I stopped paying attention to Bush’s speech about his latest plans for Iraq after he said this, because it’s the only part that matters.
[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/JAN07/BushSpeech.mp3]Going door-to-door to gain the trust of Baghdad residents? Don’t think so. There’s going to be a clamp-down. The residents of Baghdad are already terrified to leave their homes, and now they’ll be terrified in their homes. A lot of civilians are going to get killed.
As I predicted, there will be no change in Iraq, except for escalation. Why is this being called a change in policy? It’s a change in military strategy.
We’ve had 160,000 troops there before, with the difference this time being they’ll concentrate on Baghdad. But weren’t there two all-out battles to secure Fallujah? How successful were those, and will the outcome in Baghdad will be any different?
As soon as I heard the buzzword “surge” introduced in the news, I knew there would be no change of policy in Iraq, other than escalation. Here’s a brief audio clip taken from Bush’s press conference on Wednesday.
[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Sounds/Wordpress/DEC06/Bushism.mp3]Do you hear any indication that Bush intends to do anything differently? I don’t. He keeps repeating the same things over and over, in some self-deluded wish that somehow they’re true. A net increase of 20,000 – 30,000 “boots on the ground” will have the net effect of nothing, other than adding to American casualties.
Previously I posted a link to an Even Stephven video on YouTube that is now gone. But now Comedy Central has posted the best part of it, Carell and Colbert discussing Halloween.
Who cares if Halloween was two months ago? Don’t miss this before it’s pulled. Both Carell and Colbert are smart and talented actors, but despite the fact that Carell is from my town I have to give the nod to Colbert.
I was going to post a segment from Tuesday’s Colbert Report, taken from my own video capture. But Comedy Central is now offering embedded video. Above is part 1, below is part 2. Should I give up posting my own Colberts?
Wholesale prices surge
By MARTIN CRUTSINGER, AP Economics Writer
Tue Dec 19, 9:15 AM ETWASHINGTON – Inflation at the wholesale level surged by the largest amount in more than three decades in November, reflecting higher prices for gasoline and a host of other items.
The Producer Price Index, which measures inflation pressures before they reach the consumer, was up 2 percent last month, the biggest advance since a similar increase in November 1974, the Labor Department reported Tuesday.
Economists had been expecting a rebound in wholesale prices following two months of big declines. However, the 2 percent jump was four times bigger than the 0.5 percent increase they had forecast. Even excluding volatile energy and food prices, core inflation posted a 1.3 percent advance, the biggest jump in 26 years.
Wholesale prices have taken a huge jump, obviously due to oil and gas. I think it’s hilarious how the “core rate of inflation” doesn’t include energy and food. Thanks to cheap Chinese labor you can buy a DVD player for $30, but so what, if gas is over $3/gallon, with all of the money going to the biggest, most profitable corporations on Earth? I hate comparisons with gas prices in Europe, because the high gas taxes over there pay for projects that benefit society as a whole.
There’s no point in the Fed trying to adjust interest rates upwards, because all that will do is collapse whatever parts of the economy are still working. This is what happened in the 1970’s, and it resulted in the so-called stagflation, where high unemployment and high inflation defied the “law” of supply-and-demand.
One big difference between the 70’s and now is that the surge in demand for energy and cars, etc., isn’t from Baby Boomers coming of age, but from China. It would have helped if we hadn’t destabilized the Mideast by invading Iraq. Oops!
