Blog @ MoreWhat.com

The problem with party politics is why so many solutions that
should be forthcoming never see the light of day or are in the
holding pattern, not cleared for landing and running out of gas.

In an almost constant trek thru the blogosphere to find proof
of life of public debate, it has become clear that every or nearly
every discussion displays symptoms of partisan mudslinging.

If we start at the top of the poli-sphere, we find President George
Bush and his staff enrolled in pre-med for their doctors of spin
degrees. Their mantra can be best characterized by the following:

From Bing Crosby and…

(Johnny Mercer / Harold Arlen)

You’ve got to accentuate the positive
Eliminate the negative
Latch on to the affirmative
Don’t mess with Mister In-Between

If you find that amusing, stop laughing, it’s not funny. As for the
laughing, if you oppose President Bush, here’s a newsflash for
you. He’s not the only one spinning. Everyone down the line is
guilty of excessive use of spin. Partisan spin, closely related to
media spin, serves no purpose but to muddy the waters, as in
mudslinging, and further frustrate an already apathetic public. It
is certainly apathy for those who do not engage the process or
at least vote.

Can we please stop talking about Pluto, Islamofacism, macaca,
name calling, other insults and slurs then return to honest talk of
the issues that matter. Some examples are healthcare, national
security, immigration, social security, real government ethics and
a host of others.

Related post at Daily Kos

One last repeat before this turns into a full-blown rant. Earlier we
mentioned a peculiar group of comments posts at Blog for America
only to cruise to the GOP blog to find an equally troubling state.
The Dems had what appeared to be a rather solemn post followed by
a coment section that that suggested those posting comments had no
idea where they were. The GOP blog offered counter stupidity for
requiring a potential poster to become a local team rep and recruit
for the party. Either of which we found unfortunate if a political
party intends to be sensible and accountable.

In an effort to quell the mob mentality and headline
grabbing partisan politics agenda, MoreWhat.com offers
some viewpoints not typically available in the main
stream media. And the viewpoints are not only from us.

The subject relates to the blame game on Hurricane
Katrina in light of renewed interest (why we don’t know)
as the anniversary of the disaster arrives. However, we
are not submitting any commentary on the aftermath of
Katrina or the quality of response by FEMA et al.

We have hinted at the ability of Governor Blanco and
Mayor Nagin to shift focus to President Bush and the
federal government for failures related to New Orleans
inadequate protection against floods and of course the
provision of assistance after the hurricane. We might
focus on this in a subsequent post.

Let the games begin:

from Civil Engineering Magazine, Greg Brouwer, 2003

During the past 40 years the US Army Corps of Engineers
has spent hundreds of millions of dollars constructing
a barrier around the low-lying City of New Orleans to
protect it from hurricanes. But is the system of levees
high enough? And can any defense ultimately protect a
city that is perpetually sinking–in some areas at a
rate of half an inch per year.

from The Washington Post
The Slow Drowning of New Orleans
By Michael Grunwald and Susan B. Glasser
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, October 9, 2005; A01

Local officials resisted the goal of Category 3
protection for their communities as overly extravagant.
In 1982, the Orleans Levee District urged the Corps to
“lower its design standards to provide more realistic
hurricane protection.” The levee district, stocked with
political appointees, could spend freely on private
investigators, riverboat gambling and a $2.4 million
Mardi Gras fountain. But it said it could not afford
its share of protection from a 200-year storm,
suggesting that 100-year protection would be fine.

from www.propertyrightsalliance.org/ Sept 2005

Scott A. LaGanga, PRA Executive Director
Research conducted by Katherine Boyle

The Truth behind the Barriers:

The Environmental Lobby Attack on Levee Construction
and Hurricane Barriers

• In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the political
blame game has begun, and fingers are pointing in every
direction. Lack of funding by Congress, ineffective
local and state government, poor planning by FEMA, and
deficiency in President Bush’s leadership are among the
favorite targets for partisan blame. Despite these
allegations, the Army Corps of Engineers’ prolonged court
battles with environmentalist groups demonstrates that
there is one faction that is truly blameworthy. The
finger should not be pointed at Congress nor President
Bush, but at the local officials and environmentalist
groups who prevented the construction of a massive
hurricane barrier to protect the city of New Orleans and
actively sought to hinder the reconstruction of levees
and flood control reservoirs along the Mississippi River
throughout the nineties.

Once again, MoreWhat.com is suggesting to all of you
in favor of simply bashing President Bush over the issue
of Hurricane Katrina to find another bashing topic. There
are enough of them and they are not all about this or Iraq.
Have you considered that being an equal opportunity basher
will likely gain more support than picking on one tired
subject. Especially when your anger is misplaced. It is
allowing other guilty parties to escape your wrath.

Beltway Traffic Jam

We said in the previous poet that the Dems are not making it easy for us to keep an open mind about there party. That was because of a link we share in the post.

So to be fair we took a ride over to the GOP blog to compare.

We’ll have to reserve some space in a subsequent post to cover all this and then probably go back and forth a couple of times. Both parties “blog” sites are enough to make you crazy.

But we’ll mention the initial reason for the comparison; the subject of the link we included on the Dems post of ours. As it turns out, the GOP blog requires you become a local community link for their team and recruit for them.

JUST TO POST A COMMENT ON THE BLOG!!!!!!!!! Nuts!!

TBC……..

to keep an open mind on the Democratic Party

Check out the link below and tell us what you think.

DFA Link Blog Post

As the stem cell debate continues and word of a method for producing
Embryonic stem cells with no harm to the embryo is announced, it seems
that even this is unsuitable to the oh my God crowd.

A sponsor of the X prize is to be the first female space tourist. Why is
gender included in the description? What happened to equality?

Petron Corp is given credit for leasing the ship that created the largest
spill in the Phillipines. Is it possible there is no connection between the
U.S. and this spill? Let some other country get credit this time.

An unapproved biotech strain found in rice. Is its name Andromeda?
USDA states $300 tab to test for it. Who will pay for it? One way or
another it will end up on the public tax bill. ‘Some appropriation or
earmark or tax credit for the corporation that offers to solve the minor
problem.

China’s scary economic advancement is beginning to show a parallel to
the industrial achievements of their counterparts…………….ACID RAIN.
Sure, now let us hear the “ain’t no such thing” from the environmental
opposition. Chemistry certainly can be inconvenient. Especially with
the need to support an awesome ag industry for the billions. What do
you mean everyone’s moving to HK to cash in?

My Very Excellent Mother Just Sent Us Nine Pizzas
the phrase used to remember the names and order of our planets.
How about:
Most Visionary Educators Might Just Still Utilize Nine Planets
The key here being “visionary” educators. Good luck on that.

Okay, enough about you, let’s talk about Blog @ MoreWhat.com and a recent email sent to Talking Points Memo. Here in the Micro-Blogosphere any response from the top blogs is akin to a pipe dream. Surprisingly we were not seeking admiration from the big guys, but merely attempting to alter the blog talk on healthcare. Mickey Kaus and Matthew Yglesias had a discussion on universal healthcare focusing on how to pay for it. If a microblog like us can get a megablog to discuss the suggestion, it will be viewed by more people and have a shot and being taken seriously now. Not waiting until our little blog grows up. Are we selfless or what? Excuse me, MoreWhat.

Rather than ponder sharing expenses for a bloated healthcare system, the staff at MoreWhat.com thought a better approach was to concentrate on eliminating excesses to reduce total expenditures before suggesting funding solutions with public money.

Public money should not pay for erectile dysfunction drugs. Public money should not pay for people who have eaten their way to obesity. We think you get the drift. Other remedies include abolishing the unnecessary third party industry in healthcare. In other words, do your own accounting. Do not farm out records management. Administrative costs need to be reduced from the current 31% total of all healthcare costs. Rather than President Bush and his cronies in the AMA having malpractice suits eliminated. Ambulance chasers and doctors who are substandard should be eliminated and the need for and cost of litigation would recede.

We’re guessing the megablog is too busy managing megablogdom to respond yet. But we’ll wait. Maybe if they would let us post to their blog we could take care of this for them.

In a response to a comments post by us at Reality Hammer, the author of the reply stated that Hezbollah targeted civilians with cluster munitions. To that we replied we had not heard of it yet.

There is a report at the BBC regarding the U.S. State Dept is investigating whether Israel used U.S. made cluster bombs during the fighting in Lebanon. Wonder why there was no mention of Hezbollah?

Microsoft now has video search. Who cares? The Lemmings do.

If Microsoft was a political party, which one would it most closely resemble?

(hint: characterized by stiffing the public, all too frequent crashes and continuously vulnerable to attack)

Stop with the Pluto already. For Earth we prefer 3rd rock from the sun. Ya, I know, who cares. Exactly, the same with the Pluto thing. The frequency with which the scientific community changes the rules, Pluto will return as planet before the next visit from Halley’s Comet.

A Revolting Development over Pluto

Visit this link at Outside The Beltway for a good read about Wal-Mart.

A Brief Look At Money News

Dell and Apple recall Sony batteries for portable pc’s. Thats’ bad whether or not you like the companies.

At least one report credited S&P stock gains with oil. Why only the S&P? Dozen’t it play well with the other children?

Home sales and durable goods are down in July. Just one more piece of evidence that the economy is strong? Okay, in a strong economy, or even a weak economy, the numbers don’t always go up, but….. Pick an index, or more than one to view their chart from 9/11 to the present. Or just look at a date near 9/11 and today’s. Without looking, the Dow hit 11,000 the first time somewhere around 9/11. What’s it still doing five years later around 11,000 if we have such a great economy.

Another report in Reuters notes Home Depot is reopening a store in Louisiana “strengthen construction efforts in the U.S. Gulf”. Or could it be there’s money in them thar hills (swamps) when you are a Home Depot? Although upping the efforts will translate into more sales too.

California regulators reduced, uh, regulations on land line phone companies, ergo, Verizon and AT&T, and what they can charge. Don’t laugh if you don’t live in CA., they’ll get to you soon enough. Does it ever stop?

Oil is approaching $73/bbl. So what’s new? That they are blaming it on Gulf storm worries. Oh shut up!!! Only to be a child of the sixties again. Hippies and tree huggers contemplating alternative energy if only to ripoff da man. At least two oil shortages, reduced the speed limit to 55. Sure, raise it back up, buy the big guzzler, ignore all else and oops……

During Christmas 1979 ( no, we don’t call it happy holidays ) the price of gas somewhere in the Midwest broke a buck a gallon. The only thing cool about it was the pump only had two digits plus tenths on the price per gallon display. And it was analog, not digital. Five years before that a 3000 mile round trip was made for $18.00 worth of gas. Go ahead. It’s ok. Cry.

We really don’t mind making this non-story Lieberman thing a story. From one of two political parties that try to tell all what is American, or offensive, or insensitive, or worse yet un-American, you have a vindictive manner for expressing your disapproval.

Yes, we’re talking your reaction to Senator Joe Lieberman’s recent decision to run as an independent. The wonderful Blog for America site published “Lieberman’s having trouble finding tech support” today at 145PM written by Sheri Divers. So we wondered who this person was. One google and after numerous hits from Blog for America, the title DFA Communications Dir. is displayed. Your attitude is reminiscent of that held by organized crime when someone tries to discontinue membership.

All the marketing, promotion and speeches describing the many attributes of the Democratic Party’s virtues. Yet when someone leaves the fold, regardless of reason, you get vindictive. An offense that your membership will likely ignore based on their blind loyalty to empty promises. What a hose job.

To be fair we must post at least one shot at the Republicans. Not a large problem after visiting the frontpage at gop.com. We will only address the implications of the titles in their featured posts.

Liberal Judge Negligently Strikes Down Terrorist Surveillance Program.

A perfect example of more party politics. Without any further investigation as mentioned above, the title screams we did not get what we wanted so the judge was wrong. The Dems like the outcome, the GOP does not. Go figure. The judge’s decision may have nothing to do with negligence. If one eliminates the the possibility that the decision could be a mixed bag when it comes to right or wrong, then the decision has only two simple outcomes. It is either right or wrong.

We have yet to see a critique that is not tainted by partisan manure. One side claims a victory for constitutional protection and the other a defeat in the war on terror. Not convincing.

Number 2 of 3:

Opening Up ANWR For Oil Drilling Will Provide Crucial Relief

Here comes the great idea again. Have you stopped to consider that without any more refining capacity we could have all the crude on the planet and not produce another drop of gasoline?

The “not in my backyard” public attitude, the stated inability to protect from terror attacks and the oil industry’s impotent management of infrastructure contributed to the lack of new refining capacity in this country for about 30 years.

BTW, recall BP’s famous concern for the environment with this year’s Prudhoe Bay fiasco? To be called a tree hugger for that last statement is equal to playing the race card if the target is white.

Three 4 Three:

Secretary Rice Says There Is Now The Chance For Peace In The Middle East.

Short Answer: Just like there was before Anwar al Sadat was murdered. Seemed like a decent guy just trying to do his job. Another truckload of manure from Secretary Rice.

This one falls into the “can’t we all just get along” category. Reuters has a story on Senator George Allen as he was fundraising with President Bush. Seems the Senator called a campaign worker from the opposition a “macaca”. Claims he made up the word. Give the man a cigar! He made up a word that already existed. Last week, islamofascism, this week we get “macaca”. One more time, stop with the weird words already. It has distracted from the discussion on important topics like the video of Conrad Burns sleeping. Next!!

Based on another report from Reuters, Mayor Ray Nagin’s deflector shield is fully operational. However, it does not compare to Governor Blanco’s. While Mayor Nagin is still keeping the blame game pointed at President Bush and the rest of the federal government, Blanco appears burdened with local politics and re-election with the exception of filing a lawsuit to preserve gulf acreage. While the federal government has plenty to be ashamed of in the Hurricane Katrina aftermath. All parties to the natural disaster share the blame for ignoring the fact that a city was built in a cereal bowl and Mother Nature poured the milk. Mayor Nagin, have you spent any time on addressing permanent solutions or is rebuilding before the next hurricane your plan. That way it can happen all over again.