ET Williams

The Doctor of Common Sense

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Obama and Chu Rip-off Taxpayers

Shut up until after the Election

Chu offers no apology for fleecing taxpayers for Solyndra

By: Examiner Editorial

 

People can debate all day whether government should be in the business of picking winners and losers in the marketplace by selectively awarding loan guarantees. What’s beyond dispute is that any official decision that results in the loss of half-a-billion tax dollars should elicit an apology from somebody in government. Just don’t expect that somebody to be Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, even though he’s the guy who ignored multiple warnings beforehand and approved the $535 billion federal loan guarantee to the now-bankrupt Solyndra solar panel maker. He’s also the guy who approved a loan restructuring that resulted in private investors — including one of President Obama’s wealthiest campaign contributors — being repaid before the taxpayers, an arrangement virtually without precedent in the government.

House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton ofMichigangaveChuan opportunity during yesterday’s hearing by asking him “who has to apologize for the half a billion dollars in taxpayer money that’s out the door?” Here’s howChuresponded: “Well, it is extremely unfortunate what has happened with Solyndra. Was there incompetence? Was there any influence of a political nature? I would have to say no.” The cluelessChudisplayed not even the faintest hint of a regret that his decision lost more money than most Americans will earn in their lifetimes. Evidently,Chubelieves the old maxim: “Never apologize, never explain. Get it over with and let them howl.”

The energy secretary’s arrogance likely will inspire a lot more howling about Solyndra and a host of similar loan guarantees handed out by Chu and his fellow Obama appointees. What many of these loans have in common with Solyndra is that all used tax dollars to line the pockets of key Obama fundraisers and donors. Take, for example, Solar Reserve, which received an even bigger loan guarantee — $737 million — than Solyndra. Solar Reserve’s biggest investor is a company owned by Michael Froman, former deputy assistant to the president who bundled as much as $500,000 for Obama in 2008.

Then there is Abound Solar, which got a $400 million guarantee. A key investor in Abound Solar is Pat Stryker who contributed $87,000 to Obama’s inauguration festivities. Next up is Granite Reliable Wind Generation, which got $168.9 million loan guarantee. Granite’s majority owner is a firm formerly headed by Nancy Ann DeParle, deputy White House chief of staff and head of communications during the Obamacare campaign — and wife of New York Times reporter Jason DeParle. Finally, there’s BrightSource Energy, whose principal adviser is Robert Kennedy Jr., one of Obama’s earliest backers in 2008. Kennedy’s firm received $1.6 billion in loan guarantees.

Chuwants us to believe political influence had nothing to do with any of these decisions. He might as well tell us the moon is made of green cheese. Leave it to the Hoover Institution’s Peter Schweizer, who has studied the energy loans in detail, to state the obvious: “This is a payoff to people who are your political backers and supporters. And this is really a wealth transfer from middle class taxpayers to billionaires.”

http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/editorials/2011/11/chu-offers-no-apology-fleecing-taxpayers-solyndra#ixzz1e788tCiF

 

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Does Newt Gingrich have to much Baggage?

Gingrich: Freddie Mac Paid His Consulting Firm Up to $1.8M for ‘Strategic Advice’

By THOMAS BEAUMONT, Associated Press

November 16, 2011

 

URBANDALE, Iowa (AP) — Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich has acknowledged receiving personal compensation from Freddie Mac, the federally backed housing agency, but says he doesn’t know exactly how much he was paid.

The former House speaker left open the possibility that his consulting firm received between $1.6 million and $1.8 million. Gingrich says he received a portion of that for providing “strategic advice for a long period of time” after he left Congress.

That amount is significantly higher than the $300,000 figure Gingrich was questioned about last week.

Gingrich spoke with reporters inIowaon Wednesday. He defended Freddie Mac’s role and said every American should be interested in expanding housing opportunities. The federally backed mortgage lender has become a focal point of anti-government sentiment because of the housing crisis

 

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The Millionaires and Billionaires are in Congress

Seven of the Top Ten Wealthiest Members of Congress Are Democrats

YesAmerica, there is a wealth gap. Seven of the top ten wealthiest members in Congress are Democrats.

The results are based on a new study released today by the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics. The Center did an analysis of the financial statements filed by members of Congress for 2010 income and net worth.

This revelation of extreme wealth by Democratic politicians is completely contrary to the public image of the Democratic Party. President Obama has castigated “millionaires and billionaires,” suggesting they are evil people, largely Republican or conservative. The issue of the Democratic Party as the millionaire party has not yet made it into the mainstream media. But the facts are indisputable. Democratic members of Congress tend to be wealthier than their Republican counterparts.

According to the Center, 36 Senate Democrats and 30 Senate Republicans reported an average net worth in excess of $1 million in 2010. The median estimated net worth among members of the Senate Democrats was $2.58 million. Senate Republican median net worth was $2.43 million.

And, the wealthy Democrats tend to inherit their money.  Republicans tend to earn it.

Senators John Kerry (D-MA), Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) all came by their fortunes through marriage or inheritance.  Senator Kerry, who was born into wealth, has listed his net worth as high as $281 million, while his wife Teresa is estimated to be worth $1 billion.  Ms. Heinz did not earn her wealth either. She inherited the money from her husband Senator John Heinz, who died in an airplane crash.

Senator Rockefeller, representing dirt poorWest Virginia,  inherited his fortune from his family. He is reported to be worth $136 million.

While the economy continued to tank in 2010, Rep. Pelosi reported her own wealth to grow by 62%. Pelosi’s husband, Paul, is a financier.  They own a multi-million dollar vineyard and a number of million dollar homes. They have a net worth of $196 million.

Former Democrat Rep. Jane Harmon (D-CA), who in 2010 was listed as the third wealthiest member of Congress, was married to the late stereo magnate Sidney Harman of Harman-Karmen fame. Together they were worth $493 million.

Only Republican Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX) married into major money. His net worth went from $12 million to $502 million in two years.  The explanation? He married an heiress to the Clear Channel radio empire.

Among those who actually got their money by earning it, Republicans were in the slight majority. Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), a self-made millionaire earned his wealth by creating the Viper car security system. He is estimated to be worth more than $700 million.  Sen. Jim Risch (R-Idaho) started as a rancher and attorney.  His wealth is cited as $88 million.

Rep. Vernon Buchanan (R-FL), one of only three Republicans to make the top ten earned his money through real estate and car dealerships.  He is estimated to be worth over $323 million.

Much has been made about Senator Bob Corker (R-TN) being the wealthiest Republican in the U.S. Senate. But he is ranked only number 14 because there are so many wealthier Democrats ahead of him. He doesn’t make the Top Ten. He worked as a construction superintendent.  Then started his own company. Today he is worth $107 million.

Among Democrats who earned their income, Senator Mark Warner (D-VA) first made his money as a mobile phone franchiser, later as a high tech venture capitalist in Northern Virginia just outside ofWashington.

Warner is reported to have learned about the telecommunications industry while working for Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT).  Sen. Dodd decided not to run for re-election as he was under a cloud for taking a below-market mortgage from the CEO of now bankrupt Countrywide Financial.

For those who are keeping score, Dodd recently landed a sweet job as the head of the Motion Picture Association of America after he declined to run for re-election in 2008.  The Hollywood Reporter says his annual salary will be pegged at $1.5 million.

Rep. Jared Polis (D-CO), earned his fortune in the flower and greeting card business. He was the founder of Pro-Flower and an e-commerce greeting card company which he sold to Excite.com for more than $700 million.

New Jersey’s long time Democratic Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) rounds out the top ten.  He originally was with a high tech company and is worth $116 million.  New Jersey, considered one of the most corrupt states in the country, has had many home-grown Democratic gazillionaires for a long time.

Former Democratic Senator and New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine last week resigned as CEO of MF Global, a well established company he ran into the ground. As of last week federal investigators were trying to determine why the company is missing $900 million.  It closed its doors last week and laid off more than 1,000 employees.

The issue of politics and money has been a complicated one.  President Barack Obama brought in far more money from Wall Street in his 2008 campaign than his Republican opponent Sen. John McCain (R-AZ).  Obama raked in $1 million from Goldman Sachs employees that year.  While his numbers are lower this year, the President has attracted $15.2 million from the financial services industry that he attacks so frequently.

Many Democrats run institutions on Wall Street.  Jamie Dimon, the CEO of J.P. Morgan has been a long-time Democratic supporter. So too has Goldman Sachs Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Lloyd C. Blankfein.

When will the mainstream media figure out that Democrats are part of a millionaire’s club too? Maybe someone should tell the Occupy Wall Street protesters, if they are still in their park.

http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2011/11/15/seven-of-the-top-ten-wealthiest-members-of-congress-are-democrats/2/

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Illegal Aliens upset with Alabama Law

 

Go Back To Mexico if You Don't like the Laws

MONTGOMERY, Alabama (AP) — Police arrested 13 protesters in Alabama’s capital Tuesday as they demonstrated against the state’s strict new law clamping down on illegal immigrants.

About 100 people, most of them Hispanic and college-aged, chanted slogans as they marched in light rain around the state Capitol and to the adjacent Statehouse where the legislature works.

“Undocumented, unafraid,” ”No papers, no fear, immigrants are marching here,” and “Ain’t no power like the power of the people,” were among the slogans the protesters chanted as they marched. Later, some were hauled off to jail in a yellow bus normally used by the city parks and recreation department.

Some sat down on Union Street between the Statehouse and the Capitol when police approached and warned them in English and Spanish that they would be arrested if they didn’t move.

None did and police arrested 11 demonstrators, tying their hand with yellow straps and loading them into the bus.

Federal courts have blocked parts of the Republican-backed law from taking effect, but both supporters and critics still call it the nation’s toughest state law against illegal immigration. The Obama administration opposes the law, which is calls an overreach by the state.

One of those arrested was 19-year-old Catalina Rios, a student at Henry Ford Community College in Detroit. She identified herself an illegal immigrant from Mexico.

Looking like a typical American teenager with her long dark hair in a ponytail, Rios said she knew there was a possibility she might be deported as she sat in the street waiting to be arrested.

“I know that I live in fear every single day of that, so this is no different,” Rios said. “I’m doing this for all the immigrant students who struggle every day.”

A Montgomery attorney who volunteered to represent those arrested, Mike Winter, said he understood they were mostly being charged with disturbing the peace, but also could be held for immigration officials.

After walking all the way around the Capitol one time, about 20 protesters entered the Statehouse and went up to the seventh-floor office of state Sen. Scott Beason, R-Gardendale, a key proponent of the law.

Once downstairs, two of the demonstrators — college students Ernesto Zumaya, 24, of Los Angeles and Caesar Marroquin, 21, of Philadelphia — linked arms and sat down on the floor of the main lobby. They vowed not to leave until Beason responded to their concerns. Beason did not respond to the protest and Zumaya and Marroquin were arrested peacefully when the building closed for the day.

Both said they are immigrants from Mexico without papers who have lived in the U.S. most of their lives. Marroquin said he always wanted to be a U.S. Marine.

Beason said later that he was not in his office Tuesday afternoon and did not immediately get the message except being told there were people at the Statehouse to see him.

Beason defended the law when asked about the protest.

“My intention is to enforce what’s already in place in federal law,” Beason said. “I make no apologies. I’m trying to do what I feel is best for the people of Alabama.”

A leader of the protest, Mohammad Abdollahi, who said he was an immigrant without papers from Iran who lives in Bessemer, explained that the purpose of the demonstration was for their voice “to be heard.”
http://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/Police-arrest-13-protesting-immigration-law-in-US-2270749.php 

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Israel may behind Deadly Explosion in Iran

Was IsraelBehind a Deadly Explosion at an Iranian Missile Base?

By Karl Vick / Jerusalem

Israeli newspapers on Sunday were thick with innuendo, the front pages of the three largest dailies dominated by variations on the headline “Mysterious Explosion in Iranian Missile Base.” Turn the page, and the mystery is answered with a wink. “Who Is Responsible for Attacks on the Iranian Army?” asks Maariv, and the paper lists without further comment a half-dozen other violent setbacks toIran’s nuclear and military nexus. For Israeli readers, the coy implication is that their own government was behind Saturday’s massive blast just outsideTehran. It is an assumption a Western intelligence source insists is correct: the Mossad — the Israeli agency charged with covert operations — did it. “Don’t believe the Iranians that it was an accident,” the official tells TIME, adding that other sabotage is being planned to impede the Iranian ability to develop and deliver a nuclear weapon. “There are more bullets in the magazine,” the official says.

The powerful blast or series of blasts — reports described an initial explosion followed by a much larger one — devastated a missile base in the gritty urban sprawl to the west of the Iranian capital. The base housed Shahab missiles, which, at their longest range, can reachIsrael. Last week’s report from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) saidIranhad experimented with removing the conventional warhead on the Shahab-3 and replacing it with one that would hold a nuclear device.Iransays the explosion was an accident that came while troops were transferring ammunition out of the depot “toward the appropriate site.”

The explosion killed at least 17 people, including Major General Hassan Moqqadam, described by Iranian state media as a pioneer in Iranian missile development and the Revolutionary Guard commander in charge of “ensuring self-sufficiency” in armaments, a challenging task in light of international sanctions.

Coming the weekend after the release of the unusually critical IAEA report, which laid out page upon page of evidence that Iranis moving toward a nuclear weapon, the blast naturally sharpened concern over Israel’s threat to launch airstrikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Half the stories on the TehranTimes website on Sunday referenced the possibility of a military strike, most warning of dire repercussions.

But the incident also argued, maybe even augured, against an outright strike. IfIsrael— perhaps in concert withWashingtonand other allies — can continue to inflict damage to the Iranian nuclear effort through covert actions, the need diminishes for overt, incendiary moves like air strikes. The Stuxnet computer worm bollixedIran’s centrifuges for months, wreaking havoc on the crucial process of uranium enrichment.

And in Sunday’s editions, the Hebrew press coyly listed what Yedioth Ahronoth called “Iran’s Mysterious Mishaps.” The tallies ran from the November 2007 explosion at a missile base south of Tehran to the October 2010 blast at a Shahab facility in southwestern Iran, to the assassinations of three Iranian scientists working in the nuclear program — two last year and one in July.

At the very least, the list burnishes the mystique of the Mossad, Israel’s overseas spy agency. Whatever the case-by-case reality, the popular notion that, through the Mossad, Israelknows everything and can reach anywhere is one of the most valuable assets available to a state whose entire doctrine of defense can be summed up in the word deterrence. But it doesn’t meanIsrael is the only country with a foreign intelligence operation insideIran. The most recent IAEA report included intelligence from 10 governments on details of the Iranian nuclear effort. And in previous interviews, Western security sources have indicated thatU.S. and other Western intelligence agencies have partnered withIsrael on covert operations insideIran. Sometimes the partner brings specific expertise or access. In other cases, Iranian agents on the ground who might harbor misgivings aboutIsrael are allowed to believe they are working only with another government altogether.

Saturday’s blast was so powerful it was felt 25 miles away in Tehran, and so loud that one nearby resident with combat experience thought he had just heard the detonation of an aerial bomb. “Frankly it did not sound like an arms depot from where I was because when one of those goes off, it is multiple explosions over minutes, even hours depending on the size of the facility,” the resident says. “All I heard was one big boom. I was sure from the quality of the noise that anyone in its immediate vicinity was dead. Something definitely happened, but I would not trust the [Revolutionary] Guards to be absolutely forthcoming as to what it was.”
— With reporting by Aaron J. Klein / Tel Aviv

 http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2099376,00.html

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Occupy Wall Street Demands, Can someone say Communism

Liberalism is a Mental Disorder

By: Elmer Williams

Here is a list of the demands that Occupy Wall Street wants implemented. These people need to be shut down, because they are nothing but a bunch of Socialist with Communistic views. These people are advocating doing away with the Constitution. They are literately demanding that we loose all of our constitutional rights, so that we can reward lazy, worthless, vagabonds who don’t want to work.

Why didn’t you get a real degree in a relevant field, so you could have found employment? If your degree is in Horticulture which is the science of plant cultivation or you have a degree in Art Therapy. Also if you happen to get a degree in Music Creativeness, the chances are great that you will not find employment.

These morons think that if they raise the minimum wage to $18 and the maximum wage to $90 that we will have utopia. Listen you brainless little idiots, promoting mediocrity, and rewarding laziness is not the answer. What would be the motivation to succeed if we start capping success? They only want to work 6 hours a day like some others, I’m sure in the “International Community.”  

These people are requesting that we issue a moratorium on all foreclosures and layoffs. In other words if you want to lie around and smoke dope all day, the Banks should just ignore your debt. Also if you don’t feel like coming to work the boss should just be sensitive to you needs. What in the hell is wrong with these people.

This just proves that their parents should have slowed down on all the drugs from the Woodstock area. Who is going to pay for all of these brilliant ideas? Do they think that money really grows on trees? They say we should also repeal “racist and xenophobic ($10 word for tolerant) English only laws.” So we should not have an identity by speaking English only in this country. Why don’t they insist that other countries follow our footsteps and have universal languages in all countries?

Out of everything on the list and it’s hard to pick the worst thing on the list. However I though that when they said they wanted to “Ban the private ownership of land.” This was simply shocking to me. These crazy communist want to take your land. Please read all their demands below and you will see how scary these people are.

 Why don’t they petition Congress or the White House about some of these issues?  They are consistently occupying the wrong location. I suggest that they go over to 1600Pennsylvaniaand protest the real crooks.   

Here is the List of Occupy Wall Street Demands

Repeal the Taft-Hartley Act. Unionize ALL workers immediately.

Raise the minimum wage immediately to $18/hr. Create a maximum wage of $90/hr to eliminate inequality.

Institute a 6 hour workday, and 6 weeks of paid vacation.

Institute a moratorium on all foreclosures and layoffs immediately.

Repeal racist and xenophobic English-only laws.

Open the borders to all immigrants, legal or illegal. Offer immediate, unconditional amnesty, to all undocumented residents of theUS.

Create a single-payer, universal health care system.

Pass stricter campaign finance reform laws. Ban all private donations. All campaigns will receive equal funding, provided by the taxpayers.

Institute a negative income tax, and tax the very rich at rates up to 90%.

Pass far stricter environmental protection and animal rights laws.

Allow workers to elect their supervisors.

Lower the retirement age to 55. Increase Social Security benefits.

Create a 5% annual wealth tax for the very rich.

Ban the private ownership of land.

Make homeschooling illegal. Religious fanatics use it to feed their children propaganda.

Reduce the age of majority to 16.

Abolish the death penalty and life in prison. We call for the immediate release of all death row inmates from death row and transferred to regular prisons.

Release all political prisoners immediately.

Immediate withdrawal fromIraqandAfghanistan.

Abolish the debt limit.

Ban private gun ownership.

Strengthen the separation of church and state.

Immediate debt forgiveness for all.

End the ‘War on Drugs’.

 

http://occupywallst.org/forum/proposed-list-of-ows-demands/