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#4411 The Garden » House approves $70 billion more for war » 916 weeks ago
- Randall Flagg
- Replies: 33
House approves $70 billion more for war
Congress approved $70 billion Wednesday for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, a bitter finish for majority Democrats who tried to force a change in President Bush's war policy.
The House's 272-142 vote also sent the president a $555 billion catchall spending bill that combines the war money with money for 14 Cabinet departments.
Bush and his Senate GOP allies forced the Iraq money upon anti-war Democrats as the price for permitting the year-end budget deal to pass and be signed. But other Democrats were eager to avoid being seen as not supporting troops who are in harm's way '” and avoid weeks of bashing by Bush for failing to provide that money.
"This is a blank check," complained Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass. "The new money in this bill represents one cave-in too many. It is an endorsement of George Bush's policy of endless war."
The vote reflected the reluctance by each party to deny money to troops in the field. At the same time, anti-war Democrats had found their position weakened by the decline in violence in Iraq.
War spending aside, Bush's GOP allies were divided over whether the overall spending bill was a victory for their party in the monthslong fight with Democrats over agency budgets.
Conservatives and outside groups such as the Club for Growth, which seeks to elect lawmakers opposed to tax and spending increases, criticized the bill for having about $28 billion in domestic spending that topped Bush's budget and was paid for by a combination of "emergency" spending, transfers from the defense budget and other maneuvers.
Republican leaders acknowledged some excesses. But they said the measure could have cost a lot more if the GOP and the White House not stood firm against more than $20 billion in additional domestic spending included in Democratic spending bills that passed last summer.
"The fact is we got the number down to the baseline," said House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio.
Boehner supported moves that effectively broke Bush's budget cap to provide record budget increases for veterans and to build a fence and provide additional security along the U.S.-Mexico border.
While disappointed on the Iraq money, Democrats said the spending bill smoothed the rough edges of the president's February budget plan. That proposal had sought below-inflation increases for most domestic programs and contained numerous cuts and program eliminations.
For Democrats, just finishing the budget ended up as the driving goal. They wanted to avoid the humiliation of failing to enact the spending bills after criticizing then-majority Republicans for not doing so last year.
The spending legislation affects virtually every part of the government other than the Defense Department's core programs. It would pay for food and toy safety inspections, NASA, the FBI, the Coast Guard, education, health research and national park operations.
It also contains about 9,000 pet projects sought by lawmakers, at a cost of more than $7 billion, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, a Washington-based group that fights such projects.
The bill would raise the pay of federal civilian workers by 3.5 percent, extend farm subsidies the food stamp program until March 15 and eliminated money for a next generation nuclear warhead. It also would keep banks from entering the real estate business.
But the White House succeeded in using veto threats to rid the bill of more contentious items such as ending a ban on U.S. aid to overseas family planning groups that perform abortions and easing financing of agricultural and medical sales to Cuba.
#4412 Re: The Garden » Listen to the fascist sing... » 916 weeks ago
How was she not treated with respect? She was in violation of the law and was placed in restraints. I don't care if she felt embarassed. She was only in restraints when she was in a public area. This all of course assumes her story is 100% factual and she isn't distorting reality like a spoiled Paris Hilton seeking attention.
The law is designed so all people are treated the same and don't receive special treatment based on appearance and status. Next time she will honor the visa the US gave her when she comes here on 1st class.
edit: you know what my last paragraph means. You have an obsession with stories that lack strong factual basis and rely heavily on circumstancial or "hidden" evidence. Some people who have that trait are known as schizophrenic. I'm not saying you are, but your beliefs and statements are often similar to those declared mentally unfit.
#4413 Re: The Garden » Listen to the fascist sing... » 916 weeks ago
Bullshit. This is a spoiled brat who ignored America's laws and thought there would be no repercussion. While she probably posed no threat, you liberals wouls throw a fit if we focused on the only ethnicity to committ terrorist attacks. Proper procedure was followed. She doesn't have a right to come to America. She wasn't beaten or tortured. Just because she chose to stay awake for 24 hours before coming here doesn't mean the US has to provide her with a place to sleep immediately.
I'm so fucking tired of people yelling fascist everytime someone who broke the law is detained. She wasn't tortured or harmed. The fucking morons at HTGTH are having a field day with this but are demonstrating their lack of basic reading comprehension and common sense.
What should have customs done? Said "Hey, you broke your visa and disregarded the laws of our land, but FUCK IT! Welcome to America and feel free to violate our laws again if you want. " The first time something goes wrong, the sheep will scream why didn't we do something. Shit, how many idiots point blame at Bush because he didn't jump up and start screaming in front of some children when he learned the first plane hit.
Get a grip, put down the drugs and start living in the real world. They're not out to get you and there are no boogeymen. The Freemasons don't rule the world and the CIA doesn't care what bullshit some blogger posts on you tube. It's sad that people's lives are so boring and devoid of any meaning that they have to make up shit like this so they can delude themselves into thinking only they see the real truth.
/endrant
#4414 Re: The Garden » Supernatural Experiences » 916 weeks ago
If anyone took offense to my joke I apologize. Sometimes I forget that my sense of humor isn't shared by everyone. Sorry for interupting a serious thread.
#4415 Re: The Garden » Supernatural Experiences » 916 weeks ago
I have a crazy ghost story too.
I was in the library a few years ago and heard an old lady scream from down stairs. My friends and I went to go investigate and saw a ghost floating around messing with books. We didn' want to disturb her, so we just kind of hung around. We found some mucus like substance on an index card shelf as we were following it and assumed the departed must have come in contact with it. Finally the ghost was isolated in one area. I yelled to my friend Ray to "GO GET HER!" and the ghost became very angry and chased us out of the library. No one believed us though.
Later that night this girl I like came home. She felt an erie presence in her apartment. Some eggs jumped out of he grocerie bag she had brought home and started frying. She was drawn to the refrigerator door. As she opened it, she saw a parralel dimension and some dog like creature yelled "ZUEL" at her. She slammed the door shut and ran to my friends house that kind of looked like a fire house.
Little did I know, my friends Ray and Igon had developed a type of ray gun that would neutralize the ghost we had encountered. He lived right by a restraunt and we heard screaming from it. We heard people yelling that there was a ghost in there. We decided it was a good time to try out the new weapons. When we got in the haunted room, there was a Green Ghost I'll call Slimer. He rushed me and I was covered in a weird mucus substance. He ran into another room and the three of us used the ray guns Ray and Igon invented (we called em proton packs) to capture Slimer.
The next day there was a big thunder cloud over this apartment building. A huge earth quake happened and we knew the source of the paranormal activity was at the top of the building. We climed the the stairs to the top and found Zuel, the same monster I saw in my fridge. Also at some point Zuel turned this girl I was dating and this geek who kind of looked like Rick Morranis into those dog creatures I mentioned earlier.
Anyway, Zuel told us to choose the form of the destructor and my friend Ray thought of a marshmallow man. The Staypuft Marshmallow man to be exact. So this 100 foot monster came storming down the streets (this all sounds crazy I know). Anyway, we fired our proton packs at it but to no avail. Igon had told me not to ever cross the streams of our proton packs, but we had to do close the door that the evil was coming from. We did it and caused the door to close and destroyed all the ghost. Everyone was covered in marshmallow but me. The girl I was dating and the Rick Morranis lookalike turned back to normal. We scooped up some leftover marshmallow, make some cocoa and lived happily ever after.
I know that story seems crazy, but I had to share it with all the other true stories people have been sharing. Then again, I may have been on a meth, crack, heroin and LSD binge so maybe I dreamed it all or saw it on TV. Who knows.
#4416 Re: The Sunset Strip » The Mist (SPOILERS) » 917 weeks ago
The Dark Tower is the greatest set of works I have ever read. These books changed my life.
Hell, two people in this thread alone have their handles named after the two most important characters in the King Universe and thus Dark Tower.
#4417 Re: The Garden » Guitar Hero III - Legends of Rock » 917 weeks ago
Anyone have this game for the 360? it'd be cool to battle some people and trash talk on here.
#4418 Re: The Sunset Strip » The Video Game Console Thread » 917 weeks ago
i got Zelda for the wii last night, havent tried it yet though, I gotta beat mario first, I'm 26 stars into it, such a great game!
I beat Zelda last week after a year Hiatus. It is a great game, but nothing can hold a candle to The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. I've heard that Super Mario Galaxy has dethroned the aforementioned as the greatest game of all time, but I wasn't impressed with Mario 64 so I'm holding off on trying the only real Mario game since then.
#4419 Re: The Garden » Mars rover finds signs of microbial life » 917 weeks ago
Shit, that's just a ripoff of Planet of The Apes. The space virus killed all our pets so we turned to the Apes. Nothing original there.
#4420 The Garden » Interesting Read on Hillary... » 917 weeks ago
- Randall Flagg
- Replies: 8
Someone sent me this at work today......
Do you really want her to run our country?
AN ANALYSIS WORTH READING:
by Dick Morris, former political advisor to President Bill Clinton.
If you happen to see the Bill Clinton five minute TV ad for Hillary in which he introduces the commercial by saying that he wants to share some things we may not know about Hillary's background . .
beware . .
As I was there for most of their presidency and know them better than just about anyone, I offer a few corrections; Bill says: 'In law school Hillary worked on legal services for the poor.'
The facts are: Hillary's main extra-curricular activity in law school was helping the Black Panthers, on trial in Connecticut for torturing and killing a federal agent. She went to court every day as part of a law student monitoring committee trying to spot civil rights violations and develop grounds for appeal. Bill says: 'Hillary spent a year after graduation working on a children's rights project for poor kids.'
The facts are: Hillary interned with Bob Truehaft, the head of the California Communist Party. She met Bob when he represented the Panthers and traveled all the way to San Francisco to take an internship with him. Bill says: 'Hillary could have written her own job ticket, but she turned down all the lucrative job offers.'
The facts are: She flunked the DC bar exam, yes, flunked, it is a matter of record, and only passed the Arkansas bar. She had no job offers in Arkansas, none, and only got hired by the University of Arkansas Law School at Fayetteville because Bill was already teaching there. She did not join the prestigious Rose Law Firm until Bill became Arkansas Attorney General and was made a partner only after he was elected Arkansas Governor.
Bill says: 'President Carter appointed Hillary to the Legal Services Board of Directors and she became its chairman.'
The facts are: The appointment was in exchange for Bill's support for Carter in his 1980 primary against Ted Kennedy. Hillary then became chairman in a coup in which she won a majority away from Carter's choice to be chairman.
Bill says: 'She served on the board of the Arkansas Children's Hospital.'
The facts are: Yes she did. But her main board activity, not mentioned by Bill, was to sit on the Wal-mart board of directors, for a substantial fee. She was silent about their labor and health care practices.
Bill says: 'Hillary didn't succeed at getting health care for all Americans in 1994 but she kept working at it and helped to create the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) that provides five million children with health insurance.' The facts are: Hillary had nothing to do with creating CHIP. It was included in the budget deal between Clinton and Republican Majority Leader Senator Trent Lott. I know; I helped to negotiate the deal. The money came half from the budget deal and half from the Attorney Generals' tobacco settlement. Hillary had nothing to do with either source of funds.
Bill says: 'Hillary was the face of America all over the world.'
The facts are: Her visits were part of a program to get her out of town so that Bill would not appear weak by feeding stories that Hillary was running the White House. Her visits abroad were entirely touristic and symbolic and there was no substantive diplomacy on any of them.
Bill says: 'Hillary was an excellent Senator who kept fighting for children's and women's issues.'
The facts are: Other than totally meaningless legislation like changing the names on courthouses and post offices, she has passed only four substantive pieces of legislation. One set up a national park in Puerto Rico. A second provided respite care for family members helping their relatives through Alzheimer's or other conditions. And two were routine bills to aid 911 victims and responders which were sponsored by the entire NY delegation. Presently she is trying to have the US memorialize the Woodstock fiasco of 40 years ago.
Here is what bothers me more than anything else about Hillary Clinton. She has done everything possible to weaken the President and our country (that's you and me!) when it comes to the war on terror.
1. She wants to close GITMO and move the combatants to the USA where they would have access to our legal system.
2. She wants to eliminate the monitoring of suspected Al Qaeda phone calls to/from the USA.
3. She wants to grant constitutional rights to enemy combatants captured on the battlefield.
4. She wants to eliminate the monitoring of money transfers between suspected Al Qaeda cells and supporters in the USA.
5. She wants to eliminate the type of interrogation tactics used by the military & CIA where coercion might be used when questioning known terrorists even though such tactics might save American lives. One cannot think of a single bill Hillary has introduced or a single comment she has made that would tend to strengthen our country in the War on Terror. But, one can think of a lot of comments she has made that weaken our country and makes it a more dangerous situation for all of us.
Bottom line: She goes hand in hand with the ACLU on far too many issues where common sense is abandoned.