December 28 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: REPOST - Six Decades Of 'Anti-Americanism' - The Whats And Whys Of 'Where Did I Go Wrong?

"All The News You Never Knew You Needed To Know ...Until Now."

Cabale News ServiceDecember 28 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: Repost - Six Decades Of What Could Only Be Described As 'Anti-Americanism' - The Whats And Whys Of 'Where Did I Go Wrong?'

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In The News: Travus is taking the rest of the decade off (giggle...)

Travus T. Hipp's Morning News & Commentary will return next Monday, January 04 2010


Da' Buffalo has chosen to repost a commentary from February 20 2009:

Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: Six Decades Of What Could Only Be Described As 'Anti-Americanism' - The Whats And Whys Of 'Where Did I Go Wrong?' (Original link, with the day's news [here])

There IS ugly news today however in the wake of a moronic and childlike attempt by a Nigerian man with SELF-CLAIMED ties to Yemeni radicals who apparently tried to blow up an airliner with something akin to a firecracker... allowing the resurgence of the Homeland Insecurity apparatus' focus on Draconian airline security, color coded 'alert' systems, and all things PATRIOT ACT.

One particularly reprehensible item showed up in Da' Buffalo's inbox this morning leading to...

An Open Letter to the Christian Science Monitor

Friday, December 25, 2009

Predictions For The United States of America During The Second Decade Of The XXI Century

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H/t to Dimitry Orlov @ ClubOrlov:

Da Buffalo wants to note: These ARE NOT 'apocalyptic' predictions... Just predictions of change in a rather uncomfortable and unwanted direction for the citizens of America, and also, perhaps at some point in the not-too-distant future, for the rest of the industrialized world.

As Sweatshop Union exclaims in this video, it's 'ALL ON US'...

Sweatshop Union @ MySpace. The lyrics. Their Wikipedia entry.
An evolutionary HipHop soundtrack is available @ archive.org

...for blithely going about living in a materialist fantasy land since... the beginning of the industrial revolution? But CERTAINLY commencing in it's greatest haste (for the benefit of "the greatest generation", who disregarded their narcissistic and short-sighted expense to abandonment of future generations) at the end of World War II when America's power elite, economists, and leaders decided that the ever-expanding economic model (which of course is impossible) of consumer capitalism, would be the "be all and end all" of American society and culture....for the ultimate enrichment of a few.

Wikipedia has the basics on "Market Capitalism" and Consumer-based economies, but I recommend this article at the Boston Globe: "Why capitalism fails (The man who saw the meltdown coming [Hyman Minsky] had another troubling insight: it will happen again)".

Quote: "This wasn’t a Minsky moment. It was a Minsky half-century.”

...and this was the snake oil image we were being 'sold':
FlyingCities - Robert Makkoll (sp?)
The Jetsons

That said... Dimitry Orlov:
Around this time of year, some brave souls venture to put their reputations at risk by attempting to predict what the next year will bring. Some do so with uncanny accuracy, others — not so much. Being a serious author who hardly ever makes jokes, I generally sit out this annual bout of frivolity, but, noting that a new decade is about to burst upon us, I thought it reasonably safe to paint a picture of how I see the next decade. (In the unlikely case that my predictions turn out to be completely wrong, I would think that they will have been very thoroughly forgotten by the time 2020 rolls around.) And so, without further ado, here are my predictions for what it will be like in The United States of America during the second decade of the XXI century.
The decade will be marked by many instances of autophagy, in business, government, and in the higher echelons of society, as players at all levels find that they are unable to control their appetites or alter their behavior in any meaningful way, even in the face of radically altered circumstances, and are thus compelled to consume themselves into oblivion, as so many disemboweled yet still ravenous sharks endlessly gorging themselves on their own billowing entrails.

Governments will find that they are unable to restrain themselves from printing ever more money in an endless wave of uncontrolled emission. At the same time, rising taxes, commodity prices, and costs of all kinds, coupled with a rising overall level of uncertainty and disruption, will curtail economic activity to a point where little of that money will still circulate. Inflationists and deflationists will endlessly debate whether this should be called inflation or deflation, unconsciously emulating the big-endians and little-endians of Jonathan Swifts Gulliver's Travels, who endlessly debated the proper end from which to eat a soft-boiled egg...
Continued @ ClubOrlov
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Thursday, December 24, 2009

December 24 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: The Cabale News Solution To Last Minute Shopping... Shop Drunk

"All The News You Never Knew You Needed To Know ...Until Now."

Cabale News ServiceDecember 24 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: It's Christmas Eve And Your Covered In Guilt Bubbbie? The Cabale News Service Solution To Last Minute Christmas Shopping (Ht/t John Lundberg)... Shop Drunk

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In The News:
The health reform bill passed the House at 4 am this morning on partisan lines 60-39 and will now move to conference committee, but don't expect anything more to be done until after the 19th of January... When they come back from a month long vacation. How many people perusing this get to work approximately 3-4 full days a week and then take a paid month long vacation?

Still living on "plastic" - Also passed this morning was an increase in the national debt ceiling to $12.4 trillion dollars, a $300 billion dollar increase necessary to simply keep paying pretty much just the interest on the national debt.

The president is off to Hawaii for Christmas and will be working on those health care reform committee sticking points.

The US is claiming the drone strikes that killed 120 people in Yemen was due to a Yemeni tip which claimed al Qaeda was holding an organizational meeting. We hit the village and ostensibly killed 30 SUSPECTED al Qaeda members including an American Mullah from Maryland... the cleric at the mosque the "Fort Hood shooter" attended. Four to one is an improvement over our record in Pakistan where last years statistics on the civilian/militant was 50:1.

The Native Americans are going to get a few more nickels... Chevron has acceded to a $545.5 million dollar payment in return for the US government's dropping of prosecution as a result of the "Cobb settlement" which ruled the Department of Interior's allowed the looting of Native American extractive resource without, or with inadequate payment.

It's not going so well for the native wild Horses of Nevada however... Next Monday 2500 of them will be rounded up and...

Clever administrative ploy of the week... The Sonoma county administrator who ruled to ban a religious display based on a legitimate law, but leaving Sonoma up for a lawsuit has backtracked and instead is allowing each department head to decide. Making it necessary to sue each individual department, upping the tort cost for anyone who might want a nativity display on public Sonoma government property.

..and finally This ain't no Doctor Seuss, but You're a MEAN ONE, Mister Grinch!

From Reason-TV -
Cop Pulls Gun During Snowball Fight

Around 2.30PM on Saturday, December 19, during a historic snowstorm, residents at the intersection of 14th and U Streets NW started throwing snowballs at passing Hummers.

One of the cars pelted was driven by a plainclothes police officer identified only as Det. Baylor. Baylor got out of his car and brandished his gun at the crowd.

Reason.tv's Dan Hayes was on the scene, capturing the tense confrontation between police and citizens who chanted "Don't bring a gun to a snowball fight!"

Approximately 5 minutes; harsh language throughout.


One of the commenters @ YouTube gets it right, even from a policing perspective:
"Then he gets on his off duty radio demanding an emergency assist. Officer's responding to this idiot call could have hurt themselves thinking an officer is in trouble..."
H/t to Alternet, with a pertinent question... "Could it Have Been 'Roid Rage'?"

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Wednesday, December 23, 2009

December 23 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: The Republicans, Evangelical Christianity And Apocalyptic Politics

"All The News You Never Knew You Needed To Know ...Until Now."

Cabale News ServiceDecember 23 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: Willing To Sacrifice Any Future Progress Because They Don't Believe There WILL Be A Future - The Republicans, Evangelical Christianity And Apocalyptic Politics

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In The News: There have been ongoing reports that the #1 wife, daughter, and sons of Osama bin-Laden are staying in an Iranian compound after fleeing Afghanistan post-9/11. Now one of the daughters has escaped and is seeking refuge in Saudi Arabia's embassy in Tehran.

Meanwhile, The Saudis (most likely in coordination with the US which as been striking civilian populations with drone launched 'Cruise' missiles) are at war with Yemen. They've committed air/ground forces against the Northern region where they've had 73 troops killed (and 26 missing) in the last month. They've also blockaded the seaport of Mocha.

The FBI is probing a crime that the victims deny... CitiBank was supposedly hit for hundreds of millions of dollars by Russian hackers and CitiBank is claiming it ain't so (Which means they most likely will not cooperate willingly). Apparently the hackers, euphemistically called the "Russian Business Network' have also breached 7/11's system and ATMs.

Keep watching the media publicized meetings little people... The US and Russia are seeking to finalize their re-agreement of the 1991 Strategic Arms Limitation agreement sometime in 2010, but they'll honor the old one until then. Meanwhile, NATO has requested Russian ground forces for their nasty war on Afghanistan (the Russians are being non-committal on that) and ARE allowing use of their territory for logistics... and in Lithuania's case, it has just been verified by their government's investigation, that the Lithuanian government allowed secret CIA rendition torture dungeons in their country.

The companies marketing the Swine Flu vaccine have issued a second recall of children's nasal doses due to 'loss of potency' and will replace those with 'potent' ones. After 9/11, due to one of the PATRIOT ACT provisions, these companies ARE NOT legally culpable if anything happens because of that problem, and because we must have our gladiator sports protected during times of national crisis... Major League Baseball was also indemnified.

-30-

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Tuesday, December 22, 2009

December 22 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: 'Give Socks' - Dwelling On The Essence Of 'Christmas Past'

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Cabale News ServiceDecember 22 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: 'Give Socks' - Dwelling On The Essence Of 'Christmas Past'

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In The News: The 'real' Health Care Reform bill has been revealed and has passed cloture 60-40... along 'Party Lines'. More.

But for the Southern US, and many other places across America, there's no 'party' yet, as US citizens accept medical assistance from the most "unlikely" (by current US foreign policy/media-driven standards) places.

Iran engages in medical 'diplomacy' a la the "Cuban Model"
The Sunday Times (online.uk)
December 20, 2009
Deep South calls in Iran to cure its health blues
In ground-breaking project, one of America’s poorest communities is turning to the Middle East to try to resolve its crisis


AS Marie Pryor shuffles along a Mississippi roadside collecting discarded drink cans to sell for a few cents, her breath comes in short puffs caused by a congenital heart defect. The same condition caused her granddaughter’s death earlier this year.

The last place on earth she would look for help is Iran, a country widely regarded in America as the enemy. The US and Iran have not had diplomatic relations for 30 years and the two governments trade daily insults over Iran’s nuclear programme. Last week Tehran charged three American hikers with espionage after they apparently strayed across the border.

But with Congress acrimoniously debating the reform of healthcare, it is to Iran that one of America’s poorest communities is turning to try to resolve its own health crisis...[In Full]
As a news hound it nice to know one needs to peruse foreign newspapers to find out how desperate the state of health care is in one's own country

At this juncture, Da Buffalo feels it necessary to give equal time to the "Israeli model" (July 24 2009) of medical concern for the citizens of the world...
"The FBI money-laundering and corruption dragnet in New Jersey yesterday garnered 44 perps including a couple of Rabbis who were peddling black market human kidneys at $160,000 each. See: "'Breathtakingly stupid' defines the 44 caught in the N.J. corruption sting" (Source: NJ.com, July 23, 2009)
Also see this currently breaking story for more on the Israeli global medical assistance plan: "Israel admits to organ harvesting" (Source: Canoe.ca, December 20, 2009)

The Defense Authorization bill has been signed by president Obama with a 3.6% pay increase for America's Imperial military, $128 billion to fund the AfPak and Iraq wars and a TWO MONTH unemployment benefits extension for the 'rest of us'.

Here's a list of some 'pigs with lipstick' (ie: Pretty, but still PORK) from my favorite 'hawk', Tom Ricks, ex-war reporter for the WaPo at 'The Best Defense' CNAS (Neoliberal think tank) blog: Defense spending: I'm a hawk, but give me a break

Have you ever been stuck on a runway in an airliner? The US Department of Transportation has passed a rule stating if an airline sticks you on the runway for more than three hours the airline will be fined $37,000 and after 1 hour they must feed you (if you can stomach airline food).

..and don't forget to follow all other airline rules kiddies!


More transportation nightmares, EU edition: The London/Paris/Brussels 'Chunnel' has reopened after shutting down for three days due to the fact that French snow was so fine that it got into the air intake system of the Chunnel's EuroStar trains and damaged them. 90,000 commuters found themselves unable to go to work for those three days. The Chunnel has re-opened but the transportation mayhem will continue as the trains STILL aren't running with passengers . Passenger transport has been indefinitely suspended.

One pithy comment from a British newspaper:
Re Eurostar Back On Track Starting Tuesday (online, Dec. 21): An old British Rail explanation for winter train delays was that they received the "wrong kind of snow." I await the official explanation for a series of breakdowns that stranded 2,000 passengers aboard five trains inside the Channel Tunnel. Was it too dark or warm and humid inside? Did someone forget to shake the snow off his boots before tracking inside? [In Full]
According to the Wall Street Journal, service was scheduled to return to 2/3 capacity today, but no solid evidence of that has been reported so far, and this: "Currently all service is suspended on the Channel Tunnel with hopes to be back up and running within days." was reported at 2pm Pacific Standard Time Tuesday @ BlackBook.

...And finally, Da' Buffalo's Spiritual and Social Hero of the day:
Poor people who are desperate (the headline says "for cash" although that IS NOT mentioned by the good priest... Freudian headline writing by an overworked underpaid newswriter?) have been advised to go forth and shoplift from major stores - by an Anglican priest.

The Rev Tim Jones said in his Sunday sermon that stealing from successful shops was preferable to burglary, robbery or prostitution.

He told parishioners it would not break the eighth commandment 'thou shalt not steal' because it 'is permissible for those who are in desperate situations to take food that they might not starve'.

But his advice was roundly condemned by police and the local Tory MP.

Father Jones, 42, was discussing Mary and the birth of Jesus when he went on to the subject of how poor and vulnerable people cope in the run-up to Christmas. [In Full]

[After the commentary Gayla Peevey (See here) and Roy Zimmerman (who does "Funny Songs About Ignorance, War and Greed") have two very different requests for Santa Claus this year. Courtesy of the respective artists and KPIG radio Freedom California Earth.]

-30-

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Monday, December 21, 2009

Have A Clusterfuck (Nation) Christmas - Blue Christmas, James Howard Kunstler

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Blue Christmas

By James Howard Kunstler
December 21, 2009


Cluster MisunderstandingAs the end-credits rolled for James Cameron's new movie, Avatar, the audience burst into rowdy applause. It seemed to me that they were applauding the sheer computerized dazzlement of the show -- but in the story itself they had just watched the US suffer a humiliating defeat on a distant planet. In the final frames, American soldiers and the corporate executives they had failed to protect were shown lined up as prisoners-of-war about to embark on a death march.

More to the point, the depiction of our national character through the whole course of the film was of a thuggish, cruel, cynical, stupid, detestable, and totally corrupt people bent on the complete destruction of nature. Nice.

And the final irony was that Cameron had used theatrical technology of the latest and greatest kind to depict America's broader techno-grandiosity -- as the army's brute robotic warriors fell to the spears and arrows of the simple blue space aliens.

Altogether, it was a weird moment in entertainment history, and perhaps in the American experience per se. No doubt audiences overseas will go wild with delight, too, but perhaps with a clearer notion of what they are clapping for than the enthralled masses of zombie Americans.

The infatuation with technology, and the disgusting cockiness that goes with it (so well-captured in Avatar), is but one facet of the psychosis gripping the nation -- and by that I mean the profound detachment from reality.

We have no idea what is happening to us and, naturally, no idea of what we are going to do.

I sat in a bar Friday evening with a financial reporter from a national newspaper, trying to explain the peak oil situation and what it implied for our economy.

He had never heard it before. The relationship between energy resources and massive debt was new to him. (It also came up in conversation that he could not tell me what the Monroe Doctrine was about, despite a history degree from Yale.)

There you have a nice snapshot of the mainstream media in this land...
In Full at Clusterfuck Nation
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December 21 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: From Disappointment To Disinclination To Abhorrence - The Season Of 'Obverse Christianity'

"All The News You Never Knew You Needed To Know ...Until Now."

Cabale News ServiceDecember 21 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: From Disappointment To Disinclination To Abhorrence - Tis The Season Again... The Season Of 'Obverse Christianity'

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In The News: The Democrats have voted cloture and that allows them to send the Heath Reform bill to debate, perhaps even on Christmas eve. When they come back from holiday recess it will go to conference committee and perhaps, by the time the State of the Union address occurs it will get out of conference and onto the floor.

But no matter what...
Health care overhaul or no, rural Texas (and many other rural areas of America) will still lack doctors

Dianna Hunt
(McClatchy) Fort Worth Star-Telegram

December 21, 2009


"Despite efforts to increase the number of physicians in rural and other underserved areas, shortages persist. Twenty-two counties, mostly in West Texas and the Panhandle, were without a doctor as of October, and more than two dozen counties listed one physician, according to a Star-Telegram analysis of state licensing records." [In Full]

President Obama flew into Copenhagen over the weekend where the Climate Conference ended with a weak agreement containing no 'enforcement tools'.

In Yemen, a country totally incapable of defending itself, US launched 'Cruise' missiles fired by remote control drones kill 120 civilians, even as we repatriate four Guantanamo detainees there.

That's our boy! In Afghanistan, 'president' Karzai names his new cabinet... For the most part either tribal relatives or Opium warlords

Oh yeah... Da Buffalo has one last piece of news on the international diplomacy front:

As some have observed, I've been following the Sea Shepherd Antarctic campaign.
(partly because I have most of the necessary skill sets and wish I was younger, and there)

The news this morning?

Japan does not recognize the Australian Antarctic Territorial claim.

Those words were spoken to the radio operator at Australia's Antarctic Mawson’s Hut base by the skipper of the Japanese Whaling vessel Shonan Maru No. 2...

And you thought America was the only imperially oriented nation left on the planet...

Read all about it at Sea Shepherd Conservation Society's site.

[After the commentary Bob Rivers laments "Didn't I Get This Last Year" but Bob Humbug & The Double-Wide Blues Review REALLY get it down (and get down) with "I Love To Hate Christmas"]

-30-

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Sunday, December 20, 2009

You Are Being Lied To, Part 2: US Department of Agriculture Edition

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PakAlert Press annoys me sometimes because Razer doesn't "Do" apocalyptic thinking, but it's a valuable source of little known information, and this well-detailed article (sourced from Marketskeptics) is a harbinger of higher food prices to come.

Meanwhile many Americans continue to be under-or-unemployed, or working at McDonalds just to keep a roof over their heads and try to live on food bank food.... Food banks BTW that are experiencing a MASSIVE influx new 'customers' even as the US Agricultural-Industrial Complex can no longer produce enough food to provide the surplus those 'banks' require.
"All someone needs to do to know the world is headed is for food crisis is to stop reading USDA’s crop reports predicting a record soybean and corn harvests and listen to what else the USDA is saying.

Specifically, the USDA has declared half the counties in the Midwest to be primary disaster areas, including 274 counties in the last 30 days alone. These designations are based on the criteria of a minimum of 30 percent loss in the value of at least one crop in the county. The chart below shows counties declared primary disaster areas by the secretary of Agriculture and the president of the United States.

For a list of Secretarial disaster declarations, see here.

For a list of Presidential disaster declarations, see here.

The same USDA that is predicting record harvests is also declaring disaster areas across half the Midwest because of catastrophic crop losses!

To eliminate any doubt that this might be an innocent mistake, the USDA is even predicting record soybean harvests in the same states (Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Alabama) where it has declared virtually all counties to have experienced 30 percent production losses. It isn’t rocket scientist to realize something is horribly wrong."

Soy Production Disaster


Complete analysis, maps and charts @ MarketSkeptics
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Two Words... "Vested Interests" - Economic Theory And The Disdain For Empirical Verification

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"The validity of a theory proper does not depend on the correspondence or lack of it between the assumptions of the theory or its conclusions and observations in the real world. A theory as an internally consistent system is valid if the conclusions follow logically from its premises, and the fact that neither the premises nor the conclusions correspond to reality may show that the theory is not very useful, but does not invalidate it. In any pure theory, all propositions are essentially tautological, in the sense that the results are implicit in the assumptions made. {6}

Such disdain for empirical verification is not found in the physical sciences. Its popularity in the social sciences is sponsored by vested interests. There is always self-interest behind methodological madness. That is because success requires heavy subsidies from special interests who benefit from an erroneous, misleading or deceptive economic logic. Why promote unrealistic abstractions, after all, if not to distract attention from reforms aimed at creating rules that oblige people actually to earn their income rather than simply extracting it from the rest of the economy?"

--Excerpted from Michael Hudson, "Krugman's attack on my review of Samuelson, Personal correspondence (December 20 2009)". In re: "Elegant Theories That Didn't Work: The Problem with Paul Samuelson" by Michael Hudson, Counterpunch (December 14 2009)

[In Full]


For more on the topic, see: "A Note Of Appreciation From The Rich"
Let's be honest: you'll never win the lottery.

On the other hand, the chances are pretty good that you'll slave away at some miserable job the rest of your life. That's because you were in all likelihood born into the wrong social class. Let's face it -- you're a member of the working caste. Sorry!

As a result, you don't have the education, upbringing, connections, manners, appearance, and good taste to ever become one of us. In fact, you'd probably need a book the size of the yellow pages to list all the unfair advantages we have over you. That's why we're so relieved to know that you still continue to believe all those silly fairy tales about "justice" and "equal opportunity" in America.

Of course, in a hierarchical social system like ours, there's never been much room at the top to begin with. Besides, it's already occupied by us -- and we like it up here so much that we intend to keep it that way.

But at least there's usually someone lower in the social hierarchy you can feel superior to and kick in the teeth once in a while. Even a lowly dishwasher can easily find some poor slob further down in the pecking order to sneer and spit at.

So be thankful for migrant workers, prostitutes, and homeless street people...

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Saturday, December 19, 2009

You Are Being Lied To - That Describes Everything You Need To Know About The State Of The "Federal Reserve Bank"

The chart below was drawn by the St. Louis Fed in March 2009.

It SHOULD make your hair stand on end...

There ARE NO RESERVES.


Non-Borrowed Reserves of Depository Institutions_450px

NOW... go to the fed's link with the updated chart (Gleaned December 2009):



You will immediately note it has been updated, and 'weighted' to 'flatten' it by a simple illusion... The scale has been dramatically increased. But STILL, despite their best efforts, the fact that they are requiring that scaling AT ALL... publishing it in such a manner instead of the chart-typical "_ ~" "broken scale" charting method illustrates a frantic scramble (or appearance thereof) to restore those looted reserves.

Friday, December 18, 2009

December 18 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: The Plan For Legalization Of Marijuana In California Part 3 - "Harvest, Cure, And Deliver"

"All The News You Never Knew You Needed To Know ...Until Now."

Cabale News ServiceDecember 18 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: The Plan For Legalization Of Marijuana In California Part Three - How To "Harvest, Cure, And Distribute" The End Results Of A Win For Legal Marijuana On The California Ballot

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In The News: Thanks this morning to ChrisM, my MP3Angel, for supplying a backup copy of the commentary.

It depends on what you call a coup - In Pakistan, because their Supreme Court ruled that president Zadari is not protected from corruption charges, two hundred of his officials have had a travel ban imposed on them and Zadari has been stripped of most, if not all, of his presidential powers. McClatchy pops the question: Who's in charge in nuclear-armed U.S. ally Pakistan?

More from Juan Cole @ Informed Comment:
"Because Benazir Bhutto was assassinated, her husband, Zardari, ended up as president and became a chief beneficiary of the amnesty. In the 1990s he had become known as Mr. Ten Percent because he allegedly took a cut of contracts with foreign firms.

Musharraf's National Reconciliation Order was what in the US would be called an 'executive order,' a sort of presidential law-making of which the Pakistani Supreme Court is now increasingly critical. And so the Supreme Court struck down the amnesty as unconstitutional.

The reinstatement of the corruption cases in turn caused the Supreme Court to declare over 200 important political figures flight risks and to forbid them to leave the country. One of these was Minister of the Interior Rehman Malik, who was detained at Karachi yesterday on his way to Beijing." [In Full]

Maybe WE'RE in charge... at least of military ops in Waziristan where the US drone strikes continue as the Pentagon claims to have killed 16... count 'em 16... 'militant's' after three days of intensive high tech remotely operated assaults.

The "Civilian/Militant Kill Ratio" last year according to the Pakistani government was approximately 50:1.

In HUMAN terms that's 647 civilians to about 12-14 so-called 'militants'.

President Obama is now in Copenhagen for the climate summit... whether or not China will agree on the documents sitting before the convention remains to be seen, and our president plans to meet with Russian president Medyedev to attempt resuscitation of the SALT Treaty, which recently 'dissolved' despite NATO's request for Russian troops to help with their murderous little war in Central Asia.

The House of Representatives has passed a "Job Bill"... with a "Buy American" clause... There goes all your cheap construction materials and consumer crap... But WILL the jobs created put enough dollars in American pockets to buy the products when they're made by Americans with wages that 'pay the rent'... or will we ALL be working at McDonalds.

The senate will stay in session through the next week over the Health Reform bill, in part because the Republicans have demanded a complete reading of the bill and it's riders... Net effect... Government shut down.

Venezuela's offshore Islands ostensibly in Dutch hands have been accused by the Venezuelan government of allowing US military preparations such as air base building, for an invasion of, or at least destabilization operations, in Venezuela. The Netherlands is denying it claiming "...the United States uses civilian air fields on the self-governing islands of Curacao and Aruba to combat narcotic trafficking and use unarmed aircraft.".

Believe it or else!

Democracy... We Deliver!

[After the commentary.... It's time for a legal Marijuana Showdown Hoedown... From Cat Mother and the All Night News Boys album "Albion Doo-Wah", let's "Strike A Match (and Light Another Marijuana Cigarette). Go to the album title link... RareMP3.co.uk for more from Cat Mother...]
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Thursday, December 17, 2009

December 17 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: Health Care Reform Sitrep - The Republicans And Some Democrats Decide To 'Over-Kill Bill'

"All The News You Never Knew You Needed To Know ...Until Now."

Cabale News ServiceDecember 17 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: Health Care Reform Sitrep - A Change In Tactics May Be Necessary Now That The Republicans, With Help From Some Democrats, Have Decided To 'Over-Kill Bill'

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In The News: Things are deteriorating in Pakistan where their supreme court ruled that an immunity law protecting their president is unconstitutional. President Zadari will most likely be removed from power entirely and who might replace him is currently an unknown. He has already had much of his powers stripped including control of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal.

France and Britain are moving to tax the bonuses their countries financial executives granted themselves.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is in Copenhagen for the climate conference and she says the US will pony up the money for amelioration of the poor countries monetary damages due to the (most likely rigged in favor of the industrialized nation's) climate agreement, IF an agreement occurs.

From the Christian Science Monitor:
At the global warming summit in Copenhagen, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the US is willing to contribute to a $100 billion a year fund to help poorer countries mitigate the effect of climate change. But a strong agreement still looks unlikely. [In Full]

Technological voyeurism... Over the last year computer hackers with video capabilities have been hacking into the video feeds of our military drones. They can't control them, but it just goes to show the extent of the 'leakage' in our 'cyberwar' capability.

Here's how... Courtesy of Global Guerrillas.

The senate Republican have blocked the Barney Franks public option amendment and have demanded a reading of ALL amendments to the Health Care Reform bill... It will take days to read it even with a Lieberman and Co. (Blue Dog Democrats) gutting of the bill.

Perhaps all they need to do is stall, and Americans will just 'go stupid':
"...a new Washington Post-ABC News poll finds the public generally fearful that a revamped system would bring higher costs while worsening the quality of their care." [In Full]

The M4 rifle used by the US Marines and other specialized US troops is beginning to show some of the problems exhibited by Vietnam vintage M-16s... Field unreliability.

Speaking of "The Wars"... Out of soldiers, or just trying to staunch a rout until 30,000 more American soldiers show up? You be the judge. Juan Cole (Informed Comment): Contractor Surge in Afghanistan.

Walter Pincus of the Washington Post quotes the numbers:
Washington Post
December 16, 2009

Up to 56,000 more contractors likely for Afghanistan, congressional agency says

By Walter Pincus


"Contractors made up 69 percent of the Pentagon's personnel in Afghanistan last December, a proportion that "apparently represented the highest recorded percentage of contractors used by the Defense Department in any conflict in the history of the United States."

The surge of 30,000 U.S. troops into Afghanistan could be accompanied by a surge of up to 56,000 contractors, vastly expanding the presence of personnel from the U.S. private sector in a war zone, according to a study by the Congressional Research Service." [In Full]

Also notable: This time they'll most likely break both 'superpowers' economies: "NATO chief asks for Russian help in Afghanistan". It MUST BE DESPERATION (on both nation's parts as Russia ESPECIALLY depends on the pipelines in the region and planned for the region.), and desperation breeds disaster. According to reports, the Russians HAVE agreed to allow NATO and the US access to their territory as part of the logistics chain, including ground transport, but are remaining noncommittal on troops in theatre.

[After the commentary... It can only be Bob Rivers... On a sleigh ride. Courtesy of the respective artists and KPIG radio Freedom California, Earth]

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Wednesday, December 16, 2009

December 16 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: The Plan For Legalization Of Marijuana In California Part Two

"All The News You Never Knew You Needed To Know ...Until Now."

Cabale News ServiceDecember 16 2009 Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary: The Plan For Legalization Of Marijuana In California Part Two - Setting It Up To Be Controlled By Counties And Municipalities Is BRILLIANT But It Will Take More... YOU... Changing Your Local Governments

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In The News: The head of the Copenhagen Climate Convention has resigned after 230 protester crash the gates (Good try!), approximately 2000 arrests, and a walkout by third world countries in attendance. President Obama is expect to speak on Friday, and he's not liable to find a receptive welcome.

In light of the upheaval at the Copenhagen convention, you might want to learn what one of the main issues of contention is... "Cap & Trade"... The global market trading of CO2 emissions which, as the "Danish Text" secret memo leak at the convention shows, is most likely to be rigged (NO QUOTES intentional) in favor of the affluent nations despite the FACT that the poorer nations contribute to the global CO2 output mostly by manufacturing CONSUMER CRAP (again NO QUOTES intentional) for the affluent of the planet, and, as any economics text you will ever read plainly states, use their OWN output for their OWN uses (such as heating their dwellings, cooking and transportation) MUCH MORE EFFICIENTLY than the 1st world nations.

Annie Leonard, the narrator of the humorously educational "The Story Of Stuff", "The Story Of Bottled Water", and "The Story Of Electronics", fills us in, in lay person's terms, on "The Story Of Cap And Trade".



There is also an interview with a couple of her cohorts at DemocracyNow!
Cap & Trade: A Critical Look at Carbon Trading

Will the expansion of carbon emissions trading help stop global warming or just create a new market for Wall Street to make billions? We air excerpts of Annie Leonard’s The Story of Cap and Trade and speak with Larry Lohmann and Frank Ackerman. [In Full]

Iran has successfully tested a solid fuel missile that now gives them the capability of hitting Israel, American facilities in the region and more.

From Foreign Policy Morning Brief:
Iran tests new long-range missile

Iran successfully tested an upgraded surface-to-surface missile this morning, which it claims has a longer range and greater maneuverability than its existing Shahab model. If true, the new Sejil would be capable of hitting targets in Europe and U.S. bases in the Gulf. [In Full]

The Washington, D.C. city council has passed a law OKing gay marriage and the mayor says he'll sign it but all laws made in DC must be approved by congress. Expect nothing and you won't be disappointed.

President Obama has launched his "Cash for Caulkers" drive... which may generate some jobs for the currently terminally depressed construction industry, and all the slightly-beyond-peasants who bought all the ticky-tacky homes during the mortgage boom and who managed to hold on to them during the mortgage bust will have warmer toes if it works out.

Congress has finally done something! the House has passed a bill, and an identical bill is currently working it's way through the Senate, forcing the FCC to limit the use of COMMPRESSED AUDIO IN ADVERTISING which makes the volume of commercials incredibly louder than the program content. An example follows the commentary, at the end of the "commercial".

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