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Topics - Kramer

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61
3DHS / Boy Wonder is Heartbroken About Basetball Delay
« on: October 12, 2011, 11:59:47 AM »
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/10/11/obama_heartbroken_nba_season_is_getting_delayed.html

THE PRESIDENT: I love you back. I do. Although I have to say that backstage I had the chance to see Dwight Howard — (applause) — and Dwight is a great friend, and I told him I’m a little heartbroken that the NBA season is getting delayed here. (Laughter.) So I’m hoping those guys are back on the court soon. In the meantime, I’m here because I need all of your help. I need your help. (Applause.)

62
3DHS / So much for a free country anymore
« on: October 11, 2011, 07:28:16 PM »
http://www.wtop.com/?nid=149&sid=2584585

FALLS CHURCH, Va. - It seemed like a great idea -- build a treehouse on his property for two growing boys. But for one local man, it's turning into a big, expensive lesson in government red tape.

Mark Grapin thought his two sons would love the treehouse.

He called Fairfax County before starting to find out the rules for the Broyhill Park neighborhood in the Falls Church area of the county.

"The guy in building permits laughed me off the phone," Grapin says. He was told it's a treehouse and not built to any code.

So Grapin went to the local home improvement store, bought $1,400 worth of supplies and spent six weekends building the treehouse.

It has red clapboard siding, shingles, a slide, a pull-down ladder, two climbing ropes, closed windows and shutters.

It is wrapped around the tree but stands free, not touching the tree. It stands to the side of his house.

Grapin says his immediate neighbors had no complaints, but someone did complain anonymously to Fairfax County.

Grapin was told he had to treat it like an addition to his house and get a zoning variance. He spent more than $1,800 getting the proper forms and going through a hearing.

The home sits on a corner lot and Zoning Board Chairman John Ribble says that means what Grapin thought was a side lot is actually the front lot.

The variance was rejected.

Grapin says he has an appeal scheduled for Nov. 30, but if he loses that he will have to remove the treehouse.

"I don't have the heart for it," he says. "I'm gonna go pay some day laborers and hide in the house while they take a saw to it."

If that happens, what will he tell his kids?

"Daddy makes mistakes. We tried our best. I made a mistake by not knowing enough."

Follow Hank and WTOP on Twitter.

64
3DHS / Michelle shovels food down like no tomorrow
« on: October 11, 2011, 12:03:31 PM »
Nice example for the children, good job, fat ass


When Paula Deen met Michelle Obama, it wasn't exactly the queen of butter versus the first lady of garden greens. Deen, known for her delicious not-so-good-for-you recipes like Gooey Butter Cake, said the two women had more in common than you might expect.

"Well, I did a show with Michelle and I just loved being with her," Deen told Yeas & Nays. "She probably ate more than any other guest I've ever had on the show —she kept eating even during commercials." Deen taught Obama how to fry shrimp during a TV segment in September before the 2008 presidential election. "You know what their favorite foods are — it's hot wings, you know, those kinds of foods that are not necessarily top-of-the-list healthy foods, so she's no different than the rest of us," Deen said. "We love those kinds of foods, we just know that we can't eat them everyday."

The culinary superstar also said she supported the first lady's initiative to get more Americans gardening. "So I love that," she said. "I was really happy to see her encouraging children, you know, to plant their little gardens."

This week, Deen is embarking on a book tour by bus, which will bring her to Washington next month as one of the headliners for the Metropolitan Cooking and Entertaining Show at the Washington Convention Center. (Chefs Jacques Pepin, Giada De Laurentiis and Guy Fiere are also coming). There, she'll be doing some cooking, but also talking about her new book "Paula Deen's Southern Cooking Bible," her biggest cookbook yet. "I do more talking than I do cooking," she explained. "I'm just reconnecting with my friends out there and just sharing some laughs with them."

The Metropolitan Cooking and Entertaining Show will be held Nov. 5 to 6, with tickets costing $24.50 in advance online and $27 at the door.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/yeas-nays/2011/10/paula-dean-michelle-obama-likes-fried-food-too#ixzz1aUB8x18G

65
3DHS / Just like I predicted, Herman Cain is leading in polls
« on: October 11, 2011, 11:54:43 AM »

66
3DHS / Tuesday Debate
« on: October 10, 2011, 11:48:30 PM »
Don't forget to watch tomorrow nights debate.

67
3DHS / I think Obama has been a loner his whole life
« on: October 10, 2011, 12:13:08 PM »
Folks, in other words Obama is mentally depressed!!

Aimless Obama walks alone

Last Updated: 3:45 AM, October 9, 2011

Posted: 2:49 AM, October 9, 2011

The reports are not good, disturbing even. I have heard basically the same story four times in the last 10 days, and the people doing the talking are in New York and Washington and are spread across the political spectrum.

The gist is this: President Obama has become a lone wolf, a stranger to his own government. He talks mostly, and sometimes only, to friend and adviser Valerie Jarrett and to David Axelrod, his political strategist.

Everybody else, including members of his Cabinet, have little face time with him except for brief meetings that serve as photo ops. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner both have complained, according to people who have talked to them, that they are shut out of important decisions.

The president’s workdays are said to end early, often at 4 p.m. He usually has dinner in the family residence with his wife and daughters, then retreats to a private office. One person said he takes a stack of briefing books. Others aren’t sure what he does.

If the reports are accurate, and I believe they are, they paint a picture of an isolated man trapped in a collapsing presidency. While there is no indication Obama is walking the halls of the White House late at night, talking to the portraits of former presidents, as Richard Nixon did during Watergate, the reports help explain his odd public remarks.

Obama conceded in one television interview recently that Americans are not “better off than they were four years ago” and said in another that the nation had “gotten a little soft.” Both smacked of a man who feels discouraged and alienated and sparked comparisons to Jimmy Carter, never a good sign.

Blaming the country is political heresy, of course, yet Obama is running out of scapegoats. His allies rarely make affirmative arguments on his behalf anymore, limiting themselves to making excuses for his failure. He and they attack Republicans, George W. Bush, European leaders and Chinese currency manipulation -- and that was just last week.

The blame game isn’t much of a defense for Solyndra and “Fast and Furious,” the emerging twin scandals that paint a picture of incompetence at best.

Obama himself is spending his public time pushing a $450 billion “jobs” bill -- really another stimulus in disguise -- that even Senate Democrats won’t support. He grimly flogged it repeatedly at his Thursday press conference, even though snowballs in hell have a better chance of survival.

If he cracked a single smile at the hour-plus event, I missed it. He seems happy only on the campaign trail, where the adoration of the crowd lifts his spirits.

When it comes to getting America back on track to economic growth, he is running on vapors. Yet he shows no inclination to adopt any ideas other than his own Big Government grab. His itch for higher taxes verges on a fetish.

Harvey Golub, former chairman of American Express, called the “jobs” bill an incoherent mess. Writing in The Wall Street Journal, he said that among other flaws, the bill includes an unheard of retroactive tax hike on the holders of municipal bonds.

“Many of us have suspected that economic illiterates were setting the economic policy of this administration,” Golub wrote, adding that the bill “reveals a depth of cluelessness that boggles the mind.”

The public increasingly shares the sentiment. A new Quinnipiac polls finds that 55 percent now disapprove of Obama’s job performance, with only 41 percent approving. A mere 29 percent say the economy will improve if the president gets four more years.

The election, unfortunately, is nearly 13 months away.

The way Obama’s behaving, by then we’ll all be talking to portraits of past presidents, asking why this one turned out to be such a flop.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/aimless_obama_walks_alone_OUgoMTkORRJioLl7B6ZYmN#ixzz1aOMjtp3I




68
3DHS / Eric Holder
« on: October 09, 2011, 11:34:20 PM »
Eric likely will be forced to resign sometime in the next 30-60 days.

69
3DHS / Pray for our first black president
« on: October 09, 2011, 07:09:37 PM »
I pray Herman Cain will become our nations first truly black president.

Republican presidential contender Herman Cain amplified his criticism Sunday of the growing Occupy Wall Street movement, calling the protesters “jealous’ Americans who "play the victim card” and want to “take somebody else’s” Cadillac.

Cain’s remarks, on CBS’ "Face the Nation," came amidst an escalating war of words between Republicans and Democrats over the merits of the movement, which has spread from New York to other cities across the nation, including Washington and Los Angeles.

GOP politicians in recent days have stepped up their criticism of the protesters, with House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) calling them "mobs" who have pitted “Americans against Americans.”

But Cain, surging in popularity among many conservatives, seems to have had among the most virulent responses to the protests.

On CBS, Cain suggested that the rallies had been organized by labor unions to serve as a “distraction so that many people won’t focus on the failed policies of the Obama administration.”

The banking and financial services industries aren’t responsible for those policies, Cain said. “To protest Wall Street and the bankers is basically saying you’re anti-capitalism,” he said.

Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich, who appeared on the program with Cain, offered a more measured response, but blamed the White House for the discord.

“There a lot of people in America who are angry,” Gingrich said. “This is the natural product of President Obama’s class warfare.”

Speaking on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), chairman of the House Budget Committee, also pointed a finger at the president, whom he accused of fear-mongering.

"He's preying on the emotions of fear, envy and anger. And that is not constructive to unifying America," Ryan said. "I think he's broken his promise as a uniter, and now he's dividing people. And to me, that's very unproductive."

Ryan cited protests in his home state of Wisconsin this year over collective bargaining legisation when asked about the Wall Street movement. “I don’t disparage anyone who protests their government in favor of better government, no matter what perspective they come from,” he said.

Asked whether Cain’s criticism was representative of the party, Ryan said, “I think Herman’s speaking for himself.”

House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco on ABC’s “This Week,” essentially called Cantor a hypocrite for criticizing the Wall Street protesters while embracing the “tea party” movement.

“I didn’t hear him say anything when the tea party was out demonstrating, actually spitting on members of Congress right here in the Capitol, and he and his colleagues were putting signs in the windows encouraging them,’ Pelosi said.

Pelosi said she supported the movement’s “message.”

“I support the message to the establishment, whether it's Wall Street or the political establishment and the rest, that change has to happen,” she said “We cannot continue in a way that does not — that is not relevant to their lives. People are angry.”

70
3DHS / Creating Poor People
« on: October 09, 2011, 05:41:38 PM »
I wonder if it's easy to convert a nation to Communism if the Middle Class goes away?

If you had a president that was a committed Communist would it be in his/her best interest to ruin a nations capitalist economy or improve it?

I am just trying to figure things out here. After all, the smartest man in the world couldn't possibly destroy a nations economy by mistake or out of ignorance, or could he?

Vote Herman Cain for President. I want to see a real African American whoop a phony black man/boy.

71
3DHS / Obama Kills US Citizen
« on: October 09, 2011, 04:31:51 PM »
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/09/world/middleeast/secret-us-memo-made-legal-case-to-kill-a-citizen.html?_r=2&hp

Travel abroad at your own risk. Soon, maybe coming to your home in the USA.

72
3DHS / Speaking of imbecility
« on: October 09, 2011, 04:20:32 PM »
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-atf-guns-20111009,0,6431788.story?track=rss

Reporting from Washington—
High-powered assault weapons illegally purchased under the ATF's Fast and Furious program in Phoenix ended up in a home belonging to the purported top Sinaloa cartel enforcer in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, whose organization was terrorizing that city with the worst violence in the Mexican drug wars.

In all, 100 assault weapons acquired under Fast and Furious were transported 350 miles from Phoenix to El Paso, making that West Texas city a central hub for gun traffickers. Forty of the weapons made it across the border and into the arsenal of Jose Antonio Torres Marrufo, a feared cartel leader in Ciudad Juarez, according to federal court records and trace documents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

The smugglers' tactics — quickly moving the weapons far from ATF agents in southern Arizona, where it had been assumed they would circulate — vividly demonstrate that what had been viewed as a local problem was much larger. Six other Fast and Furious guns destined for El Paso were recovered in Columbus, N.M.

"These Fast and Furious guns were going to Sinaloans, and they are killing everyone down there," said one knowledgeable U.S. government source, who asked for anonymity because of the ongoing investigations. "But that's only how many we know came through Texas. Hundreds more had to get through."

Torres Marrufo, also known as "the Jaguar," has been identified by U.S. authorities as the enforcer for Sinaloa cartel chieftain Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman. The Fast and Furious weapons were found at one of Torres Marrufo's homes April 30 when Mexican police inspected the property. It was unoccupied but "showed signs of recent activity," they said.

The basement had been converted into a gym with a wall covered with built-in mirrors. Behind the mirrors they found a hidden room with the Fast and Furious weapons and dozens more, including an antiaircraft machine gun, a sniper rifle and a grenade launcher.

"We have seized the most important cache of weapons in the history of Ciudad Juarez," Chihuahua state Gov. Cesar Duarte said at the time, though he did not know that many of the weapons came from the U.S. and Fast and Furious.

Torres Marrufo has been indicted in El Paso, but authorities have been unable to locate and arrest him.

In the U.S., intelligence officials consider the Sinaloa cartel the most powerful drug trafficking organization in the world. Weekly reports from U.S. intelligence authorities to the Justice Department in the summer of 2010, at the height of Fast and Furious, warned about the proliferation of guns reaching the Sinaloa cartel.

Under Fast and Furious, begun in fall 2009, the ATF allowed illegal buyers to walk away with weapons in the hope that agents in Phoenix could track the guns and arrest cartel leaders.

Three months into the program, El Paso began to emerge as a hub, perhaps the central location, for Fast and Furious weapons. On Jan. 13, 2010, El Paso police stumbled upon 40 firearms after following a suspicious dark blue Volkswagen Jetta that backed into a garage at a local residence, according to federal court records.

Alberto Sandoval told authorities he acquired the weapons three days after they were purchased from someone he knew only as "Rudy." He said he was paid $1,000 to store the guns and "knew the firearms were going to Mexico."

Sandoval pleaded guilty in federal court in El Paso and was sentenced to 6 1/2 years in prison. A month later, on Dec. 17, 2010, he escaped from a minimum-security prison in Tucson; officials believe he fled to Mexico.

Two others, Ivan Chavira and Edgar Ivan Galvan, were subsequently charged in that gun recovery, along with the recovery of 20 Fast and Furious weapons on April 7, 2010, in El Paso. Those guns also were discovered by chance by local authorities, and ATF trace records show that the weapons were purchased in Phoenix two weeks before they were found in El Paso.

Chavira and Galvan pleaded guilty. Chavira received eight years in prison; Galvan is to be sentenced next month.

73
3DHS / Barone: Time to raise Cain to contender status
« on: October 02, 2011, 10:40:45 PM »
http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/article/barone-time-raise-cain-contender-status

Is Herman Cain a serious contender for the Republican presidential nomination? It's a question no one in the pundit world was asking until the past week.

Cain has never held public office. When he ran for the Senate in Georgia in 2004 he lost the primary by a 52 to 26 percent margin.

He has zero experience in foreign or defense policy, where presidents have the most leeway to set policy. When questioned about the Middle East earlier this year he clearly had no idea what the "right of return" is.

His solid performance in the Fox News/Google debate Sept. 22 didn't get pundits to take his chances seriously.

Neither did his 37 to 15 percent victory over Rick Perry in the Florida straw poll Sept. 24. That was taken as a response to Perry's weak debate performance and a tribute to Cain for showing up and speaking before the 2,657 people who voted.

But Republicans around the nation seem to have responded the same way. The Fox News poll conducted Sept. 25-27 showed Cain with 17 percent of the vote -- a statistically significant jump from the 5 percent he had been averaging in polls taken in previous weeks.

And a SurveyUSA poll of Florida Republicans conducted Sept. 24-27 showed Cain trailing Mitt Romney by only 27 to 25 percent, a statistical tie. That's very different from the Florida polls conducted by Public Policy Polling Sept. 22-25 and Quinnipiac Sept. 14-19, both of which showed Cain with 7 percent.

We will see whether other national or state polls show Cain with a similar surge. If so, then there's a real possibility that Cain could win enough primaries and caucuses to be a real contender.

That possibility is already being taken seriously by the Wall Street Journal's Daniel Henninger. Henninger argued in a Sept. 29 column that Cain's success in business -- engineering turnarounds in Burger King's Philadelphia stores and Godfather's Pizza nationally -- made him a plausible candidate.

"Unlike the incumbent," Henninger wrote, "Herman Cain has at least twice identified the causes of a large failing enterprise, designed goals, achieved them and by all accounts inspired the people he was supposed to lead."

Cain's business success, his "9-9-9" tax plan, his generally conservative stands on issues, the youtube clip showing him debating Bill Clinton on health care in 1994 -- all of these help account for his apparent surge in the polls.

But I suspect there are a couple of other factors. One is likability. Romney's attempts at ingratiation are awkward, and Perry's charm is lost on most non-Texans. But Cain is, as the Atlantic's liberal analyst Chris Good concedes, "undeniably likeable."

Another thing going for him is race. White conservatives like to hear black candidates who articulate their views and will vote for them: check out Rep. Tim Scott of Charleston, S.C.

In this, white conservatives resemble white liberals, who liked hearing Barack Obama articulate their views and were ready to vote for him too. This is what Joe Biden was getting at with his awkward 2007 comment that Obama was a "clean" black candidate.

White moderates are ready to support black candidates too, as Obama showed in the 2008 general election.

Cain claims that he could get one-third of the black vote in a general election. There's no way to rigorously test that.

But it finds some support in Scott Rasmussen's polls, which have been regularly pitting 10 current or possible candidates against Obama. Rasmussen finds Romney ahead by 2 percent and Chris Christie trailing by 1 percent. The other candidate closest to Obama, trailing by 5 percent, is Cain.

Moreover, Cain holds Obama to the lowest share of the vote, 39 percent, of any of the 10 Republicans. That may be because some black voters desert Obama when Cain is the opponent.

Further support can be found in the Low Country of South Carolina, where Tim Scott won with 65 percent of the vote in 2010 in a district where John McCain won just 56 percent and where 20 percent of the population is black. No other Republican freshmen in the Old South ran so far ahead of McCain.

All this speculation may be getting far ahead of the facts. Cain still has significant liabilities as a candidate and could make a disqualifying mistake any time. But he's beginning to look like a contender.

Michael Barone,The Examiner's senior political analyst, can be contacted at mbarone@washingtonexaminer.com. His column appears Wednesday and Sunday, and his stories and blog posts appear on ExaminerPolitics.com.

74
3DHS / Did you know this about Herman Cain?
« on: October 02, 2011, 08:50:49 PM »
Did you know this about Herman Cain?

Herman Cain is running for president.
He’s not a career politician (in fact he has never held political office).
He’s known as a pizza guy, but there’s a lot more to him.
He’s also a computer guy, a banker guy, and a rocket scientist guy.

Here’s his bio:
Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics.
Master’s degree in Computer Science.
Mathematician for the Navy, where he worked on missile ballistics (making him a rocket scientist).
Computer systems analyst for Coca-Cola.
VP of Corporate Data Systems and Services for Pillsbury (this is the top of the ladder in the computer
world, being in charge of information systems for a major corporation).

All achieved before reaching the age of 35. Since he reached the top of the information systems world, he changed careers!

Business Manager. Took charge of Pillsbury’s 400 Burger King restaurants in the Philadelphia area, which were the company’s poorest performers in the country.

Spent the first nine months learning the business from the ground up, cooking hamburger and yes, cleaning toilets.

After three years he had turned them into the company’s best performers.

Godfather’s Pizza CEO. Was asked by Pillsbury to take charge of their Godfather’s Pizza chain (which was on the verge of bankruptcy). He made it profitable in 14 months.

In 1988 he led a buyout of the Godfather’s Pizza chain from Pillsbury.

He was now the owner of a restaurant chain. Again he reached the top of the ladder of another industry.

He was also chairman of the National Restaurant Association during this time.
This is a group that interacts with government on behalf of the restaurant industry, and it gave him political experience from the non-politician side.

Having reached the top of a second industry, he changed careers again!
Adviser to the Federal Reserve System. Herman Cain went to work for the Federal Reserve Banking System advising them on how monetary policy changes would affect American businesses.
Chairman of the Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank.

He worked his way up to the chairmanship of a regional Federal Reserve bank. This is only one step below the chairmanship of the entire Federal Reserve System (the top banking position in the country).
This position allowed him to see how monetary policy is made from the inside, and understand the political forces that impact the monetary system.

After reaching the top of the banking industry, he changed careers for a fourth time!
Writer and public speaker.

He then started to write and speak on leadership.
His books include Speak as a Leader, CEO of Self, Leadership is Common Sense, and They Think You’re Stupid.

Radio Host. Around 2007—after a remarkable 40 year career he started hosting a radio show on WSB in Atlanta (the largest talk radio station in the country).

He did all this starting from rock bottom (his father was a chauffeur and his mother was a maid).

When you add up his accomplishments in his life—including reaching the top of three unrelated industries: information systems, business management, and banking,

Herman Cain may have the most impressive resume of anyone that has run for the presidency in the last half century.

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