Photoshop Express
“The maker of the popular photo-editing software Photoshop has launched a basic version available for free online. San Jose, California-based Adobe Systems says it hopes to boost its name recognition among a new generation of consumers who edit, store and share photos online”
https://www.photoshop.com/express/landing.html
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‘People have reached a point that they will sell their refrigerator to buy a rocket launcher to kill Americans.’ Under siege in Baghdad’s Mahdi army stronghold
30 Mar 2008
Iraq’s government said it began the offensive to wipe out Basra’s Shia militias and criminal gangs. ‘They know the Sadrists will win the elections,’ Abu Mustafa al-Thahabi, adviser to the Mahdi army of Moqtada al-Sadr, said. ‘So they are using the Americans against the Mahdi army. People have reached a point that they will sell their refrigerator to buy a rocket launcher to kill Americans.’ …Suddenly, they heard mortar rounds being launched outside with a boom like the sound of a wrecking ball. ‘This is to the Green Zone,’ said Abu Zainab al-Kabi. ‘These are gifts to Maliki’s government.’ He and Abu Moussa al-Sadr both work for Iraq’s Ministry of Interior, which runs the police and is viewed as infiltrated by the Mahdi army. They said many police officers had defected and were now fighting with the Mahdi army.
At:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/mar/30/iraq2
From: CLG News
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Brooks, Broder praised McCain’s rebuke of Bush-style unilateralism, but didn’t mention McCain’s past comments attacking allies who opposed Iraq war
The New York Times’ David Brooks asserted that Sen. John McCain’s March 26 foreign policy speech “was so important because he broke with Bush on several ways” and described one of those ways as, “Should the U.S. go it alone on certain issues? He said no, we are — we need a strong America, but in the community of nations. And he detailed that.” Similarly, The Washington Post’s David Broder wrote that McCain “outlin[ed] a vastly different approach from President Bush’s” in the speech, in part by offering a “repudiation of unilateralism.” Yet neither Brooks nor Broder accounted for any of the statements McCain made during the run-up to the Iraq war about France, Germany, and Belgium, which revealed a very different attitude to U.S. allies.
Read More
http://mediamatters.org/items/200803300003?lid=190281&rid=5979831
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MCCAIN’S ‘MAVERICK’ MYTH IS THE MEDIA’S CREATION
By David Brock, Paul Waldman, Anchor Books
The bizarre tale of how the media turned a crooked Republican into the mirage of a principled politician.
http://www.alternet.org/mediaculture/80724/
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Crandall Canyon Report Details Industry Pressure, Regulatory Lapses
A Senate committee has released a report on last year’s mine disaster at Crandall Canyon mine in Utah. The report shows the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration disregarded the opinion of one of its analysts when it approved the mine owner’s plan to conduct retreat mining at Crandall Canyon.
Read more…
http://ombwatch.org/article/blogs/entry/4706/26
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The Fed’s Dealings: For Public or Private Interest?
THOMAS FERGUSON, thomas.ferguson@umb.edu,
http://tinyurl.com/2xusmd (www.huffingtonpost.com)
ROBERT A. JOHNSON, rajshaman@mac.com
Ferguson is professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. He is the author or coauthor of many books and articles, including “Golden Rule: The Investment Theory of Party Competition and the Logic of Money-Driven Political Systems” (University of Chicago Press).
Johnson was previously a managing director at Soros Fund Management, where he managed a global currency, bond and equity portfolio specializing in emerging markets. He served as chief economist of the U.S. Senate Banking Committee under the leadership of Chairman William Proxmire and before that as senior economist of the U.S. Senate Budget Committee under the leadership of Chairman Pete Domenici.
Ferguson and Johnson recently wrote the piece “Britney and the Bear: Who Says You Can’t Get Good Help Anymore?” The piece states: “It is high time for someone to start raising questions about the public interest here. … Since the first deal was announced, J.P. Morgan Chase’s stock has rallied smartly. With its enormous market capitalization, that translates into a gigantic increase in market value. If the deal unravels, the stock price might — indeed, almost certainly will — fall again, but that is precisely our point: markets considered the deal that the Fed and Morgan tried to cut a very good one for Morgan.
“The question that needs to be asked is why none of that increase in value is ever to flow back to the public, whose money is critical to the deal. This would be easy to arrange and it does not risk reviving the Soviet Union’s Gosplan: the Fed or the federal government could simply have taken some stock in J.P. Morgan Chase. Or, as in the Chrysler bailout, there could have been warrants issued,
guaranteeing the government the right to buy stock at a low price. At some point in the future, when J.P. Morgan Chase’s management and investors are again comfortable lecturing the rest of us about the magic of the marketplace and the urgent need to cut the size of government, the stock or the warrants could be sold off or redeemed, to pay for the rescue.”
From: Institute for Public Accuracy
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Chase mortgage memo pushes ‘Cheats & Tricks’ –The bank says it never backed the strategies, which detail how to get an iffy loan approved
27 Mar 2008
A newly surfaced memo from banking giant JPMorgan Chase provides a rare glimpse into the mentality that fueled the mortgage crisis. The memo’s title says it all: “Zippy Cheats & Tricks.” It is a primer on how to get risky mortgage loans approved by Zippy, Chase’s in-house automated loan underwriting system.
At:
http://tinyurl.com/2phpus (www.oregonlive.com)
From: CLG News
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Congressman Ron Paul’s Texas Straight Talk – On Money, Inflation and Government
“These past few weeks have provided an unfortunate opportunity to discuss inflation. The dollar index has reached new all-time lows. The total money supply, M3, as calculated by private sources, is growing at a disturbing 17% rate. The Fed is pumping dollars into the economy at an alarming rate. Just recently the Fed announced new loan auctions totaling $100 billion. That is new money created from thin air. If these money auctions, combined with the bailout of Bear Stearns, continue to be the trend, we are in for some economic stormy weather. The explanation lies in understanding the basics of money, and why it is dangerous to give government and big banks control over it.”
Click here for the full article:
http://www.house.gov/paul/tst/tst2008/tst033008.htm
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And now for the important news ….
By Argus Hamilton
The U.S. Senate will vote today on whether to rename Ellis Island’s library the Bob Hope Library. Before he died he donated all his radio and television monologues to the Smithsonian. Over the years only the voters have sent more jokes to Washington.
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com
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three thousand words
This Modern World By Tom Tomorrow: Hillary Clinton’s six-point strategy.
http://images.salon.com/comics/tomo/2008/03/31/tomo/story.jpg
Matt Bors: corporate sociaalism
http://www.mattbors.com/strips/367.gif
Monte Wolverton: see? it’s all good!
http://editorialcartoonists.com/cartoons/WolveM/2008/WolveM20080331_low.jpg
