Green Dog dem

Bush adm resistance to alternative energy putting america's economic future at risk

2007-12-09T07:50:00.000-05:00

The close to 6 year resistance by the Bush Adm and republican lead congress has put American is a bad future economic position. Instead spreading the cost of conversion to a fossil fuel alternative or alternative the republicans have fought tooth and nail against it. Now, we are in the max pain position of having to in short accord to make massive changes to our environmental situation or risk the same economic pain we sought to avoid by not doing them.

While, the rest of the industrialized world has been creating it's alternative energy industries we are in the beginning stages. We are now starting to see the international costs, in our auto-industry. Ford and Gm are not simply being hurt by their labor situation they being hurt because they are being cut off from foreign markets because of their failure until recently and putting their market share at risk at home as fuel efficiency has become a bigger and bigger concern.

We are now getting to this position with other industries as well. As, well we as we are rushing to deal the environmental problems the Republicans until recently have tried to explain away as unproven and in some cases are still trying to. We are being forced to import or have foreign companies build our alternative energy infrastructure,because the country has failed to invest in the technology or create the capacity to do it ourselves. This has created a secondary cost of us not even benfiting from our own attempt to shift to alteratives to fossil fuels.

Our failure to take the pain of changing over while the europeans started to in the 80's and 90's and the first 6 year of this adm and we made fun of them for it. They are benefiting and we are paying the price, as we are now years behind them, and the costs of doing so now will be much more expensive for our leaderships lack of vision.

Lucky Dog of the 2007 Election

2007-11-14T22:51:00.000-05:00

In an up and back vote count that wasn't settled till monday, Whitehall Twp Commissioner Thomas Slonaker seems to have eeked out win in the race for Lehigh county controller (and I mean eeked out) over the current Lehigh county controller Paul Shaffer by 23 votes. On election night it looked like Slonaker had originally won by 278 votes 22,280 to 22,002 then the next morning it had flipped to a 67 vote advantage for Shaffer 21,464 votes to 21,397. Finally today Slonaker 21,624 votes, compared with Shaffer 21,601. I honestly don't understand the vote total changes either.

All I can say is Thomas Sloanker is one lucky dog and definally deserves the title of Lucky Dog of the 2007 Election

Maliki and his achievements

2007-09-03T10:32:00.000-04:00

1. Maliki has achieved 3 racially Homogenious regions.
More or less the precence of Kurds and Sunnis had been removed from Southern Iraq and most of Baghdad.

Al abar is now Homogenously Sunnis

the North or Now what is called Kurdistan is almost homogenously Kurd

2. There are now 3 million or more Sunnis and Shites mostly sunnis that have fled the country.

3. There is more or elss an automous southern Iraq region

Iraq visits by congressmen and Senators Staged events

2007-08-31T21:09:00.000-04:00

It seems now that rather than a briefing on what is going on in Iraq congressmen and Senators have been receiving what amounts to Pr campaign orchastrated by the Miltary and the Bush adm to convince them that surge was working.

The congressmen and Senators were set up with pr officers. The senators and congressmen's bios were plastered all over the green zone. Spin City," Rep. Moran said of the incident. "The Iraqis and the Americans were all singing from the same song sheet, and it was deliberately manipulated."

They are restrict from who they are meeting with and are only given access to what amounts to specfic officals and soilders that were prescreen to talk to them. On several occasion people that tried to talk to them were cut off, block as when they started trying to tell them what was really going on.

This brings into question what is really going on in iraq and if we are really being given a the picture or this is simply another con game by this adm to keep the war going. Is the surge really working or not I now question if what the congress member are coming back with is the truth or is simply a well orchastraed fraud by the adm to convince them and us it is. I don't think the adm would be going to this level of restricted access if it was. They seem to be so desperate to keep the war going they will resort to even staged events for congress to convince them things are going well even if they aren't.

Bush pushing towards invasion of Iran

2007-08-29T08:36:00.000-04:00

It's quite clear that George Bush intends to try to convince the American people that's a good idea to invade Iran. We are hearing the same language that lead up to his unilateralist invasion of Iraq, plus the increased craziness of a Nuclear Holocaust. It's quite clear that they have decided that the best way to deal with our problems in Iraq is to start a war with Iran. This is Bush's desperate last ditch effort to keep the Iraq war going,to distract the failure of Iraq with a New enemy a new war someething and i'm going to get attacked for this that is worthy of Nazis propagandist Joseph Goebbels. The idea that keeping people in fear will keep their support no matter how bad things are going. I honestly have now lost what little respect I had for this President that he would resort to this, and am will lose what respect I have for the American public if they fall for it.

Today proves we need to Pressure the Iraqi government So Mr Maliki Shut up.

2007-08-26T18:23:00.000-04:00

It seems that the only time that makes the Iraqi government do anything is the threat that the American troops will actually leave. Mr. Maliki spent the past 3 days cursing and screaming at US elected officials mostly Democrats. Who wanted him removed, that they were undemocratic. Telling us if we don't want to be their (his) friend he can find someone else. That this is their government that we should mind our own business, screaming and yelling and having a fit on Television like a lunatic. Telling us compromise takes time progress takes time. Well, Mr. Maliki it seems the only way we can get you and the Iraqi government to show progress in Iraq is a threaten your power. That someone actually lit a fire under you and your government. That have had months and years to do thing and only do them now that if you don't the troops will pull out. That all of a suddenly only today moved to meet the US benchmarks because Democrats and some republicans put pressure on you.

This simply proves that the only thing that will speed up progress in Iraq is continued pressure and threats of leaving by American officials. That unless we put up a real threat of leaving or your removal nothing will happen. It proves Democrats were right to put the screws to the iraqi government. We will continue to spill our blood for nothing, infiniteum. So Mr. Maliki Shut up I'm almost as sick of listening to your bs as our President's rants about Vietnam.

How stupid does Bush think the American People are Vietnam,Japan,Korea

2007-08-22T08:57:00.000-04:00

Bush must really think the American People are stupid. Bush is goin to try and conflate Japan,Korea and Vietnam into the same frame work.

We did not go into Japan and try to beat the people into submission, nor did we create a government before the war was over. We had already won there were no insurgence in Japan and there was a true leader to negotiate with.

We won in Japan and were able to set up a democracy because we had nuked the country and destroyed their will to fight.

Second Korea, exists and continues to exist in the way it does because of outside infulences between the Soviets, China and the Us and other allies.

But again this was a fight between two groups and even though we standed thousands died and even though we were there South Korea had a coup d'etat lead by General Park Chung-hee 1961, and who was replace in a coup d'etat by General Chun Doo-hwan 1979 There was also a masacre in 1980 of Democracy groups and then a revolt in 1988.All this happened while we were there.

In Vietnam we didn't lose because we left we lost because we destablize the rest of the region and didn't understand the culture of vietnam. We have incompitent allies and that no matter how much we trained them couldn't get anything done. The invation of Cambodia and the Kent State mascare in the us ended the war. Congress only cut off the Money because it had no choice, and it was the only way to end the war. Bush is continuing to point to Domino theory which didn't happen. The simple fact is that reguardless of what the Vietnam apologist say we could not have won in Vietnam no matter how long we stayed. The government was courpt and incomptient and based on the pentagon papers the Johnson and Nixon adm had been lying to the American people about what was going on in Vietnam for years. The simple fact is the Johnson adm tried to paint the tet offensive as a victory that it wasn't. Which is where the war started to go down hill. We simply couldn't control vietnam without ourselves and neither can we control Iraq.

The simple fact is the comparison between Iraq and the other wars is a load of dung. Iraq is more closely related to Vietnam because there is some ethnic strugle and we are bogged down. We were told over and over again in Vietnam we were winning there is a light at the end of the tunnel unforuntaely the light at the end of the tunnel was the light from an on coming train. That is what is happening in Iraq we make a little progress to make it look like we are getting somewhere just enough to keep us there then all hell breaks loose again. This is what happened in Vietnam except by the end Congress had had it and cut it off. It doesn't matter how long we stay or if we stay there will be continued violence and in the end there will be a civil war if not this year next year or 10 years from now.

Has the Us Miltary Become an Evangelical Cult

2007-08-19T10:23:00.000-04:00

It seems there is a continued attempt to evangialize Miltary recruits still reguardless of what is going on. If you are wondering why the Us Miltary is having such a hard time recruiting to the numbers it sets and keeping people. On every level evangical chrisitans have invaded the us miltary and are using the insitution to harrass recruits into converting to Evangical christianity reguardless if they are any other type of Christianity.

The Miltary has because so bad that the recruits are being commanded to go to Evangical events. The miltary is being run on faith based action what is going on in Iraq is no longer a war but a crusade, it believes that Iraq is a battle of Revelations. That is doesn't matter what the truth is they will lie, distort, and alter to keep the war going. This is part of why we are really not winning because the Us miltary and the people running it are just as intollerant as the people we are fighting. They blame those who are not evangical christians for their failures and most specifically non-christians. That we are losing not because of their actions but because they have lost the support of god because they haven't converted enough people.

It is a highly disturbing situation and everything that comes out of the us miltary should be taken in the Light that they view this as a religious crusade and not what is in the Best interest of the american people.

Here we go again the National Press and American Public is Conned by the Bush adm again

2007-08-13T21:22:00.000-04:00

It seems that the Much touted anti-war scholar Michael O'Hanlon aggressive critics of the Bush administration's handling of the war" or as "critics of the war by his own admission is not a war critic at all but a whole hearted supporter of the war from word one.

It's quite clear from the quote below that what we have been hearing is alot of happy happy nonsense from a staged trip by the Dod. There is no real evidence what was reported with O'hanlon and Pollack was true nor that there is any real progress in Iraq at all or that what is being Shown as said by sen Webb was nothing more than a Horse and Pony show.

Greenwald: OK, but once George Bush is primed to invade in March of 2003, the strategy is known, on balance did you believe that with the strategy that Bush was going to use, that the war on balance was a good idea rather than a bad idea? You favored it, right?

O'Hanlon: Yes, yes I did.

Greenwald: As far as the Surge is concerned, the policy that President Bush announced in January 2007, you were a supporter of that strategy on balance, right?

O'Hanlon: Correct, yes.

Greenwald: OK. And in terms of the reasons that you favored it, you say that you obviously got Weapons of Mass Destruction wrong - you wrote a Washington Times February 2003 column where you said: “the President was still convincing on his central point that the time for war is near.” And then you went on to say that "It is now time for multilateralists to support the President." Weapons of Mass Destruction was a very significant part of the case that you made for invading Iraq. Would you agree with that?

O'Hanlon: Yes, I would.

Greenwald: Why did you need the permission of the U.S. military in order to go? Why couldn't you just go yourself?

O'Hanlon: I suppose I could have, but I was hopeful that someone could help take care of my security, for one thing. I'm not going to try to sound more heroic than I am. And also I wanted to talk to a lot of military personnel and get their impressions.

And also I'm not a long-standing enough specialist on Iraqi politics. I'm more of a defense scholar. So I don't have the kinds of contacts in Iraq that some of my friends who are first and foremost Iraq specialists have. And therefore in order to have a useful trip, I need to sort of tag along with somebody. So this was a great benefit to me that not only the U.S. military would help arrange the trip, but also that Ken Pollack and Tony Cordesman -- who were two long-standing Iraq experts, two of our nation's best Iraq experts -- would be on the trip as well. So for all these reasons, that was why I took the chance to go on that trip.

Greenwald: The first line of your Op-Ed said:"viewed from Iraq where we just spent the last eight days interviewing American and Iraqi military and civilian personnel..."

How did you arrange the meetings with the Iraqi military and civilian personnel?

O'Hanlon: Well, a number of those -- and most of those were arranged by the U.S. military. So I'll be transparent about that as well. These were to some extent contacts of Ken and Tony, but that was a lesser number of people. The predominant majority were people who we came into contact with through the itinerary the D.O.D. developed.

Greenwald: Were you concerned that you were getting an unrepresentative view of the situation in Iraq because the Iraqis with whom you spoke were ones hand-picked by the U.S. military?

O'Hanlon: If someone wanted to argue that we were not getting a representative view of Iraqis because the ones we spoke with were provided by the military, I would agree that this would be a genuine concern. Certainly that might have influenced the impressions that we were presented, though by no means did all of the Iraqis agree with the view of progress in Iraq.

Greenwald: Given that some of the claims in your Op-Ed are based upon your conversations with Iraqis, and that the Iraqis with whom you spoke were largely if not exclusively ones provided to you by the U.S. military, shouldn't that fact have been included in your Op-Ed?

O'Hanlon: If the suggestion is that in a 1,400 word Op-Ed, we ought to have mentioned that, I can understand that criticism, and if we should have included that, I apologize for not having done so.

But I want to stress that the focus here was on the perspective of the U.S. military, and I did a lot of probing of what I was told, and remain confident in the conclusions that we reached about the military successes which we highlighted. But if you're suggesting that some of our impressions might have been shaped by the military's selection of Iraqis, and that we might have disclosed that, that is, I think, fair enough.

Greenwald: So were all of the people with whom you spoke in Iraq ones you encountered as a result of planning by the U.S. military?

O'Hanlon: Well, other than the ones we encountered in passing in the Green Zone or whatever. And I’m not going to claim that there was a huge amount of back-and-forth. There was a little bit. But for the most part, the conversations were ones arranged by D.O.D., yes

But I've often not been in agreement with them on how they interpreted things, I’ve often done thing to try to get details on the tactics.

You know, there's always obviously a danger of being a little bit wowed by the group you're with, but I have been involved in this debate long enough and been involved critically long enough that I feel from the D.O.D. point of view, I have a very good interaction with our leadership and our personnel.

We also saw C.I.A personnel, we saw A.I.D personnel, we met with people from senior CENTCOM positions who were not on General Petreus' staff. We had a lot of interaction with civilian officials there – including the ambassador, a number of people in his office. We had ample opportunity to probe at and assess the U.S. take - I am not worried about that.

However I will take your point and I would agree with your point that we were certainly not getting a representative view of Iraqi opinion. And nor would I claim that we got a representative view, or at least got a widespread sampling of, American enlisted military personnel thinking. We had a couple dozen of enlisted personnel we come in contact with, but as you can probably surmise -- unless you are totally out of earshot - which I was sometimes - the ability to get a totally independent take was difficult. I would go out of my way to get that independent take when I could, but I would admit to you that in the space of seven and a half days I only had probably a few independent opinions in private settings from enlisted personnel. So, that's a limited sampling. And that's part of why we said we felt morale was high, but we didn't go and use more superlatives. Frankly, the people we talked to I thought morale was outstanding, but I didn't want to get carried away in a situation where there was a limitation on our ability to do a full sampling.

So in regard to the military we had a lot of access, conversations with a lot of people we had professional relationships with for years, and I feel that I have an accurate sense of how they view the mission. I do not claim to have near as detailed a sense of how Iraqis think about our role there at the moment.

Greenwald: But even in terms of what’s going on in the various cities, and how ready the Iraqi troops are, and whether their divisions really are as ready as the Op-Ed suggested – Isn’t it fair to say that the great bulk of your information about those matters came from statements made to you either by the U.S. military officials or the Iraqi officials selected for you by the U.S. military?

O'Hanlon: Yes. But I would actually challenge what you just said. We do not in the Op-Ed give an overall glowing assessment of the Iraqi security forces. We do say there has been progress with some of them. But we do not --

Greenwald: I understand. But with the ones where you said there was progress -- that was based largely on, if not exclusively on, the claims of the U.S. military and the Iraqi military officials they picked for you, right?

O'Hanlon: No, it's more than that because it's also looking at data on what they've been doing on the battlefield and who they're led by. And in fact Ken Pollack and I are now doing a longer trip report in which you'll see, I think, if you're interested in some of the detail in our thinking about the progress, but also the limitations on Iraqi security forces. And one thing I had decided to tell General Petreus and General Odierno and others in my visit and subsequently is that I don't think we have yet a very compelling transition strategy for how we can ultimately pass off security in some of the most tense, inter-ethnic neighborhoods to Iraqi forces, because I am not yet confident that we are seeing a large enough number of them become non-sectarian and dependable in their nature.

And this is a point I made repeatedly with Petreus and Odierno and a point that we are going to make in our trip report. The Op-Ed said -- listen, there is momentum at one level. There are some Iraqi security forces that are looking better, and on top of that there's a volunteer phenomenon -- where they want to work places like al Anbar Province and some other places to go against our common enemies -- that's also impressive. But it's by no means a resolution of the sectarian conflict. I remain quite concerned that we need an end-game for that.

In fact, if you'll permit me - one last thing I've done in the last two months is to write a paper on the “soft partition” option for Iraq, because I think that in the end it would be much easier to actually figure out a transition strategy out of Iraq for us if Iraqis would agree to essentially create three autonomous regions – with one of them being Kurdistan and the other two being predominantly Sunni and predominately Shia. I think it would be easier to build security forces around protecting those sorts of zones.

So that has been an enduring concern of mine. And it's true that in this Op-Ed we tried to emphasize where we saw momentum; we focused more on some of the good news, and I suppose we could be criticized for that. But, we did acknowledge the sectarian problem is far from addressed, and that's something that's very much on our minds still today.

Greenwald: Your partner in this Op-Ed, Ken Pollack, spoke with George Packer of The New Yorker, who afterwards wrote: Pollack "spoke with very few Iraqis and could independently confirm very little of what he heard from American officials." Is that your experience as well? Do you agree with that characterization?

O'Hanlon: Well, I just told you my fuller view on that, which is that I don't claim any great sense of what the Iraqi public or Iraqi leadership is thinking. We did actually have a number of meetings with some top Iraqi politicians, but a small enough number that I'm not going to make undue claims about it.

Now you could say in one sense all this data ultimately, all this information ultimately is coming from the U.S. military. Yes, but there's an opportunity for a lot of probing, a lot of debate, a lot of conversations back and forth and so I think Packer is slightly too strong in his criticism on that point.

Greenwald: Well, I think he's quoting, or purporting to describe, what Pollack told him. But I take your point and it is fair enough to say that just because you're getting your information from military sources doesn't mean you are just gullibly swallowing what they say, because you're a professional and you're making assessments about what their credibility is. That's fair enough and I understand that point. And I guess you've said in the past you felt like you had less faith than what they where telling you this time, and that's all fine.

But what I'm trying to get at is if they told you, for instance, that there were certain army divisions in Mosul where the bad commanders were being weeded out and they were now capable of holding neighborhoods better, you wouldn't actually go to the neighborhoods and inspect whether or not what you were told was true. Your claims in that regard in the Op-Ed were based upon your belief that what the U.S. military commanders were telling you was accurate. Is that true?

O'Hanlon: Yes, that’s true. Based on that example, on that type of example, you're right.

quote from interview by Glenn Greenwald
http://utdocuments.blogspot.com/2007/08/interview-with-michael-ohanlon.html

So Mr President Who are we going to invade Next Bush's Middle East Jihad

2007-08-09T17:11:00.000-04:00

Bush more or less said today that we need to invade countries all over the middle east and install democracies. So that we can remove the atmosphere that makes people hate us. Bush more or less said today that we need to go all over the middle east and Depose governments. So where are we going to invade Next Saudi Arabia, Jordan, UAE, Barain,Kuwait most of our allies in the middle east are dicatorships or Monarchies.I mean there are only 3 true free democracies in the Middle east {i really can't called Iraq a Democracy) Israel, Iran and Turkey,. One of which we can't stand so how in the world can we say democracy works. The places were Democracy exists in Arab countries in the middle east they elect the head of their sects or tribal leaders or some religious leader that tells them to vote for them. They more or less elect the lunatic fringe in the country.

53 Lehigh valley still in use bridges found deficient or with ratings close to it

2007-08-05T12:02:00.000-04:00

It was kinda disturbing looking at this list realizing that over the past yr I had driven over a number of these bridges sometimes several times a day. Especially the Highly Dangerous Gen Thos R Morgan brige in Slatington. A councilwoman in Slatington had told me how dangerous the bridge was but and the state kept refusing to fund replacing it but now I feel lucky the bride didn't fall out from under me looking at this rating.

It seems that most of the deficient bridges are in Western and Northwestern Lehigh County mostly in the old industrial boros that have been left to rot by both the county and the state and the new suburbs build around aging and rotting infrastructure. This is a disaster waiting to happen, do not forget Lehigh county is geologically active as a result of mining and the Limestone base of our soil, that is being undercut by water insursion, sinkholes, etc.

Most of the problems in Northampton county simply seem to be the result of a population that is simply growing too fast for the infrastructure to keep up.
Lehigh county

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20099121#LEHIGH
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20099121#NORTHAMPTON
(was requested to remove the data and put up links)

Finding the proper balance between: Taxation, Regulation and Business interest,the Free market,Personal Wealth

2007-08-04T12:59:00.000-04:00

We as a country seem to have a severe problem with moderation and balance,in general but most explictly in the area of taxation and regulation. Government in the Us tends to either do too much or do too little. This was most explictly shown this week in the collapse of the credit market for the second time in 7 years, and the collapse of the 35w bridge in minn and the realization that 13% of american bridges are on the same condition. As,well as the realization of a week by week erosion of civil liberties and privacy of Americans as came out in House hearings this week, and continued willingness to use tax dollars in ways that most americans don't agree with and are probally not in the countries best interest.

The first credit crunch in 2000 happened because Allen Greenspan quickly lowered the us prime interest rates during the 90's and as a result numberous businesses incured enmorous amounts of debt that could only be prepetuated by more debt. So when the debt (loans) was cut off by increasing the prime interest rate. The whole house of cards collapsed under it. This was caused by a failure to regulate the credit industry so many non doc un-secured loans were created. Collapsing the stockmarket and send the economy into recession. I thought we had learned from this but it seems we have not.
In 2002 and several other times over the past 5 years the republicans cut taxes several times to excessly low levels while the interest rates were lowering interest rates to the point of almost zero by 2006, with no real increase in workers pay. Thereby creating an enviroment that both corporations and individual were living well beyond their means. Crediting the current situation were both corporations and individual are over leveraged, and the finanical institutions that made the loans and organization and investment firms that bought the paper on the loans are having them default on them. Thereby creating a credit crunch and making it hard for even good credit risk individuals and businesses to, great credit, and creating a 8 trillion dollar debt whose interest is hardly being covered by the addition revenues that were created from the cuts, so the increases are simply paying for the interest on the cuts.

Beyond this to cut this the tax cut also resulted in funding cuts such as highway funding and unfunded mandates like no child left behind. Thereby shifting large amounts of extra expreses on the state and local governments. That has resulted in increases of property taxes to fill the gap and states to fill the road funding gap resulting in 13% of bridges and thousands of miles of roads in desperate need of repair and an event like the 35w bridge collapsing because the Minn governor refused to increase taxes to pay for the repairs to the bridge.

As well while this was going on the money that inspite of this could have been shift to these projects was shifted to unnecessary activities like invading and then more or less dumping billions of dollars into iraq. That went to fund the people who were attack us. As well there is unneccary regulation of freedoms in this country as Ben Franklin said people who give up a little freedom for a little security will soon have neither and now we have neither. It is not his or any other government's responiblity to try and protect us from everything nor can they and the amount of freedom we have given up over the past years is much greater than the security we are reciving in return.

We now are probally at more risk from the government than we are from the people who attacked us on 9/11. The point of the constitution and the laws that were created by the founders were not to make us 100% safe but to ensure that there was a balance between security and freedom which has now shift dangerously towards the prior.This is too much government interferance in our lives and much more than the founders would have allowed.

But as i said we need balance too much taxation would not be good either, nor is too much spending nor is too little security. It was ok to cut corp taxes but not to continue the cuts once the economy was capable of funding itself. If you do that the only thing you do is overheat the economy and create a dependence by the corporation on the extra funding. This goes the same for lowering interest rates it's ok to stimulate the economy but if you keep them too low for too long it creates a money glut and bad loans to people and corporations that shouldn't have had them that can collapse the economy. As we are seeing today because there are too many bad loans that are drying up the credit market on it's own by in a much harsher way than if the central bank had raised rates back in feb and slowly raised them. It would have beena shock to the system it could have absorbed but this is now a meltdown.

That is the problem the government doesn't seem to understand when to start and when to stop doing things. It either over does or under does thing that only it can do and simply can not be done by the private sector. The Free market is incapable of completely regulating itself, or has the willingness or ability to regulate, or handle certain thngs. Nor should the government so restrict it that it can't function. The governement always needs to be there to steady the scale but it should be with a light touch not a heavy hand. The Free market will take things to the extreme and the government needs to stop it from doing so, such as the enviroment or ensuring fair treament of workers. But the Government must also not go in the exstreme opposite direct.

The basic point of this whole dicussion is that when there is a balance between the free market, the government, the rights and freedoms and protection of the governed, and security and the public good there is harmony, and no one knows if they are doing anything thing at all. When there is an inbalance between these forces the side that inbalanced is shifted towards fights tooth and nail to keep that inbalance and the other side fights to get it back to balance. Right now the imbalance is shifted towards the freemarket,the government, partually for and against the public good and against Freedoms and protection of the governed. That is why the country is in the state it is now and will be until either Bush is out of office or until congress reins him in.

When there is Balance

Fact Fact and damn Statistics why the July downturn in us deaths in iraq means nothing

2007-07-29T14:56:00.000-04:00

us causality stats avg from 2004-currect (i excluded 2003 because that was the year of the invasion and scews up the numbers)

Jan 74.75 Jan 07 83 +11%
Feb 53.5 Feb 07 81 +34%
March 49.75 March 07 81 +39%
April 91.75 Apr 07 104 +13%
May 88.75 May 07 126 +42%
June 70.5 June 101 +43%
July 55 July 81 +47%
Aug 72 Aug 37
Sept 67
Oct 88.66
Nov 97
Dec 84

The numbers as you see are statiscally higher than the avg deaths. There is a consistant build and break down period for this entire situation. With Feb,March,July and Sept are build up periods and major attack periods and death being and , April,May,Aug,Oct,Nov and dec. This year the cycle has speed up to one month of down attack lightly down attacks leading to 2 months of statisically higher attacks then one both of slightly elevated attacks. If the current pattern holds true Aug and Sept will have a higher number of attacks and more troops deaths if this pattern holds true there will be around 112 us troops deaths in Aug and 105 troops deaths in sept.

I honestly don't know how they can say the surge is working when it seems the only reason the deaths are down is because of this cycle and because July is the hottest months of the year in Iraq and there are just less attacks in July because of this.

I will believe this is there is an actual break in this cycle not the meaningless claims by the generals who are trying to keep this war going.

Part of America's perception problem around the World is the Bush era Military culture itself.

2007-07-28T10:34:00.001-04:00

The Culture that has seems to have develop during the Bush adm in US Military is one of an absolutist cult. That sees the rest of the world as inferiors needing to be "civilized" it seems to even been ingrained in the base live at home and abroad. This attitude of what could be akin to a new "white man’s Burden" idea even extends to the British our "allies". This is exemplified in a statement by a young woman in one of the documentaries who moved to a base in the Uk that going there would be good start to her Missionary work.

This sort of exemplifies the evangelistic Disrespects for the local culture the Military is based in. The Military culture has be come ultra fundamentalist Christian in such a way that it really doesn't even understand American culture itself, living in what seems to be a 1950's black hole, that is transported from base to base.

That even is upsetting the locals in the Uk where they see the Americans and their families based there as insulting and isolationist, with little concern what their activities have on the locals. This is sort of exemplified by instructions that are given to people who are new to the bases that there are just a few nut bags that will be rude to you.

This level of disrespect for the local cultures is only adding to Growing Anti-Americanism overseas. As this is because members of the military and their families are usually the only contact that foreigners have with Americans. After watching them in action in several of these documentaries I wouldn't have a very good view of America either if I was a foreigner.

Finally if this culture of disrespect is not fixed in the American military no amount of activity by the military or diplomats are going to fix America’s image around the world.

and we should do what Bush wants this time because???

2007-07-20T10:47:00.000-04:00

Every decision Bush has made from the decision to go into Iraq was the complete opposite of the decision that should have been made. Starting with going in then going in with too few troops, to letting the iraqi miltary be disbanded, to allowing rioting in the streets, to pushing election on the iraqis, to insisting on staying at every exit point we had, firing any General that suggested leaving Iraq was the best strategy, to sending in wave after waves of troops that have amounted in nothing.

THe simple fact is when Bush is faced with two options. When it has come to Iraq he always picks the wrong one. Whatever Bush suggests we should be doing the exact opposite. That includes approving General professional son Petraeus I've looked at Petraeus's record it's not very impressive and the only reason it seems he was put forward is because it seems he's good at towing the line. If he wrote the counter insurgency strategy for the us which hasn't worked for years then it should have been good enough reason not to approve him.

Very simply Bush's surge strategy deserves no more time beyond september if that long. The only point of what Bush is doing is so he can dump this on the next president so they can be blamed for the collapse of iraq and not him.

Well know we know what Jerkoff was talking about

2007-07-11T21:04:00.000-04:00

Well we know that Sec Chertoff was trying to avoid saying that Al Queada is stonger now than in 2001 because we F-cked up. After, 4 years of this nonsense in Iraq we are no safer now than we were 4 years ago. Al queada has reconstitued itself because we wasted all this f-cking time in Iraq,because we didn't go after them in pakistan and let things go in Afghanstan. We are no better off today because we invaded Iraq stupidly and the Bush adm is trying to cover it up.

Secreatary Homeland INsecurity needs to take an anti-acid and Shut up and stop fearmongering

2007-07-10T20:19:00.000-04:00

Today Secretary Michael Chertoff said he had a "Gut Feeling" that AL queda was going to attack us this summer. I don't want to hear about his Gut Feelings about Al queada we are spending Billon of f-king dollars on the fbi,cia and other group. He should know if there is going to be an attack. If he doesn't and the best he can do is guess he should f-cking resign. He has no business being the head of homeland security if that's the best they can do is guess. I can only assume this is the Bush adm's latest attempt to scare the american public and distract from the Iraq disaster they have created. Like the Terror Alert system was used during the 2004 election to destract for the Democratic candidates. So Mr Chertoff find an actually Threat or Shut the F-ck up.

General or Propgandists? The Latest Desperate act to keep us in Iraq

2007-07-08T16:48:00.000-04:00

We seem to be watching what is the Latest campaign by the Bush adm to keep us in Iraq 'til he leaves office in 2009. As we saw with, the other generals Petras and Lynch seem less like comanding Generals, and more like they are running a propganda campaign. Trying in what seems to be an endless propganda campaign to con the America people yet again into supporting continuing our act of insanity in Iraq. Over the last four years plus we have been told over and over again by generals everything is fine everything is great and progressing until about a month before they either resign or are removed from command. They suddenly admit things aren't going as well as they claimed, and more or less admiting they had to say whatever the bush adminstration wanted them to no matter what the truth was.

I have a hard time trusting anything the Generals are saying now to be honest, and looking at the two generals that are speaking for the Miltary I have even less trust. General David Petras is a professional Kiss ass, he was know a the Professional son in the miltary because he was the aid to camp of almost every general in the miltary. He has very limited experience and little if any success as a compander of operation the fact that he wrote the anti-insergence hand book for the miltary sort of speaks for it self showing how well things have gone so far. As to General Rick Lynch the guy is simply a mouth piece who you had and paper and he stand there and rattles it off trying to intimidate everyone.

It's quite clear the surge isn't working and it isn't going to work and we are being lied to yet again. That Bush will keep whining and whining until he gets his way or congress stands up to him and cuts off the funds. We keep going down the same road over and over again doing the same thing and getting no returns.

The Simple fact is it doesn't matter when we leave Iraq. How we leave it as soon as we leave the iraqis will turn on each other and start killing each other. The current government doesn't want us to leave because they know as soon as we do their all Dead and that's the only reason they want us to stay to protect their own skin and nothing else. They don't care how many americans die just that they survive. Well here we go again back down the rabbit hole maybe i'll find Alice this time.

Update: I failed to mention something in my post: That I had also noticed and some of the Journalist mentioned. One of the greatest examples of this propganda is the labeling of everyone we are fighting as Al-queda, if they are sunni, and sometimes even if they are Shia. It seems to be the Bush adm and Miltaries fall back now to label anyone that is opposed to us in Iraq as Al-Qaeda. There is little evidence there were never more than a few hundred Al-Queada related fighters in Iraq most of which have probally been wiped out already. Most claims by either Al-Qaeda or Al-Qaeda related attack in Iraq have had little to do with the group and Al-Qaeda was simply claiming responiblity for them as a propganda campaign that the Bush adm has fallen into, and legitmized by supporting the claims.

The I Scooter Libby kick back

2007-07-03T08:53:00.000-04:00

To, start off with I will not assert, that Bush did not have the right to Commute the sentence of I Scooter Libby. The constitution gives him that right and I will not dispute that. It is very clear thought that this was political kick back for Libby Keeping his mouth shut during the trial. That there it was obvious that a deal was made that Bush would commute or pardon Libby if he was convicted. It's clear that there was a there there. That this is a Cover my ass commutation,of the sentence that if they had left Libby in prison and he might speak.

As to the assertion that this sentence was excessive, there are thousands of Americans in Jail for Committing Perjury. Whom have spend much longer than 30 months and prision and aren't getting out because they don't have friends in high places. I highly doubt the founders intended for this power to be used for political means. In the end this was simply a bald faced political kick back. Very simply, elected republicans are only the party of law and order when it applies to other people and not to themselves.

Bush amd new message stay in Iraq forever

2007-06-18T17:15:00.000-04:00

The Bush adm's new policy is to convince the American Public that they don't know what they want so they can convince us to stay in Iraq forever. The latest message is the american people want victory and if it takes 10 year or forever we have to stay there.

I'm about to say something you won't see on many other Democratic Blogs

2007-06-17T16:00:00.000-04:00

If you are in the Us Illegally you should be arrested and Deported. No ifs, and, or buts. I don't care, why Millions of other People are here, that shouldn't be,the fact that are here makes them Criminals. No one is criminalizing them, they made themselves Criminals when they came accross the boarder without permission and stayed here without permission. I don't care that Businesses wants them here, if the business owners or hr depts are encouraging, people to come accross the boarder illegally they should be fine or arrested as accessories.

The simply fact is they are not Americans and broke our laws to get here which makes our only responibity to them giving them swift justice and deport them. As, we would with any legal alien that committed a crime. Yes if you're a legal Alien and you commit a Crime you are deported. We seem to be willing to waste tons of money on what are fruitless efforts overseas that cost 10 or 20 times a year as it would to deport these Criminals but the Bush adm and the Republicans are unwilling to spend the money to do this.

It's time to start enforcing the laws and throw the criminals out of the country. They have no right to be here and we shouldn't have to put up with their Criminal presense anylong. I don't care if your European, asian, African,or Hispanic or anything else if you are here illegally get out, or we should throw you out.

DEPORT THE ILLEGAL ALIENS NOW!!!!!

Palestine the New Pakistan

2007-06-15T21:03:00.000-04:00

It seems we are seeing a replay of the 1971 break up of West Pakistan (Bangladesh) and East Pakistan (current Pakistan). Hamas has now taken over Gaza and Fatah now only controls the West Bank. This was pretty much of an inevitability when you have a country (autonomous region) that is created on two side of another country will eventually split up. Especially when the majority of one group is so ideologically different than the other,i.e. West Pakistan was more or less at Peace with India and East Pakistan was at loggerheads with them. As, Fatah is interested in making Peace with Israel Hamas wants to burn Israel to the ground.

You better Damn well be sure this time!!!!!!!!! Before we start something we can't get out of.

2007-06-12T18:05:00.000-04:00

First of all Mr/Ms. Media pundit cut it out. This is serious stop spinning this We have gone in a week from: Karzai: Iran not backing Taliban,No evidence Iran moving weapons to Taliban: Gates,then suddenly we went to well Iran maybe helping the taliban, then suddenly Iran is helping the taliban. If anyone bothers to read the stories these statements are based on the improvement in the Taliban's techniques and armaments, and suppositions not any real documentation. What is failed to be mentioned in the story is the armaments aren't just of Iranian Origins but they are also of Chinese origins and no one is saying China is supporting the Talibian.

The Claims in these stories are entirely based on suppositions and assumptions and are not even based on intelligence. There is little reason for the Shia Iranians to help the Sunni Taliban. We as a country can not be wrong again and before we get ourselves into a war we can't get out. If we bomb Iran we won't just be doing strategic bombing we will start a war. The Irans will attack us because unlike the Iraqis they do have the ability to come back after us. We have little credibility in the world left and if we attack Iran and start another war we will be all alone and if we are wrong it will make Iraq look like the cake walk Bush claimed it would be.

We cannot invade another country on supposition and the idea of maybe they are doing it or maybe they did this or that. We can not be wrong again, we have to be right we can not simply attack a country because we don't like them we can neither afford to do so we don't have the troops or the money to do so. We have to be right everytime from here on out. We can not afford to screw up again. So before we invade another country we better be damn sure we are right and the media and the Bush admin making unproven calms is not helping the situation and is only making things worse for us.

I hope the Democratic party is paying attention the republican debates

2007-06-06T23:15:00.000-04:00

All the Republican candidates in Yesterday's Debate more or less said they'd prefer to have the terrorist attack us rather than have a gay Arabic Translator in the Military. That nuking Iran is a good Idea, as a response to them having a centrifuges not a a nuke a centrifuge. They want to deport Legal Aliens.

Better way to deal with Property Taxes

2007-05-31T09:16:00.000-04:00

Lower Pa Sales tax below the States around Pennsylvania then set up outlet malls near every major highway along the north at where between 81 and 29 in Susqueahana county, rt 15 in Tioga county,rt 219 in Mckean county 82 in warren county and 90 in Erie county and rt 220 in Bradford county. This as an example and do this at every major entry road along the Pa Board with Ny, Ohio and Maryland and New Jersey that is at least 70 miles from the Delaware Boarder. So more or less north of rt 276 and West of the Susquehanna River in Se pa.

This would Bring People into Pennsylvania from New York, New Jersey, Maryland and Ohio to avoid the taxes on large items in their state that they can bring home with them in their car. This would greatly outstrip any gain that would be had by raising Pa's state tax. Raising Pa's state tax will simply cut consumption in the state and encourage people to go to other states to Buy and live.

We finally have Proof Bush is Deranged and a Danger to the troops

2007-05-29T00:46:00.000-04:00

It is clear from this latest story that President Bush has completely become detached from reality. Based on this story Bush has deluded himself into thinking that most Americans still support staying in Iraq. When in reality most Americans are simply want to find the quickest exit from this insanity. Most Americans think there is no "WIN" in Iraq that the only question is how many more Americans will die because of this.

I believe that if the Democrats had come out and said we are voting for this Bill to give Bush funding for Iraq not because we believe it's the right thing to do but because we are afraid that he might leave the troops there to die if we don't. I think most Americans might have believed them. Bush is a danger to America now and a Danger to the troops. There is no way to remove him because the Republican elected offials are willing to allow this insanity to continue because either they are as deluded as he is, or care as little for the troops as I think.That the only thing they are to them is a campaign prop and nothing more and they are showing it by not standing up to George BUsh

Bush adm Flips off the troops

2007-05-17T20:23:00.000-04:00

Bush in response to Congressional attempt to raise Soldiers pay and the Death Benefits is to call them excessive.

Military Pay: The Administration strongly opposes sections 601 and 606. The additional 0.5 percent increase above the President’s proposed 3.0 percent across-the-board pay increase is unnecessary. When combined with the overall military benefit package, the President’s proposal provides a good quality of life for servicemembers and their families. While we agree military pay must be kept competitive, the three percent raise, equal to the increase in the Employment Cost Index, will do that.

More or less Bush is opposing giving the avg soldier any extra 6 dollars a month.

Beyond this he refuses to increase death Benefits by 40 dollars a month and refuses to increase the total death benefits for troops killed in battle an extra 100k to 600k for life time benefits.

The Bush adm also told the Soldier that they shouldn't get the discount on drugs that most people get from their plans, at a regular Pharmacy.

Finally the Bush adm told the American public screw you by asking the cost controls be put on contractors. Asking that negotiation requirements be removed from the bill for military contracts. i.e. to stop companies like haliburton from screwing the tax payers again with over priced food and goods.

It's kinda funny Bush and the Republicans accuses the Democrats of not caring about the troops but the republicans and Bush only seem to care about the troops when they are being used for his insanity.

Lehigh County Democratic Primary non-urban Roundup

2007-05-16T08:30:00.000-04:00

Challenged races only

Salisbury twp Current Ward 1 commissioner Robert Martucci bearly breaks a sweat defeating new comer John Eberhard

Upper Macungie Twp twp Commissioner race Chris Casey backs the truck over Chuck Deprill and runs him over again to take on Ed Early in November

Whitehall twp - Current Whitehall twp Executive Daneil Mcneil seems to have been Edged out by Edward Hozza jr

Current Commissioners Kenneth Snyder,Kyle Kern,Carl Hunsberger along with new comer Phillip Grinder edge out current county Secretary commissioner Bruce Brinker and new comers Ron Stern and Bob George.

on a different not the Joke of Property Reform ballot prop act 1 went down on an avg of 3 to 1 all over Lehigh county.

How Al Qaeda's number 2 is setting Us Policy

2007-05-06T10:06:00.000-04:00

Iman Al-Zawari seems to now be setting US policy in Iraq now. Yes I'm saying Al-Qaeda's number two is setting us policy. No, I'm not asserting collusion between the Bush adm and Al-Qaeda. I'm saying that Al-Zawari seems to have figured out how to get the Bush adm, to do exactly what he wants. It seems that Al-Qaeda has figured out that the best way, to win is to get the us to do what it wants. They are doing this by dropping fake messages about how important Iraq is to them. That are easily found by Us or Allied intelligence and playing on the Neo-cons and Bush's ego with mocking videos.

The simple fact is Iraq is not very important to Al-Qaeda. While they are keeping us bogged down in Iraq with the help indirectly of the many other insurgent groups. That they really have no control over. They are building up all over the rest of the world.
Such as in Pakistan,Afghanistan,Philippines, Indonesia,Thailand all over Europe. While we are wasting our resources in Iraq they are getting stronger.

This government simply doesn't get this,it takes whatever Al-qaeda says at face value. Therefore they are able to set our policy.

Why the Democrats aren't cutting off funds for Iraq

2007-04-20T20:30:00.000-04:00

The Reason Democrats aren't cutting off funds for Iraq is not because they think it's winnable or good to keep funding this war. But, Because George Bush is so deranged they are afraid that unlike Gerald Ford, Bush would leave the troops in Iraq to suffer. He wouldn't pull them out. Then as the troops died and suffered scream and yell that they weren't being funded to make a political point.

Bush is so psychotic he's willing to defy congress and get the troops killed to get his way. So the Democrats have to fund this insanity not because it's a good idea but because Bush is nuts.

Guns and Resident Aliens

2007-04-18T08:52:00.000-04:00

What happened at Virginia Tech this week raises a question should non-citizens in the United States be allowed to own guns. I highly question if non-citizens have inalienable rights under the Us constitution. Yes they have a right to due process but I question if the second Adm also covers Resident or Non-Resident Aliens. There seems to be a clear distinction in the constitution between rights of citizenship and the right of a Human being in the country. the right of the People vs No person shall be it's quite clear the the People means Us citizens not non-citizen residents.

Later in the constitution the word citizen is used more often but in general the term the people generally is seen as referring to us citizens and not non-citzens. This leads to the question does that second adm apply to non-citizens? I'm not sure it does or that they have or should have access to guns.

Yes we Did!

2007-04-17T01:30:00.000-04:00

Yes the American People did elect congress to substitute their judgment over the commanders on the ground especially since it seems they don't know what they are doing.
We now have our forces in Iraq lead by General of questionable competence that was put in place by Bush because he's a Yes man. That won't question the policy and will never admit it's a failure. Who seems to have the same type of messianic insanity that Bush does and has shown, a willingness to continue the policy of Lying to the American public to buy time to keep failed strategies going. The question Bush keeps going back to his rant about if we don't win there they'll come after us here. The things is it doesn't matter if we "win" in Iraq or not it will make no difference in the end whether we are attacked here or not. If they are going to attack us they can simply send some one here with a gun, or a bomb and get us, and since their base is Pakistan and not Iraq what we are doing does little to disrupt them.

Aero/Space Defense Sector Weakness Telegraphing future of Iraq war

2007-04-16T19:19:00.000-04:00

Over the past 3 to 5 days there has been a trend down in Aero/Space and Defense stocks. In spite of massive earnings increases Def stocks have started to go down. In fact in after hours today several of the Def stocks lost over 1% additional. I think this selling is by large institutional investors that see US defense spending going down in the next several quarters. As we scale down our involvement in Iraq regardless of what the Bush adm is saying. The writing seems to be on the wall at least in the mind of investors.

The Hatch Act

2007-04-15T10:22:00.000-04:00

Who is covered

All civilian employees in the executive branch

of the federal government, except the President and the Vice President, are covered by the provisions of the Hatch Act. Employees of the U. S. Postal Service and the District of Columbia are also covered by the Act.

May not use their official authority or influence to interfere with an election
• May not solicit, accept or receive political contributions unless both individuals are members of the same federal labor organization or employee organization and the one solicited is not a subordinate employee
• May not knowingly solicit or discourage the political activity of any person who has business before the agency
• May not engage in political activity while on duty
• May not engage in political activity in any government office
• May not engage in political activity while wearing an official uniform
• May not engage in political activity while using a government vehicle
• May not be candidates for public office in partisan elections partisan elections
• May not wear political buttons on duty

The only winner from the our Surge in Iraq is AL Queda

2007-04-12T20:54:00.000-04:00

The simple fact is regardless of what the Bush adm and Senator Mc Cain keep saying Al Aqeda has little or no presence in Iraq. They keep pointing to this or that person or this or that action as by done by an AL Qaeda member. While in reality the action are being done by this or that Shite or Sunni actor in the current civil war in Iraq.

An example of this is today's attack on the Iraqi Parliament that was clearly done by someone in either Al-Sadar's Mahdi army or by one of the Sunni insurgent group. Blaming this on Al Queda only strengthens Al Queda giving them a new propaganda source.

The simple fact is the Us military is being run ragged trying to stop a civil war that will happen no matter when we leave. That is happening around our troops and instead of being fought where we are the insurgence simply moved the attacks to a different part of the country. The Madhi army is attacking sunnis in Najafi, and other places in the country. The Sunnis are attacking the Kurds in the north etc. We aren't stopping anything and 3 to 5 more bridges are going to make no difference.

In the end all we are doing in Iraq is slowly destroying our military, it's equipment and putting ourselves in more debt. While not making any real dent in power of the people who attacked us on 9-11. Al Queda is all over the world is networking all over the world while we waste our energy in Iraq. They are in Thailand,Indonesia, Philippines, Europe and probably in the US and we don't have the resources to do anything about it because we are wasting time in Iraq.

If we are attacked by Al Queda again in the Us it will be because we have shown how stupid we are to continue to stay in Iraq and let ourselves get destroyed by numerous insurgent groups in the Same way the Russians were in Afghanistan. Rather than if we had left Iraq and had directly gone after Al queda were they are. In the end after all the fighting we are going to have to leave Iraq at some point. In the end the real winner in all of this will be Al Queda because we have destroyed ourselves with our own stupidity. They didn't have to do anything to defeat us we destroyed ourselves simply because they egged us on with phony leaked messages saying that Iraq was such a great prize and that they would win if we leave.

Hum Mr Bush did ever come into your mind that Al queda wants us to stay in Iraq that they know from the war with the Russians that you can destroy a country without even trying. Oh yes I forgot who i'm talking about a government that can't even do the most simplest tasks. That's run by a man that thinks everything he's does is bless by god . Who keeps making mistake after mistake of course he would fall for what amounts to school yard taunts to get us to do stupid things that will damage ourselves.

No Senator Mccain You are playing Politics

2007-04-11T20:13:00.001-04:00

Senator Mccain you ask about the consequence of losing in Iraq. As far as I can tell most Miltary people and most of the American public can tell we have already lost in Iraq. You are simply trying to ride a wave of delusion of well lets just try one more thing and another thing and another thing. Senator Mc Cain you say give this Surge a change we haven't given it a change. This isn't a new strategy this is the same strategy that was tried before and didn't work. In the first few months it looked like it worked. Then it self destructed you keep patting General Petraeus on the back as some brilliant General it didn't work before now we are trying our past failure on a large scale. Give it a chance ha we already gave it a chance it FAILED. The bigger question we aren't talking about is what are the consequences of us staying in Iraq forever. 1. a destroyed miltary, 2. a broken us economy. 3. a massive victory for al aqueda. Yes a Massive victory for Al queada has it ever come into your mind that Al Queada is putting out phoney releases to try and con us into staying in Iraq and continuing to damage ourselves. That while we are wasting our time money and treasuer in Iraq they are building up their strength and we are getting weaker. That by the Us and our allies what few of them staying in Iraq the Al quaeda and our enemies are winning that we are doing exactly what they want us to. That it's probably more likely we are going to get attacked here because we are giving them a live fire training ground, recruiting tool and a causes to use against us. No us leaving Iraq will not help them it will hurt them. The longer we stay in Iraq the more it hurts us not Al Aqeda Al Aqueda wants us to stay in Iraq till we destroy ourselves. But you can't seems to get this or care about it because even if you realize that they are playing a big con game on us. All you care about is the political gain you get from screaming about staying in Iraq till we "win"

Here we go again

2007-04-03T17:20:00.000-04:00

The party leadership has now decided to abuse their power again. I'm sorry but if Sam Bennett wants to run for congress she need to resign her seat as the Vice Chair of the County committee. It's inappropriate for the party to be allowing the county committee email to be used for fund raisers for candidates that aren't the party's nomaniee or even the single post-filing candidate. These fund raising emails through the party's email address are an abuse of power and show how weak of a candidate Sam Bennett is if she has to resort to Abusing her office to raise money for herself.

Here we go again another inapporiate fundraiser

2007-03-23T23:44:00.000-04:00

Well it seems that no one learned anything from the uproar about having fund raisers for non-Lehigh valley candidates ( Lois and Patrick Murphy) last year. I got this lovely little email tonight from the Lehigh county Democratic Committee
URGENT! Support Latino candidate
Maria Quiñones-Sánchez
Democratic Candidate for Philadelphia City Council

At the home of Sam Bennett and Martin Estrada

It seems now that Philadelphia and it's suburbs doesn't just expect us to fund their congressional elections now we have to fund their local elections too. I mean has the party just done such a good job fund raising for our own candidates that we now have extra time to fundraise for Philadelphia. Well if that's true congratulations, but based on past experience I highly doubt it.

Where is the fund raiser for our candidates? Hum? Isn't that the county committee's job first to support our candidates. I know the party failed to fill all the slots but we still have our own candidates that need money to run. It is shameful that we aren't taking care of our own. Beyond that is it really an appropriate use of the county committee email to advertise a fund raiser for a candidate none of us can even for for? There is a limited supply of campaign dollars in Lehigh county and the Lehigh valley to start with should we really be sending more of them out of the area?!

IS IT NOVEMBER 5th 2008 YET?!!! PLEASE TELL ME IT IS

2007-03-21T19:43:00.000-04:00

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh I can't take much more of this insanity. Obama this Hilary this Mccain this Gulliani that. We are now 10 months from the first votes in this election and I'm already sick of listening to it. I'm sick of it,I honestly wish the whole process would go underground for maybe 6 months as a cool down process. I'm simply just burnt out from all of this and so is probably everyone else. We all know that neither Obama or Hilary are going to be the Nominee in the end, and neither will Gulaian or Mccain. I wish they would just shut up already.

Give Bush A choice

2007-03-12T16:54:00.000-04:00

Well Bush wants to be the Decider this is the Choice the Democrats should give him.

1. Sign the Bill we are sending you get your money for now and Get out by 2008

or

2. Veto the Bill and Get out now

In this case if Bush Veto's the Bill he's De-funding the troops. If the Republicans in the Senate try to block the bill accuse them of not supporting the troops. Just because the man acts like a child doesn't mean he should get his way all the time, and if he whines about the money just keep sending him the same bill, he will either sign it or run out of money. He's the Decider now give him a choice.

removed post

2007-03-09T18:05:00.000-05:00

I decided to remove a post related to Chris Casey running for Upper Mac twp supervisor because of some inaccuracies about, who asked him to run (wife asked him on her own not at the urging of the residents of Umt but of her own accord.). It was removed because I like to be as accurate as possible and Chris's wife pointed out the post was, not completely accurate.

Disappointed but not shocked by Shamefully Poor Lehigh county Candidate Recruiting

2007-03-08T14:51:00.000-05:00

Well much to my schagrin it seems my predictions of inability to find candidate for local offices has already started. I thought this would be something that would happen 1 or 2 cycles down the road not this year. But it seems that this has already happened. ref post Jan 29th

There is no candidate for the 4th seat up for election on Alburtis boro council, only one candidate for 3 seats up for election on Cooperburg boro council. No candidate for 2 year Audtor Upper Saucon twp; 4 year Auditor term in Heidelberg twp or Lower Mac twp; the 6 year auditor term in Lower Milford,Lowhill twp,Washington twp and worst of all no candidate at all for the 5th ward commissioners seat in Salisbury twp.

And Shameful as the total recruiting was Failure of recruiting on the Democratic side outside the city of Allentown and Bethlehem and 2 or 3 other places, was worse. We Fielded no Candidate of any kind in South Whitehall twp, Macungie boro, Lower Milford, Lowhill,Lynn, Upper Milford, Upper Saucon. Beyond this we only fielded min numbers [one candidate or one office] of candidates in Coopersburg, Emmaus,Slatington boros and Lower mac, Heidelberg, N. Whitehall,Salisbury,Upper Mac, Weisenberg and Washington twp. We couldn't even field a candidate for D.A., or at least get one that would bother to follow thru with running.

This is shameful disgusting and shows how much work the party has to do outside the cities. The lack of vision and last min requests for people to run do nothing to fill this gap. It's too late if you begging for candidates to run for these offices at the Feb meeting.Looking at all these empty positions for seat we could have picked up at least 4 local legislative seats with no effort. But this is why the republicans control somewhere between 65 and 70% of the local seats because we don't even bother trying as I said in my post Just winning the County commissioner seats is not good enough about the party's lack of vision .

Rank Hypocrisy

2007-03-05T20:17:00.000-05:00

It seems that the right wing extremists in the Republican party only seem to care about the troops. So long as they are carrying out their grand plan, but once they come home they don't seem to give a damn and even to some extent when they are in the field .

I was completely shock by the vicious and down right nasty response I got to my post Va System Complete mess. I usually get 5 or 10 a day emails a few of which are really nasty emails a day.After,I posted this on Feb 19th I got a few emails related to it, the first week it was up, mostly positive. Suddenly, the beginning of last week in what seems to be part of a hit campaign to kill the story on Walter reed I started getting a flood of nasty email.

I was accused of being a liar nothing shocking there, but then I was accused of treason,helping al-quaeda, and pretty much every other slanderous line you could think of in these email.I'm jaw droppingly shocked that, this would illicit this type of venom, I've posted a lot more inflammatory things, than this.

It seems that this truth is a greater threat to their image and plans than anything else. That is probably, why most of the extreme right wing media is glossing this over and treating it as a second rate story. The Right-wing extremist and the Bush adm seem to care more about the image of supporting the troops than actually doing it. From sending in the troops in poorly prepared so badly that their families had to buy them body armor, to the troops running out of bullets to allow the Va to fall apart. The right wing extremists see the troops as cannon-fodder and tool for propaganda and only do things when they are embarrassed by the media.

If the media had not reported what was happening at Walter Reed nothing would have been done and there would have been a continued cover up. In fact the Bush adm has had the army ordering troops not to speak to the media anymore, so nothing else is uncovered. The same type of cover up is true about the body armor and the bullets and everything else. The simple fact is the Bush adm knows about these problems and simply doesn't care, and their horde of right wing supports obviously don't either.

I'm personally sick of listening to these people meme the talking points of support the troops when they don't. The troops will do what they are told to do if they were ordered into hell they would probably go. It is the job of the Government to decide the mission congress and the President. Then send them in equipped to do it and take care of them when they get home in the manner befitting their sacrifice if they are injured. Not sent into a rotting rat infest hell hole. It is also the job of the government to decide when a war is unwinable or the course of action is wrong and change it or stop it, but simply throwing more troops in and using them as a propaganda tool is not supporting the troops.

You will never hear an American solider admit in front of a camera how bad things are,to the media. They are there they don't see the larger picture or if it is winnable they simply do what they are order to do. They don't think about what is next or it's working they look on the bright side of it, because it's the only way they can keep going.

Pennsylvania Primary 2008

2007-02-28T12:47:00.000-05:00

The Pennsylvania State Senate is now starting to finally take action on a report release in may of 2005 moving forward. I talked about this in a post from Dec 06 on this subject. It's seems that the state legislature is now talking about moving the primary up to Feb 5th 2008.

Unfortunately, they seem to be talking about have the primary on Feb 5th for the President then having another one at the normal time for everything else. I'm all for having an earlier primary but I personally think it's a waste of money to have two primaries in one Year. I realize people are complaining about how early the signature collection will be but we shouldn't be wasting money on two primaries. The state have better thing it can waste the money on (j/K).

Opps got distracted

2007-02-28T12:23:00.000-05:00

I forgot to mention that there are only 7 days left to file your petitions,Yesterday. The 300-500 point drop on the DJIA sort of distracted me yesterday. Well now you have 6 day left tick tick tick

Do Transit solutions in Pennsylvania take too long? continued

2007-02-26T22:53:00.000-05:00

Continuing from my prior post another reason, that appropriate solutions to traffic and transit problem are not done in a time manor or at all is the interference of Business and the local Municipality.

There have been several examples, of this in the Valley, the most resent one being the "222/100 Bypass". It is quite clear that the 222/100 bypass was intended to a true bypass in the vein of the Kutztown and Reading 222 bypasses, that had a 55 mph speed limit and limited access entrances.

What seems to have happened is both Business interests in the twps and the Municipalities themselves had a hissy fit. They were afraid this would take business away from them so they set up all types of road blocks. Until, we ended up with this blvd model road that will do nothing to relieve traffic and in 5 years will probably be just as congests at 222.

Businesses will build along this "bypass" will draw even more traffic to the area that weren't simply trying to use it as a way to bypass 222 or 100, and the road will end up looking like Rt 30 in York county, which was intended to be a bypass of the old rt 30 (PA 462) but became just as congested, because they allowed all types of malls to build up along it if we aren't careful it could end up being a second Whitehall type shopping area. Speaking of Whitehall further back the reason Rt 22 isn't any bigger is because of the Business interest. That more or less have made it impossible to widen the Highway. That unwisely built right along it and have been fighting screaming and yelling to keep the state from claiming eminent domain on their land to expand the highway for the past 20 years. Now we have a slow moving parking lot several hour of the day instead of a highway.

Then we have the special interest groups the pro-mass transit groups, the pro-existing mass transit groups and the pro-highway groups. You get the project approved then the existing mass transit starts whining for money. Such as several times, mass transit has been stalled, in the Lehigh Valley, and in most of the rest of the state because Septa keeps reaching the edge of insolvency. They start whining and the state ends up shifting all the funds from everywhere else in the state to save it. If a doesn't happen then what happens is the Mass-Transit group and the Pro-Highway expansion group fights with each other and nothing happens. Which is more or less what is happening now, in the valley, and by the time it's all sorted out we will have an even worse problem then was attempting to be solved, originally.

Do Transit solutions in Pennsylvania take too long?

2007-02-25T14:01:00.000-05:00

The Valentine's day storm, that shut down I-78 may have shown poor planing, on Penn dot's part, but also shows another Failing in Pennsylvania. The amount of time it takes, to get both road, and other Transit projects, from the drawing board, to initial construction to final completion.

It took 30 years + to finish, the Pa portion of I-78 and, by the time, it was opened in 1989, I-78 was not the relief originally intended. In the 1950's, 1960's and even 1970's the finished product would have fit the intention of the planers, but by 1989 although not a complete failure at relieving some of the traffic from 222 and 22 it gave much less relief, than envisioned by the planners in the 1950's. Within the first 10 year of I-78 opening it had became clear, that the 4 lanes were too small for the usage. The roadway also lacks any sort of emergency exit gates between long stretches between exits, something that may have helped eliveate some the problems on Valentines day.

These problem are not simply limited to I-78 these type of problems are also happen on I-83 and I-81 in York and Cumberland counties. Where one minor accident can trap people on these road ways, in between exits for hours, at a time. An example of, this is an accident near Baltimore can tie traffic up going south all the way up to the northern Part of York county. As, well an accident in Cumberland county can tie traffic up all the way down to the southern part of York county.

The problem is essentially that these 4-lane Highways are being asked to handle the traffic of a 8 lane highway. This is understandable in the case of I-83 which was built in the 1960's . It was quite clear by the time, that the building, on the final length of I-78 was started in the 1980's. That the roadway needed to be larger ,than the 4 lanes that were plan, on most of it but by that time the old plans seem to have been set in stone, and the future was simply ignored. Therefore we have the mess today and I-78 is simply heading towards being another rte-22 and I-83.

I will continue this thought in another post later on this subject related to special interests and transit projects

VA System complete mess

2007-02-19T17:25:00.000-05:00

The Veterans Administration, under the Republicans has been destroyed. In order to save money the Bush adm has been taking it out of the Va system. The Hospitals are understaffed, poorly keep up and simply given the illusion of being up to date. They redo the frontage of the hospital and let everything else go to pot. In a number of the hospitals the OR's are dated in some places they haven't been updated since the Vietnam war. Updates that were ordered under the Bush I and Clinton adms were pushed back or eliminated by the Bush adm.

Physicians and other staff at the hospitals are promised pay raises over and over again, but when the new pay package comes out. Their pay hasn't gone up because even thought it's on the books they should get more the Hospital's area isn't given the money for the raises, and their part of the insurance cost goes up at the same time. They are already paid at something close to 1/3 to 1/2 what the avg Physican makes on the open market depending on the area. Physicians that are in the system came into the system when it wasn't like that, and whatever difference was made up in benefits that were much better than they are today, a good number of the people are getting close to retirement. It is so bad a good number of the Hospitals are staffed with people on foreign worker Visas.

The Physician's don't speak out because they have almost drill Sargent supervisors, who more or less punish anyone who questions the situation in the system. They are there to shut up anyone that questions or blow whistles and most of the Physicians are just trying to make it to retirement and vestiture of their retirement benefits.

Will the Surge Simply Just move the Violence

2007-02-17T16:33:00.000-05:00

It seems we have been here before, we move in quiet an area. The insurgence move to another area of the country. For a surge to work we have to have enough troops not simply to suppress the area a or b but all the areas or it's kinda pointless. It's sort of like crime you increase the police in area A the crime goes up in area B. It's simple and understandable the Iraqis and us are going to move into Baghdad so the insurgence are going to move into Dyjlah province or al anbar or some other area in Iraq. We are playing a game of wack-a-mole in Iraq. As, soon as we calm one area the next area acts up to bring in enough troops into Baghdad the Iraq government had to remove them from the"stabilized" areas. So more or less we are simply speeding the violence not ending it.

Dent Throws lot in with Bush

2007-02-16T16:40:00.000-05:00

Dent has Decided today decided that Party loyalty, is more important, than the continued viability of the Us military and the troops in the field, and winning the war against Terrorism (or whatever it's called now). That the will of the voters of the 15th congressional district is less important than his loyalty to George W Bush. Let's just remember this in 2008 when he comes up for election again who he stood with.

Why I don't Fly anymore

2007-02-15T21:36:00.000-05:00

It's been about quite a while since, I've flown about 7 years to be exact. Yesterdays events have not made me anxious to resume doing so anytime soon. About the time I stopped flying things had starting bad with the industry the last straw was a flight I was on between Newark and Lisbon Portugal. We were delayed 3 hours, then halfway over the Atlantic the toilets started to overflow then the last hour there were no toilets. Then we landed and sat on the runway for 3 hrs waiting to taxi to a gate. The plan stank of waste and then we found out they had lost some of our luggage which ended up in Australia and we didn't get till the end end of our trip.

This have now seems to have gotten worse in the past 7 years in at least 4 of these last 7 years there have been passengers stuck on planes for hours events. Yesterday, Jet Blue and several other airlines left passengers stuck on planes for as much as 9 hrs, because of an Ice and snow storm. Some of the planes actually froze to the runway and had to be pulled free.

Why are the airlines doing this profits, every time they have to bring a plane back to the runway is money out of their pocket. This have happened over and over again the airlines promise to fix the problem, promise not to let it happen again, under the threat of legislation. They agree to xyz self-policing matter the matter drops til' the next time it happens and then the dump a bunch of money into xyz congressmen and Senators pockets and it goes away.

It's become Quite obvious they are incapable of policing themselves. That they have no interest in policing themselves, and unless they are specific regulations in place the airlines will continue to hold passengers against their will on the run way for hours on end to keep their schedules.

It's time to tell the senate and congress no more. The Airlines have run out of changes an organization called
"Coalition for an Airline Passengers' Bill of Rights" has a petition to Congress we want the end of this nonsense. http://www.petitiononline.com/airline/petition.html

Is Al-Qaeda trying to keep the US in Iraq intentionally?

2007-02-13T15:45:00.000-05:00

It is starting to seem that Al Quaeda's intention is to bog the US down in Iraq. While putting out little or no effort on their part in doing so. That by simply egging us on with personal attacks almost school yard childish taunts, on Bush and other us leaders and by dropping what seem to be phony notes and letters to convince us how important Iraq is to them and playing on Bush's ego. So, that we will stay and continue to degrade our fighting ability, do damage to our economy and creditability around the world. They seem to be intent to make US seem irrational and unhinged,damage our image around the world.

I honestly believe Al Quaeda's intention is simply to continue to bog the us down in Iraq while building itself up all around the world. Al-Quaeda doesn't need to attack us if we keep taking their bait and hurting ourselves. It's time for us to get out of Iraq and stop taking Al-Quaeda's bait so we can actually win the war against the people who are trying to destroy America.

Iran,IEDS and What we really Know

2007-02-12T11:18:00.000-05:00

The Bush adm again seems to be putting the cart before the horse, and the media is following close behind. They have sent Def Sec Gates and a number of "experts" out saying, that the Bush adm and Us intel "Know" that top levels of Iran's government are sending IED's into Iraq. That we know they were smuggled in by the government with their approval and that is the only place that they can be manufactured. They are also trying to make it this sound like these were the major cause of us deaths in Iraq.

1. According to Senator Jack Reed -RI and a number of other people in the Congress. The intel that has come out does not really point at anyone. It could be the top leadership,but there is really no proof. It also could be a radical lower element inside the government that is doing this without the leadership's approval. Finally, we could be,being yanked around by Iran dissident groups. That could themselves being supplying these weapon to try and incite the to invade Iran. The same way the Iraqis dissidents more or less coned America into Iraq, with phony claims about wmds.The could also being sold to insurgence on the black market.

2. Though, the weapons are probably coming out of Iran there is no exact proof they were created in Iran. They could have come from another place through the black market.

3. Less than one-half-of one percent of troop deaths and wia were caused by these devices. They are simply a minor element in a larger problem and seem to be trumped up as a major issue. I'm not sure why or if this is just a strategy to distract from the fact we are losing to insurgent elements in iraq.

Finally, this seems to be another rush, by this Administration to find yet another reason to continue the war in Iraq. The flagging support for this war is the biggest threat to the Bush adm, to their legacy. They need to try and keep the public scared and seem, to be willing, to float out any justification, or threat to keep this going. This quote well vetted, proof is no better than the Aluminum tubes they came out with in 2003 prior to invading Iraq. Saying something is well researched and checked and dbl and triple checked doesn't make it so, and in this case it seems to be being check and check again with the same unreliable sources that got us into Iraq in the First place. I'm not saying that this can't be true,I'm saying the adm doesn't really seem to have the proof they claim they have.

LET GET READY TO RUMBLE

2007-02-10T19:42:00.000-05:00

VS.

State Senator

Lisa Boscola
cccxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Sam Bennett

It seems that the 2008 Democratic Presidential Primary isn't the only thing that is heating up. We already seem to have two candidates for the 2008 Democratic primary for the Pa 15th congressional district. Two very colorful women State Senator Lisa Boscola from the 18th State Senatorial district and Siobahn(Sam Bennett) Vice-chair of the Lehigh County Democrat party. Both candidates seem to be actively lining up support for this race as we speak. This should be a knock down drag-out 18 round fight to take on the current Republican Congressman Charlie Dent.

Now here are the rules: No Hits below the belt, No mud Sling, and No Video recordings (hehe) now shake hands and come out fighting. LETS GET READY TO RUMBLE!!!!

Correction to prior post

2007-02-08T22:56:00.000-05:00

In my prior post I had mistakenly listed Lois Herr. When I Meant to list Lois Murphy. It has been corrected, but I felt I needed to point this out for Clarification.I think that I was paying too much attention to that Cocker spaniel on animal planet when I was writing the original post.

The Party that Learned Nothing From 2006 Clearing the Field in Pa 15th district

2007-02-08T13:51:00.000-05:00

It seems that the Democratic party has learned nothing from the 2006 election either Nationally, or locally. The message from the Voters in 2006 was we want, to choose who we want to vote for in Democratic primaries. Not be coned by the party into choosing whom they want us to. In the places in Pa and nationally were the SDCC, Dccc or local parties interfered in the primaries and their candidate won they generally lost in the Generally election. Where the Candidate was Chosen inspite of massive interference in the primary that candidate generally won. Examples of these are Patrick Murphy,Jason Altmire and Mt-Tester compared to Duckworth- IL + Lois Murphy.

What I'm starting to hear now is that Northampton county Chair Joe Long, has decided that he knows what the voters want better, than they do. It sounds as if there is an attempt to pressuring Candidates out the Race, to clear the way for Lehigh County Vice-Chair Sam (Siobhan) Bennett, to the Nomination of the Democratic party for the Pa 15th congressional district. I'm not sure if this is true and whether it's some sort of political payback to VC Bennett or act of retaliation by the party against one or more of the other potential candidates by the state party, such as Very popular State Senator Lisa Boscola, whom leadership in Harrisburg don't like because she tends, to stand, by her convictions,and the best interests of her district, even when it goes against what the party wants.

Beyond, the fact that members of the Democratic party in Lehigh,Northampon,Berks and Montco county should have the right to choose whom their candidate will be without party interference and strong arming. V.C. Bennett is a candidate that is even Less viable than Charles Dertinger was. She has never won a party primary of any kind other than a committee seat, and was beaten in a mayoral primary in the City of Allentown in 2005 by a large enough margin to give pause of giving her a pass. If she can't even win a primary in the city of Allentown how can she beat Congressman Dent in the General Election.

I believe that the party should stay out of primaries and let the candidates speak for themselves. Which has been the party's policy til' recently, and it has availed us not. If Mrs. Bennett wants the nomination she needs to win it on the Field of battle not thru back room deals and party pressure.

IS the Latest NIE another CON

2007-02-06T22:42:00.000-05:00

I'm starting to wonder, if the Latest NIE is really another attempt, to Con the American public into supporting Bush's policies in Iraq. It seems kinda odd, that it insists, that we are the only thing keeping Iraq from falling apart, and that any plan that doesn't lead to what Bush wants, will only lead to more chaos. Partitioning is characterize, as simply pointing, to civil war. It says if, we pull out and leave them to it the place will become a hide out for Al queda, and haven for Iran. That the only way things will be ok is if we stand up this government we created. Hum, I wonder is this true, or simply another Con-game, to give Bush more cover, to keep this nonsense going? What do you think.

If anyone wondered where I stood Politically

2007-02-04T13:03:00.000-05:00

I saw this on The PA Progressive's Website and he Challenged people to take and it and shock of all Shocks I'm a Centrist. I guess that's why I piss off activists in both parties. But, I am a Green Dog so this should Shock no one.

You are a
Social Moderate
(56% permissive)

and an...
Economic Moderate
(50% permissive)

You are best described as a:

Centrist

Damn the Fact no actually Just change them

2007-02-02T21:13:00.000-05:00

Well it seems the Bush adm is at it again. In what is the Bush adm latest attempt to simply wipe away an ugly number they have decide to ex sponged 16,164 wounded in Iraq
that weren't flown out in an attempt to pretty up the numbers. This is a complete change in practice that is an complete change from other conflicts the us has been in the past. This is simply another attempt to try and convince the American public things are better than they actually are in Iraq. But what do you expect from an Administration that does this as common practice.

In 2001 the when unemployment was high the Bush adm simply cut back the number of weeks that unemployment was counted from from 6 months to 3 months then later to 6 weeks and simply more quickly shifted people from unemployment to the catagory of marginally attached to the work force then right off the books. Then in 2004 because the numbers weren't looking good enough they simply changed the survey they were using because it didn't make the numbers look pretty enough. (i.e. if the Clinton numbers were looked at thru this lens unemployment would have been close to 1%).

But what do you expect from an an administration that will do anything to get it way lie to the American public twist the facts. Say one thing one day then do the exact opposite.

Here we go again

2007-02-02T12:30:00.000-05:00

It seems here we go again is the best phrase I can think of. The Media is again trying to convince the American public, that Iran is such a great threat that we must invade. That somehow invading Iran is going to fix our problems in Iraq buying into the same false permious that attacking another country will fix things. The media is again bring on these "experts" that insist that we must invade Iran to stop the violence in Iraq. That we must invade Iran because they might get a Nuke. That we must invade Iran because they might be a future threat. One failed policy is not justification to create another one. That somehow Bush knows best even thought we have seen his action wrong over and over again.

Why is the Media giving the Bush adm the equal time (and an equal air of creditability) that they refused to give everyone else. When the Bush adm were pounding away for the last war. Hum, maybe it's because, they need access to the White house. If they don't do some of what the Bush adm wants, they won't get access to the president.

When in the past I've scoffed at claims by news outlets like the Morning Call calling blogger not credible or not held accountable, who was holding them accountable then?

If the media was impartial or had some sort of Supervision, the other side would have been given a hearing. The media no longer seems interested in the investigative jornalism or truth but getting the story. Not, if the story is true just getting the story. Not informing the public but selling commercials, and getting access to the powerful. Bloggers are just as creditable and help as or more accountable then they are. If we lie or get something wrong people stop reading us. If the Media gets something wrong they do a Mea Culpa fire a few people and give some half hearted apology and everyone forgives them after a while because there are no other options.

America I think we have a problem with the Enviroment

2007-02-02T12:05:00.000-05:00

Well it's become quite clear global warming is real and based, on our little friend's get up we are at war with global warming. It seems to have been come quite clear that in the past 30 years; we have done so much damage, to the environment that won't see improvement in our lifetimes. That Bush's and other president's short sited policies, that the idea is a 4th quarter problem was short sighted.

Bush continues to refuse to do anything because he claims it will hurt the economy is even more short sighted. Yes in the short time we will have to give up a little bit of earning for long term gain but that's what any investment requires. The simply fact is if we don't make the hard choices now there will be a much greater economic penalty for America.

We are quickly losing our place in the world other countries are going, to be reaping the benefits of early change over, to other fuels and other distribution formats. While, we are just making the change of because we will be forced to catch up by the rest of the world. So we can continue to compete in the world, while we destroy our economy trying to do so. But that's the mindset of the Bush adm living in the moment something we are going to pay for for a long time

Politics of Charatcter assassination is it Destroying Government in the Lehigh Valley and across the state

2007-01-29T12:20:00.000-05:00

The last month or so I've been personally trying, to recruit people, to run for local office i.e. supervisor, commissioner, and Council people, as Democrats. What I found after a month, of very frustrating discussions is people aren't running ,because they don't want, to put up with the abuse, or give up their personal time and wealth to for something they don't feel will change anything.

These are the common everyday folks that use to make up local government, that use to serve because they wanted to improve their community. These people have decided it's not worth their time, the personal attacks bordering on slander , and the lasting damage these attacks cause, to run. When they can be working or having family time. The simple fact is most of the personal attacks are aren't even based in fact but once they are out there they might as well be.

Why is this a problem well eventually no one willing to run for these positions, and we are starting to see this in places like Slatington boro where they can't even keep a full boro council. This is just the starting a number of counties in Pennsylvania have numerous boros councils,twp supervisor, and even Mayor's seat that have stayed open for at least one or more terms.

This is by no means it's not simply the democrats that can't field candidates it's also the republicans and the third parties. Pennsylvania really needs a strict truth in politics law, a law that false accusation in politics are slander and immediate action need to be forced when such falsehoods are leveled. Such as removal from the ballot or massive fines.

Just in.........

2007-01-24T13:01:00.000-05:00

John Kerry will not be running for the Democratic Nomination for President in 2008

THANK GOD!

Something that Bush doesn't seem to get

2007-01-22T00:29:00.000-05:00

"When you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all",

Bush's New Iraq Plan Heads they win tails we lose

2007-01-17T17:36:00.000-05:00

Bush's own Generals are now saying that these additional troops have at best a 50-50 change of improving the situation in Iraq.

Meaning that there is a 50% change that Iraq will continue to spiral down further into a civil war with our troops in the middle of it. That we will end up in the same situation we did in Vietnam not knowing who we are fighting. Who is friend who is foe, where the Iraqi troops turn on our soldiers and shoot them in the back or al sadar's forces pretend to be Iraq troops and shoot the troops in the back.

or

We calm it down and Iranian's win because Iraq becomes a quassi-Iranian Vassal. The Shias are pro-Iran and so are the Kurds. Yes the Kurds are pro-Iranian the Kurds are an Iranian Ethnic group.

I would like to know where the "VICTORY" is?

Governor Rendell Stop the insanity

2007-01-11T16:52:00.000-05:00

I implore you to find a way to stop President Bush from using more, of the Pennsylvania National Guard as Cannon fodder, for his acts of insanity in Iraq. I know you have the power, to stop anymore deployments, of the Sons and Daughters of the Commonwealth, to this act of insanity. It was made clear last night, that President Bush cares little for the people. Who put themselves in harms way for the Citizens of the Commonwealth, of Pennsylvania who are already so over stretched mentally, emotionally, and economically. I ask you, implore you to stop his continued insane actions, in Iraq, at the expense of the People of the commonwealth, and with the lives of the Citizens of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Tell President Bush you will authorize, no more Pennsylvania national Guard, to be sent to Iraq.

Just winning the County commissioner seats is not good enough

2007-01-09T16:48:00.000-05:00

IN 2006 we "won" but we still only control 6 out of 14 state legislative seats, in the Lehigh valley and only 4 of 11 State legislative seats in Lehigh county. i.e. we only control 36 1/3 % of the state seats in Lehigh county and almost the same number of local seats 37% of the seats or 65 out of 174 elected positions (the best number i can get from the state website) on the Local level. It will be nothing to celebrate if we win a number of county commissioner seats in 2007 and do nothing about the low number of supervisor and council and other Elected municipal seats this will be no victory at all.

It is unacceptable for Democrats to make up more than 50% of the voters, but only make up 37% of elected officials, in Lehigh county. If no efforts are made to close this gap no one will deserve a pat, on their back for "winning" in '07. If all the attention
is given, to the County commissioners races, and none to the local ones(and i don't mean the city of Allentown), and we lose big like we did in 2005, on the local level. There will be hell to pay.

Repost of Lehigh county positions up for Election 2007

2007-01-08T17:04:00.000-05:00

Seats currently Held by republicans needing challengers)

4 Lehigh County Commissioner seats
Lehigh County Controller
the newly created Clerk of Judicial Records
Lehigh county District atty

in addition

Alburtis boro will have election of two council seats

The city of Allentown will election one council member

CATASAUQUA BORO 4 council member

Coopersburg Boro 1 council member

Emmaus Boro 1 council member

HEIDELBERG TWP 1 Supervisor and chair of Auditors

Lower Macungie twp 1 sec of auditors

Lower Milford twp 1 Supervisor 1 Auditor

Lowhill twp 1 Supervisor

Lynn twp 1 auditor

Macunguie Boro 1 Council member

North Whitehall twp 1 Supervisor 1 Auditor

Salisbury Twp 1 commissioner

Slatington boro 3 council members

South Whitehall twp 3 commissioners

Upper mac twp 2 supervisor 1 Auditor

Upper Saucon twp 1 Supervisor 1 Auditor

Washington twp 1 Supervisor 1 Auditor

Weisenburg twp 1 supervisor 1 Auditor

The real impeachable offense of George W Bush

2007-01-06T16:25:00.000-05:00

I know a number of you would like to have President Bush impeached for misleading the American public into Iraq, but in all reality whether, this is true or not is not an impeachable offense.

What is an impeachable offense is attempting to set aside parts, of legislation he does not like through signing statements. No one in this country not even the president has the right to ignore the laws. The only authority the President has is to either sign it or veto it, not to alter them.

Prohibition of such was made clear in the Case of Clinton v City of Ny.The Court ruled that the line item veto act of 1995 allowed the President to unilaterally amend or repeal parts of duly enacted statutes by using line-item cancellations; it violated the Presentment clause of the Constitution, which outlines a specific practice for enacting a statute. The Court construed the silence of the Constitution on the subject of such unilateral Presidential action as equivalent to "an express prohibition" of such action by the Executive branch, agreeing with historical material that supported the conclusion that statutes may only be enacted "in accord with a single, finely wrought and exhaustively considered, procedure", and that a bill must be approved or rejected by the President in its entirety.

What Bush has been doing is using his signing statements as a quassi- line item veto process. Simply stating he will not enforce portions of bills; he does not wish to enforce and, which is in violation of this prohibition of such acts found in the 1998 Supreme Court ruling.

Signing statements have in the past been used by Presidents to clarify unclear laws but never as an attempt to avoid enforcing provisions of laws. Such examples of Bush using the Signing Statement as a quassi-line item veto are the Mc Cain torture ban in which Mr. Bush signed the law then choose to say he could use torture anyway, under his own discretion in the a signing statements; another more resent example of this is this is a signing statement more, or less choosing to ignore a law that said the executive branch can not open the US mail; lastly and probably most unconstitutional example was in the reauthorization of the USA Patriot Act President Bush choose to write a signing he could choose what information was given to congress by the Fbi at his own discretion, indirect contradiction to the language of the Bill he had just signed,

These examples are clear violations of the separation of the powers set forth in the Constitution. It is made clear in the Constitution that congress writes legislation, President either approves or denies it, and the Judiciary determines its constitutionality. This was the intent of the framers of the Constitution and how the Us federal government is suppose to work are supposed to work.

I hear this constantly from Conservatives in reference to “Activist Judges” legislating from the bench, that this activity violates the strict construction of the Constitution. They fail to notice or mention, or realize that the same restriction, they are pointing out also apply to the Executive Branch; legislating from the White House is just as Prohibited by the Constitution, in fact probably even more so than on the Judiciary which is decider of what is and isn’t constitutional inside the bounds of the Constitution.

Therefore the action of the George W Bush of trying to make laws or reinterpret laws is very likely an impeachable offense. The constitution does not give the President the right or ability to alter legislation, at his or her own choosing such act has been seen by the courts as blantly unconstitutional and therefore is impeachable.

(Bribery and treason are among the least ambiguous reasons meriting impeachment, but the ocean of wrongdoing encompassed by the Constitution's stipulation of “high crimes and misdemeanors” is vast. Abuse of power and serious misconduct in office fit this category. In the face of instruction for the Supreme Court and from congress that this is the legislation that we have passed no president may alter such legislation.

Therefore this is a severe and intentional abuse of power and an impeachable offense. By Art. II Sec. 1 Cl. 8, the president must swear: "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States." the violation of this is also an impeachable offense by ignoring the constitution President Bush is also committing an impeachable offense.)

The claim that he didn’t know or was not responsible for his actions is not an excuse for this as is set forth in the argument below. The President in the end is responsible for the actions of himself and anyone that he has brought into the administration. The below would also infer other Impeachable offense committed by both the President and VP in their name with or without their knowledge.

“An executive official is ultimately responsible for any failures of his subordinates and for their violations of the oath he and they took, which means violations of the Constitution and the rights of persons. It is not necessary to be able to prove that such failures or violations occurred at his instigation or with his knowledge, to be able.

It is sufficient to show, on the preponderance of evidence, that the president was aware of misconduct on the part of his subordinates, or should have been, and failed to do all he could to remedy the misconduct, including termination and prosecution of the subordinates and compensation for the victims or their heirs.The president's subordinates include everyone in the executive branch, and their agents and contractors. It is not limited to those over whom he has direct supervision.
He is not protected by "plausible deniability". He is legally responsible for everything that everyone in the executive branch is doing.

President Bush has no Shame Ford Eulogy the Last Disrespect

2007-01-02T14:03:00.000-05:00

I watched today as the current President Bush attempted to justify in a poorly covered unspoken analogy between Ford's Decision to pardon Nixon and his current insistence to stay in Iraq in spite of all advice to the contrary. I have never seen anything like this in my life. That somehow because Ford happened to be right in deciding in to Pardon Nixon in attempt to move the country on and contrary to the wishes of the public that he is right in continuing to dig us deeper in Iraq. The simple fact is in the end Ford was hurt no one but himself by doing this, and in the end it probably was best for the country. In comparison what Bush is doing effects hundreds of thousands of troops and America as a whole. Let not forget the other major difference is Ford did not make the mess he was only trying to fix what he was given. Bush takes no personal risk by doing what he is doing. Bush beyond this has no dishonored the memory of President Ford who stated he disagreed with this war and Bush truly has no shame and simply only cares about himself, not America and not the Fords. He seems to be willing to use any means to justify his actions, and not even the funeral in the memory of a fmr president will stop it. You could even see the disgust in Laura Bush's expression when he did it. This man as I stated simply has no shame, and I hope everyone can see that now.

Alternatives to De wesse

2007-01-01T12:53:00.000-05:00

The Voters of Pennsylvania voted for Change not Bill De Wesse who is part of the problem in Harrisburg these are 5 Democrats who voted against the Pay raise and have close to as much experience as De Wesse and deserve to be Speaker more than he does, since they represent what the people voted for a real change not more of the same.

32 Anthony M. DeLuca (D, Allegheny)

39 David K. Levdansky (D, Allegheny)

36 Harry A. Readshaw (D, Allegheny)

72 Thomas F. Yewcic (D, Cambria)
76 Michael K. Hanna (D, Clinton)

Well it seems Pennsylvania Democrats are Paying for Bill De Wesse's Behavior

2006-12-30T17:11:00.000-05:00

It now seem that Jon Prezel will continue to be the Speaker of the Pennsylvania house because of the Shameful behavior of who know what his title will be Bill Dewesse and Veon and the rest of the Democratic leadership. Rep Thomas Caltagirone said today that he would support Jon Prezel for speaker instead of De wesse because "The leaders of our caucus have shown little regard for many members of the caucus, the constituents they represent, and the legislative initiatives we should be supporting," the letter said. "Instead, they have operated the caucus as a personal fiefdom, promoting their own personal and political ambitions behind a wall of secrecy and petty personal vindictiveness." In my post on Nov 28th I said that if continued down the path you were the Democrats were going to be Punished for it. It seem that some elected Democrats decided that you didn't even deserve the chance to hurt the party more with your behavior. So in the end the way you, the Democratic leaderships and Hdcc acted in the election and in the your dealings with other Democratic Rep's have now served to punish the whole party and the people of Pennsylvania with 2 more years of Speaker Prezel. I could say that Rep Caltagirone had betrayed the party or that this was violating the will of Pennsylvania's voters but in the end the only person there is to blame is you (and fmr rep Veon). You could have expanded the field but you spent enormous amounts of money in sure thing races. Threw candidates that might have won to the wolves. Punished candidates that wouldn't get down on their knees and kiss your ring. So Mr. De Wesse when you look for someone to blame look in the Mirror buddy you did this to yourself.

Some quotes Relevant to the Current situation in Iraq from our founding Fathers

2006-12-21T21:41:00.000-05:00

The constitution vests the power of declaring war in Congress; therefore no offensive expedition of importance can be undertaken until after they shall have deliberated upon the subject and authorized such a measure.
George Washington

Worry is the interest paid by those who borrow trouble.
George Washington

An enemy generally says and believes what he wishes.
Thomas Jefferson

Conquest is not in our principles. It is inconsistent with our government.
Thomas Jefferson

Delay is preferable to error.
Thomas Jefferson

Errors of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it.
Thomas Jefferson

Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.
Thomas Jefferson

I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them but to inform their discretion.
Thomas Jefferson

If there is one principle more deeply rooted in the mind of every American, it is that we should have nothing to do with conquest.
Thomas Jefferson

The spirit of this country is totally adverse to a large military force.
Thomas Jefferson

Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.
John Adams

Great is the guilt of an unnecessary war.
John Adams

Power always thinks... that it is doing God's service when it is violating all his laws.
John Adams

Do not separate text from historical background. If you do, you will have perverted and subverted the Constitution, which can only end in a distorted, bastardized form of illegitimate government.
James Madison

It is a universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged to the provisions against danger, real or pretended, from abroad.
James Madison

By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.
Benjamin Franklin

I conceive that the great part of the miseries of mankind are brought upon them by false estimates they have made of the value of things.
Benjamin Franklin

If passion drives you, let reason hold the reins.
Benjamin Franklin

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
Benjamin Franklin
The learned fool writes nonsense in better language that the unlearned - but it's still nonsense.
Benjamin Franklin

Those that won't be counseled can't be helped.
Benjamin Franklin

To Follow by faith alone is to follow blindly.
Benjamin Franklin

Wars are not paid for in wartime, the bill comes later.
Benjamin Franklin

Whatever is begun in anger ends in shame.
Benjamin Franklin

When will mankind be convinced and agree to settle their difficulties by arbitration?
Benjamin Franklin

Where sense is wanting, everything is wanting.
Benjamin Franklin

Wise men don't need advice. Fools won't take it.
Benjamin Franklin

Count down to Filing 2007 (80 days and counting)

2006-12-16T14:45:00.000-05:00

As you may have noticed I put up a countdown clock to 1600(4pm) on March 6th 2007. This is the date and time all petition have to be filed by in the Lehigh valley for running in the 2007 Primary. The first date that Petitions can be circulated and filed is Tuesday, February 13th 2007. This is a link to the Filing requirements to run in Lehigh county. Filing requirements Lehigh county As my continuing effort to get people to run I'm posting this information. As today is 80 days out from this date i felt it was important to put this up.

Well

2006-12-13T22:51:00.000-05:00

I've decided to bring some other contributors into my blog one is another Green dog democrat from my litter and our founding fathers who is just some guy I know who likes to quote the founding fathers. As you may have noticed some of the posts were not in the same tone as all the others and they posted one or two of them. I mean I can't spend all my time typing with my nose. I mean there are a lot of people to bite and sticks to chase and kibble to eat.

Why Does the Lehigh Valley not have major public transit-- SEE SEPTA

2006-12-11T19:41:00.000-05:00

There was a discussion of this on on true Democrats http://thetruedemocratsoflehighcounty.blogspot.com/2006/11/another-rail-option.html Well very simply the reason we don't have public transit of very much substance is a 5 letter acronym SEPTA or Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation authority. or as I like to call it the Southeastern Pennsylvania money pit. Beyond sucking up most of the state's Public Transit fundings. It also has a $1 tire tax, 1% extra tax on Leased vehicles,rented Vehicles,and 1.22% of the state sales tax, plus 400 million dollars in federal highway funding. Beyond that now they want to add additional .89% onto the property transfer tax in Pennsylvania,11.5 cent increase in the gas tax, to make up for it's 55 to 70 million dollar shortfall. So if you wonder why we can't get mass transit in the Lehigh valley such as rail service just look south

Huh? they were negligent? Congressional Pages at risk children !?

2006-12-09T16:06:00.000-05:00

It is disturbing that Republican leaders were found no more than "negligent" in relation to Mr. Foley's, chasing of under aged boys (Aides and Pages). The leaders of the house have temporary guardianships of these minors while they are in these programs . If this type of Negligence was committed by any other American Adult in charge of a child they would be serving a Jail term. It would be called Criminal negligence and Child endangerment.

So why is this being shoved under the rug maybe as an attempt to shut this down before someone demands that they start looking for inappropriate relationships between underage female Pages and aids in this program. This honestly only seems to be an issue because of it being about homosexuality. The question is what else is going on there and how many Congressmen and Senators might be having inappropriate heterosexual relationships with under aged pages. I think the American people and all the parents of young people working on Capital hill in the page and aid program have the right to know and people need to be held accountable if so more so than in the brush off way it was handled with Mark Foley.

I hope this is not the start of a Pr campaign

2006-12-07T21:31:00.000-05:00

This morning I was highly distressed to see this letter to the Editor
I hope this is not what it looks like but this looks like which is the first salvo in a Pr
defense of Ms. Depaul for what happened on election day. Especially since this person claims to be a member of the League of Women voters. But this letter to the editor looks more like the
a letter written in defense of an embattled political office holder than a county workers. I've also noticed that this just came out and this issue has started to heat up. I hope this is not as bad as it looks and simply is just the isolated letter to the Editor instead of the start of a pr campaign.

There are 25 municipalities in Lehigh county

2006-12-05T10:23:00.000-05:00

The problem is if you talk to most of the democratic leadership there are 9 municipalities in Lehigh county and a big blob that is not Lehigh county. This has been the view towards Lehigh county that is held by both state and good portion of the county Democratic leadership.
That we can't win in the big blob and well we simply aren't going to try.

This is part of the reason that the republicans control 70 to 80% of the municipal seats and most of the State representative seats in the county. Most of the time there is no one on the ballot and If there is a D on the ballot out side of the area that's considered Lehigh county for a municipal race. In a general election a lot of times it's a either a republican who decided to make sure he won by getting himself written in on
both sides of the ballot or a republican who didn't win their republican primary, and got themselves written in on the Democratic side. If by chance there is actually a registered Democrat on one of these ballots. They are one of 4 types they have been in that office for decades, they are simply got themselves on the ballot for ego, or they are someone who is has good intentions but then get little or no help and get murdered(or once in a while sneak in because no one else wants the seat) or the smallest group the person that can buy the seat themselves, but have little or no party loyalty.

If in the rare case the county committee bothers to recruit someone they do little to support them.

The simply fact is if we are going to take back some of the big blob we are going to have to get out of the mind set of we can't win and we aren't going to try, and if we ever hope to gain back some of the state house seats. The simple fact is most people are State Representatives from Lehigh county were at one time were on their local council, or Board. At this point since we hold so few of these seats we have a very small farm team to pull from. The simple fact to people experience does matter. When it comes to legislative positions and local officials already start with a base of support. That someone coming off the street in these races don't have, and simply we hold the least seats in the districts we do the worst. Not because we can't win them but simply because we don't even try to win them most of the time.

What the Democrats in Lehigh county need is a 25 municipality strategy. I know the party right now is rebuilding but there are still local seats we can win all over the county if we just make the effort to do so and don't simply only focus on the county commissioners race and what goes on in the area of least resistance. I know they aren't going to be the easiest places to win and I know they aren't the flashiest things to win but they are important for now and into the future and as sooner we figure this out the better off we as Democrats in Lehigh county will be.

Northampton county paper verifiable election

2006-12-04T10:26:00.000-05:00

I had a hard time imaging since the last election that anyone in Northampton county would argue that having a paper verifiable back up to elections was a bad Idea. But Ms. Deborah Depaul Chief register of Northampton county. Whose statement on the issue in the morning call was "'''I think it would be redundant [to add a paper backup],'' DePaul said. ''And an extra burden and cost to the general public.''".

That's the point of a paper back up Ms. Depaul redundancy, I thought you would have learned the value of that from the mid-term elections in Northampton county. http://greendogdem.blogspot.com/2006/11/more-evidence-of-northampton-county.html

http://greendogdem.blogspot.com/2006/11/northampton-county-board-of-election.html

I find it almost laughable that you don't seem to understand that voters now question if their vote really counted in Northampton county. That you don't seem to understand that had there been a any close elections in Northampton county it would have cost Northampton county much more than 600k in legal, and administrative fees (the figure she quotes as a cost to upgrade the machines in Northampton county), simply to sort it out. That the county may still be sued because of this election. I'm not making accusations of partisanship because the mistakes ran both ways, Against Dent, Browne,Wisley and Shade.

It is shameful that Ms. Depaul fails to realize the damage this could cause in a contested election, that the paper backup would have lessened these question of accuracy. I personally think this type of statement off hand and the showing that happened on Nov 7th brings into question whether ms. Depaul is up to this job. That serious consideration should be made to her removal from her position this is not my decision but the facts speak for themselves and when people in charge don't do their jobs they should be removed.

Iraq the one the only time I'm going to dicuss it

2006-12-02T19:13:00.000-05:00

I have made it my policy to stay out of national politics and stay on the topic of local and state politics. I simply can not keep quiet on this subject anymore. We have reached the point where no rational unbiased observer can say Iraq is in some way leading to anywhere but to this countries determent. It is getting worse not better. It's a situation that is worse than Vietnam and we are having non-fatal causalities that are 3 times that of the first 4 years of the Vietnam war and Fatal causalities that are 157% of the first 4 years in Vietnam.

Regardless of what the Bush adm and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki (who at this point is nothing more than a puppet of the bush adm and knows he will be killed as soon as the us leaves therefore will never ask us to go.) continue to imply things in Iraq are not improve and there is already a festering civil war in iraq, based on vengeance and hatred of the Sunnis by the Shites and Kurds and equal retaliation by the sunnis in tit for tat ethnic cleansing. Which our troops are now sitting in the middle of, which looks like it will not let up for years or generations.

This leads to the question why does Bush Refuse to leave Iraq this is not about the betterment of the Us but about a Neo-con ideology that has lead us down this path of disaster. This ideology is neither conservative nor New smacking more of the idea of extremist Liberalism (one of the uses of the word not the same meaning as the current usage) of the "White man's Burden" ideology a rather twisted self justification of theft, and murder. More or less the Bush adm was trying to Missionize democracy on the middle east in return for access to oil for the Iraqis own good at the point of a gun. As, with the "civilizing of the "savages" of America this is never at the locals benefit. This ideology couple with deranged absolutism of a dry drunk who refuses to admit he has ever made a mistake. Very simply more American troops are going to die and we are going to blow more treasure in iraq because we have a deranged president that simply is more interested in his place in history than the country itself coupled with an ideology of absolutism that mirrors that of the most fundamentalists of religious ideology.

Resulting in what we have now an Administration that refuses to admit it made a mistake and a situation that there is no good way out of . If we leave now Iraq will plunge into a 20 year blood bath, dragging in the rest of the middle east. If we stay we continue to stand in the center of a very hot civil war laced with Ethnic overtones. In this case which is worse than Vietnam because there is no one to trust and anyone could stab us in the back. We are also entering the proverbial year of chaos that sent Vietnam into the death spiral, that it became. We maybe simply prolonging the inevitable chaos that our action have caused. Even if we stay another 10 years or 20 yrs. I don't' think it will change anything other than point the Iraqis frustration more at us and increasing the likely hood we will be attacked at home. The only truthful thing Bush has said is there will be not be a Graceful exit from Iraq. I agree that option has long passed when we leave it will be messy and horrible.

continued Election reform what has been done

2006-12-01T12:17:00.000-05:00

To this point very little of this has been acted on, by the state legislature.
under number one of the Ballot access &Election date section there has been 1 bill in the state senate and 2 in the state house relating to changing the date of the presidential primary all have languished in committee since their introduction.

As far as I can tell nothing have been done in relation to the Absentee ballot Question or it has been intentionally shelfed by the state legislature for lack of interest

What is a Ballot and a Vote?
Based on what i've seen and heard the only answer to this was the purchase of Massive numbers of electronic voting machines by the counties so they could use the money they were given from the federal government and no law requiring verifiable voter paper trails.

Second

What seems to have happened is that the state legislature actually made the provisional ballot laws worse, and left the training of how to use them to the local boards of elections. Which in Northampton county was a complete disaster.

SO more or less this turned into another throw away report and a waste of tax payer dollars, why i'm not sure maybe it's ego maybe the state legislatures don't care who know but there were some good Ideas in the report that to this day have not been acted on and probably never will be.

Pennsylvania Election reform update

2006-12-01T11:42:00.000-05:00

On May 12th 2005, the Election reform Task force consisted of 13 members.,created On December 13, 2004, by Executive Order 2004-11, you created the Task Force

Filed it's report to Governor Rendell

Ballot access and Election date
Recommendations
1. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to set the dates of the primary elections in 2008 and 2012 (presidential elections) as the first Tuesday in March (sunset on November 30, 2014).
2. The specifics of refining the ballot access procedures should be left to the General Assembly.

Recommendations
Absentee ballot
1. The Pennsylvania Constitution, if necessary, and the Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to eliminate all reasons or conditions necessary to qualify for an absentee ballot and permit any qualified elector to vote by absentee ballot without excuse (“no-excuse absentee ballots”).

2. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to allow qualified electors to apply for an absentee ballot at any time prior to a primary election or general election, including on the date of a primary election or general election at a time no later to allow for the return of the ballot by the close of the polls, but no sooner than the date of the immediately preceding the primary election or general election.

3. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to allow submission of an application for an absentee ballot by facsimile or computerized electronic transmission provided it contains all required information and a facsimile of the elector’s signature or the signature of an adult member of the elector’s immediate family.

4. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to require county boards of elections to print absentee ballots immediately upon certification of the official ballot and begin to deliver or mail absentee ballots to qualified electors immediately upon receipt of absentee ballots from the printer but no later than one week following receipt of the certification.

5. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to allow absentee ballots to be returned to the county boards of elections by personal hand delivery by the elector, United States mail, an individual representative of an elector specifically authorized to deliver the elector’s absentee ballot pursuant to a statutory declaration, or a commercial delivery or courier service that accepts and delivers as an intermediary between third parties in the ordinary course of its business throughout the year documents and packages deliverable to a specific street address.

6. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to provide that all absentee ballots
containing a postmark no later than the day before Election Day (must be received no later than seven days after Election Day) or hand-delivered by the close of polls on Election Day shall be canvassed before the completion of the official count of all votes cast.

7. The Pennsylvania Constitution, if necessary, and the Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to require all absentee ballots to be retained, canvassed, and counted at the county boards of elections with procedures to ensure that no elector votes more than once.

8. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to require county boards of elections to make publicly available at the office of the county board of elections and upon request on Election Day and as soon as practicable following the receipt of absentee ballots a list of electors, arranged by election district, who voted by absentee ballot. The county board of election should continue to send precinct lists to the polling places.

9. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to require district election officials to make a list of absentee electors available for inspection only upon written request.

10. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to authorize the Secretary of the Commonwealth to require county boards of elections to report to the Secretary of the Commonwealth information concerning domestic civilian, overseas civilian, and military absentee ballots, including specifically but not limited to the number of absentee ballot applications received, the number of electors listed on the permanent absentee ballot qualification list, the number of absentee ballots distributed or mailed, and the number of absentee ballots returned by electors.

11. All changes to the absentee voting process and procedures shall be made in a manner that maintains the integrity, security, and secrecy of the process.

(I'm skipping the sections on overseas and Miltary)

Recommendations
What is a ballot and what is a Vote

1. The General Assembly should maintain the use of provisional ballots as currently utilized.

2. The Commonwealth/Department of State should re-visit the format of the provisional ballot envelope (based on its original purpose).

4. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to require that the county boards of elections include Voter Registration Mail Applications with election materials distributed to district election officials to provide for use by individuals casting provisional ballots to apply to register to vote for the next succeeding election.

6. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to allow the use of “curbside voting.”

7. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to incorporate federal law regarding alternative language accessibility.

8. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to adopt the Voting Standards Development Board report, “What Constitutes a Vote.”

9. The General Assembly should conduct hearings related to voter verifiable paper ballots and voter verifiable paper audit trails.

10. The Pennsylvania Election Code should be amended to include the purpose, scope, and process for alternative ballots in compliance with federal standards and current Pennsylvania procedure

http://www.dos.state.pa.us/election_reform/lib/election_reform/PERTF_Final_Report_051705_Website.pdf

Lehigh Valley Winners and Losers Democratic Take-over Pennsylvania State House

2006-11-29T10:52:00.000-05:00

Winners- Part of Salisbury twp, and Parts of the City of Allentown

Really Big Winners - City of Easton,Forks twp,Glendon boro, Palmer twp, Tatamy Boro, West Easton boro, Williams twp, Wilson Boro

Losers- Northern Whitehall twp, part of Lower Saucon twp

Really Big Losers-
Lower Nazerath twp, North Catasauqua Boro, Northampton Boro, Pen Argyl, Plainfield twp,

Mr. De Wesse I have my Eye on You

2006-11-28T19:41:00.000-05:00

It seems that the Democrats have won the Pa state house in my view probably in spite of ourselves. It also seem that Mr Bill De Wesse is now will be the Speaker of the House, something I find distasteful but is probably a slight improvement over Prezel.

Mr. Speaker-Elect De Wesse I would like to remind you of what fmr President Clinton said "voters have given us a chance not a Mandate" (and one seat is even less of a mandate than we have in the us house) Democrats were elected to deal with what you were guilty of yourself. (back door dealings,late night pay raises, corruption). If you continue on the path you have and do not champion change the Democrats will be thrown out on their Ears in two years the same way the republicans were. Don't forget you yourself had a near miss in your home district because of your action. I and the rest of the bloggers will be watching you to make sure you don't do this don't forget we are watching you.

The Gift for the Soccer mom who thinks her SUV just doesn't waste enough gas

2006-11-28T10:52:00.000-05:00

JL421 Badonkadonk Land Cruiser/Tank
Price: $19,999.95

In the End it's the Voters Fault

2006-11-27T01:31:00.000-05:00

If, your State rep or State senator either voted for or enabled the vote for the pay raise and you voted for them. Whatever they do from here on out "IS YOUR FAULT". I'm already listening to the same people who complained about the pay raise now complaining about the "middle of the night session the state legislature passed a bill to let slots operators give away free booze to players."Again they passed a law without any hearings, public input or openly debating the proposal 3 times as the state constitution requires." In the end fair number of the people who were screaming and yelling about how horrible and underhand the pay raise was when push came to shove went in and voted for their state legislature that vote for the middle of the night pay raise, or did nothing to stop it. It's kinda funny when push comes to shove it's obvious that Pennsylvania voters don't seem to care what their legislatures do especially in the valley. They reelected a man who voted for the pay raise then spent a ton of money telling people he didn't a bunch of other legislature who may or may not have voted for it but allowed it to get up for a vote in the first place only to place a ceremonial objection vote. The only message that this sends to Harrisburg is keep on doing what your doing keep on having mid-night votes keep on passing things without the 3 day review period. Keep on doing what your doing because when all is said and done when the chips are on the table the voters will fold every time all the self righteous anger all the protest meant nothing. SO VOTERS OF PENNSYLVANIA YOU
VOTED FOR THEM NOW IT'S YOUR FAULT SO LIVE WITH IT FOR TWO YEAR THEN MAYBE YOU"LL WISE UP and STOP wasting your vote on the "NICE OLD WOMAN who comes to our events" or the guy who "the guy who got me my handicap placard" or did this or that or 90 other things any state rep could have done for you that you think is so great but does not really have anything to do with being a state rep or senator.IN THE END WHEN YOU WAN T TO COMPLAIN ABOUT MIDNIGHT VOTES or anything the state legislature does GO LOOK IN THE MIRROR AND SCREAM AT YOUR SELF BECAUSE NOW IT"S YOUR FAULT

It maybe time to look at The Oregon Voting model Again in Pennsylvania

2006-11-22T14:38:00.000-05:00

In 2004 and 2005 when the issue of what to replace our prior voting machines came up there were 3 solutions optical scanners,Electronic machines or chucking the polling place although and having all mail in balloting; in addition these three there was a proposal to allow absentee/mail in balloting by choice not just by need. The last two were for some reason were rejected out of hand by Pennsylvania law makers. The lawmakers in Harrisburg for some reason have a tremendous resistance to doing this and I'm not sure why.

So we went ahead with using a mix of optical scan ballots and Electronic voting machines. All of the state in the past two election since areas started using the electronic voting machines the machines have been glitchy hard to start up they've broken down. Then we have accusation that machine actually voted for the wrong person when someone hit the party button. Then we have the latest mess in Northampton county. It's kinda funny to start off with that Northampton county is the only county in the state that didn't release unofficial voting prescient totals, then had anywhere from a 6-60% swing in a number of races. Claiming first on Tuesday night oh there really was no problem then on Friday coming out with these tremendous swings in a number of races that make no sense. I can see human error in one race or two but not
5 or more. So we simply aren't even sure if the numbers that were "official" are even correct.

Then we have the issue of after all this and all this money we only have 49.2% turn out in Pennsylvania which seems to be one of the most important mid-terms in recent history. While getting back to the original header of this Topic Oregon had 70%+ turn out in an election that cost half as much. What is the difference they vote by mail or drop their ballot in a collection box. I'm hear sure the election machine makers will probably scream murder in response to this or claim there is fraud or etc. There were several studies of Oregon's voting and found no more fraud then there was in a the avg election with either other type of voting machine. It's kinda hard to commit fraud when the ballots are numbered and certified like Super bowl tickets.

I think it's time to Chuck all the new voting machines and switch over yes we spent millions of dollars on these new machines and yes people won't like it in the beginning
but in the end we will have higher turnouts and probably cleaner elections with less problems and people feeling they were cheated out of their vote

Money plundered from the valley by Lois Murphy and First mate Rahm emmanuel

2006-11-20T23:30:00.000-05:00

total 23,100

ATIYEH, ABRAHAM R MR.
BETHLEHEM, PA 18017
BROOKSIDE COMMERCIAL CONSTRUCTION
500.00

BAKER, JAMES R EMMAUS
PA 18049 09/15/2004 500.00

BRADEN, DANIEL C BETHLEHEM
PA 1500

BUTZ, LEE A MR. ALLENTOWN
PA 18104 500

EATON, J. J ALLENTOWN
PA 18104 0 500.00

FOUCEK, OLDRICH ALLENTOWN
PA 18104 09/03/2004 500.00

GRAVER, ELIZABETH M ALLENTOWN
PA 18104 09/15/2004 250.00

GROSS, JANET L COOPERSBURG
PA 18036 09/03/2004 1000.00

GROSS, MALCOLM J. COOPERSBURG
PA 18036 1250

HABERERN, JOHN EMMAUS
PA 18049 09/15/2004 500.00

HENRY, MICHAEL A WESCOSVILLE
PA 18106 09/15/2004 250.00

LABARRE, DONALD ALLENTOWN
PA 18105 09/15/2004 500.00

Manly Ann
Alentown pa 750.00

MCGINLEY, PAUL A ALLENTOWN
PA 18105 2250

MCTISH, MATTHEW P OREFIELD
PA 18069 1000

MORAN, JOAN M ALLENTOWN
PA 18103 500

ORLOSKI, RICHARD J MR. ESQ. ALLENTOWN
PA 18104 250

RODALE, ARDATH N MS. Allentown pa
5500

RODALE, MARIA J EMMAUS
PA 18049 4100

ZINCZENKO, DAVID ALLENTOWN
PA 18102 1000

More evidence of northampton county screwups

2006-11-20T20:27:00.000-05:00

Beyond this I looked at further extreme over and under reporting and found these example I think the levels of under and over reporting in some of these races is far too high and I find the we didn't find any problems explanation the Northampton county board made to the newspaper shameful http://www.mcall.com/news/local/allentown/
all-b1-3vote-5rnov16,0,6199763.story?coll=all-newslocalallentown-hed
But from the Stories I've heard of what goes on in the Northampton county board of election this does not surprise me in the least.

Northampton county
Nov 8th reporting
SHADE, RUSS (DEM) 3,146 33.9%
HARHART, JULIE (REP) 5,899 63.6%
EDWARDS, CARL C. (CST) 225 2.4%
friday reporting
JULIE HARHART (REP)5,643
RUSS SHADE (DEM)3,184
CARL C EDWARDS (CST)220

additional abnomalities

Shade +38 +1.2%
Harhart -256 -4.33%
Edwards -5 -2.22%

Northampton County
Nov 8th reporting
Candidate Votes Percent
WILSEY, DAVE (DEM) 9,813 49.3%
WONDERLING, ROBERT C. (REP) 10,088 50.7%

Friday reporting
SENATOR IN THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY 24TH DISTRICT
DAVE WILSEY (DEM)
9,866
ROBERT C
WONDERLING (REP)9,752
CARL J. ROMANELLI (Write In)1

Wilsey +53 +5.4%
Wonderling -336 -3.34%

while the differentials in
the 133rd were only
BRENNAN +36 +2.9%
BERRIGAN +8 +2.6%

Pa 131
Beyer +38 +4.44%
Minger +32 +4.62%

The only race on this level I could find a change in Lehigh county was
pa 131 and that was
Minger +2 +.02%
Beyer +0 +0%

Northampton County Board of Election

2006-11-20T16:40:00.000-05:00

There is really something extremely wrong with a board of election that has a several thousand vote swing between the unofficial number in two different races. I'm talking about the Dertinger v Dent Race and the Browne v Orloski. This is far too much of difference between two counties to be an accident. There needs to be some accountability for this. If this had been a truly competitive race how would we have been sure the damage to the election could have been repaired

Northampton differential from election day to official results
Dertinger v Dent v Browne
+1545 +4772 + 282
4.2% 13.06% 11.74%

Lehigh County
Dert v Dent v Browne
22 27 8
nil nil nil

Northampton
Orloski v Browne
+813 +2722
13.26% 57.49%

Lehigh
Orloski V Browne
+20 + 18
nil nil

Northampton county
Dent v Dertinger numbers report to state board of elections
on Nov 8th

DERTINGER, CHARLES (DEM)
36,667
48.5%
DENT, CHARLES W. (REP)
36,540
48.3%
BROWNE, GRETA (GRN)
2,409
3.2%

Friday the release this
CHARLES W DENT (REP)
41,312
CHARLES DERTINGER (DEM)
38,212
GRETA BROWNE (GRN)
2,691
PAT TOOMEY (Write In)
32
RON SHEGDA (Write In)
6

Nov 8th
ORLOSKI, RICHARD J. (DEM)
5,311
52.9%
BROWNE, PAT (REP)
4,735
47.1%

Last Friday
PAT BROWNE (REP)
7,457
RICHARD J ORLOSKI (DEM)
6,124

compared to Lehigh county

Nov 7th
DERTINGER, CHARLES (DEM)
38,307
41.3%
DENT, CHARLES W. (REP)
51,318
55.4%
BROWNE, GRETA (GRN)
3,043
3.3%

Final report
Dertinger, Charles
Dem

41%
38,329

Dent, Charles W
Rep
55%
51,345

Browne, Greta
Green
3%
3,051

Nov 7th
ORLOSKI, RICHARD J. (DEM)
23,561
46.3%
BROWNE, PAT (REP)
27,286
53.7%

Orloski, Richard J
Dem
46%
23,581

Browne, Pat
Rep
54%
27,304

"

State Rep campaigns may have helped Dertinger indirectly.

2006-11-19T15:10:00.000-05:00

It's quite possible that the Higher than avg number of people voting in State rep races may have helped boosted Charles Dertingers Numbers. Looking at past mid-terms and even presidential elections usually somewhere between 10 and 20% of voters in Lehigh county tend to not bother to vote further down the ticket than congress.

This year less than 4% of voters didn't vote in the State rep races. It is quite possible that the increased activities by the state rep candidate may have brought out more party line voters, or changed peoples minds about voting Democratic. The margin for Dertinger in Lehigh increased by 3% over what had been a vote Driscoll and and matching O' Brien's number in 2002, even with 3% of the vote being pull off by Greta Brown.

Dertingers Margins of increase over Driscoll and the places he got his votes from were not the same as O'brien. A large amount of the increase came from Lower Mac and Upper Mac and Whitehall twp but not from the areas that you would expect.

They weren't the areas that were targeted by coordinated and the increases are far too high to be explained by people simply coming out for Rendell and Casey and voting for them. Wilsey who ran in the 24th State Senate dist. would have shown some improvement over the performance Mazza did in 2002 of 43% Both of them only received Wilsey was simply on the ballot.

Where as there were 3%-19% democratic increases over 2002 (which is the last reasonably comparable year). in percentages, for Democratic competitors. I would have attributed this would have been attributable to people simply coming out for Rendell or Casey and voting straight down the ticket but in a number places the increase in the state house vote was much to high to simply attributed to party line voting. But what seems to be an active choice to vote for the State rep candidate. It's also notable that where this didn't happen Dertinger didn't do as well in Lehigh county.

It is very possible that although most of the state house candidates didn't win their actions they had some effect on turnout and how people voted at first when I looked at the numbers on election night they looked awful but when comparing the to 2002 to they are shocking improvement. Going from being murdered to making a race look somewhat winnable.

The simple fact that some of the candidates made direct outreach to voters beyond simply mailing to them may have increased turn out, and have help the ticket as a whole.

I know the party would like to give Rob Hopkins all the credit for Dertinger doing better I venture to think had the State rep candidates all just sat on their hands Dertinger my simply not have done as well as he did. Though being underfunded and under help and think outreach by these candidates may have made the Congressional race a good deal closer than it would have been in a number of places.

It is also quite possible had the State house candidates been given more help in their races in Lehigh county they may have made the race even closer, or have swung the race. Part the advantage, the republicans have is all the campaigns work together.

I know a lot of party insiders will dispute the value of having functioning campaign or the affect they can have on all the races I put forward that had all the campaigns really been working in a "coordinated campaign" and when I say coordinated I mean bottom up top to bottom interaction strong on all levels Dent may not have been re-elected.

The Money Problem and State Legislative Challengers in the Lehigh Valley

2006-11-17T18:04:00.000-05:00

One of the Major problems Democratic Challengers for State Legislative offices in the Lehigh Valley have is money. I may have mentioned this before in another of my posts, but I figure I should probably go into this more now. In politics Money seems to be a the last and final determiner of viability, and if you don't have it you aren't viable and it's hard to get it. (This is also why we don't have the best selection of candidates running, or challenged primaries or in some cases candidates at all.)

So what do candidates do well,

They are told go to your families and friends for money, go to the unions, go to this group got to that group. The simple fact is when most of the candidates go to their friends and family they can only scrape together a few bucks maybe a few hundred maybe a thousand or a little more. Most of these candidates don't have deep pockets and neither do their friends and families.

It's been made clear by their action and statements, that the Unions simply don't have the means to help with funding state legislative Challenger candidates the way they use to in addition to funding the federal and statewide candidates, and the Hdcc really has no interest in funding challenger candidates in the valley and probably will have even less of an interest in funding races after the last election. Unless the candidate is polling gangbusters right off the bat, or already has a ton of money.

The Final group that candidates go to is the bloggers well for Federal candidates this seems to work but there seems to be little taste among bloggers to help State candidates in pa outside of Philadelphia. On avg most State candidates got many 150 to 200 dollars from the net.

So What can be done, that is the question I've been racking around in my little green head for a few weeks now.

It can't keep going the way it is if we expect to win any more seats back from the republicans in the valley any time soon.

I came up with a number of options to deal with this.

1. The Lehigh and Northampton county parties could get together and create a Lehigh county Legislative fund raising action committee for State Democratic Challengers that would be there for these candidates as start up money once we know who the candidates are after the primary.
We have two of the best fund raiser in the Democratic party in the Valley. I can't imagine if the party asked them nicely they wouldn't help in this en devour or they could find someone else in the party to do this with Fund raising skills. I'm not talking about the 1k donation i'm talking about 10-20k starter funds per candidates

2. The counties could do this separately

3. The clubs could form state pacs and do the fund raising for candidates.

4. something I'm sure I'll hear the most howling about is put together a group of donors for candidates to go to they know will give them money, beyond just unions.

Which ever option we choose one thing that simply isn't an option is the status quo. If we want to win seats ever again in the Lehigh valley.

Don't like intra-party fighting (in public)

2006-11-17T11:51:00.000-05:00

We as a party do not need anymore bad press. I was highly distrubed last night that a rumor about Lisa Boscola possibily running for office on Lv ramblings about who might or might not have asked her to do what turned into an almost 60 comment tirade in which you had a High ranking state senators chief of staff having an all out brawl with a northampton county committeeman. Over what? A misstatement of fact, this is what woodsheds are for doing this type of stuff on the internet in an open forum is bad for all parties involved and the party itself.

You want to take a wack at Dewesse fine that's one thing or the way the Hdcc handled things in 2006 but having personal fights on the internet just makes the party look bad. I'm sure Bernie is going to box my ears for putting this up but somethings are best dealt with in private and this is one of them

Hum what is a Green-Dog Dem

2006-11-15T03:23:00.000-05:00

Well it seems I need to give a better explaination. Green-Dogs (stupid blogg didn't let me put in the Hypen) are Democrats that tend not to fix into one box they maybe just as likely to side with one side of the spectrum on one issue as they do on another, or simply not care about an issue at all. It's a group of Democrats that simply is neither Blue,nor Yellow nor Orange. But, most of us tend to be to the Left of the Blue Dogs but the Right of the Orange dogs(dean democrats). But whatever postitions we care about we tend to defend it rabidly. We are the "real" Middle of the Democratic party.

Not sure why everyone is complaining on mydd

2006-11-13T19:05:00.000-05:00

It seems the Bloggers on Mydd are really in a tift that Rahm emmauel is getting a ton of credit for the Democrats taking over the house. I mean the man is 20 feet tall and Shoots Lighting bolts out of his ass. What are they complaining about so he wasted 10 million dollars on Tammy Duckworth in race she lost in larger margin then Charles Dertinger did. So he didn't pick up one seat in his home state. So just about every race the Dccc inserted itself into we lost. I mean we what are they complaining about most of the races we won we won with no help from the Dccc at all. I mean so Lois murphy lost and they wasted a ton of money on that race. I'm not sure what they are complaining about. I mean we could have won like 20 or 30 more races with the money they used for the targeted races they lost all 14 of them but what the heck who cares.

whoosh it's quiet

2006-11-12T17:19:00.000-05:00

Boy it's gotten quiet in Lehigh valley Poltical blogosphere really quick after elections. My ears go up every so often but it seems to be more from a milkweed tumbling by or a car on the Highway then from a post. But I guess once the excitements over people's interests drift to something else for another 2 year.

2006-11-10T17:14:00.000-05:00

Well I've been foaming at this mouth on everyone else's blog this week about the election in the Lehigh Valley. So it's probally time to do it on mine. I'm Howling mad we didn't win any new seats in the valley the dog was working his tail off for the past 4 months. Only to be hosed down by the Hdcc and the donar in the Valley.

I would like to rip the seat out of Veon's pants but the voters in Bulter county already did that for him. It's time was time for the Hdcc to put up or shut up they are now dancing around patting themselves on the back for the possiblity that they might get a one seat majority in the house, from a recount. The simple fact is it shouldn't even be a question we should have picked up at least 10 seats.

The simple fact is Hdcc don't know what it's doing and they are wasting the parties money. It's time for the Hdcc to go or be reorganized or put down. But this is just the view of one angry Green dog

2006-11-10T16:54:00.000-05:00

Green Dog dem

Bush adm resistance to alternative energy putting america's economic future at risk

Lucky Dog of the 2007 Election

Maliki and his achievements

Iraq visits by congressmen and Senators Staged events

Bush pushing towards invasion of Iran

Today proves we need to Pressure the Iraqi government So Mr Maliki Shut up.

How stupid does Bush think the American People are Vietnam,Japan,Korea

Has the Us Miltary Become an Evangelical Cult

Here we go again the National Press and American Public is Conned by the Bush adm again

So Mr President Who are we going to invade Next Bush's Middle East Jihad

53 Lehigh valley still in use bridges found deficient or with ratings close to it

Finding the proper balance between: Taxation, Regulation and Business interest,the Free market,Personal Wealth

Fact Fact and damn Statistics why the July downturn in us deaths in iraq means nothing

Part of America's perception problem around the World is the Bush era Military culture itself.

and we should do what Bush wants this time because???

Well know we know what Jerkoff was talking about

Secreatary Homeland INsecurity needs to take an anti-acid and Shut up and stop fearmongering

General or Propgandists? The Latest Desperate act to keep us in Iraq

The I Scooter Libby kick back

Bush amd new message stay in Iraq forever

I'm about to say something you won't see on many other Democratic Blogs

Palestine the New Pakistan

You better Damn well be sure this time!!!!!!!!! Before we start something we can't get out of.

I hope the Democratic party is paying attention the republican debates

Better way to deal with Property Taxes

We finally have Proof Bush is Deranged and a Danger to the troops

Bush adm Flips off the troops

Lehigh County Democratic Primary non-urban Roundup

How Al Qaeda's number 2 is setting Us Policy

Why the Democrats aren't cutting off funds for Iraq

Guns and Resident Aliens

Yes we Did!

Aero/Space Defense Sector Weakness Telegraphing future of Iraq war

The Hatch Act

The only winner from the our Surge in Iraq is AL Queda

No Senator Mccain You are playing Politics

Here we go again

Here we go again another inapporiate fundraiser

IS IT NOVEMBER 5th 2008 YET?!!! PLEASE TELL ME IT IS

Give Bush A choice

removed post

Disappointed but not shocked by Shamefully Poor Lehigh county Candidate Recruiting

Rank Hypocrisy

Pennsylvania Primary 2008

Opps got distracted

Do Transit solutions in Pennsylvania take too long? continued

Do Transit solutions in Pennsylvania take too long?

VA System complete mess

Will the Surge Simply Just move the Violence

Dent Throws lot in with Bush

Why I don't Fly anymore

Is Al-Qaeda trying to keep the US in Iraq intentionally?

Iran,IEDS and What we really Know

LET GET READY TO RUMBLE

Correction to prior post

The Party that Learned Nothing From 2006 Clearing the Field in Pa 15th district

IS the Latest NIE another CON

If anyone wondered where I stood Politically

Damn the Fact no actually Just change them

Here we go again

America I think we have a problem with the Enviroment

Politics of Charatcter assassination is it Destroying Government in the Lehigh Valley and across the state

Just in.........

Something that Bush doesn't seem to get

Bush's New Iraq Plan Heads they win tails we lose

Governor Rendell Stop the insanity

Just winning the County commissioner seats is not good enough

Repost of Lehigh county positions up for Election 2007

The real impeachable offense of George W Bush

President Bush has no Shame Ford Eulogy the Last Disrespect

Alternatives to De wesse

Well it seems Pennsylvania Democrats are Paying for Bill De Wesse's Behavior

Some quotes Relevant to the Current situation in Iraq from our founding Fathers

Suggested reading

Count down to Filing 2007 (80 days and counting)

Well

Why Does the Lehigh Valley not have major public transit-- SEE SEPTA

Huh? they were negligent? Congressional Pages at risk children !?

I hope this is not the start of a Pr campaign