Month: November 2013

Iran and World Powers Reach Deal on Nukes

Here’s the video: (H/T to Crooks and Liars)

The Stories via WaPo:

GENEVA — Iran and six major powers agreed early Sunday on an historic deal that freezes key parts of Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for temporary relief on some economic sanctions, diplomats confirmed.

The deal was reached after four days of marathon bargaining and an 11th-hour intervention by U.S. Secretary of State John F. Kerry and other foreign ministers from Europe, Russia and China. the sources said.

The agreement, sealed at 3 a.m. signing ceremony in Geneva’s Palace of Nations, requires Iran to halt or scale back parts of its nuclear infrastructure, the first such pause in more than a decade.

“We have reached an agreement,” Michael Mann, spokesman for European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said in a Twitter posting.

“We have reached an agreement,” echoed Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif in a separate posting.

…and from the NY Times:

According to the accord, Iran would agree to stop enriching uranium beyond 5 percent. To make good on that pledge, Iran would dismantle the links between networks of centrifuges.

All of Iran’s stockpile of uranium that has been enriched to 20 percent, a short hop to weapons-grade fuel, would be diluted or converted into oxide so that it could not be readily used for military purposes.

No new centrifuges, neither old models nor newer more efficient ones, could be installed. Centrifuges that have been installed but which are not currently operating — Iran has more than 8,000 such centrifuges — could not be started up. No new enrichment facilities could be established.

The agreement, however, would not require Iran to stop enriching uranium to a level of 3.5 percent or dismantle any of its existing centrifuges.

Iran’s stockpile of such low-enriched uranium would be allowed to temporarily increase to about eight tons from seven tons currently. But Tehran would be required to shrink this stockpile by the end of the six-month agreement back to seven tons. This would be done by installing equipment to covert some of that stockpile to oxide.

To guard against cheating, international monitors would be allowed to visit the Natanz enrichment facility and the underground nuclear enrichment plant at Fordo on a daily basis to check the film from cameras installed there.

In return for the initial agreement, the United States has agreed to provide $6 billion to $7 billion in sanctions relief, American officials said. This limited sanctions relief can be accomplished by executive order, allowing the Obama administration to make the deal without having to appeal to Congress, where there is strong criticism of any agreement that does not fully dismantle Iran’s nuclear program.

Naturally, Israel and their neoconservative friends are not pleased with this; which is not too terribly surprising.

I am going to make some changes

I was sitting here tonight and looking at some of the photos from the Reagan Library. While doing so I came a bit of a realization — I have done on this blog; what I have decried others doing: I have become a bit of an offensive conservative. Sure, as a Fundamentalist Christian; I have issues with Zionism, Judaism, Islam and Roman Catholicism; however, that does not excuse some of the stuff in my sidebars. So, I am going to remove them. I will, however, keep the gospel tract there for someone who might need to read it.

The reason for this is this: I was looking at the photos from the Reagan White House era. President Ronald Reagan was a Conservative; but, he was never an offensive man. He simply stuck to his principles, but not in an abrasive, nasty way. I realize now, that I should be following Reagan’s example of this; when it comes to all things. This is simply the Christian way, and I have failed in this area. Christian and Conservative principles are a good thing; but if they are exercised in a manner that is offensive, they become quite useless.

I will try to do a bit better from here on out.

 

Big Pharma is on the prowl for E-Cigarettes

They’ll get my E-Cig, when they pry it from my cold dead hands.

The Story: (H/T Jazz Shaw)

So, I’ll give you three guesses which industry is behind the global push to clamp down on e-cigarettes.

If you assumed concerned doctors or “consumer-rights advocates” are the driving force for regulation in Europe and the U.S., then you haven’t been paying attention to way profit and politics interact.

If you said Big Tobacco, close, but no cigar. Philip Morris, R.J. Reynolds, and Lorrillard all jumped in the e-cig game in the past two years. They’re not opposing regulation (the big guys rarely do), but they’re pushing back on the most onerous rules.

Big Pharma is the real foe of e-cigs, and Big Government is their weapon of choice — on both sides of the pond.

This fall, the European Parliament considered new rules regulating e-cigs. E-cigarette manufacturers, of course, lobbied like crazy to block the proposal, and it seems they won. But the drugmakers fought for stricter regulations, for obvious reasons: E-cigarettes compete with prescription drugs that are supposed to help people stop smoking.

GlaxoSmithKline sells Nicorette gum and Johnson & Johnson manufactures nicotine patches. The New York Times reported these companies helped lead “strong opposition” to e-cigarettes.

In the U.S., the Food and Drug Administration is about to announce new proposed rules on e-cigarettes. Big Pharma’s shadow hangs over the rule-making.

via Big Pharma, not tobacco companies, wages war on electronic cigarettes | WashingtonExaminer.com.

Yes, I use E-cigs, and yes, I am a Christian. Judge me, I do not care. I started back smoking, after that idiotic debacle that happened with a well-known trucking company. So, I decided that I did not want to inhale all of that crap that they put in cigarettes; and I picked up a Lava e-cig. It works well, gives me the same amount of nicotine; and I might actually live to see 70 years old!

Good ol’ crony capitalism; lets deny people a healthy alternative to tobacco products; so we can pimp our pills and patches! Unreal. 🙄

The Friday Night Music Express Presents: The Boston Symphony Orchestra

I am including this because of this historic day and anniversary.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=IVNKNz-lc6k

Via UpWorthy:

President Kennedy was a transformational leader, and it’s hard to imagine what it felt like to hear of his assassination 50 years ago today. Kennedy was shot as the Boston Symphony Orchestra was about to begin its regular Friday afternoon concert. When word of his death reached the hall a few minutes later, the audience was already seated, oblivious to the world-changing events happening in Dallas.

In a powerful — and stunningly level-headed — decision, the orchestra’s music director, Erich Leinsdorf, sent librarian William Shisler to get the music for the funeral march from Beethoven’s “Eroica” symphony. Shisler quickly distributed the music onstage, letting the musicians know what had happened.

This recording, from WGBH in Boston, begins when Leinsdorf takes the stage to announce the terrible news to the audience and captures the BSO’s heart-rending performance of the Beethoven symphony — a work they found out they were playing only minutes before.

ORIGINAL: By Erich Leinsdorf and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Originally broadcast on WGBH and found on Time. You can hear the full introduction from the radio broadcast in WGBH’s archives.

Again, may we never forget; and never forget who did this.

Videos: 50 years ago today – The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy

It is quite hard to believe that one of the worst tragedies in the United States of America happened 50 years ago today — The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Much ink will be spilled this day; and I must say, much of it is well done.

However, as a history buff, I believe the best way to remember, is to go back and watch the event, as it happened.

The first breaking report by Walter Cronkite:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2K8Q3cqGs7I

The news as it broke on ABC Radio:

youtube placeholder image

Coverage from all the major networks:

youtube placeholder image

ABC TV’s two hour coverage of it:

youtube placeholder image

A stunned New York reacts:

youtube placeholder image

Reactions from many major states:

youtube placeholder image

Martin Luther King Jr’s reaction, who would join him in death in 1968:

youtube placeholder image

A documentary:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yg0f_QHNSUw

May we never forget. 🙁

The most important thing to remember about the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1964

Is this right here:

There will be a lot of retrospective stuff published today, and I suspect that much of it will either omit or distort one key fact—Lee Harvey Oswald, the man who killed President Kennedy, was a leftwing nut job; he was a communist.

via 22 November, 1963 | hogewash.

Me and Sen. Carl Levin are on the same wavelength!

Which is pretty scary, considering he is a Democrat and I am a paleoconservative.

In a previous posting I wrote:

Not only that; what happens if the Democrats lose the majority in both houses of Congress? Then, the Republicans will use that relaxed power to stack the courts with people who, of course, the Democratswill not like and then you would have state Christian statism in a horrible form; and you have to know the Democrats will not like that one bit. Now, if I were a partisan type, I would think this would be awesome. However, I believe in divided Government and I happen to believe that one party acts as a check and balance to the other. It keeps one party from holding a monopoly on Government.

Take it away Senator Levin:

But Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan, one of three Democrats who voted against diluting the filibuster, noted that past Democratic minorities have used the procedure to block GOP moves to limit abortion rights and repeal the estate tax.

He said he feared that a future Senate majority would weaken filibusters against legislation and “down the road, the hard-won protections and benefits for our people’s health and welfare will be lost.”

This is because that Senator Levin is from the old school Democratic Party and he happens to know a little about the game. Also, unlike some of the other Democrats; Levin is looking down the road, past 2014 and 2016, when the Democrats might actually lose the majority in both houses, due to the Obama Administration’s failures —- and he sees the Republicans abusing this little change in the rules to the high heavens.

Another reason too, is because he is not running for reelection. This is because of the stupidity, like this, up on the hill. The Parties have become too divided; and the partisan rancour has become too ugly. Levin comes from the old school Democratic Party and he sees the future, this is why he is getting out of it. Which is a smart move in this paleoconservative writers opinion.

Kudos to Senator Levin for having the guts to call a spade for what it truly is; a massive blunder by the Senate Democrats.

Um, that’s pretty low brow ya’ll…

Nothing really shocks me in the political blogosphere anymore; but this here; is pretty darned low brow.

Click here, here and here.

I mean, I know that Reid did this here; but…. accusations of child molestation? Come on. 🙄

Of course, this is to be expected of the Trotskyite neoconservative right. As they do have a reputation of smearing people with untrue accusations; believe me, I know.

It’s just sad, really sad. 🙁 Whatever happened to blogger ethics, integrity and moral values?

UPDATE: I feel the need to post this update to say the following: I don’t claim to be any sort of a moral authority or anything like that. In fact, I will readily admit to have done some incredibly stupid stuff, when I started blogging. However, I just do not believe that the conservative right is going to help their cause any; especially among the blogging community,by lobbing tasteless and stupid accusations such as this one.

For one, the accusation comes from an anonymous source and from blogs that are simply not reliable. I think if the conservative right believes that lobbing accusations such as this is going to help their cause or even help defeat Harry Reid; then I believe they’re going to be highly mistaken.

I will simply say this: this little idea here is simply out of hand and I believe that it is going to hurt everyone on the right even in 2016 especially if the mainstream media like Fox News picks this up.

I can understand the entire Anthony Weiner scenario. But this here; this could damage someone’s marriage and family. Even if it is proven to be untrue. I simply do not understand how people can do this and look at themselves in the mirror this goes well beyond slander this is simply uncalled for.

I think the conservative blogosphere needs to really look at themselves in the mirror and think long and hard about this and ask themselves this; is this what the conservative blogosphere wants to be known for? Slandering people who they disagree with politically or don’t like what they did politically?

It simply does not make sense to this former left of center turned Paleoconservative.

And I simply ask those who have blogged about this and now have it on their site; do the ends justify the means? Does destroying a man’s reputation simply because you disagree with him justify blogging an unreliable story reported by anonymous sources by unreliable blogs?

I shudder to think the responses by those who I linked to, I really do.

I could understand the liberal left doing this to a Republican. However, I never thought I would see the day when conservatives, who are supposed to be better than the nasty liberal left, would actually do something like this? It is a sad state of affairs and shows you where America and the political blogosphere, especially on the right has come. It is simply a sad parody of what it was in 2006 when I started.