Free kibbles

ECONOMY:

Unemployment increases to 9.2 percent. Apparently this was a surprise to the so-called experts. Huge majorities say the economy is going in the wrong direction. Ya think?

TAX AND SPEND:

Both parties may end up embracing this 14th amendment runaround of the debt ceiling limit. Democrats can claim they did it to save the people from Republicans, and Republicans can claim they didn't cave and pretend to be outraged.

"The reality is that the 14th Amendment option would let both parties off the hook. As one House leadership aide in on the budget negotiations tells me, "you have to understand [that] nobody wants to vote to raise the debt ceiling." Both parties might be so deadlocked that they may choose to let Mr. Obama raise the debt ceiling on his own. That way, no one in Congress has to take the blame."

That's why it's suddenly become feasible. This is how and why Congress cedes all its powers to the president.

HEALTH CARE:

The government is trying to starve us of salt, and that will make us more unhealthy or kill us.

POLICE STATE:

Using computers to predict the general area where crimes will occur.

TSA employee stole $50,000 worth of electronics from travelers.

This lynch mob mentality exhibited around the Casey Anthony trial is why we suffer under a police state.

"Prosecutors routinely make prosecutions for political reasons."

All prosecutions are made for political reasons. Fortunately, prosecuting real criminals is usually good for the prosecutor, so they overlap, but so is prosecuting the innocent, especially in high profile cases.

"We don't know how we would react if one of our children ended up dead. The prosecution's case rested heavily on using Casey Anthony's strange and distasteful public behavior following the death of her daughter to paint her as a callous murderer. The moralists all declared that "we would never act that way.""

This is a great point. I don't think the judge should have allowed that evidence in. It's prejudicial but not probative.

FOREIGN POLICY:

South Sudan is born.

POLITICS:

I wonder if enough Democrats will cross over and vote for Ron Paul in the primary to make a difference.

This fast and furious thing is really exposing some serious corruption.

"The Justice Department blocked senior ATF leaders from cooperating with Congress in its investigation of the “Fast and Furious” weapons operation, ordering them not to respond to questions and taking full control of replying to briefing and document requests, the agency’s top boss told congressional investigators."

ATF used to be in Treasury. When did it end up under Justice?

Suggestion that DSK was framed to put a new person in charge of the IMF.

"Why was the substance of the housemaid's false accusations not released at an earlier stage? Who was protecting her?Why did the media wait to reveal information which confirms DSK's innocence.This information was known to the prosecutors at an early stage of the investigation, yet it was only released after the appointment of France's Finance Minister Christine Lagarde as Managing Director of the IMF.Lagarde's candidacy was confirmed and accepted on June 26th. Her mandate was confirmed on June 28th following a decision of the IMF's 24 member executive board.Lagarde is an appointee of Wall Street and the US banking establishment. Her candidacy had been approved by U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on the 28th of June:"I am pleased to announce our decision to support Christine Lagarde to head the IMF," Geithner said in a statement hours before the 24-member IMF executive board was expected to select her as its managing director.Careful timing. In a bitter irony, the report from the prosecutor proving DSK's innocence was released on the day following the IMF's executive board decision instating Lagarde as Managing Director of IMF for a five year term.The frame-up has visibly succeeded. Who instructed prosecutors not to release this information until after the appointment of Lagarde as IMF Chief?If this information had been revealed a few days earlier, Lagarde's candidacy as IMF chief might have been questioned.Regime change at the IMF has been speedily implemented, not to mention the implications of the DSK affair in relation to the French presidential elections."

But he was reportedly about to resign at the IMF to run for president of France, so regime change at the IMF doesn't seem like the motive.

This is a great story about how politics divides people and promotes violence.

MISC:

Twenty bad categories in which the US is number 1.