Why did the Bush leave one million VA claims for the Obama adminstration?

The answer is simple. the Republicans were more concerned about taking a veteran's disability away. The VA secretary directed that a review of all the VA claims that had been approved. If you lost a disability while Bush was president, now you know why.

Subject: NEW VA SECRETARY DIRECTIVE CALLS FOR REVIEW AND RE-EVALUATION OF ALL VETERANS SERVICE-CONNECTED DISABLITY CLAIMS
 
Date: Fri, 22 Jul 2005 13:43:00 -0700 (PDT)
 
THIS DIRECTIVE AFFECTS ALL VETERANS RECEIVING SERVICE-CONNECTED DISABILITY COMPENSATION, IN THAT THE SECRETARY'S DIRECTIVE REQUIRES THAT REGIONAL OFFICES REVIEW AND RE-EVALUATE ALL CURRENT AND PAST VETERANS CLAIMS. 

THE CLAIMS THAT WILL PROBABLY BE REVIEWED WITH THE MOST SCRUTINY ARE THOSE VETERANS RATED AT 100% - AND THOSE RATE 50%-90%...

Essentially the Republican VA secretary suggested that veterans are welfare cheats.  It may take years to process a VA disability claim and the process is comprehensive. Unfortunately, the VA often errors on the side of the government contrary to congressional law.

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WSJ: Is Oil Destined for East Coast?

6/3/2010 5:34:57 PM

New supercomputer studies suggest it is "very likely" that ocean currents will carry oil from the Deep Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico around Florida and up along thousands of miles of the U.S. Eastern seaboard this summer, researchers announced.

WSJ's Lee Hotz joins the News Hub with more.

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Americans used to be for the Underdog

During the great depression and through the 1960s. Americans always rooted for the underdog. The Shirley Temple movies were about a young girl who came form a poor family but through pluck and talent was able beat the rich snobs in the neighborhood.

James Stewart  in "It's a Wonderful Life" is  a good example of an underdog movie. So is Black Beauty. Take a look at the following quote to see what Rightrardia means"

George Bailey (James Stewart) : You sit around here and you spin your little webs and you think the whole world revolves around you and your money. Well, it doesn't, Mr. Potter. In the whole vast configuration of things, I'd say you were nothing but a scurvy little spider.

These movies are still being made; Rocky is an excellent example. Dodgeball is another good underdog movie. So is 'Rudy,''Chariots of Fire,' and the 'Revenge of the Nerds' series. The House Bunny and the Waterboy are also examples of newer underdog movies.

In the 1970s everything changed After Lyndon Johnson got the Civil Rights Act of 1964 passed, many southern Democrats defected and became Republicans. Sen. Robert Byrd, who recently passed away,  was not one of them.

This led to the so-called "Reagan Revolution." Now America was about the affluent overlords and not the underdogs anymore. A new economic orthodoxy was created by Arthur Laffer called Supply Side economics. Americans were told that taxes needed to be cut for the wealthy to create jobs and improve the economy.


We heard the same story when George W. Bush was president. As George W. Bush stated during an inauguration speech, my base is the 'have mores."


When the economic performance of the Reagan and Bush administration is examined, Americans saw government running in the red, a massive increase in defense spending and underemployment. In fact, GWB had the worst job creation record of any modern president.

If you are a yellow dog Democrat, you are probably rooting for the Underdog. if you are a Republican, you would probably prefer the Overlord.

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Brave New Films: Drill, Baby, Drill

See 'ass kissing big oil Republicans' get whipped into a frenzy by  "drill, baby, drill."

BP has caused an unprecedented environmental and economic disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.

Yet along with conservative politicians, a well oiled public relations machine and their countless and shameless lobbyists they continue to push for more irresponsible drilling and want to make us believe that what they are doing is righteous and necessary.

Enough!

We don't need more shameless media games and manipulative political agendas. What we need now more than ever is to stop once and for all our obsession with petroleum.

This is why we have launched Power Without Petroleum, a community ready to fight back against big oil interest and the politicians that serve as their mouthpiece.

source: http://bravenewfilms.org/ Subscribe to the Rightardia feed: feeds.feedburner.com/blogspot/IGiu

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POLITICO 44: 'Tectonic rift' with Israel

By LAURA ROZEN | 6/27/10 8:48 AM EDT

Israel’s Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren is reported to have told Israeli diplomats that the U.S. and Israel are experiencing a “tectonic rift,” not a temporary crisis.

“There is no crisis in Israel-US relations because in a crisis there are ups and downs,” Oren told a a closed briefing to senior officials in the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s North America Branch and research division, Yedioth Ahronoth’s Itamar Eichner reports.

“According to the Israeli diplomats, Oren said …’Relations are in the state of a tectonic rift in which continents are drifting apart,’” Haaretz said.

“Oren noted that contrary to Obama's predecessors — George W. Bush and Bill Clinton - the current president is not motivated by historical-ideological sentiments toward Israel but by cold interests and considerations,” Haaretz reports.

He added that his access as Israel's ambassador to senior administration officials and close advisers of the president is good. But Obama has very tight control over his immediate environment, and it is hard to influence him. ‘This is a one-man show,’ Oren is quoted as saying.

Oren told Haaretz he denied the report, which the paper attributed to "five Israeli diplomats, some of whom took part in the briefing or were informed about the details." The Israeli Embassy did not immediately respond to a query from POLITICO Sunday.

Oren’s remarks come ahead of a July 6 meeting between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Barack Obama.

The White House meeting – the fifth between Netanyahu and Obama — had been originally scheduled to take place earlier this month but was postponed after Israel’s interception of a Gaza aid flotilla on May 31.

The confrontation, in which eight Turks and one Turkish American were killed, has caused a crisis in Israeli-Turkish relations which the U.S. has been trying to defuse.

source: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0610/39059.html

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NotionsCapital: Judge Sold Exxon Stock 5 Hours Before Lifting Drilling Ban

June 27, 2010 by Mike Licht

Federal Judge Martin Leach-Cross Feldman engaged in an oil spill cleanup of his own last week.

Five hours before he rendered his decision blocking the six-month moratorium on deep-water Gulf oil drilling, Judge Feldman sold his personal holdings of Exxon Mobil stock.

Exxon was not a party to the case under consideration but will directly benefit from the Judge’s action.

Judge Feldman may have lost a few dollars on the sale; he definitely lost much more in credibility. ”The judicial canons require that judges be aware of their investments,” wrote Steven Mufson and Joe Stephens in the Washington Post:

“Judicial ethicists said that, had he been aware of his holdings, Feldman should have disclosed the ownership or recused himself at the case’s outset if he thought it posed a conflict or raised questions about his impartiality.

The court docket indicates that Feldman signed several orders before the sale.

“‘I’ve never heard of a situation like this,’ said Jeffrey M. Shaman, a judicial ethics specialist and law professor at DePaul University.

“The judge may have thought the stock did not create a substantial conflict, legal analysts said, but the fact that he apparently felt compelled to sell the stock and disclose it could be seen as indicating otherwise.

source: http://notionscapital.wordpress.com/2010/06/27/judge-sells-exxon-stock-5-hours-before-lifting-drilling-ban/#more-30824

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New .XXX domain for the porn industry?

Should porn sites have their own .xxx domain rather than .com? Family advocates and even some in the porn industry say yes.

ADVERTISEMENT

This is not a new idea. It was rejected by the Bush Administration.  To be effective, the domain should be mandatory for the adult industry. This would make it easy to block adult content from homes.

Most software that filters porn and other objectionable content uses black lists that have to be updated continually to block new porn sites that are registered every day.  Many porn companies will not use the .xxx domain unless it is required by law.

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Mike Huckabee Puts The Oil Spill To Music

Mike Huckabee opted to re-write the lyrics to Creedence Clearwater Revival’s ‘Who’ll Stop the Rain’ to make them oil spill appropriate for Fox News.

Then he had his band the Little Rockers perform it: ‘Long as I remember, the oil is flowin’ free…’

Huckabbee has moved to Florida and will probably run for office while he is there.

Huckabee was one of the more 'down to earth' GOP candidates, but his fundamentalist religion worried Rightardia because evangelical are pro-military and pro-Israel. Many evangelicals think that wars are necessary to spread Christianity.

Huckabee's 'fair tax' never resonated with the public either. Conservatives have wanted to make US Income tax regressive like the the other state and municipal taxes. This would be a gift to the affluent.

A regressive tax is hardly populist.

In any event, we liked Huckabee's lyrics and the "Litttle Rockers." It's too bad the video  had to end with an Obama dig.

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Senator Robert Byrd passes away

Robert Byrd was a powerful senator in West Virgina, one of the poorer states in the US.  For 2007, Byrd was deemed the fourteenth-most powerful U.S. Senator, as well as the twelfth most powerful Democratic Senator.

He was greatly responsible for the excellent highway system in WV and also moved a lot of federal facilities into the state to create jobs.

Byrd was  a repentant Dixiecrat. He was once  a member of the  KKK and even filibustered the Civil right s Act of 1964. But unlike many of his southern peers, he remained a Democrat.

A firm believer in continuing education — vocational schools, community colleges, adult education — Mr. Byrd practiced what he preached.

While in the U.S. House from 1953 to 1959, he took night classes at law schools. He received a law degree from American University in 1963 and is the only member of Congress to put himself through law school while in office.

source: http://mariopiperni.com/

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American kids are flocking to the biggest and richest sport in the world

The next generation of America's soccer stars have begun hitting the field, as more and more kids are signing up for summer soccer camps.

The United States has more official soccer players than any other nation in the world - almost 18 million. No other sport crosses so many cultural boundaries, and it no surprise that it is the fastest growing team sport in the United States.

Soccer the world’s richest sport. It also has the largest contingent of diehard fans, players and professional leagues in the world’s largest economy, Europe.

The English Premier League and the Champions League are the most popular football leagues, with the matches shown live to half a billion people in 202 countries.

Manchester United is the richest club in the world with a valuation of $1.87 billion.

The FIFA World Cup is the largest and most lucrative sporting event in the world.

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