Sharyn's blog

January 21, 2010 statement from Doris “Granny D” Haddock in response to the Supreme Court’s decision today to overturn campaign finance limits:

           Ten years ago, I walked from California to Washington, D.C. to help gather support for campaign finance reform. I used the novelty of my age (I was 90), to garner attention to the fact that our democracy, for which so many people have given their lives, is being subverted to the needs of wealthy interests, and that we must do something about it. I talked to thousands of people and gave hundreds of speeches and interviews, and, in every section of the nation, I was deeply moved by how heartsick Americans are by the current state of our politics.

            Well, we got some reform bills passed, but things seem worse now than ever. Our good government reform groups are trying to staunch the flow of special-interest money into our political campaigns, but they are mostly whistling in a wind that has become a gale force of corrupting cash. Conditions are so bad that people now assume that nothing useful can pass Congress due to the vote-buying power of powerful financial interests. The health care reform debacle is but the most recent example.

Who made these statements today?

"Instead of back room deals, we're talking about transparency."

"I just went to the gym, I had a nice workout."

A)  Hillary Clinton

B)  Martha Coakley

C)  Barack Obama

D)  Scott Brown

find correct answer in following link:

  http://www.thebostonchannel.com/politics/22273287/detail.html 

cited for increase in female ambassadors to and from U.S. (from Washington Post):

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/10/AR2010011002731.html?hpid=topnews
 

quick quote:  

"More than half of new recruits for the U.S. Foreign Service and 30 percent of the chiefs of mission are now women, according to the State Department. That is a seismic shift............"

I just finished reading Battle for America 2008 by Dan Balz and Haynes Johnson.  (anyone else read this yet?)   The authors briefly touch upon The Obama's campaign questionable caucus strategies and the campaign's pressure/influence on the DNC vis a vis primary voting rules.

On Iowa Caucus:  "Tom and Christie Vilsack were arriving at the Ward One precinct caucus in Van Allen Elementary School in Mt. Pleasant.  'Who are these people?' Vilsack thought, 'I've never seen these people before.'  The population of Mt. Pleasant is about 9,000.  Vilsack's wife is a native and Vilsack himself has lived there most of his adult life.  For him to walk into a caucus and not recognize scores of people was unnerving."

The civilized world is attempting to address the huge problem of the illegal weapons market (with strong support from Sec. of State Hillary Clinton).    The Guardian reported a couple weeks ago:

One of the great tragedies of our times is the uncontrolled spread of weapons, often from illegal markets, sometimes in violation of international embargoes. Up to a thousand people a day – mostly women and children – are killed by such arms, most of them in the world's poorest countries. ...

One crucial step will be to negotiate a worldwide arms trade treaty. Britain and France have been working closely since 2006 to promote the idea of such a treaty in the United Nations, which would join up the current patchwork of national and regional systems for regulating arms exports. It is the gaps in these systems and their lack of consistency and coherence that have allowed illegal arms markets to spring up.

Afghanistan’s Bravest Woman Speaks Out:    

With all that's going on now:  Fort Hood, Unemployment, Health Care Reform, and Wall Street Shennanigans, take a look at Huff Post's front page headline.

They're playing the freaking race card again! -- putting Glen Beck's comments from last July front and center (because a right-wing guy recently said he agreed with Beck).  Aren't there more important things worthy of headline status? Honestly.  (and I thought I'd seen some improvement at Huff recently -- maybe they figured they took a couple steps forward, so they're due for a step back?)

 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ 

and the Speaker likely validated vis a vis CIA lies:

The CIA may have misled Congress at least five times since 2001, two Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee said Tuesday.

“There have been…examples where the committee actually has been lied to."

… “We’re in the process of reviewing several instances where the executive branch may have violated the [notification] requirements that are in the National Security Act.”

One of the instances being closely examined by the two Democrats is the September 2002 briefing on enhanced interrogation techniques that became the basis for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) claim that the CIA lied to her. Findings on this point could bolster Pelosi’s case.

http://thehill.com/homenews/house/65027-pelosi-claim-that-cia-lied-validated-by-intel-panel 
 

Check out these photos.

I especially like "Bankers get rich; We lose our pension." and "Jail 'em; Don't bail 'em"   These big showdowns seem to go down in Chicago!  Remember that one back in the 60s (Dem Party Convention)?

-- the cutting block, that is.

Here in New Hampshire the counties are being hit pretty hard by the so-called stimulus package.  Not only are the cooperative extension offices in danger of closing due to lack of funding ( http://www.lancasterfarming.com/node/1779 ), but home health care services are also up on the block.  I asked my Cheshire County Administrator what's going on with the HHC programs now at risk of being shut down, and then asked "What about the new stimlus money on its way soon?"  He replied that HHC is funded in no small part through Medicare programs, and the stimulus bill actually is significantly cutting Medicare funding.

How is HHC doing in your state?

Obama, Geithner and Summers continue to bailout the Wall Street tycoons, but are cutting Medicare. So there you go.  (That portion of the bailout allocated to the tycoons would have been more appropriately directed to replace the retirement money all those people lost because of the tycoons' incompetence and, more precisely, greed.) 

But I'm digressing now from Home Health Care.  So that's all I have to say for now.

some observations: