Women and men from Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, will be among the first to head out. It takes an estimated $1 million to send each of them surging into Afghanistan for one year. So a 30,000-person surge will be at least $30 billion, which brings us to that $57,077.60. That's how much it will cost you, the taxpayer, for one minute of that surge.
By the way, add up the yearly salary of a Marine from Camp Lejeune with four years of service, throw in his or her housing allowance, additional pay for dependents, and bonus pay for hazardous duty, imminent danger, and family separation, and you'll still be many thousands of dollars short of that single minute's sum.
A Costco in Utah took tomatoes off the shelves during a visit by Sarah Palin, after the Alaska Governor was pelted with the fruit on a stop at the Mall of America.
If Ted Alvin Klaudt had his way, we'd owe him $500,000 for the first clause of this sentence. The former South Dakota state representative has sent a notarized letter from prison -- where he is serving time for the rape of two of his foster daughters -- notifying several news organizations of a "Common Law Copyright" on the use of his name.
Ted Klaudt, 49, a Republican rancher from Walker, faces a long list of charges: eight counts of rape, two counts of sexual exploitation of a minor, two counts of witness tampering, sexual contact with a person under 16, and stalking.Court documents mention five possible victims. Three were foster children between the ages of 15 and 19 who lived with Klaudt's family. One is a cousin of one of those girls, and the fifth is a friend of Klaudt's daughter.In the most disturbing accusation, the girls say Klaudt had them convinced they could earn up to $20,000 by donating their eggs to a fertility clinic. And even though he has no medical training, the girls say Klaudt did all the supposed "exams" and "procedures" himself.
A Congressional tax standoff has opened a window of opportunity for wealthy Americans determined to avoid paying up post-mortem.With lawmakers unable to agree on a year-end fix for a quirk in the Bush-era tax cuts, the federal estate tax is set to be repealed for one year as of Jan. 1, meaning that those who suffer a timely death could escape the usual certainty of taxes.
Tiger Woods Named 'Sexual Athlete of the Year';
Papuan Tribesman Named 'Body Piercer of the Year'
Now we have a situation in which Joe Lieberman, who rakes in cash from the insurance industry and whose wife is a lobbyist, and others stuffing their pockets with insurance company cash, are holding hostage real reform on the backs of those who can't afford insurance.
Today Paul Krugman joins the "Pass it, it's better than nothing" side: http://brilliantatbreakfast.blogspot.com/2009/12/krugman-calls-for-health-care-reform.html
WASHINGTON -- Militants in Iraq have used $26 off-the-shelf software to intercept live video feeds from U.S. Predator drones, potentially providing them with information they need to evade or monitor U.S. military operations.
Senior defense and intelligence officials said Iranian-backed insurgents intercepted the video feeds by taking advantage of an unprotected communications link in some of the remotely flown planes' systems.
That would be an incredibly foolish mindset to have.
MOSCOW (Reuters) - NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen asked Russia on Wednesday to give the Western military alliance more help in Afghanistan but failed to get an immediate pledge of assistance from the Kremlin.I suppose that "Вы курите крак?" (are you smoking crack) would seem to be the appropriate response.
"Please get involved again in Afghanistan" is a request to the Russians that would be about as attractive to Moscow as if the Chinese had asked us for help with their little border war with Vietnam in the late `70s and early `80s. Either that, or the sound that the Muscovites are hearing now is laughter emanating from the Kremlin.
The US Second Circuit Court of Appeals recently reversed an attempted murder conviction for a Blackwater guard, citing what it called the prosecution's "gratuitous exploitation" of the defendant's nickname, "Murder." Now lawyers for two other guards want to mount the same defense.
Lawyers for two of five Blackwater guards charged in the shooting deaths of 17 Iraqi civilians, killed in a shootout in September 2007, want their clients' nicknames stricken from use by prosecutors. Their nicknames, according to the lawyers' motion, are "Savage Viking" and "Extreme."
http://rawstory.com/2009/12/blackwater-guards-lawyers-nicknames-jury-savage-extreme/
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Old and busted: visiting ACORN as a pimp and prostitute.
New hotness: using the repuke voters database to stalk women:
More misconduct has been alleged against Arizona Republican Party executive director Brett Mecum, who is now the subject of a criminal complaint alleging he used the Republican's voter database to stalk a young female graduate student...
None of the women were willing to speak on the record. Some were afraid of Mecum. Others were afraid of hurting the party. Each, for her own reasons, was afraid to speak out. In fact, the only woman who feels safe enough to file a formal complaint against Mecum did so as she was moving out of state.
It's hard to listen the GOP reaction to President Obama's decision to move the detainees to a nearly empty prison in Thomson, Illinois, without cringing at their statements. After the US government has tried and sentenced so many maniacs, hard-core criminals, and yes, other international terrorists, there is this feeling within the Republican party that this one prison - located on the Iowa-Illinois border, miles from civilization, with a local population who fervently welcomes the opportunity - is somehow the greatest threat to liberty today. Here's a memo the Repubs are circulating and its statements.
- Importing terrorists from Guantanamo into the United States likely gives them more legal protections than they have now.
- Voluntarily bringing Guantanamo terrorists into the United States increases the chances they will be ordered released into the country.
- Creating Guantanamo in Illinois will not appease the Democratic base.
- Creating Guantanamo in Illinois certainly will not appease al Qaeda.
- So who is coming to dinner? – Reviewing the Guantanamo population
- Hasn't the Senate clearly opposed this move?
- At the end of the day, the President has not explained how this decision makes America safer.
It almost doesn't deserve a response, these statements are so ridiculous. But I can't help myself.
- They have to get more legal protections, since the Bush administration started them with zero. Even if we have military tribunals, it will mean that they finally have more legal rights than they have for the past six-seven years.
- How asinine is the statement that the US government will release detainees - which haven't been found guilty as terrorists - into the country? The really bad ones are probably not even getting the hearing. This line is really for the stupid and those fearing their own shadows.
- No, Gitmo in Illinois will not appease Dems, but those people who elected Obama will understand that he keeps his promises - to close Gitmo's prison system.
- No, Gitmo in Illinois will not appease al Qaeda, but it will ensure that they can't claim that the US government is running a gulag for Muslims.
- Who's coming to dinner? Is that a racist crack? Yeah, we don't need any more brown people here. Keep 'em out of the country. Very nice attitude, guys.
- The Senate is ruled by eunuchs who need to remember that they have a pair of balls. The original signers of the Declaration would be embarrassed to watch this spectacle.
- Obama has in fact explained that the United States endorses the principle of "rule of law," that to try all people under formal courts that will determine their guilt or innocence will in fact reduce the chance of more people joining terrorist groups.