McKinney running for president as Green candidate
July 13, 2008
Moonbattery given legitimacy by CNN
(CNN) — The liberal environmentalist Green Party nominated former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney as its presidential candidate Saturday.
Cynthia McKinney represented a suburban Atlanta, Georgia, district for six terms as a Democrat.
Cynthia McKinney represented a suburban Atlanta, Georgia, district for six terms as a Democrat.
McKinney, 53, held off three rivals to win the party’s nomination during its convention in Chicago, Illinois. She picked journalist and activist Rosa Clemente as her running mate.
Green Party spokeswoman Scott McLarty acknowledged McKinney was a “long shot” for the White House, but said, “Every vote that she gets helps the Green Party.”
“The United States needs an alternative party,” McLarty said. “The narrow two-party system we have right now has not served us very well.”
McKinney represented a suburban district of Atlanta, Georgia, as a Democrat in the U.S. House of Representatives for six terms — five consecutively.
First elected in 1992, she lost a primary challenge in 2002 after suggesting in a radio interview that members of the Bush administration stood to profit from the war that followed the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York and Washington.
In 2004 she ran again and won with a low-key campaign in which she largely avoided controversy. But voters ousted her again in 2006 after she was accused of a physical altercation with a U.S. Capitol Police officer who questioned her after failing to recognize her at a security checkpoint.
The most successful Green Party presidential candidate was consumer advocate Ralph Nader, who drew nearly 3 percent of the vote in 2000. Nader is running again this year, this time as an independent.
Earlier this year, the Libertarian Party nominated McKinney’s onetime House colleague, ex-Republican congressman Bob Barr, as its presidential nominee. Barr also represented a district in the Atlanta suburbs during his four terms in Congress.
It will be interesting to see how many moonbats vote for this creature. This lunatic was a 6 term congresscreature, someone voted for her!
Saturday, July 12, 2008
WASHINGTON — President Bush on Saturday tried to pin the blame on Congress for soaring energy prices and said lawmakers need to lift long-standing restrictions on drilling for oil in pristine lands and offshore tracts believed to hold huge reserves of fuel.
“It’s time for members of Congress to address the pain that high gas prices are causing our citizens,” the president said. “Every extra dollar that American families spend because of high gas prices is one less dollar they can use to put food on the table or send a child to college. The American people deserve better.”
With gasoline prices above $4 a gallon, Bush and his Republican allies think Americans are less reluctant to allow drilling offshore and in an Alaska wildlife refuge that environmentalists have fought successfully for decades to protect. Nearly half the people surveyed by the Pew Research Center in late June said they now consider energy exploration and drilling more important than conservation, compared with a little over a third who felt that way only five months ago. The sharpest shift in attitude came among political liberals.
Democrats say they are for drilling, but argue that oil companies aren’t going after the oil where they already have leases. So why open new, protected areas? they ask. Democrats say there are 68 million acres of federal land and waters where oil and gas companies hold leases, but aren’t producing oil.
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o Transcript: President Bush’s Radio Address
“Americans are fed up every time they go to fill up and they’re right to demand action. But instead of a serious response, President Bush and his allies simply repeat the same old line more drilling,” Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., said in the Democrats’ radio address.
“Democrats support more drilling,” he said. “In fact, what the president hasn’t told you is that the oil companies are already sitting on 68 million acres of federal lands with the potential to nearly double U.S. oil production. That is why in the coming days congressional Democrats will vote on ‘Use It or Lose It’ legislation requiring the big oil companies to develop these resources or lose their leases to someone else who will.”
“But we know that drilling by itself will not solve the problem of high gas prices,” Van Hollen said. “We cannot drill our way to energy independence.”
He cited Democrats’ calls to tap the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve, because it is full and “America’s rainy day is now.” And he said the country must focus on new energy policies that focus on alternatives to oil.
Bush said that Democrats are at fault and that “Americans are increasingly frustrated with Congress’ failure to take action.
“One of the factors driving up high gas prices is that many of our oil deposits here in the United States have been put off-limits for exploration and production. Past efforts to meet the demand for oil by expanding domestic resources have been repeatedly rejected by Democrats in Congress.”
Bush repeated his call for Congress to lift the restrictions, including a ban on offshore drilling. A succession of presidents from George H.W. Bush to Bill Clinton to the current president have sided against drilling in these waters as has Congress each year for 27 years, seeking to protect beaches and coastal states’ tourism economies.
Yes, the Democrats really do think we are stupid…
President Clinton warns of growing polarization
July 13, 2008
By ANDREW WELSH-HUGGINS
Associated Press Writer
Bill Clinton-National Boob
Speaking at the National Governors Association’s semiannual meeting, Clinton noted that on the one hand, following the early stages of the Democratic primary, “the surviving candidates were an African-American man and a woman.”
Clinton’s wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, battled for the Democratic nomination into June with fellow Democrat Barack Obama, son of a white mother and black father.
But this achievement was overshadowed by a growing distance between Americans, said Clinton.
“Underneath this apparent accommodation to our diversity, we are in fact hunkering down in communities of like-mindedness, and it affects our ability to manage difference,” Clinton said.
Clinton developed his 44-minute speech from themes he said he drew from a new book, “The Big Sort,” by Bill Bishop.
He cited statistics compiled by Bishop that found that in the 1976 presidential election, only 20 percent of the nation’s counties voted for Jimmy Carter or President Ford by more than a 20 percent margin.
By contrast, 48 percent of the nation’s counties in 2004 voted for John Kerry or President Bush by more than 20 points, Clinton said.
“We were sorting ourselves out by choosing to live with people that we agree with,” Clinton said.
Clinton has often meshed big picture admonitions with new books whose ideas he admires. He drew similar conclusions in 2000 following the publication of Robert Putnam’s “Bowling Alone,” on the decline of civic engagement in the United States.
Among the approximately two dozen active governors in attendance Saturday were some of the 11 who backed Obama over Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Gov. Timothy Kaine of Virginia said he wasn’t worried about how President Clinton might view his support for Obama.
“We’re human beings, too, so there are feelings, but we understand this is a team sport, and we come back together as a team,” Kaine said.
After weeks of not speaking to each other, Obama last month reached out to President Clinton and asked him for help winning the White House. Clinton had portrayed Obama as too inexperienced to be president.
Clinton concluded his speech by reminding governors, who are marking the association’s centennial, that the issues they face today are similar to problems President Teddy Roosevelt grappled with a century ago.
Those include inequality among rich and poor, immigration and energy policy.
If those issues are dealt with, “We’re about to go into the most exciting period of human history,” Clinton said.
“If we don’t, in the words of President Roosevelt, dark will be the future,” he said. “I’m betting on light – I hope you are, too.”
(This version CORRECTS that some, not all, of the 11 governors who backed Obama in the primary were in attendance Saturday.)
The only people who pay attention to Bill Clinton are the folks at the AP..
No War in Iran
July 13, 2008
EDITORIAL
Be in the streets on Aug. 2
Published Jul 3, 2008 8:59 PM
On June 26, the Stop War on Iran Campaign initiated an emergency call to action to oppose a war on Iran on the weekend of Aug. 2 and 3. A major march is being planned Aug. 2 in New York. Demonstrators will assemble at 12 noon in Times Square at 43rd Street and Broadway. Other places, inside the U.S. and worldwide, are organizing local actions.
This mobilization could not have come at a more critical juncture as the warmongering Bush administration, the Pentagon and their puppet Israel are setting the stage for this unbridled attack on yet another sovereign country.
Investigative reporter Seymour Hersch wrote in the July 7 New Yorker that the U.S. government has funded a $400 million covert operation involving anti-Iranian groupings with the aim of destabilizing the Tehran government.
This criminal act is a violation of international law that should be protested by every activist, revolutionary and worker regardless of whether one agrees with the policies of the Iranian government or not. U.S. imperialism is the enemy, not Iran.
It is in this spirit that the managing editors wholeheartedly support the Aug. 2-3 mobilization. Below are excerpts from the call. Go to www.StopWarOnIran.org to read the entire call and to find out how to get involved.
Never mind the fact that Iran declared war on the United States years ago. Just forget the fact that they have expressed interest in nuking Israel. Overlook Iran’s blatant funding of terrorism, see who is really to blame; the US! Jeez, it’s hard to believe Americans can think this way..
Three Ways Obama Can Prove he is Patriotic
July 1, 2008
The second one is the best..
Parts of St. Charles’ Elm Point Levee burst
June 24, 2008
(KMOV) — What residents were hoping they could avoid has happened in St. Charles.
As feared, part of the Elm Point Levee has burst and water is rushing through right now at a rapid pace.
Authorities say that the levee burst in two spots around 1:30 a.m. on Tuesday.
One of those holes is reportedly the size of a football field.
Several homes and businesses in the area are now flooded.
Officials say that residents in that area voluntarily evacuated before the breach.
Roberta Flack – The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face
June 23, 2008
I found this on Youtube. We were playing the studio version in here tonight, and it was making the baby move, so I went looking for the tabs for guitar and bass and found this. It is stunning. Roberta has one of the most beautiful voices ever, and apparently Gina, our daughter to be in September, likes it, too.
Editors’ Note (None Dare Call It Treason)
June 22, 2008
The Central Intelligence Agency asked The New York Times not to publish the name of Deuce Martinez, an interrogator who questioned Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and other high-level Al Qaeda prisoners, saying that to identify Mr. Martinez would invade his privacy and put him at risk of retaliation from terrorists or harassment from critics of the agency.
After discussion with agency officials and a lawyer for Mr. Martinez, the newspaper declined the request, noting that Mr. Martinez had never worked under cover and that others involved in the campaign against Al Qaeda have been named in news stories and books. The editors judged that the name was necessary for the credibility and completeness of the article.
The Times’s policy is to withhold the name of a news subject only very rarely, most often in the case of victims of sexual assault or intelligence officers operating under cover.
Mr. Martinez, a career analyst at the agency until his retirement a few years ago, did not directly participate in waterboarding or other harsh interrogation methods that critics describe as torture and, in fact, turned down an offer to be trained in such tactics.
The newspaper seriously considered the requests from Mr. Martinez and the agency. But in view of the experience of other government employees who have been named publicly in books and published articles or who have themselves chosen to go public, the newspaper made the decision to print the name.
This is the same exact thing the Times threw a fit about during the Democrat/Media generated and created Plame story. The hypocrisy would breathtaking if it wasnt the DNC/Obama controlled NYT. (It used to be edited by the Clintons, now its edited by the DNC and Obama Campaign). I posted this without permission, in hope of drawing out the author; he needs to be called seditious, and be assured by honest and resonable people of his treason. NYT-you dont speak for America, you speak for her enemies. Dont like my posting without permission? Sue me, you ******* traitors.
Blue skies belie the coming flood
June 20, 2008
By Tim Bryant
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
06/18/2008
FOLEY — John Watson plans to ride out this spring’s flood in a tent set up near a portable generator, fan, TV and a cooler — all on his roof.
On Tuesday, water from the flooding Mississippi River remained a couple of miles away, out of sight in a line of pecan trees across wide bottomland fields.
“But it’s coming,” Watson said.
Water began pouring Tuesday over levees in several areas in Lincoln County. Authorities repeated their plea, first made Monday, for residents between the river and Highway 79 to voluntarily evacuate.
No way, said Watson, who lives on Mill Street, in sight of the highway.
He and his stepson Billy Ray Smith, and a friend, Charles Jarvis, sweated as they rolled up carpets and hoisted them into the attic, safe from the flood they expect will arrive by Thursday. Watson, 49, also stored interior doors in the attic and put his furniture and appliances in storage.
He is among the estimated 20 residents in low-lying areas who plan to stay in Foley, population about 200, and nearby Winfield, population about 900, as the Mississippi rises to near the record levels of 1993.
Parts of Foley, Winfield, Elsberry and Old Monroe are among the Lincoln County areas likely to go under this week. Several hundred homes could be affected, said Andy Binder, a spokesman for the county emergency management department.
Eighty National Guard members were scheduled to be in the county by today, Binder said. Half would help bolster levees while the rest would prepare to man checkpoints along Highway 79 to keep potential looters out of flooded areas.
Watson, a roofer, said he feared that thieves would enter his unprotected residence and strip out valuable wiring.
“I can’t afford to lose my house,” he said.
As a result, he plans to camp out on his roof in a tent set up on a wooden pallet leveled with bundles of shingles.
About a dozen flood victims moved temporarily to an American Red Cross shelter established at Winfield High School.
Lincoln County authorities appealed for donations of nonperishable food and bottled water for weary volunteers and emergency officials. Donations may be delivered to the Winfield Ambulance Base at 11 Highland Drive.
To the south, St. Charles County Executive Steve Ehlmann declared a state of emergency, which can help in getting state and federal aid. Emergency management officials met in Portage des Sioux to discuss flood preparations, which include the stacking of 10,000 sandbags along Portage Road. The West Alton and Portage des Sioux areas are expected to bear the brunt of flooding.
Upstream, in Clarksville, Mo., residents, volunteers, National Guard members and Missouri inmates continued sandbagging to protect the small town. Mayor Jo Anne Smiley said all was being done to prepare for the predicted 38-foot flood crest on Friday.
“We fix one thing and it breaks,” she said. “Sewers are plugged up. We have leaks in wells, and people need things. We’re boating food to people.
“I cry a lot, but I get a lot of e-mail prayers. That helps.”
Farther upstream in Hannibal, Mo., residents expressed relief because levee breaks to the north caused the Mississippi to drop slightly in Mark Twain’s hometown. Officials said they expect the city’s levee and flood wall to hold back the water.
In all, the state deployed nearly 500 National Guard members to flood areas. Nearly 190 prisoners from the state Department of Corrections helped pile sandbags in Clarksville, Canton, Louisiana and Marion County.
Hermann and Washington authorities said flooding from the Missouri River is minor and presents no threat to residents.
In Illinois, a breach in a sodden levee on the Mississippi near Burlington, Iowa, gave quiet relief to several Grafton-area residents.
“It’s terrible to say, but a levee breaking up there helps us down here,” said Greg Medford, a Jerseyville resident who was in Grafton on Tuesday to help sandbag his father’s convenience store.
West and East Main streets remained divided by the encroaching river. Water lapped at the backs of businesses along Main Street — with some closed and others open.
Residents milled about town or drove the steep back roads along the bluffs to bypass the flooded area severing the town’s main thoroughfare.
The river crest forecast was extended a day and raised by 4 inches in Grafton. Now, the Mississippi is expected to crest Tuesday morning at 31.4 feet.
In Alton, floodwater covered part of West Broadway, which was partially closed Tuesday. Workers began constructing a temporary gravel road to bridge floodwater at the entrance to the Argosy Casino, which remained open.
Gov. Rod Blagojevich added Madison County to a state disaster declaration to help those areas respond to flooding issues along the Mississippi. Since last Wednesday, the governor has declared 19 counties state disaster areas.
About 230 Illinois inmates helped pile sandbags in several areas. Blagojevich activated 1,100 Illinois National Guard troops to assist with sandbagging and other flood preparation efforts.
In Foley, Watson already was looking forward to the post-flood cleanup. He eyed a large mulch pile across the street and predicted floodwater will float it through his neighborhood.
“It’s going to be a huge mess,” he said. “That’s why we’re going to leave the screen doors up, to keep some stuff out.”
Post-Dispatch reporters Nicholas J.C. Pistor and Joel Currier and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Ever since the basement floods from last April and May, I have a phobia of floods. By this weekend, Old Charbonier will be completely underwater all the way to 370. The entire valley from Portage De Sioux over to West Alton and down to Old Charbonier will be flooded. Yesterday and today, FEMA began staging behind our building, anticipating a crest at 30 feet all the way to Jefferson County. On Monday, I’ll be seeing it from the air. Looks like we wont be fishing in the rivers for awhile..
Levee breaks near Winfield
June 19, 2008
Clarksville, MO, which is upriver from Winfield
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
06/19/2008
UPDATED, 7:12 a.m.
WINFIELD, Mo. — Floodwaters punched a 150-foot hole in a Winfield levee last night, and firefighters spent hours in the dark going door-to-door to warn residents in one subdivision that water was coming faster than expected.
Bill Byram, assistant chief and fire marshal of the Winfield-Foley Fire Protection District, said the levee just east of Winfield along Pillsbury Road broke about 8:15 p.m. Wednesday. Water was quickly flowing toward a second levee, and the National Guard was fortifying that with sandbags.
About 2 a.m. today, Byram noticed that water was coming up Highway N, north of Foley, at a fairly fast pace. It was heading west into Winfield Acres, a subdivision just outside the city limits.
“Water was coming to town faster than we thought,” he said.
So by 3 a.m., Byram had ordered firefighters to knock on doors of about 40 homes and wake up residents in a voluntary evacuation.
Some said they wanted to stay. But about half decided to go.
“They started loading up right then. They didn’t realize it was coming so soon,” he said.
For those who stay, Byram said the fire crews have boats ready for rescue efforts.
Click here for map of floods in MO
OUR EARLIER STORY
By Joel Currier
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
PORTAGE DES SIOUX — Winona Cissell isn’t worried. She’s seen it all before.
She says her cousins took her in when the 1993 flood forced her out of her house on Main Street.
But at 96, she says she has outlived her cousins and has no plans of abandoning her home unless this spring’s high-water mark turns her living room into a muck-filled aquarium.
“I’ve been through a lot,” she said Wednesday as water lapped onto her driveway. “I don’t think it’s going to get that high this time.”
In towns such as Portage des Sioux and West Alton, living by the Mississippi River this week means living on the edge. Surging floodwater breached two levees in western Illinois and spilled over levees in Lincoln County, where another levee breached late Wednesday.
The river is expected to crest Monday at 31.2 feet in Grafton, which officials say is the closest measure for Portage des Sioux. At that level, water could cover sections of Portage Road and block access to the town. Volunteers filled 6,000 to 8,000 sandbags to protect stretches of Portage Road, where minor flooding is expected over the next few days.
Officials in St. Charles County, however, were optimistic that no major population areas would see flooding after the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers lowered some of its crest predictions slightly Wednesday, in part because of the two levee breaches about 45 miles south of Gulfport, Ill.
The levees surrounding West Alton held Wednesday and water levels stayed about 2 feet below the top, according to Alderman Beth Machens. But officials planned to watch the river closely. “It’s really day-by-day,” she said.
Serious flooding struck Lincoln County when floodwater broke through a levee Wednesday night just east of Winfield along Pillsbury Road. The county’s emergency operations center said the breach was 150 feet wide and water was quickly flowing toward a secondary levee, but would not affect sandbagging efforts under way at that levee.
Lincoln County authorities urged residents east of Highway 79 to evacuate their homes and go to the Winfield High School shelter or seek higher ground immediately. Hundreds of homes in the area were threatened as water continued rushing over levees near Winfield, Elsberry, Foley and Old Monroe, but it was unclear late Wednesday how many were affected by the breach.
Earlier in the day, water was rushing into farm fields east of Highway 79 and was expected to flood several other roads in the area. Nearly 190 National Guardsmen patrolled the region Wednesday, fortifying levees, checking on residents and guarding against the threat of looting, Andy Binder, spokesman for the county emergency management department, said.
Volunteers had filled about 25,000 sandbags by Wednesday, Binder said, but more help is badly needed to fill 175,000 more.
Sandbagging also continued Wednesday in Clarksville and Louisiana, Mo., where Fire Chief Mike Lesley said the man-made walls of sandbags were holding strong. Volunteers in Clarksville this morning will begin building two 200-foot-long walls of compacted mesh and sand along one of Clarksville’s main thoroughfares, said Mike Russell, the city’s emergency management director. The river there is expected to crest Saturday at a record-breaking 37.7 feet, just above the 1993 level. Russell said volunteers will not stop sandbagging until the river drops.
Gov. Matt Blunt toured the levee in Hannibal and met with volunteers Wednesday. The river is expected to crest there at 31.3 feet Friday evening but officials say they expect the levee and floodwall to protect the town. The record is 31.8 feet set in 1993.
The Associated Press and Leah Thorsen of the Post-Dispatch provided information for this story.
jcurrier@post-dispatch.com | 636-255-7210
Portage De Sioux is visible from the roof of our house. Fortunatley, we are considerably higher on the bluff, than Portage, which is in the valley. One of my favorite fishing sites will be gone this weekend. Prayers for all involved.
