The REAL "Fast & Furious" story

An 18-year-old bought guns at a Virgina Gun Show with Drug Cartel.....
No law says an ATF Agent can arrest a LEGAL gun purchase...

Issa stops AZ ATF Agent talking about this

What is the truth about "Job Killer" claims?

According to Huffington Post article out of the 381 articles posted in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post and New York Times, the phrase "Job Killer" was NOT substantiated -- backed up with facts.

The University of Northern Iowa Study says:

"The news media's chronic lack of fact‐checking has only encouraged ramped up use of the 'job killer' allegation as a political strategy against the Democrats in recent years," the study says.

A Politifact story says:

"The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that the legislation, on net, will reduce the amount of labor used in the economy by a small amount—roughly half a percent—primarily by reducing the amount of labor that workers choose to supply." 

So why is this so important?

With politicians repeating the phrase "Job Killer" without ever questioning that statement, then lazy reporters just regurgitate the phrase acting as if the evidence has already been proven -- acting as if it is an established fact -- when in fact it has not.

GOP Uses the THREAT of Filibuster to block...

Once again the Republicans are using the Filibuster to STOP any governing....
Roll Call News: GOP begins Judge Blockade talks about how they use the "Filibuster" to BLOCK anything coming to the floor for a vote.

Individual Republicans during the past year have vowed to block one or more of Obama’s judicial nominees for a variety of reasons. Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) earlier this month cited the looming presidential election for his decision to filibuster a district court judge from Baton Rouge.

Once again...

But the decision by leadership to formally invoke the Thurmond Rule raises the stakes significantly because an individual Senator’s filibuster can be overcome — so long as enough Republicans are willing to vote with Democrats. With McConnell now backing use of the Thurmond Rule, that appears unlikely to happen.

 And then again....

Hurwitz’s road to confirmation, however, may have foreshadowed the coming blockade, considering GOP backers, such as Minority Whip Jon Kyl (Ariz.), were barely able to muster the eight Republican votes needed to help Democrats overcome a filibuster. And with the Thurmond rule being invoked, Hurwitz may be the last circuit judge to see confirmation this year.

GOP Begins Judge Blockade : Roll Call News

The problem is that the Minority only says....filibuster...and then THEY walk away form the floor for 31 hours.... If they were serious about objecting.... Why can't they stand on the floor and fight for it..... But this is ONLY a blocking mode and not anything they are passionate about.

It's nothing but a shell game....to stop anything happening.

How is this good for the country?

CA Senators vote down notifying property owners of fracking

Senator Gaines sides with Oil Companies again.

Senator Ted Gaines voted "Against" a bill (SB 1054) that would require Well owners or operators to notify "Surface Property Owners" before they can drill or perform "hydraulic fracturing operations" that will occur below their property.

By blocking this bill fracking companies do 'not' have to tell you, the property owner what they are doing under your property where you pump or store your water. In the Midwest actual “Earthquakes have occurred” where companies were “fracking for gas.”

I called Senator Gaines’ office and asked why did he vote against the interest of his constituents?  The receptionist read from a prepared statement that said he was against the $500,000 that the state would have to pay to setup this special fund.

I looked over the Bill and I couldn’t find any place that said $500,000.  In fact the Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary says that a one-time cost of $220,000 would be pulled from the “Oil, Gas, and Geothermal Administrative Fund” financed by energy companies fees.

So who would be hurt by this bill?  Fracking companies.  Who would be protected by this bill?  Property owners.  So who is Senator Ted Gaines really protecting?

Federal Government would take supremacy over California Water Rights

As Chairman of the Water and Power subcommittee, Congressman Tom McClintock of the Northern California’s District 4 developed a bill with his Republican committee members and brought it to the House floor for a quick discussion and vote.

     McClintock’s bill steps way beyond established water rights in California and asks to give the Secretary of Interior, a Federal Agency, authorization to issue water contracts and to give that agency  “supremacy” instead of the Bay-Delta Planning Commission.

    This will be a first – the Federal government having supremacy over the State’s Rights to manage their own water. 

    Water is unique to the local environment and essential to the community around that water, therefore water has always been a matter held by the State.  But HR 1837 introduced by McClintock will make California the first exception.

    Back in December 2010 when the Republicans took control of the House, McClintock was appointed to Chair the Natural Resources subcommittee, Water and Power. 

    That's when Westlands Water District, which consume more than 700,000 acre feet of the water pumped out of the delta, refused to agree to "not sell" the water they were given and walked away from California’s Bay-Delta Plan only turn to McClintock’s committee along with $14,575 in campaign contributions 

    McClintock held his first committee meeting on February 2, 2011 but it did not go well.  Newly elected Congressman John Garamendi from Walnut Creek also new to the Subcommittee was familiar with the Delta issues back when he served as Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Interior Department during Clinton’s administration. 

    Garamendi exploded, questioning McClintock’s logic in presenting a bill like this that would undermine his own district's “Water of origin rights."  He repeatedly asked McClintock if the people in his district knew what he was doing.

    McClintock whose district includes one-third of Northern California’s Watershed for the Bay-Delta water pulled the Bill back for reconsideration and on February 29 presented the Bill again.  But this time he brought it to the House floor for a 30 minute discussion and quickly voted on it. 

    McClintock tried to reassure Garamendi and other members of the House that California will ‘not lose their water rights.’  McClintock emphasized the Bill’s words that says the Secretary (Federal Level) will oversee “Long-Term” water contracts “Under the terms and conditions mutually agreeable to the parties.” 

But who are the agreeable parties?  According to McClintock’s own words the water contract “is negotiated anew between the government and the contractor.” 

    Section 4 (1) of the Bill specifically says “The Federal Government, require assertion of Federal supremacy to protect existing water rights throughout the system.”  That leaves  California out of the “mutually agreeable” part.  Would California really want someone in Texas or Georgia deciding California’s water rights? 

    McClintock’s efforts to fight for the Kern and Kings county farmers are not going unrewarded.  McClintock received more than $12,000 in campaign donations from Fresno County and an additional $11,475 in the last couple of months from the Crop Production Industries based in Westland Water District, according to OpenSecrets.org.

    Since this is such an unprecedented step to take water rights from the states, Subsection (2) was added: “These circumstances are unique to California.  Therefore nothing in this act shall serve as ‘Precedent’ in any other state.”

    This statement gave little reassurance to five other states that border the Colorado River.  They sent “Letters of Objection” to be added to the long list of letters already attached to the bill, which include every Northern California county and the hundreds of Northern California Agribusinesses that will be impacted by this bill.

    Not only would the bill give California’s water rights away, it would also give the Kern and King County water districts 40% of the delta water right off the top, leaving the Northern counties struggle with any environmental issues and Northern California agribusinesses to fall victim to the demands of the Tracy pumps. 

    The Bill sits in the Senate and Republican Senators are talking about attaching it as an amendment to another bill to get it passed.

The fight over Delta water heats up again...

So why should I care if I live up here in the Gold-Country?  We have plenty of water.

Remember Owens Valley?  They had a "Water Police"  That prevented well drilling, tapping into streams and such.  Farmers who sat in a rich green valley had NO water for their cattle.

Remember last year?  Record rainfall?  Yet, the Governor declared it a "Drought Year."
What did that mean?  That meant that communities such as Georgetown Divide, with reservoirs still spilling were told to cut their water use by 20%.

We weren't short of water.  But the controlling agencies were, and they had the law on their side. Do we want to go down that path?

Local Legislators are fighting for their water

Sy Hersh's articles about Iran's nuclear program

I have always been a fan of Sy Hersh.  He gets inside information and it always ends up being so far from the "Talking Points" coming out of the government (Clinton, Bush or Obama).

In the interview with "Democracy Now" he talks about the REAL Iranian program:
Video.... http://www.democracynow.org/2011/11/21/seymour_hersh_propaganda_used_ahead_of

Then he goes on CNN Wolf's "The Situation Room" and talks about how Sy's information was accurate in the past.    Crook and Liars link

Then I found this great TIME LINE of the NIE story...

NIE time line

• November 2006: NIE "completed"
• January 5, 2007: John Negroponte resigns as DNI, reportedly because of fight over NIE; Negroponte would move to become a top official at State
• January 11: US takes six Iranians in custody after a raid on a diplomatic building in Irbil, Iraq
• February 2007: NIE completed; Cheney objecting to content
• February 7: Iranian Revolutionary Guard General Ali Reza Asgari arrives in Turkey; he disappears there, and is presumed to have defected or been kidnapped; in March he was reported to be cooperating with western intelligence
• April 26: Thomas Fingar announces NIE will be delayed due to Ahmadinejad’s demagoguery
• May 12: Cheney meets with Saudi Arabia
• July 2007: Intelligence community intercepts communications that verify claim Iran’s nuclear program remains suspended; Senior Administration Officials briefed
• August 2007: Bush claims he learned new intelligence exists
• August 9: Bush substitutes the claim that Iran was seeking nuclear technology for earlier claim that they were seeking nukes. (h/t Froomkin)

• They have expressed their desire to be able to enrich uranium, which we believe is a step toward having a nuclear weapons program. That, in itself, coupled with their stated foreign policy, is very dangerous for world stability. . . . It’s a very troubling nation right now.
  

• August 29-30: Six nuclear warheads "accidentally" get flown from Minot AFB to Barksdale AFB in Louisiana
• September 6: Israel strikes site in Syria
• October 2007: BushCo considers spiking the NIE
• October 14: Putin meets with Germany’s Angela Merkel; news reports of assassination attempt planned in Iran
• October 16: From Iran, Putin says an attack on Iran is an attack on Russia
• October 17: Bush makes World War III comments
• October 19: Benazir Bhutto returns to Pakistan
• October 24: McConnell writes memo outlining conditions for declassifying NIEs
• October 27: David Shedd reveals Mike McConnell has made it harder to declassify NIE judgments–leading most observers to believe the Iran NIE would not be released
• November 3: Pervez Musharraf declares martial law
• November 9: The US releases prisoners captured in Irbil in January
• November 13: McConnell says NIE will be done "in about a month" but that judgments will not be released; he also says he would resign if results were "cherry picked"
• November 16: At OPEC, the Saudi Foreign Minister refuses to make a public statement about ditching the dollar–but he says the economic ministers should discuss it
• November 22: Mohammed el Baradei states Iran is cooperating, though IAEA still has questions about its nuclear program
• November 23: The Saudis confirm attendance at Annapolis Conference; on the same day, they send the conservative Nawaz Sharif back to Pakistan to contest elections
• November 25: Nawaz Sharif returns to Pakistan
• November 26: Syria confirms attendance at Annapolis Conference
• November 26: Per Seymour Hersh, Bush tells Ehud Olmert what’s in the NIE.
• November 27: The Annapolis Peace Conference
• November 28: The day Hadley claims Bush was briefed on the NIE; Bush meets with Olmert again; in Pakistan, Musharraf relinquishes military position
• November 29: Khalilzad submits a resolution endorsing Annapolis at UN; Condi calls Khalilzad in the middle of the meeting to ask WTF he’s doing
• November 30: A Khalilzad deputy withdraws the UN resolution while Khalilzad is in "previously scheduled" meeting in DC with Condi; Iranian nuclear negotiator Saaed Jalili tells Javier Solana that all previous negotiations are meaningless (h/t Danger Room)
• December 1: Mohammed el Baradei states that bombing Iran would ensure it gets the bomb more quickly
• December 3: Unexpected public release of NIE showing Iran has given up nuke program; Nawaz Sharif barred from participating in election
• December 4: Israelis say the NIE is wrong; Bush announces his first trip to Israel as President (h/t Laura); both Annapolis and Iran’s purported nukes are on the agenda; Khalilzad calls the claim that he had submitted the resolution without vetting it bull