Tag Archives: country

Obama To Earn Nearly $85 Million From Gulf Oil Disaster

Posted on June 16, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Upon Obama’s taking office he staffed his administration with what is called a “Wall Street Cabinet”, including former employees of Goldman Sachs who Rolling Stone Magazine in their devastating article “The Great Bubble Machine” on this banking behemoth warned, “From tech stocks to high gas prices, Goldman Sachs has engineered every major market manipulation since the Great Depression — and they're about to do it again.” And when Rolling Stone Magazine warned that Goldman Sachs was about “to do it again” they probably didn’t even know how apocalyptic this banking giant’s machinations towards the United States really are, and as evident by the BP disaster in the Gulf when just three weeks prior to the Deepwater Horizon explosion they sold nearly half their shares of BP stocks saving for their investors billions of dollars of potential losses. Goldman Sachs wasn’t alone either in its astute “foreknowledge” of the collapse of BP’s stock value due to the Gulf disaster as BP’s own chief executive, Tony Hayward, sold about one-third of his shares weeks before this catastrophe began unfolding too. But according to this FSB report the largest seller of BP stock in the weeks before this disaster occurred was the American investment company known as Vanguard who through two of their financial arms (Vanguard Windsor II Investor and Vanguard Windsor Investor) unloaded over 1.5 million shares of BP stock saving their investors hundreds of millions of dollars, chief among them President Obama. For though little known by the American people, their President Obama holds all of his wealth in just two Vanguard funds, Vanguard 500 Index Fund where he has 3 accounts and the Vanguard FTSE Social Index Fund where he holds another 3 accounts, all six of which the FSB estimates will earn Obama nearly $8.5 million a year and which over 10 years will equal the staggering sum of $85 million. The FSB further estimates in this report that through Obama’s 3 accounts in the Vanguard 500 Index Fund he stands to make another $100 million over the next 10 years as their largest stock holding is in the energy giant Exxon Mobil they believe will eventually acquire BP and all of their assets for what will be essentially a “rock bottom” price and which very predictably BP has hired Goldman Sachs to advise them on. Important to note is that none of this wealth Obama, Goldman Sachs, and other American elites is acquiring would be possible without this disaster, all of whom, as the evidence shows, “somehow” knew what was going to happen before it actually did, including the US energy giant Halliburton who 2 weeks prior to this disaster just happened to purchase the World’s largest oil disaster service company Boots & Coots. Unfortunately for the American people watching as these elites destroy their country is that they are being told none of the truth, especially about Obama, who while becoming enormously wealthy off the hardship, misery and toil of his citizens has become the only US President in history to begin jailing every government whistleblower he can find, has won the right to jail anybody he wants without charges and hold them forever, and most incredibly has claimed the right to assassinate any American citizen he deems a threat. The great American Founding Father, and the United States first President, George Washington once said, “Experience teaches us that it is much easier to prevent an enemy from posting themselves than it is to dislodge them after they have got possession.” The American people to their great shame didn’t heed these words, now they are paying for it. http://beforeitsnews.com/story/79/527/Obama_To_Earn_Nearly_85_Million_From_Gulf_… added by: TomTucker

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Celebrities, Hot Stuff

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

CNN Airs Gushing Two-Part Report on ‘Powerhouse’ Anti-Prop 8 Lawyers

Posted on June 16, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

CNN senior political analyst Gloria Borger returned to her roots as a slanted journalist on Wednesday’s Newsroom with a glowing two-part report on Ted Olson and David Boies, the former rivals in Bush v. Gore who are now fighting to overturn California’s Proposition 8, which outlawed same-sex “marriage.” Borger portrayed their coalition as ” a script that could have been written in Hollywood .” Anchor T. J. Holmes introduced the first part of the analyst’s report just before the bottom of the 1 pm Eastern hour. After noting that closing arguments had begun in the lawsuit against Proposition 8, Holmes stated that the challenge was “the story of two powerhouse lawyers who have turned the partisan divide on its head. Ted Olson, a Republican, and David Boies, a Democrat, famous arch rivals in Bush v. Gore, have now joined together in this fight. It reads like a novel , which may explain why Hollywood had a lot to do with it .” Borger, who, before joining CNN as an analyst in 2007, served as a political correspondent for CBS News , continued on the Hollywood theme: ” It’s a script that could have been written in Hollywood . The opening shot? A lunch in the Polo Lounge at the Beverly Hills Hotel, and it starts where you might expect, with a Hollywood heavy hitter: director and actor, Rob Reiner.” She featured Reiner, a well-known liberal, throughout the first part of her report, as well as Chad Griffin, a former Clinton administration staffer turned activist for same-sex “marriage.” Later, the analyst did her best to establish Olson’s apparent conservative credentials, all the way emphasizing his service to the anti-Proposition 8 cause: OLSON: I’m a lawyer. I represent cases involving the Constitution. This is an important constitutional question. Yes, I think that when we hurt people, when we tell them they’re no good. We tell them that they’re not equal to us, and we say, your loving relationship doesn’t count? The words in the California Constitution are that your relationship is not recognized. What harm do we do? What harm do we do to those individuals every single day, to their family, to their friends? We’re putting a badge on them that says unequal, and that’s contrary to everything we believe in this country. BORGER (voice-over): So Ted Olson took the meeting with Griffin. They kept it a secret, though. BORGER (on-camera) Here you are with Donald Rumsfeld. BORGER (voice-over) After all, Olson is a conservative legal icon. BORGER (on-camera) Of course, one of the first things you see when you walk through your door in this office is a picture of Ronald Reagan. OLSON: He was a wonderful, wonderful man to know and to work for. And, of course, President Bush is here, too. BORGER (voice-over): That would be Bush 43. FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: And I will to the best of my ability- BORGER: The President whose election Olson successfully defended before the Supreme Court in 2000, a memory that wasn’t lost on Chad Griffin. GRIFFIN: I knew I was in foreign territory. But I saw enough in that office to know just how Republican- you know, of a world that Ted Olson comes from, and my world could not be more different than that. Near the end of the first part of her report, Borger revisited her show business theme as she noted the former solicitor general’s partnership with his former adversary in the Bush v. Gore Supreme Court case, David Boies: BORGER: … Olson made another move right out of central casting . He wanted to hire a co-counsel. Of all people, the liberal David Boies, his former Supreme Court rival, the man he beat in Bush versus Gore. The director [Reiner] loved it. REINER: And then when he suggested that we get David Boies to be his co-counsel, I thought- wow. To get the two guys who opposed each other on Bush v. Gore, to team up was saying that this is a nonpartisan issue. GRIFFIN: They share an abiding belief- BORGER: Not to mention, irresistible public relations. WHALEN: I think Ted recognized that this odd bedfellows combination, so to speak, would get a lot of attention. BORGER (on-camera): So people call them the odd couple. WHALEN: Well, it’s- it is a very odd couple, isn’t it? BORGER( voice-over): Or is it? judge for yourself. OLSON: As we were getting ready to argue Bush versus Gore, did we have this conversation? BOIES: Yes- exactly- in the chamber, in the chamber. OLSON: We said, someday, someone is going to come to us who will want to get married, and they’ll be gay. And we’ll do this together. We actually talked about that. BOIES: That second part I don’t remember. More than forty-five minutes later, Borger aired the second part of her report, but instead of interviewing Olson and Boies’s opponents in the lawsuit, she decided to continue her beyond sympathetic profile of the anti-Proposition 8 lawyers, focusing on how the two are “now friends- really good friends” and how the two discuss their tastes in movies and wine: BORGER (voice-over): It was the historic case that decided the presidency and divided the nation. Olson and Boies were the ones on the steps of the Supreme Court battling it out. That was then. This is now. On the streets of New York, they’re talking anything but the law. TED OLSON: It’s called ‘Crazy Heart.’ DAVID BOIES: Oh, I know. OLSON: Jeff Bridges. BOIES: I know. I know. I haven’t seen that. OLSON: Have you seen it? BOIES: I haven’t seen that. I want to see that though and ‘Avatar.’ OLSON: Yes. BORGER: They’ve come a long way….The adversaries are now friends, really good friends. And when we asked to meet with them, they suggested a personal spot, David Boies’ apartment in New York City. BORGER (on-camera): If anybody had said to me nine years ago that I would be about to be interviewing the two men who fought each other tooth and nail in Bush versus Gore on the same side of a constitutional fight, I would have said, are you crazy?… BORGER (voice-over): Politics aside, their wives joke that they’re like an old married couple . They go biking together and both enjoy the finer things. BORGER (on-camera): But what do you like about each other? BOIES: Where shall we start? Shall we start with the wine or the bike trips? BORGER: Yes, let’s start with the wine. After a long day, a glass of- BOIES: A glass, definitely. OLSON: Chardonnay. BOIES: Yes, Chardonnay. CNN, who earlier this year, touted itself as the only “non-partisan” cable news network , has all but made it clear that it is out to promote same-sex “marriage.” On June 9, correspondent Soledad O’Brien previewed her upcoming one-sided documentary , “Gary and Tony Have A Baby,” for the left-wing Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. O’Brien also filed a sympathetic report about a lesbian teenager in Mississippi on Tuesday. After Borger’s report, Holmes himself promoted his colleague’s documentary: “And also, reminder to our viewers, coming up here on CNN, just a few days, the concept of family can mean one thing to you, can mean something else to another . And our Soledad O’Brien, following a same-sex couple in their struggle against the legal and personal obstacles to becoming parents. C an these men achieve a life as mainstream as their parents? Watch ‘Gary and Tony Have a Baby.'”

View original post here:
CNN Airs Gushing Two-Part Report on ‘Powerhouse’ Anti-Prop 8 Lawyers

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

Illegal Alien Incarceration Bad for States’ Budgets

Posted on June 16, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

By Jim Kouri Tuesday, June 15, 2010 President Barack Obama says he wants lawmakers in both houses of Congress to make progress this year on reforming the immigration system. However, he’s not talking about how his administration is failing to protect citizens from criminal aliens. When the United States incarcerates criminal aliens — non-citizens convicted of crimes while in this country legally or illegally — in federal and state prisons and local jails, the federal government bears only a small part of the costs. While the federal government pays to incarcerate criminal aliens in federal prisons, it reimburses state and local governments such as Arizona for a mere portion of their costs of incarcerating some, but not all, criminal aliens illegally in the country through the Department of Justice’s State Criminal Alien Assistance Program managed by the Bureau of Justice Assistance. Some state and local governments have expressed concerns about the impact that criminal aliens have on already overcrowded prisons and jails and that the federal government reimburses them for only a portion of their costs of incarcerating criminal aliens. Congress requested that the General Accounting Office provide information concerning criminal aliens incarcerated at the federal, state, and local level. For the criminal aliens incarcerated, the state and local governments that received reimbursement through SCAAP, only received about 25 percent of the costs . At the federal level, the number of criminal aliens incarcerated increased from about 42,000 at the end of calendar year 2001 to about 49,000 at the end of calendar year 2004 — a 15 percent increase. The percentage of all federal prisoners who are criminal aliens has remained the same over the last 3 years — about 27 percent. The majority of criminal aliens incarcerated at the end of calendar year 2004 were identified as citizens of Mexico. It is estimated the federal cost of incarcerating criminal aliens — Bureau of Prison’s cost to incarcerate criminals and reimbursements to state and local governments under SCAAP — totaled approximately $5.8 billion for calendar years 2001 through 2004. BOP’s cost to incarcerate criminal aliens rose from about $950 million in 2001 to about $1.2 billion in 2004 — a 14 percent increase. Federal reimbursements for incarcerating criminal aliens in state prisons and local jails declined from $550 million in 2001 to $280 million in 2004, in a large part due to a reduction in congressional appropriations. At the state level, the 50 states received reimbursement for incarcerating about 77,000 criminal aliens in fiscal year 2002 and 47 states received reimbursement for incarcerating about 74,000 in fiscal year 2003. For the 5 states incarcerating about 80 percent of these criminal aliens in fiscal year 2003, about 68 percent incarcerated in mid-year 2004 reported that the country of citizenship or country of birth as Mexico, the Dominican Republic, or Cuba. Four of these 5 states spent about $1.6 billion to incarcerate criminal aliens reimbursed through SCAAP during fiscal years 2002 and 2003. Estimates are that the federal government reimbursed these four states about 25 percent or less of the estimated cost to incarcerate these criminal aliens in fiscal years 2002 and 2003. At the local level, in fiscal year 2002, SCAAP reimbursed about 750 local governments for incarcerating about 138,000 criminal aliens. In fiscal year 2003, SCAAP reimbursed about 700 local governments for about 147,000 criminal aliens, with 5 local jail systems accounting for about 30 percent of these criminal aliens. The 147,000 criminal aliens incarcerated during fiscal year 2003 spent a total of about 8.5 million days in jail. Mexico leads as the country of birth for foreign-born arrestees at these 5 local jails in fiscal year 2003. It’s estimated that 4 of these 5 local jails spent $390 million in fiscal years 2002 and 2003 to incarcerate criminal aliens and were reimbursed about $73 million through SCAAP. It’s believed that the federal government reimbursed these localities about 25 percent or less of the criminal alien incarceration cost in fiscal years 2002 and 2003. Sources: US Justice Department, US Bureau of Prisons, General Accountability Office, American Federation of Police, National Association of Chiefs of Police http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/24303 added by: Nick_Hearn

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Celebrities, Hot Stuff

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Joe Scarborough Defends Obama’s Speech, Gives Soft Interview to Axelrod

Posted on June 16, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

MSNBC “Hardball” host Chris Matthews felt a “thrill” up his leg when Obama spoke at the Democratic National Convention in 2008. Keith Olbermann’s leftist bias was great enough to merit a Saturday Night Live parody of his show “Countdown With Keith Olbermann.” And yet both trashed President Obama’s Oval Office speech on Tuesday. “Maybe I missed something. I thought it was a great speech if you’ve been on another planet for the last 57 days,” Olbermann remarked. Matthews said that he didn’t “sense executive command.” But Joe Scarborough, who has repeatedly thrown his support behind President Obama’s handling of the crisis, thought the speech “struck all the right notes,” and was in disbelief on his morning show over the media’s general distaste for the speech. Scarborough then hosted David Axelrod for an interview that can only be described as a barrage of softballs. “I just wonder if this is a season, that, no matter what the President’s doing, he is going to get hit by both sides right now?” Scarborough asked Axelrod, senior advisor to President Obama. “He gives a speech that you guys thought struck all the right notes, as did we,” he said to Axelrod. “Gets hammered. What’s the next step? What is the knitting process? What do you do now?” Donny Deutsch, advertising executive and chairman of Deutsch, Inc., chimed in later to pledge his affection for Obama’s speech. “I thought it was a great speech, by the way,” he assured Axelrod. “I don’t know what I would have done different.” He then decided to give the administration some advice, in the form of a question. “If I was in your inner circle, I would say the 20 minutes today with BP is the opportunity,” he told Axelrod. “There is a clear bad guy here. With everything that goes wrong in the world, we need the perp-walk. I would say he can’t spank them hard enough.” Axelrod delivered his answer. But Deutsch wasn’t satisfied. “David, even your answer to me was very methodical. I want to see anger in your eyes. That’s what the American public wants.” The overall interview lasted eight minutes. The segments including Joe Scarborough and Donny Deutsch are included below. The transcripts of the segments, which aired June 16 at 7:21a.m. and 7:26a.m., EDT, are as follows: JOE SCARBOROUGH: David, I just wondered–you’ve been in politics a long time. This happens to every politician. I just wonder if this is a season, that, no matter what the President’s doing, he is going to get hit by both sides right now. DAVID AXELROD: Yeah, I think that that’s probably true, Joe. And you know, one of the things that we’ve learned over a long period of time through a very long campaign and in this building, is that you just got to stick to your knitting. You got to keep doing your work, you got to keep moving forward. JOE SCARBOROUGH: Keep your head down, yeah, keep your head down. So what does the president do? He follows up on a speech. He follows up, as I was saying last bloc, on the very successful Gulf Coast tour where a lot of conservatives were very pleased with the President, liked what he was doing. He gives a speech that you guys thought struck all the right notes, as did we. Gets hammered. What’s the next step? What is the knitting process? What do you do now? DAVID AXELROD: Well, first of all, I think as to the speech, I think he imparted the information that needed to be imparted to the American people about where we are, what we are going to do to make the people in the Gulf whole and hold BP accountable, how we are going to clean this thing up and how we are going to deal with the problems that led to it. And he made a strong pitch for a new energy policy. It was an important presentation. In terms of what we’re–I mean, we have a meeting with BP today to deal with the issue of claims and putting money in an escrow account so that–independently administered–so that people have some confidence that they can–down there who have been hurt by this–that they can get some recompense for the money that they’ve lost. We’re going to  talk to them about some of the containment strategies, and what we need to do to make that–to accelerate that process. Obviously, he’s going to follow up with members of the senate on the Energy–on the Energy bill. JOE SCARBOROUGH: Okay. DAVID AXELROD: So we’ve got a lot of work ahead of us. And then there’s the day-to-day work of trying to intercept this oil and protect the coast and protect the people as best that we can. (…) (7:26 a.m. EDT) DONNY DEUTSCH, chairman of Deutsch, Inc.: David, you know, I’m one of the–I thought it was a great speech, by the way. I don’t know what I would have done different. If I was whispering in your ear, and tell me if you’d say ‘Donny, I agree with you’– DAVID AXELROD: You are whispering in my ear! DONNY DEUTSCH: If I was in your inner circle, I would say the 20 minutes today with BP is the opportunity. There is a clear bad guy here. With everything that goes wrong in the world, we need the perp-walk. I would say he can’t spank them enough. Wherever you’re going to kick them–he’s going to kick ass–kick harder. I’d say, “David, tell them to do that.” What would your response be to that? DAVID AXELROD: Well my response is we have one mission, and one mission–and that mission is to make sure that the people of the Gulf are made whole, that BP pays every dime they owe, that this–that there’s an independent administrator to make sure that that happens, that they do everything they need to to collect as much oil as they can. And it’ll be clear, I think, to them and to the country that that is–that that is not a negotiable–those are not negotiable issues. DONNY DEUTSCH: David, even your answer to me was very methodical. I want to see anger in your eyes. That’s what the American public wants. (Crosstalk) DONNY DEUTSCH: Everything you said is right. It’s like, “There’s a bad guy out there. There’s a bad–there’s somebody with a black hat out there. This oil company– (Crosstalk) DAVID AXELROD: You’re a–I know you’re not just a creative genius but you’re a great businessman. And you understand that the best way to express yourself is to take from the company what they owe and put it away, and make sure that people are taken care of. That is–you know, that is much more important, I think, to the people of the Gulf than sort of contrived expressions. JOE SCARBOROUGH: Kicking ass. DAVID AXELROD: I think that everybody down there–everybody down there who met with the President understood his sense of connection, his sense of advocacy. But they weren’t asking him to get angry, they were asking him to get results. They were asking him to get the money from BP that they are owed, and to restore the Gulf.

Follow this link:
Joe Scarborough Defends Obama’s Speech, Gives Soft Interview to Axelrod

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

Defending the Indefensible: ABC’s Moran, Stephanopoulos Shill for Obama’s Gulf Address

Posted on June 16, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Despite widespread criticism of President Barack Obama’s Oval Office address on the Gulf oil spill–including flak from MSNBC’s left-wing posse of Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann, and Howard Fineman–ABC’s Terry Moran and George Stephanopoulos on the June 15 “Nightline” fawned over the president’s speech and ignored its obvious shortcomings. In recapping the address, Moran could not contain his adulation for Obama’s ability to assert his presidential authority and inspire the nation: “For the first time in the Oval Office, President Obama addressed the nation. A nation anxious and doubtful about his leadership on the environmental catastrophe that’s unfolded in the Gulf for 57 days. So, the main goal tonight, show the country he’s truly in charge.” “President Obama, who finished a two-day trip to the Gulf Coast this afternoon, clearly wanted to project power in his handling with the oil spill, and the most direct way to do that is to use the language of war of the commander-in-chief.” “As the cleanup efforts continue to grapple with the giant spill, residents all along the coast have grown more and more worried, more and more angry and the president spoke to that directly tonight, and he made a promise.” “At the end, like so many in the Oval Office before him, President Obama asked for prayers.” Moran praised Obama for taking charge of the Gulf, but failed to acknowledge critics who point out that the commander-in-chief dawdled for 57 days before addressing the nation. The “Nightline” anchor lauded Obama for engendering in Gulf Coast residents a sense of hope, but he ignored the cries of local fishermen who have criticized the president’s handling of the spill. Gushing like an uncapped oil well, Moran discarded journalistic integrity and reported only portions of the address he wanted his viewers to see. In contrast, NewsBusters reported that MSNBC’s liberal panel excoriated the president. Olbermann quipped, “Maybe I missed something. I thought it was a great speech if you’ve been on another planet for the last 57 days.” Matthews promised to “barf” if the president mentioned the Energy Secretary’s Nobel Prize again. Fineman lamented, “We want to explain how we`re going to clean up the Gulf. We want to talk about long-range goals. But this 15 or 16 or 17-minute speech really didn’t go into any of those things in detail.” After adorning Obama with plaudits, Moran brought on Stephanopoulos, a former Bill Clinton operative turned political correspondent, who made the unconscionable claim that Obama’s speech was brimming with detail. “First of all, this was the first time the president put all of the facts and figures and details to what he’s done in one place,” declared Stephanopoulos. “You know, 30,000 personnel, the ordering of 17,000 National Guards, men and women down to the area.” While the “Good Morning America” anchor quenched his thirst for a detailed plan of action, MSNBC’s liberal panel was starving for specifics. “Nothing. Nothing specific. Nothing specific at all,” bemoaned Olbermann. “Yeah, you said he aimed too low,” proclaimed Fineman. “I don’t think he was specific enough, Keith.” “[Energy legislation is] the hardest thing in the world, and he’s saying ‘I’m going to do it,’ and then no more information,” bellowed Matthews. Stephanopoulos also compared Obama’s address to FDR’s famous fireside chats, but that was a bridge too far even for Moran, who observed, “Franklin Roosevelt, those are big shoes to fill.” A transcript of the segment can be found below: ABC Nightline 6/15/10 12:39 a.m. TERRY MORAN: Just a few hours before President Obama made his first address to the nation from the Oval Office, a shocking new estimate was released of how much oil is gushing into the Gulf each day, up to 60,000 barrels, a number up roughly 200% over the original estimate. It was the latest reminder of how high the stakes are in this historic environment catastrophe. For the first time in the Oval Office… PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: Good evening. MORAN: …President Obama addressed the nation. A nation anxious and doubtful about his leadership on the environmental catastrophe that’s unfolded in the Gulf for 57 days. So, the main goal tonight, show the country he’s truly in charge. OBAMA: Make no mistake. We will fight this spill with everything we’ve got for as long as it takes. We will make BP pay for the damage their company has caused. And we will do whatever is necessary to help the Gulf Coast and its people recover from this tragedy. MORAN: President Obama, who finished a two-day trip to the Gulf Coast this afternoon, clearly wanted to project power in his handling with the oil spill, and the most direct way to do that is to use the language of war of the commander-in-chief. OBAMA: Tonight, I’d like to lay out for you what our battle plan is going forward. I’ve authorized the deployment of over 17,000 National Guard members along the coast. The one answer I will not settle for is the idea that this challenge is somehow too big and too difficult to meet. You know, the same thing was said about our ability to produce enough planes and tanks in World War II. MORAN: As the cleanup efforts continue to grapple with the giant spill, residents all along the coast have grown more and more worried, more and more angry and the President spoke to that directly tonight, and he made a promise. OBAMA: The sadness and the anger they feel is not just about the money they’ve lost. It’s about a wrenching anxiety that their way of life may be lost. I refuse to let that happen. Tomorrow, I will meet with the chairman of BP and inform him that he is to set aside whatever resources are required to compensate the workers and business owners who have been harmed as a result of his company’s recklessness. And this fund will not be controlled by BP. MORAN: And typical of this president’s grand–some say grandiose ambitions, a call for a new national energy policy to reduce American dependence on fossil fuels. OBAMA: Now is the moment for this generation to embark on a national mission to unleash America’s innovation and seize control of our own destiny. MORAN: At the end, like so many in the Oval Office before him, President Obama asked for prayers. OBAMA: We pray for the people of the Gulf. And we pray that a hand may guide us through the storm towards a brighter day. Thank you, God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America. MORAN: And we’re joined by our Chief Political Correspondent and “Good Morning America” anchor George Stephanopoulos for his take on the President’s address. George, an Oval Office address to a nation that has had real doubts about President Obama’s leadership on this crisis. Did he do the job tonight in showing he can take charge? GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, ABC chief political correspondent: I think he did what he needed to do, saying it, but I say that knowing full well that it’s not going to make a difference until we stop seeing that oil on our television and computer screens every day. I think the White House knows that, as well. I think one of the reasons the President decided to give the speech tonight is that they now believe what he did say in the speech, that within a couple of weeks, 90% of the oil coming out of that leak, it will be siphoned off, will be captured and they believe that will set the stage for future political gains and for getting this whole mess under control. MORAN: So, he was able to deliver that bit of news. But he said a lot of these kinds of things before in the various places he’s been talking about this. What else was new? What did we learn tonight from him? STEPHANOPOULOS: Well we–I think we learned a few things tonight. First of all, this was the first time the president put all of the facts and figures and details to what he’s done in one place. You know, 30,000 personnel, the ordering of 17,000 National Guards, men and women down to the area. What we did see new tonight is he named the head of restoration project for the Gulf, Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus, a former governor of Mississippi, former ambassador to Saudi Arabia to come up with a restoration plan, which is critically important to the people of the Gulf. As the President said tonight, so many of them fear that they’re going to lose their entire way of life. We heard a new name for the head of that Minerals and Management Service, which has just been plagued, really by corruption, and by lax regulation of the industry. The President putting in a former prosecutor, Michael Bromwich. He has new men in place to help lead this effort. We also saw him come down pretty hard, as you might expect, on BP. On British Petroleum, saying he’s informing them they have to come up with this escrow fund, some in Congress calling for up to $20 billion. Now there is some question of whether President has the legal authority to do that. He’s just asserting it. MORAN: Let’s take a step back. It’s a historic moment in the Obama presidency. First Oval Office address to the nation. Optics. That’s a big word in the political class right now. How did he look up there? How do you think people received this moment of Barack Obama addressing from the Oval Office? STEPHANOPOULOS: You know, usually the public, especially those than tune in who tend to want to support the president anyway have a good reaction to these kinds of speeches, and they get all of his information unfiltered. Now for me it was just, you know, I’m not used to watching the president speak sitting down. You know, he gives so many of his big speeches standing up and I think that was a new way to look at the president. I think he was certainly reaching for the language of Oval Office addresses, all of these have military language–siege, assault on our shores, battle plan. White House aides tell me that the President was trying to recreate the feel of Franklin Roosevelt’s fireside chats because he wanted people to understand how serious this moment is. That said, I think all presidents are a little bit nervous going into their first Oval Office address. I think the President showed a little bit of that at the beginning as well. MORAN: Franklin Roosevelt, those are big shoes to fill. George Stephanopoulos, thanks very much for being with us tonight. –Alex Fitzsimmons is a News Analysis intern at the Media Research Center. Click here to follow him on Twitter.

See the rest here:
Defending the Indefensible: ABC’s Moran, Stephanopoulos Shill for Obama’s Gulf Address

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , ,

WikiLeaks Founder Has Garani Massacre Video, According to New Email

Posted on June 16, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Julian Assange, who the Feds fear may release State Dept. secrets, denies having them—but he’s readying video of a deadly U.S. airstrike in Afghanistan. After several days underground, the founder of the secretive website WikiLeaks has gone public to disclose that he is preparing to release a classified Pentagon video of a U.S. airstrike in Afghanistan last year that left as many as 140 civilians dead, most of them children and teenagers. In an email obtained by The Daily Beast that was sent to WikiLeaks supporters in the United States Tuesday, Julian Assange, the website’s Australian-born founder, also defends a 22-year-old Army intelligence specialist who is now under arrest in Kuwait on charges that he leaked classified Pentagon combat videos, as well as 260,000 State Department cables, to WikiLeaks. “Mr. Manning allegedly also sent us 260,000 classified US Department cables, reporting on the actions of US Embassy’s [sic] engaging in abusive actions all over the world,” Assange said in an email. “We have denied the allegation, but the US government is acting as if the allegation is true.” American officials have said they are eager to determine the whereabouts of Assange, who canceled an appearance last Friday in Las Vegas, to discourage him from releasing any more classified information on his website, which is nominally based in Sweden and promotes itself as a global resource for whistleblowers. As recently as two weeks ago, Assange, who first gained global notoriety as a computer hacker, was in his native Australia. In April, his website posted a copy of a classified Pentagon video of a 2007 American helicopter attack in Baghdad in which a dozen people were killed; that video is also believed to have been leaked by the Army intelligence analyst, Specialist Bradley Manning of Potomac, Maryland. While denying again that WikiLeaks has the State Department cables, Assange acknowledges in the email today that he is in custody of the May 2009 video that shows the airstrike on the Afghan village of Garani, believed to be the most lethal combat strike in Afghanistan—in terms of civilian deaths—since the United States invaded the country in 2001. Assange writes that “we are still working on” preparations for release of the video of “the Garani massacre.” (more @ link) added by: Omnomynous

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Celebrities, Hot Stuff

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

Drake Recalls Visiting Lil Wayne In Prison

Posted on June 16, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

‘There’s a whole world moving out there that he hasn’t seen for so long,’ Drizzy tells MTV News. By Shaheem Reid, with reporting by Sway Calloway Drake Photo: MTV News When Drake visited Lil Wayne last week in Rikers Island, it was an experience like no other. “It was just not the country club,” Drake told MTV News on Tuesday, the day his debut album, Thank Me Later, was released. “It wasn’t his Miami condo. It wasn’t Atlanta. It wasn’t Tree Sound Studios, all the places I’m used to seeing him. It wasn’t Club Liv in Miami. It wasn’t any of them.” Drake has tried to wrap his head around Wayne’s situation in prison. It’s been difficult, but he did grasp some jewels from their visit. “He kept looking to the window,” Drizzy described. “He’d look up at the window almost like he’s looking right through it. It’s frosted, so you can’t see out. I was like, ‘Why does he keep staring through the window? There’s nothing out there.’ To him, there’s a whole world moving out there that he hasn’t seen for so long. He was just like, he told me something I never thought I’d hear him say, which was, ‘You’re the ultimate artist. You’re better than me. You don’t have the tattoos, you don’t cause any trouble. People like you.’ He was like, basically, ‘Look at me and look at you.’ “He was like, ‘Man, listen. You know what I think you’re about to do? You’re about to do 2 million,’ ” Drake recalled, echoing Wayne’s sentiments from last week’s “Nino Brown Story, Pt. 3″ preview . ” ‘You’re about to do 2 million the first week.’ ” Drake thought back to a conversation they previously had, when the Toronto native wanted to get a tattoo; Weezy advised against it. ” ‘Whatever, man, whatever you do, do not get no tattoos never in your life,’ ” Drake recalled Wayne telling him. ” ‘They gonna think you got it because you came around me.’ He said the same thing to me [during the Rikers visit]: ‘Don’t change yourself, please. You got it. I’ve never met a young dude that has it figured out, but you got it. Don’t mess it up. Just be you. Sing! Rap! Be you. Don’t stop smiling.’ That’s what he said.” What do you think about Drake and Wayne’s relationship? Let us know in the comments below! Related Videos MTV News Extended Play: Drake Drake’s MTV Special “Better Than Good Enough”

Visit link:
Drake Recalls Visiting Lil Wayne In Prison

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Celebrities, Gossip, Hollywood, Music

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

E3 Nintendo Press Conference 2010 (Full Video)

Posted on June 15, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

The Nintendo press conference from E3 2010 included the announcement of the Nintendo 3DS, as well as The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, Goldeneye 007, Metroid: Other M, Donkey Kong Country Returns, Epic Mickey, and more. http://e3.g4tv.com/videos/46345/E3-2010-Nintendo-Press-Conference/ added by: Agent_Alpha

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Celebrities, Hot Stuff

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Bachmann: Obama Oil Spill Response ‘Dereliction of Leadership’; Media Lowered President’s ‘Level of Accountability’

Posted on June 15, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Minnesota Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann isn’t exactly known for her reticence on the news of the day. And when it comes to the White House’s handling of the BP oil spill disaster, Bachmann had some harsh words for President Barack Obama. Speaking at the June 25 Bloggers Briefing at the Heritage Foundation , Bachmann pointed out how she thought it was peculiar that all the comments coming out of the White House were geared toward the president specifically and not to the victims of this crisis. “The thing that we’re all focusing on today will be the president’s remarks that he’ll be giving tonight and it looks like an absolute opportunism moment for the president to try and advance the next stage of his legislative agenda,” Bachmann said. “And I think the curious feature in all of this has been: this is a major disaster and yet it seems like every response that has been coming out of the White House has been about the president rather than about the disaster. That is odd to me. That seems extremely odd.” The Minnesota Republican said the hapless reaction to the oil spill event and the administration’s mishandling of the Nashville flood in April that went largely ignored by the President and the media raised questions about the administration’s leadership. “It seems like a dereliction of leadership, especially when you consider what happened in Nashville was also a disaster – an unmitigated disaster for the people down in Nashville,” she said. “Not only has the president not yet visited to highlight the devastation that has happened to businesses and people’s lives there, but he also hasn’t even mentioned Nashville as a disaster. That’s interesting to me, how the White House seems to be picking and choosing between disasters – for whatever reason and I can’t speculate what that reason may be, but for some reason Nashville didn’t make the cut for a presidential visit or a presidential mention.” When asked, Bachmann didn’t sound too hopeful that Congress would exercise its oversight role and hold hearing looking into what she suggested was the federal government’s mishandling of the oil spill response efforts. “I am sure Nancy Pelosi will get on that tomorrow morning and Harry Reid,” she said, to laughter. She characterized the ongoing Gulf disaster as a missed opportunity for the president to untie the country, something that “candidate Obama” seemingly could have done, as opposed to President Obama. “I give the President a lot of credit as candidate Obama,” she continued. “He really did have kind of a once-in-a-generation opportunity to be that transformational president, which I wish he could have been. But unfortunately the last 18 months I think we have seen the ground shake underneath our country because of a lot of policy decisions he’s made but also from a stylistic point of view – the way that he has handled various crises in his presidency – and I don’t think that has engendered confidence.” She also mentioned the White House’s handling of  last month’s flotilla disaster, and she took a shot at the media for not holding Obama as accountable as they held the Bush administration for similar responses. “Look at the blockade situation with Turkey and with Israel,” Bachmann said. “All the wrong signals were sent out of that event in my opinion. And it’s made Israel even more vulnerable than they were before. So for that and a lot of other reasons, I think we really need to give – the White House needs to be held at least to the same level of accountability the previous administration was held to. And I don’t see that media, present company excluded, has necessarily done that.”

Follow this link:
Bachmann: Obama Oil Spill Response ‘Dereliction of Leadership’; Media Lowered President’s ‘Level of Accountability’

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

MSNBC’s Schultz Asks When Obama Will ‘Become a Dictator’ on Gulf Cleanup

Posted on June 15, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

When asked what President Obama needs to do to prove to Americans that his administration is on top of the Gulf cleanup, Ed Schultz pressed that the President needs to call the shots and go “dictator” in his dealings with BP. “I think the President has to make it very clear to the American people tonight, Chris, that we’re not going to be stuck with the bill on this,” Schultz said about the BP oil spill. “When does the President become a dictator on this?” Schultz asked in an outburst. “When does the President start really calling the shots and saying ‘This is the number. This is what you’re going to pay. We’re not going to let you off the hook.’?” He sternly warned that BP will do its level best to escape having to pay the full cost of the oil spill cleanup, and implored the President to be frank with BP in demanding that they pay full restitution. “[BP has] destroyed our environment by going down so far, circumventing the permitting process, cutting corners, not doing everything they had to do when it came to safety,” Schultz ranted, “and… this is a defining moment for this crisis, maybe for [Obama’s] Presidency.” Little more than a month ago, Schultz lambasted a Southern congressman for downplaying the effects of the oil spill, by generalizing all Southern politicians as “drill baby drill” congressmen and senators, and questioning if America really wanted to help out the ravaged Gulf Coast states. He certainly proved his devotion to maintaining the ultra-serious nature of the oil spill in asking Obama to get his “dictator” on and smack BP around. The transcript of the MSNBC News Hour segment, which aired on June 15, at 10:06 a.m. EDT, is as follows: CHRIS JANSING, MSNBC Anchor: So Ed, what do you think the President has to say if he’s going to dispel the notion that somehow this federal government has always been a step behind this crisis? ED SCHULTZ: Well I think the President has to make it very clear to the American people tonight, Chris, that we’re not going to be stuck with the bill on this. $20 Billion in an independent fund, an escrow, is a great start but I think most Americans believe it’s going to go far beyond that for a number of years. So, this is all about the money and I think a lot of Americans, including myself, in reference to what Chuck Todd was saying, is that the White House is negotiating with BP. When does the President become a dictator on this? When does the President start really calling the shots and saying this is the number, this is what you’re going to pay, we’re not going to let you off the hook? But the fact is, we’re dealing with a multi-national that has in their DNA over the past years–that they don’t pay for everything, they never paid for everything. And I think the President has to speak straight to the American people tonight about what we’re dealing with, with a multi-national corporation that’s going to take every legal avenue they can to wiggle out of paying the bill. Now, I see that they’re taking out some nice commercials, I see that they’re doing all the right things by writing some claims, but we all know from the Exxon Valdez that this is much bigger and it is going to go on for years. CHRIS JANSING: So you want to hear the President say, look I’ve got my teams of lawyers–this is all going to be legal, but I’m going to demand from BP–I’m going to have them in the Oval Office tomorrow and here are the things that I am going to demand from them on behalf of the American people. You want him to be that blunt and straight forward? ED SCHULTZ: Absolutely. They have destroyed our environment by going down so far, circumventing the permitting process, cutting corners, not doing everything they had to do when it came to safety, and I don’t think there’s any question the President–this is a defining moment for this crisis, maybe for his Presidency, because I just think that the American people feel–and I’ve been around the country doing town halls–they feel like we’re being gamed by BP. We know how BP plays the game, we know how they wiggle out of stuff–now I think it’s important for the president to make it very clear to the American people that this is how we’re going to do this. And I think it speaks volumes that he hasn’t met with Tony Hayward. Because if he does, then he’s going to be on record. Tonight he is on record with the American people, and I think the American people are going to hold him accountable for it. CHRIS JANSING: And let me go back to the point that I was talking about with Chuck. Which is that, obviously, he’s going to get a lot of facts out there. He wants the American people to know what is going on and to know that he’s on top of what’s going on, but how much of this has to be–in spite of the fact that Barack Obama doesn’t like the use of this word–how much of it has to be theater? How much of it has to be emotion? ED SCHULTZ: Well, I think we’ve seen plenty of emotion from the people down in the Gulf. And I think the President, who has a history of being well versed, very detailed, explains things very well–he will do that, I’m sure, tonight, in his normal style of presentation. I don’t think there will be any deviation from that. I don’t think there’s going to be any emotional moment. I think he’s a serious guy and he’s got his facts and he’s going to present it out, and I think he’s going to be very thorough tonight. Pushing energy policy right now–it’s a bull horn moment, no doubt. But I’m not convinced that the American people, including myself, view tonight as ‘Okay, it’s time for some legislation. What do you say we go in this direction?’ I think it’s all about accountability right now, stopping the leak, making sure that people are made whole, and define what does ‘made whole’ mean? Does that mean this year? Next year? Because the damage that’s being done here is for years to come. Every scientist that we talk to is saying that well this is going to be going on for the next decade and it’s going to take years to clean this up. So, what does being made whole mean? A $5,000 check, a $50,000 check and we’ll see you next year? I think that the $20 billion fund is a small start in totality and the president has to make sure that he’s clear with the American people tonight that we, the American people, are not going to be stuck with BP’s bill. CHRIS JANSING: Thank you, Ed.

See more here:
MSNBC’s Schultz Asks When Obama Will ‘Become a Dictator’ on Gulf Cleanup

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Hollywood, Hot Stuff, News

Tagged , , , , , , ,