WOW- couldn't have said this better myself...I have a new hero in the fight to retain common sense in this country....

perfect framing of the American ideal..Hanna Barbara style...

FINALLY- some REAL video is released of the guitar gods concert I went to in California

Richie Kotzen tearing it up on a Hendrix classic...

How are the folks who CAUSED the economic meltdown really going to FIX it?

This crisis was caused by political correctness being forced on the mortgage lending industry in the Clinton era.
Before the Democrats' affirmative-action lending policies became an embarrassment, the Los Angeles Times reported that, starting in 1992, a majority-Democratic Congress "mandated that Fannie and Freddie increase their purchases of mortgages for low-income and medium-income borrowers. Operating under that requirement, Fannie Mae, in particular, has been aggressive and creative in stimulating minority gains."
Under Clinton, the entire federal government put massive pressure on banks to grant more mortgages to the poor and minorities. Clinton's secretary of housing and urban development, Andrew Cuomo, investigated Fannie Mae for racial discrimination and proposed that 50 percent of Fannie Mae's and Freddie Mac's portfolio be made up of loans to low- to moderate-income borrowers by the year 2001.
Instead of looking at "outdated criteria," such as the mortgage applicant's credit history and ability to make a down payment, banks were encouraged to consider nontraditional measures of credit-worthiness, such as having a good jump shot or having a missing child named "Caylee."
Threatening lawsuits, Clinton's Federal Reserve demanded that banks treat welfare payments and unemployment benefits as valid income sources to qualify for a mortgage. That isn't a joke – it's a fact.
When Democrats controlled both the executive and legislative branches, political correctness was given a veto over sound business practices.
In 1999, liberals were bragging about extending affirmative action to the financial sector. Los Angeles Times reporter Ron Brownstein hailed the Clinton administration's affirmative-action lending policies as one of the "hidden success stories" of the Clinton administration, saying that "black and Latino homeownership has surged to the highest level ever recorded."
Meanwhile, economists were screaming from the rooftops that the Democrats were forcing mortgage lenders to issue loans that would fail the moment the housing market slowed and deadbeat borrowers couldn't get out of their loans by selling their houses.
A decade later, the housing bubble burst and, as predicted, food-stamp-backed mortgages collapsed. Democrats set an affirmative-action time bomb, and now it's gone off.
In Bush's first year in office, the White House chief economist, N. Gregory Mankiw, warned that the government's "implicit subsidy" of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, combined with loans to unqualified borrowers, was creating a huge risk for the entire financial system.
Rep. Barney Frank denounced Mankiw, saying he had no "concern about housing." How dare you oppose suicidal loans to people who can't repay them! The New York Times reported that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were "under heavy assault by the Republicans," but these entities still had "important political allies" in the Democrats.
Now, at a cost of hundreds of billions of dollars, middle-class taxpayers are going to be forced to bail out the Democrats' two most important constituent groups: rich Wall Street bankers and welfare recipients.
Political correctness had already ruined education, sports, science and entertainment. But it took a Democratic president with a Democratic Congress for political correctness to wreck the financial industry.

Contradictions of Socialism (I saw the future & ran away)

A dissertation from a refugee from the former USSR- I remember befriending a Russian girl named Marla when I was at the beautiful Gateway High School. We had an oral communication class in which she would constantly shout down the teacher's "progressive" notions as the very same theories and ideas that her family had just rescued her from- and she actually used the term "how dare you". "How dare you act like these ideas are good and just". "How dare you act as if what you are teaching isn't dangerous...". I loved Marla, she had alot of spunk and drive, big Metallica fan- when I pressed her on it, she told me she believed that the song "creeping death" was about Socialism....so then I became a fan.I often wonder what happened to her, especially in light of recent events in America. Putin is now warning OUR president, and Britain's Prime Minister Brown to stop going down the path to Socialism...not the other way around.
I wonder if she has gone back to Russia yet, as in less than a decade, they will have more freedom than we Americans, and most of Europe will have. Its a very sick, but very REAL irony- my generation grew up at the end of the Cold War, and watched Socialism collapse under the weight of its own injustice, and now we are bringing that same injustice home. I do believe we have failed in our stewardship of this wonderful country, and some day a future generation will look back on us, as Marla looked back on Stalin, and say "what the hell were you thinking, Mom...Dad...Grandmother...Grandfather? How could you let this happen" The only difference is, the Russians didn't have the benefit of watching another proud country fall to the Spectre of Marxism..WE DID- which makes our mistakes EVEN WORSE-

There was a time in recent American history when certain Soviet jokes didn't work in translation - not so much because of the language differences, but because of the lack of common sociopolitical context. But that is changing. As President Obama is preparing us for a great leap towards collectivism, I find myself recollecting forgotten political jokes I shared with comrades while living in the old country under Brezhnev, Andropov, and Gorbachev. (I was too young to remember the Khrushchev times, but I remember the Khrushchev jokes.) I also noticed that the further America "advances" back to the Soviet model, the more translatable the old Soviet jokes become.
~
Not all Soviet advancements have metastasized here yet, but we have four more glorious years to make it happen.

One of my favorite political jokes is this:

The six dialectical contradictions of socialism in the USSR:

There is full employment - yet no one is working.
No one is working - yet the factory quotas are fulfilled.
The factory quotas are fulfilled - yet the stores have nothing to sell.
The stores have nothing to sell - yet people got all the stuff at home.
People got all the stuff at home - yet everyone is complaining.
Everyone is complaining - yet the voting is always unanimous.
It reads like a poem - only instead of the rhythm of syllables and rhyming sounds, it's the rhythm of logic and rhyming meanings. If I could replicate it, I might start a whole new genre of "contradictory six-liners." It would be extremely difficult to keep it real and funny at the same time, but I'll try anyway.

Dialectical contradictions are one of the pillars in Marxist philosophy, which states that contradictions eventually lead to a unity of opposites as the result of a struggle. This gave a convenient "scientific" excuse for the existence of contradictions in a socialist society, where opposites were nice and agreeable - unlike the wild and crazy opposites of capitalism that could never be reconciled. Hence the joke.

Then I moved to America, where wild and crazy opposites of capitalism were supposedly at their worst. Until recently, however, the only contradictions that struck me as irreconcilable were these:

Economic justice:

America is capitalist and greedy - yet half of the population is subsidized.
Half of the population is subsidized - yet they think they are victims.
They think they are victims - yet their representatives run the government.
Their representatives run the government - yet the poor keep getting poorer.
The poor keep getting poorer - yet they have things that people in other countries only dream about.
They have things that people in other countries only dream about - yet they want America to be more like those other countries.
Hollywood cliches:

Without capitalism there'd be no Hollywood - yet filmmakers hate capitalism.
Filmmakers hate capitalism - yet they sue for unauthorized copying of their movies.
They sue for unauthorized copying - yet on screen they teach us to share.
On screen they teach us to share - yet they keep their millions to themselves.
They keep their millions to themselves - yet they revel in stories of American misery and depravity.
They revel in stories of American misery and depravity - yet they blame the resulting anti-American sentiment on conservatism.
They blame the anti-American sentiment on conservatism - yet conservatism ensures the continuation of a system that makes Hollywood possible.


I never thought I would see socialist contradictions in America, let alone write about them. But somehow all attempts to organize life according to "progressive" principles always result in such contradictions. And in the areas where "progressives" have assumed positions of leadership - education, news media, or the entertainment industry - contradictions become "historically inevitable."

If one were accidentally to open his eyes and compare the "progressive" narrative with facts on the ground, one might start asking questions. Why, for instance, if the war on terror breeds more terrorists, haven't there been attacks on the U.S. soil since 2001? Why, if George W. Bush had removed our freedom of speech, was nobody ever arrested for saying anything? And if Obama has returned us our freedoms, why was a man harassed by police in Oklahoma for having an anti-Obama sign in his car? Why would anyone who supports free speech want to silence talk radio? And why is silencing the opposition called the "Fairness Doctrine"?

After the number of "caring," bleeding-heart politicians in Washington reached a critical mass, it was only a matter of time before the government started ordering banks to help the poor by giving them risky home loans through community organizers. Which resulted in a bigger demand, which resulted in rising prices, which resulted in slimmer chances of repaying the loans, which resulted in more pressure on the banks, which resulted in repackaging of bad loans, which resulted in a collapse of the banks, which resulted in a recession, which resulted in many borrowers losing their jobs, which resulted in no further mortgage payments, which resulted in a financial disaster, which resulted in a worldwide crisis, with billions of poor people overseas - who had never seen a community organizer, nor applied for a bad loan - becoming even poorer than they had been before the "progressives" in the U.S. government decided to help the poor.

As if that were not enough, the same bleeding hearts are now trying to fix this by nationalizing the banks so that they can keep issuing risky loans through community organizers. In other words, to prevent the toast from landing buttered side down, they're planning to butter the toast on both sides and hope that it will hover in mid-air. Which also seems like a sensible alternative energy initiative.

If that doesn't fix the problem, there's always the last resort of a liberal: blame capitalism. It's always a win-win. Today government regulators may be blaming capitalism for the crisis caused by their dilettantish tampering with the economy, but who do you think they will credit after market forces resuscitate the economy?

Years ago, living in America made me feel as though I had traveled in a time machine from the past. But after the recent "revolutionary" changes have turned reality on its head - which is what "revolution" literally means - I'm getting an uneasy feeling I had come from your future.

As your comrade from the future, I also feel a social obligation to help my less advanced comrades in the American community, and prepare them for the transition to the glorious world of underground literature, half-whispered jokes, and the useful habit of looking over your shoulder. Don't become a nation of cowards - but watch who might be listening.

Let's start with these few.

People's power:

Liberals believe they're advancing people's power - yet they don't believe people can do anything right without their guidance.
People can't do anything right - yet the government bureaucracy can do everything.
The government bureaucracy can do everything - yet liberals don't like it when the government takes control of their lives.
Liberals don't like it when the government takes control of their lives - yet they vote for programs that increase people's dependency on the government.
They vote for programs that increase people's dependency on the government - yet they believe they're advancing people's power.
Bush and the media:

The media said Bush was dumb - yet he won over two intelligent Democrats.
He won over two intelligent Democrats - yet the media said his ratings were hopeless.
The media said his ratings were hopeless - yet the 2004 electoral map was red.
The 2004 electoral map was red - yet the media said his policies failed.
The media said his policies failed - yet the economy grew and the war was won.
The economy grew and the war was won - yet the media said we needed "change."
Public education:

Liberals have been in charge of education for 50 years - yet education is out of control.
Education is out of control - yet liberal teaching methods prevail.
Liberal teaching methods prevail - yet public schools are failing.
Public schools are failing - yet their funding keeps growing.
Their funding keeps growing - yet public schools are always underfunded.
Public schools are always underfunded - yet private schools yield better results for less.
Private schools yield better results for less - yet public education is the only way out of the crisis.
Foreign radicals*:

Foreign radicals hate America - yet they're all wearing American blue jeans.
They're all wearing American blue jeans - yet they disdain American culture.
They disdain American culture - yet they play American music, movies, and video games.
They play American music, movies, and video games - yet they call Americans uncivilized.
They call Americans uncivilized - yet they expect Americans to defend their civilization.
They expect Americans to defend their civilization - yet they think American capitalism is outdated.
They think American capitalism is outdated - yet most of their countries require American handouts.
(* Some US politicians have similar opinions about their redneck constituents - yet they won't shut up about how proud they are to have their mandate.)

Liberals and taxes:

Liberals want to help the poor - yet they won't give money to charities.
They won't give money to charities - yet they'd like the government to become a gigantic charity.
They'd like the government to become a gigantic charity - yet the money has to be taken from people by force.
The money has to be taken from people by force - yet they call it welfare.
They call it welfare - yet higher taxes make everyone poorer.
Higher taxes make everyone poorer - yet liberals find ways not to pay taxes.
Liberals find ways not to pay taxes - yet they get to be chosen to run the government.
Liberals and the CIA:

The CIA is a reactionary institution - yet its agents always leak information that helps liberals politically.
CIA agents always leak information that helps liberals politically - yet liberals say the CIA is clueless.
Liberals say the CIA is clueless - yet in their movies the CIA is running the world.
In their movies the CIA is running the world - yet they tell us that better intelligence could have prevented the war.
Better intelligence could have prevented the war - yet "enhanced interrogations" of captured terrorists must not be allowed.
Love and marriage:

Sex differences are the result of social conditioning - yet homosexuality is biological.
Homosexuality is biological - yet everybody is encouraged to experiment with it.
Everybody is encouraged to experiment with it - yet venereal diseases are treated at the taxpayers' expense.
Venereal diseases are treated at the taxpayers' expense - yet taxpayers have no right to impose standards since there are no moral absolutes.
There are no moral absolutes - yet gay marriage is an absolute must.
Gay marriage is an absolute must - yet family is an antiquated tool of bourgeois oppression.

What do the Russians who fled their homeland to the land of the Free think now?

From the Blog of a Russian dissident...quite a lament. I never thought I would see this in my lifetime- he even brings forth some things that have happened recently that I wasn't aware of, and I PAY ATTENTION like a good American should...




American capitalism gone with a whimper
English Pravda ru ^ May 4, 2009 Mat Rodina

Posted on Monday, May 04, 2009 7:28:24 AM by HighlyOpinionated

It must be said, that like the breaking of a great dam, the American decent into Marxism is happening with breath taking speed, against the back drop of a passive, hapless sheeple, excuse me dear reader, I meant people.

The ultimate perfection More...

True, the situation has been well prepared on and off for the past century, especially the past twenty years. The initial testing grounds was conducted upon our Holy Russia and a bloody test it was. But we Russians would not just roll over and give up our freedoms and our souls, no matter how much money Wall Street poured into the fists of the Marxists.

Those lessons were taken and used to properly prepare the American populace for the surrender of their freedoms and souls, to the whims of their elites and betters.

First, the population was dumbed down through a politicized and substandard education system based on pop culture, rather then the classics. Americans know more about their favorite TV dramas then the drama in DC that directly affects their lives. They care more for their "right" to choke down a McDonalds burger or a BurgerKing burger than for their constitutional rights. Then they turn around and lecture us about our rights and about our "democracy". Pride blind the foolish.
Then their faith in God was destroyed, until their churches, all tens of thousands of different "branches and denominations" were for the most part little more then Sunday circuses and their televangelists and top protestant mega preachers were more then happy to sell out their souls and flocks to be on the "winning" side of one pseudo Marxist politician or another. Their flocks may complain, but when explained that they would be on the "winning" side, their flocks were ever so quick to reject Christ in hopes for earthly power. Even our Holy Orthodox churches are scandalously liberalized in America.

The final collapse has come with the election of Barack Obama. His speed in the past three months has been truly impressive. His spending and money printing has been a record setting, not just in America's short history but in the world. If this keeps up for more then another year, and there is no sign that it will not, America at best will resemble the Wiemar Republic and at worst Zimbabwe.

These past two weeks have been the most breath taking of all. First came the announcement of a planned redesign of the American Byzantine tax system, by the very thieves who used it to bankroll their thefts, loses and swindles of hundreds of billions of dollars. These make our Russian oligarchs look little more then ordinary street thugs, in comparison. Yes, the Americans have beat our own thieves in the shear volumes. Should we congratulate them?

These men, of course, are not an elected panel but made up of appointees picked from the very financial oligarchs and their henchmen who are now gorging themselves on trillions of American dollars, in one bailout after another. They are also usurping the rights, duties and powers of the American congress (parliament). Again, congress has put up little more then a whimper to their masters.

Then came Barack Obama's command that GM's (General Motor) president step down from leadership of his company. That is correct, dear reader, in the land of "pure" free markets, the American president now has the power, the self given power, to fire CEOs and we can assume other employees of private companies, at will. Come hither, go dither, the centurion commands his minions.

So it should be no surprise, that the American president has followed this up with a "bold" move of declaring that he and another group of unelected, chosen stooges will now redesign the entire automotive industry and will even be the guarantee of automobile policies. I am sure that if given the chance, they would happily try and redesign it for the whole of the world, too. Prime Minister Putin, less then two months ago, warned Obama and UK's Blair, not to follow the path to Marxism, it only leads to disaster. Apparently, even though we suffered 70 years of this Western sponsored horror show, we know nothing, as foolish, drunken Russians, so let our "wise" Anglo-Saxon fools find out the folly of their own pride.

Again, the American public has taken this with barely a whimper...but a "freeman" whimper.

So, should it be any surprise to discover that the Democratically controlled Congress of America is working on passing a new regulation that would give the American Treasury department the power to set "fair" maximum salaries, evaluate performance and control how private companies give out pay raises and bonuses? Senator Barney Franks, a social pervert basking in his homosexuality (of course, amongst the modern, enlightened American societal norm, as well as that of the general West, homosexuality is not only not a looked down upon life choice, but is often praised as a virtue) and his Marxist enlightenment, has led this effort. He stresses that this only affects companies that receive government monies, but it is retroactive and taken to a logical extreme, this would include any company or industry that has ever received a tax break or incentive.

The Russian owners of American companies and industries should look thoughtfully at this and the option of closing their facilities down and fleeing the land of the Red as fast as possible. In other words, divest while there is still value left.

The proud American will go down into his slavery with out a fight, beating his chest and proclaiming to the world, how free he really is. The world will only snicker.

Stanislav Mishin

The article has been reprinted with the kind permission from the author and originally appears on his blog, Mat Rodina

http://mat-rodina.blogspot.com/ This is an excellent blog for the Russian Viewpoint.

Follow the money .....

OUTRAGEOUS!!!! Politicians accept funds from AIG After BAILOUT !!!
Everyone is pocketing our money except us. This is infuriating! The majority of Americans were against the Bailout and now the government is adding insult to financial injury!


The below listed politicians accepted the listed amount of funds from AIG after bailout funds were provided out of our taxes.

Office Name Amount
President Barack Obama $107,332.00
Vice President Joseph Biden Jr. $ 41,350.00
Senate Chris Dodd (D. CT) $280,238.00
Senate Chuck Schumer D NY) $111,875.00

Senate John McCain (R AZ) $ 99,249.00

Senate Max Baucus (D MT) $ 90,000.00
Senate John Kerry (D MA) $ 85,000.00
Senate Joe Lieberman (D CT) $ 57,900.00

Senate John Eensign (R NV) $ 44.569.00

Senate Evan Bayh (D IN) $ 43,700.00
Senate Tom Carper (D DE) $ 37,312.00

Senate Richard Shelby (R AL) $ 31,250.00
Senate Jack Reid (D RI) $ 30,600.00

Senate Chuck Grassley (R IO) $ 27,750.00

House Charlie Rangel (D NY) $ 53,582.00
House John Larson (D CT) $ 43,000.00
House Nita Lowey (D NY) $ 31,800.00

House Michael Castle (R DE) $ 29,350.00

House Garry Ackerman (D NY) $ 27,750.00
House Jerrold Nadler (D NY) $ 26,000.00
House Earl Pomeroy D ND) $ 20,720.00
House Carolyn Maloney (D NY) $ 19,200.00
House Joseph Crowley (D NY) $ 18,500.00
House Howard Berman (D CA) $ 18,000.00
House Edwin Perlmutter (D CO) $ 14,650.00
House Steve Israel (D NY) $ 13,950.00

Thanks for your attention!
A2Z Publications LLC
http://www.a2zpublications.com/
_________________

And more reason to be infuriated!!!!


German and French banks got $36 billion from AIG Bailout

Posted by: Michael Mandel

We officially moved into the next stage of the crisis today. AIG, likely under pressure from the administration, decided to come clean about where most of the bailout money was going. In a press release with several attachments, the struggling insurer detailed which counterparties had gotten about $100 billion of the bailout funds.


I added up the various lists provided by AIG by country (see below), and the results were quite revealing. About $44 billion went to counterparties headquartered in the U.S., such as Goldman Sachs and states such as California and Virginia.

But as I expected, the majority of the funds—$58 billion—went to banks headquartered outside the U.S. The big winners were French and German banks, which pulled in $19 billion and $17 billion respectively.

To put these numbers in perspective, remember that the U.S. fiscal stimulus bill passed in February provided only $27.5 billion for highway and bridge construction.

In effect, the U.S. Treasury and Fed have been bailing out the rest of the world, to a massive degree. Is this a good thing? Perhaps.

But the U.S. cannot be the banker for the entire world. Now that the list are public knowledge, Congress is going to balk at providing any more open-ended financing for foreign counterparties. We are faced a global crisis, and it can only be solved through global action.

Here’s the country table. The detailed bank table is under the break.



Country AIG-related payments

billions of dollars
US 43.5
France 19.1
Germany 16.7
UK 12.7
Switzerland 5.4
Netherlands 2.3
Canada 1.1
Spain 0.3
Denmark 0.2
101.3



AIG-Related Payments
Country
Bank Amount Total Country
billions of dollars
Bank of Montreal 1.1 1.1 Canada
Danske 0.2 0.2 Denmark
Société Générale 11.9 France
BNP Paribas 4.9 France
Calyon 2.3 France
19.1 France
Deutsche Bank 11.8 Germany
Dresdner Kleinwort 2.2 Germany
Deutsche Zentral-Genossenschaftsbank 1 Germany
DZ Bank 0.7 Germany
KFW 0.5 Germany
Dresdner Bank AG 0.4 Germany
Landesbank Baden-Wuerttemberg 0.1 Germany
16.7 Germany
ING 1.5 Netherlands
Rabobank 0.8 Netherlands
2.3 Netherlands
Banco Santander 0.3 0.3 Spain
UBS 5 Switzerland
Credit Suisse 0.4 Switzerland
5.4 Switzerland
Barclays 8.5 UK
HSBC Bank USA 3.5 UK
Royal Bank of Scotland 0.7 UK
12.7 UK
Goldman Sachs 12.9 US
States and Cities 12 US
Merrill Lynch 6.8 US
Bank of America 5.2 US
Citigroup 2.3 US
Wachovia 1.5 US
Morgan Stanley 1.2 US
AIG International Inc. 0.6 US
JPMorgan 0.4 US
Citadel 0.2 US
Paloma Securities 0.2 US
Reconstruction Finance Corp 0.2 US
43.5 US

Just in case you don't believe it... read all about it........here