Obama craves familiarity on Hawaiian vacation
There are those who crave adventure and spontaneity during their vacations. Then, there’s President Barack Obama.

http://www.mysanantonio.com/business/stories/MYSA060107.02C.freetrade0601.2aa2d46.html

“A controversial provision of the North American Free Trade Agreement that would allow Mexican trucks access to U.S. roadways may never happen, a South Texas congressman said Thursday in San Antonio.
“I don’t know if we’re ever going to have cross-border trucking,” Rep. Charlie Gonzalez, D-San Antonio, said at the Free Trade Alliance San Antonio’s annual free-trade luncheon….

Early this year, the Department of Transportation proposed a pilot that would allow a test of NAFTA’s cross-border trucking provisions, but a measure signed into law last week will keep that project from going forward as initially planned.

The measure, part of emergency war-funding legislation, would increase the regulations under which such a cross-border trucking pilot could be carried out. The measure “pulls the rug out from under the secretary of transportation’s plans,” Gonzalez said. ”

Thoughts?

Congressman: Stock Market Will Eventually Collapse
Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Ron Paul says martial law provisions in place to deal with economic discord

Texas Congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul says that attempts to rescue an ailing stock market last week, during which the Fed pumped in billions in liquidity, were merely a stop gap measure – and that an economic collapse is all but inevitable.

“They think that they can control it but eventually they can’t, as powerful as they are eventually the markets are more powerful,” the Congressman told the Alex Jones Show yesterday.

“The dollar can’t be kept in check because eventually it will come unwound,” he added.

Texas Congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul says that attempts to rescue an ailing stock market last week, during which the Fed pumped in billions in liquidity, were merely a stop gap measure – and that an economic collapse is all but inevitable.

“They think that they can control it but eventually they can’t, as powerful as they are eventually the markets are more powerful,” the Congressman told the Alex Jones Show yesterday.

“The dollar can’t be kept in check because eventually it will come unwound,” he added.

“But I think the most significant figure we’ve heard in the last few weeks is the measurement between 2000 – 2005, the clear cut admission that real income has gone down, which is a reflection of the dollar.”

Paul explained that recent attempts to pump liquidity into the markets are only a temporary fix and that the long-term effects of doing so spell disaster for the economy.

“The dollar is plunging no matter what you read and hear about and no matter how hard they work to keep the bubble going the only way they can do that is creating more money….causing the dollar to go down even faster, the market seems to be reassured – there’s a contrivance to try to hold this together….but it won’t last, eventually it’s going to collapse,” said Paul.

The Texas Congressman cited the repeal of the Insurrection Act as opening the door to a declaration of national emergency and martial law which could be instituted for any number of reasons, including civil disobedience in the event of an economic downturn and a run on the banks.

“If in 6 months or a year there is total chaos who knows what they might try to do,” said Paul.

The presidential candidate also slammed the abolition of Habeas Corpus as a “very dangerous sign” that plans were being laid for martial law.

“Why would they change them (the laws) if they didn’t plan to use them,” concluded Paul.

Suspicions were raised last week when a mystery trader risked billions of dollars after buying 245,000 put options on the Dow Jones Eurostoxx 50 index, in effect a speculation that the market would crash by a third before September 21st.

as the union of one first name and one last name. Do you think that Congressman Ron Paul of Texas, Congressman Lee Terry of Nebraska, and Senator Kent Conrad of North Dakota would agree to sponsor this bill?

For a PolSci Essay, im supposed to examine the Republican Candidate for the US Senate from Texas against the background of the 2002 and 2006 races for US Senate from Texas…Im having trouble figuring out what to focus on, and what to start writing about..and the wording is really confusing to me….please help if you have any ideas…

And don’t say he was govenor of Texas, because it’s not same experience.
Obama had tree years? Then why is everyone saying he has only 143 days

We do not live in a democracy simply because of the fact that we do not strictly go upon majority rule, rather we as well consider minority rights! Which, to me is better. However with that said, please understand that there is a difference between democracy and the democratic party. Democracy is a form of government in which the majority always rules! The democratic party is a political party, in which the members with in have varied conservative and liberal ideals. Please do also understand the difference between a political party and ideals. The 14th amendment known AKA the Due process state amendment applied the constitution to the states.

OK, I get it. The biggest gripe of the Republican party is that the stimulus legislation is going to spend huge amounts of money. Everyone agrees on that. Nobody is denying that it is going to be an expensive step in an effort to repair the economy. The argument has been made that it may not work. One side believes it will work and the other believes it won’t. But, the talking point of the Republicans, aside from the whole fear of “socialism”, is that the stimulus is going to run up our national debt spending huge amounts of money on government expenses and giving state agencies blank checks to spend however they see fit which inevitably will lead to mismanagement and corruption and ultimately cause a massive debt we may never recover from.

Of course, this is a worse case scenario that is simply being made the most likely scenario according to the Republican argument.

Now, for what I don’t get. Republicans made no beef about starting a costly war in Iraq. They defended the idea we may need to stay in Iraq indefinitely at the cost of billions (if not trillions) annually. They supported sending billions of dollars to repair and rebuild the infrastructure of not just Iraq and Afghanistan but many other nations as well. So, why is it ok to spend billions to trillions of dollars on wars and helping other nations, but, if we spend any money helping our own nation then we are going to be ‘ruined’? There is a war in America. The war on poverty. The war on unemployment. The war on corporate corruption. The war on a failing infrastructure. Would calling it a war and giving it a fancy operation name like “Operation save our nation” make it easier for Republicans?
I notice that nobody is even talking about the billions to trillions spent and being spent overseas. I guess nobody wants to address why it is ok for us to spend billions to trillions helping other nations but not to help our own.