here.
http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/Joye-$pd20090226-PM69X?OpenDocument&src=sph
(Free sub req.)

Article in The Houston Chronicle in 2000.

Stanford, a little-known investment banker and real estate developer in Houston, caught the State Department’s attention for his leading role in tightening Antigua’s already secretive banking laws.

Washington insisted that the changes could hamper international efforts to halt the flow of drug money. The result was a protracted confrontation between the United States and Antigua that is only now being resolved.

Stanford had deep ties to Antigua and their government, and the way Ivanovich describes it, Stanford’s conduct comes across more like a cult-leader than a financier:

Holding dual U.S.-Antiguan citizenship, Stanford owns Antigua’s largest newspaper, heads a local commercial bank and enjoys access to Prime Minister Lester Bird.

He is the man to whom the islanders have turned to help finance construction of a hospital, build a shelter for single mothers and start up a carrier when airline service to the region was curtailed.

And honestly? This part alone is mindbending enough:

When a Catholic priest stricken with the stigmata (wounds resembling those Jesus suffered in his crucifixion) needed medical treatment in the United States, Stanford flew him on his private plane.

“That was a major personal event in my life,” Stanford said. “It was truly an out-of-this-world experience, a supernatural experience.” Indeed, Stanford still carries with him congealed fluids that drained from the priest’s foot.

the full story can be found in The Huffington Post

Italy and Vatican threaten EU unity in drugs talks.
Italy is threatening to undermine EU unity in high-stakes UN talks on drug abuse, with Rome appearing to take the lead from the Vatican in a recent u-turn on issues such as needle-exchange.

Heading into a UN conference on 11 March whose outcome will set the international anti-drugs policy agenda for the next 10 years, the European Union, negotiating as one bloc, has so far backed greater emphasis on “harm reduction.”

read the whole story in the EU Observer

I remember a Catholic work colleague commenting one day that outsiders should keep out of the Catholic Churches business. I can suggest that the Catholic Church should also stop interfering in everyone else’s business first.

The Australian Government made 2 announcements today:
1) Kevin Rudd will be visiting Barack Obama in March http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/02/27/2502838.htm

2) The Australian Government will reinstate the Racial Discrimination Act later this year
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/02/27/2503040.htm

Are these two announcements related – youbetcha have a read of what Dr. Claire Smith says”_
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/02/02/2479644.htm?site=indigenous&topic=latest

I am so glad that the world has a Barack Obama. I have witnessed a world of pain since the advent of income management. Until this visit was announced Jenny Macklin had ignored all of the evidence presented to her on this topic – and now finally they are going implement income management only for people who need it!

I am sure he would fix the housing – which is another story of NT Government with their snouts in the trough!

Southern blacks: Obama will heal racial rift.

President Barack Obama will help America rid itself of racial prejudice, said nearly 75 percent of African American Southerners, an indicator of the high hopes black America has invested in Obama’s ability to improve race relations.

Since his election in November, Obama has made talking about race easier, respondents in the latest Winthrop/ETV poll of the South said. The poll surveyed African Americans in 11 Southern states on issues, values, politics and the new president.

But Obama-inspired optimism was tempered by what poll respondents consider to be still poor race relations south of the Mason-Dixon** line. More than 50 percent of respondents think race relations in the South are generally bad.

read the rest of this story in the State

** Mason-Dixon line is an imaginary line that runs roughly along the top of West Virginia and Virginia. Most of the states below the Mason-Dixon line were in the Confederacy. Mason and Dixon were surveyors. Virginia was the headquarters of the Confederacy. Which the Democrats won at the last election. 😈

Chris at 866, when one is a “registered” religion and a valued member of The Establishment with no income taxes to pay and a vested interest in maintaining control of its marks, “interfering in everyone elses business” is what they have been doing since they found a way to suck money from governments for indoctrination of devotees at schools pervaded by pushy penguins and predatory pedophile priests and “brothers”.

Always worth remembering that Holy Mother Church accomodated Mussolini, Hitler, Franco, Pinochet and Christ knows how many other regimes with an “entrepreneurial” bent. Check out the Vatican share portfolio, they’re running a vertically integrated business that relies on the “liturgical skill” of an army of ordained and foresworn spiritual pickpockets.
Did you see the column Randy Devine wrote the other day about Fr. Kennedy in Brissy whose love of society’s down and outers is interpreted by upline controllers as a threat to the established order.
———————————————————

THIEVES USE CAT TO TRIGGER STAMPEDE
AB friggin’C Online:

Thieves caused chaos outside a Somaliland mosque late on Thursday when they took advantage of a power cut to throw a stray cat into the crowd, triggering a stampede so they could rob worshippers.

Pity orthodox tease and tithe merchants coulndn’t be as honest with their flocks.
🙂

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/02/27/2503057.htm

Feb 26:
http://news.yahoo.com/edcartoons/tomtoles;_ylt=AhbKZPZwKREkZFi.nK.M0xjd.sgF

Feb 26
http://news.yahoo.com/edcartoons/jeffdanziger;_ylt=AjlhUk6B.zBJMWe_gmtrsixX_b4F

Detroit/ Flint Bugle ~ personal classifieds:
dead man driving seeks jump start
http://editorialcartoonists.com/cartoon/display.cfm/67311

Michelle Obama: The right to bare arms?
Michelle Obama knows how to impress her friends. The emerald, tea-length dress she wore Wednesday night to present the Library of Congress Gershwin Prize to Stevie Wonder was designed by the singer’s wife, Kai Milla.

read more in The USA Today

Isn’t it guaranteed in the constitution? 😈

Exactly what I have been saying!

Bloggers, liberal groups challenge centrist Dems.
A coalition of liberal bloggers and activists backed by organized labor announced a campaign Thursday to pressure Democrats to move to the left by financing challenges to centrist members of Congress.

The group, which calls itself Accountability Now, plans to raise money online and recruit liberal candidates to run in the primaries against Democratic incumbents it considers out of step with constituents.

The group has the backing of the Service Employees International Union, one of the most politically active in organized labor, and MoveOn.org. Both have raised and spent tens of millions of dollars in recent elections.

The formation of the group highlights a tricky political dynamic for Democrats that could complicate President Barack Obama’s efforts to advance his agenda. The effort threatens to deepen rifts that separate the party’s liberal Democratic leaders, personified by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., from the growing group of moderates who have helped the party expand its majority in Congress.

Leaders of Accountability Now say they have no ideological litmus test for their targets, but it’s clear they are focusing on Democrats — including some who are members of the fiscally conservative Blue Dogs and the New Democrat Coalition — who typically side with business interests.

“What we’re set up to oppose is the influence of lobbying money,” said Jane Hamsher of the blog firedoglake.com. “The danger is that (Democrats are) going to become as responsive to the influence of money over their constituents as Republicans did.”

Backers of the movement say they’re hoping their efforts will give Obama greater latitude to push liberal policies in key areas such as health care by creating an organized and well-funded group of Democrats who can act as a counter to more conservative voices in the party.

read more on Associated Press

We need to do the same thing here in Australia. Get rid of people like Conroy. What do the Ticster’s think?

The thing is, though, we do not have the primary system that they do. The only way to influence the Labor Party is to join it. And unless you are a pushy, ruthless bastard, you’re not going to get very far. That is why I took one look and ran screaming for the hills. And this was the ACT, where the Labor Party is very far to the left …

Existentialist Cowboy at 857:

Welcome to Pol 101, ’tis indeed an honour. Have just been to the engine room, Len, and released your comment from the spaminator. I’m a tech trog but will confer with Catrina to jigger the settings where your posts slip “in like Flynn”, first time, every time.

David Gould, EC’s comments at 857 have you in the cross hairs, any comment comrade?

‘Conspiracy theorist’ is a phrase used colloquially to describe someone who sees in many unconnected events the workings of a particular group of powerful individuals (this group differs from conspiracy theorist to conspiracy theorist).

These kinds of conspiracy theorists fall into the all too human trap of seeing patterns in places where there are none. Recognising patterns is probably *the* survival trait of humanity – it is the basis for science, for example. However, the side-effect of our amazing ability to uncover hidden patterns in the world is that we see faces in the clouds and see for reasons in randomness. This gives rise to religion along with conspiracy theorists.

I would also point out that the obvious claim that there are and always have been conspiracies does nothing to bolster the credibility of any particular conspiracy theory. It stands or falls on its own merits.

So: present me with a decently argued and evidenced case for a particular conspiracy and I will pay it due attention. But if you present me with obvious crap, I will call it each and every time – and I will laugh mockingly while doing so. I’m like that, I’m afraid.

Supporting independents in each state would be a good start. Making sure more Mr. X’s get up, along with the Greens.

David, anything that we could prove, would already be in court long ago. We keep showing you suspicious information. But we cannot prove it.

I would prefer the Greens to independents, no matter how far to the left. But that’s just me, I guess.

Chris B at 881,

The problem is, any piece of data can be interpreted as ‘suspicious information’ if you filter it through the right preconceptions. Indeed, one thing that makes conspiracy theorists stand out is their ability to take anything that is presented to them and weave it into their theory.

If no piece of hypothetical data can be used to falsify the theory, then the theory is nonsense.

The main conspiracy theories that I have discussed over the years -and which have led to me becoming the hollow shell of a man I am today – include 911 (obviously!), global warming (damn all deniers …) and the one world government (bloody religious lunatics …).

LOL
This trial stank of dead fish before it even began.

The Trial Begins
With the Government’s clean feed trial about to start, a number of policy questions remain known unknowns, writes Colin Jacobs
For months now Communications Minister Stephen Conroy has been answering letters about his internet censorship drive with generalities about “cyber-safety”. He has deferred any further debate on the policy until after the upcoming “live” filtering trial. Just this week, he deflected comments about the scope of the proposed blacklist in a Senate Estimates hearing, saying “it will be determined, as we have always said, following the live pilot trial.”
more….

http://newmatilda.com/2009/02/25/trial-begins

Given the climatic ravages at both ends of our little island continent over the last few weeks

Crikey’s opening salvo today……It seems to be fairly topical. 🙁

A major business group says many companies will not be ready for the proposed emissions trading scheme (ETS) by next year’s planned start date.

The Australian Industry Group (AIG) wants the Government to delay the introduction of the scheme by two years.

The group’s chief executive, Heather Ridout, says many companies need more time to prepare for the emissions trading framework. “They can’t make the investment in the emission saving technology because the financials aren’t adding up because of the global financial crisis, and the lack of access to credit and the price of that credit,” she said.

This was in the news too:

Icecaps around the North and South Poles are melting faster than expected, raising sea levels as a result of climate change, a major scientific survey has shown.

And that’s our bind of the moment, that we face the twin and simultaneous difficulties of both an economic and environmental crisis. It’s a tweely glib piece of affogato-leftist twaddle (but no less true for all of that) that there are “no jobs on a dead planet”. No industry either. No boardrooms. No Fed. No Wall Street. No ABS. No GDP. No chamber of manufacturers. No new-start building approvals. No current account deficits. Just increasingly fecund expanses of warm swamp.

The AIG and others (perhaps even the Federal Government) need to face the fact that pretty soon now we’re all going to have to combine walking and the quiet but purposeful chewing of gum.

857 Existentialist Cowboy. Extremely well said. Thanks for your input. Better add a permanent link to his site.

Negative on that, Chris. But Obi did. And Don Watson will be pleased. His reading from “American Journeys” this morning on RN’s The Book Show took me every cicketty-clack of the way with him. Great story teller that he is, Don took us for a fleeting fifteen minutes to another place.

Come to think of it, the first few plinks of the banjo intro and this little piggy was there.

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/firstperson/stories/2009/2466705.htm

God, you would think that would be something obvious that needed to be done. After the Liberals have emasculated our railways Australia wide.

Row over web blacklist.
MAJOR inconsistencies have emerged in the way a top-secret blacklist of web pages is managed by the Australian Communications and Media Authority.

The content of the list of illegal, prohibited and potential prohibited web pages is meant to be strictly confidential. It is the backbone of the federal Government’s internet censorship plan.

The list is of critical importance as it is being used as a basis for internet filtering trials, which involves internet service providers blocking web pages.

ACMA is exempt from the Freedom of Information Act 1982, and disclosure of information on the blacklist could jeopardise efforts to block access to harmful and offensive online material.

“ACMA would not disclose information if doing so would contradict the Freedom of Information Act,” the spokesman said.

Recent actions by ACMA, however, have called into question its methods of administering the list.

On January 5, an internet user in Melbourne, known online as Foad, lodged a complaint with ACMA about content on an anti-abortion web page, not the entire website. The man did not want his real name published for fear of reprisals. He said his motive was to test the system and show that web pages not showing material connected with sexual abuse of children could end up on the blacklist.

About two weeks later, he received a reply from ACMA informing him it was “satisfied that the internet content is hosted outside Australia, and the content is prohibited or potential prohibited content”.

There was no warning from ACMA not to publicise the anti-abortion web page. “I never received any indication from ACMA not to publish it,” he said.

more of this article in the Australian IT

And Grace-
not sure about the article which basically is set out to imply that “just like Kevin, Obama ….”
I honestly don’t think they are in the same ballpark in terms of global influence, cultural change, whatever.
Rudd is undoubtedly a good and decent man – but he is not within a cooee of having the kind of global influence and power that Obama wields.

Jen they could work well together. Kevin’s Mandarin, would impress Obama. Kevin has some influence with China which may be a help to Obama in some way. Then there is the fact that he is not John Howard. That should count for a lot, after the run in John had with Obi Wan.

Masters of the Universe Inc (aka Citigroup): Oh, how the mighty have fallen on bad times! As of today:

The federal government tightened its grip Friday on a battered Citigroup Inc., agreeing to convert its preferred shares into common stock and boosting its direct ownership in the nation’s once-largest bank to 36%.
The move, which will also install three new directors, presumably aligned with the government’s interest in mind, sent Citi shares down more than 30% as the firm also reported another $10 billion in fourth-quarter losses and said it will suspend common- and preferred-stock dividends.
Citi’s shares closed off 39% to $1.50.
The shares had fallen as much as 50% before the bell.
_________________________________________________

I checked the market capitilisation, and you could buy the lot with change from 10 billion, although they claim their book value to be $18/share! As if!

Obviously the punters are piss scared the Gumnit is gonna whip their asses, but Obambi doesn’t sound like he’s in the mood for outright owning Citi or BA or any of them.

So on the numbers, I’d reckon it would be a smarter move to be buying and holding on for the trashed balance sheet to work its way through while living on government funds, because you can bet they will not now let it go under. Some sackings and belt tightening will be conducted, the roulette tables on the trading floor will be shut down, and the high stakes punts with securitized mortgages and CDO’s have already been terminated.

When house prices hit bottom (and they ain’t there yet, but soon will be), the mortgage markets will stabilise, financial markets will be able to value their dodgey paper, and the banks can start lending again, albeit at a fraction of previous manic rate.

Nup, it doesn’t look like they’ll nationalise fully, despite howls from ALL quarters to do it.

When EVERYONE is selling, that’s the time to buy, and hold your eyes shut for the horror period to end.

Pleasure to see that we have been visited by Royalty from the Good old USA.
Welcome aboard Cowboy.
I have enjoyed reading your Blog.

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