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Faces In The Rocks

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[I'll try this now and then. Great Four Corners road trip with lots of digital clicking. I was looking for faces. This is what I saw and what the camera saw.] Canyon de Chelly, Arizona: "Tough Guy"

Military vs. Civilian Spending

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Think what might happen with just a few fewer tanks... --> Over 8,800 M1 and M1A1 tanks have been produced for the US Army and Marine Corps, (and a relative few for the armies of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait) at a cost of US $2.35–$4.30 million per unit, depending on the variant. (“top-of-the-line” = $4.3 million) The M1 Abrams Main Battle Tank is made by General Dynamics Land Systems. Supporting the Abrams is a Tank Recovery Vehicle. The United States Army requirement is for 595 M88A2 HERCULES recovery vehicles, the Marine Corps requirement was originally for 60 vehicles (now 66).The US Army has fielded 157 HERCULES and the US Marine Corps all its planned HERCULES. Unitary Cost: USD $2.0 million. The Hercules is made by BAE Systems (AirBus, etc.). Both vehicles are totally paid for with taxpayer dollars. The top-of-the-line combine John Deere offers is the 9870 STS.Manufacturer's suggested list price: $

Two More Strikes Against For-Profit Health Insurance

How many strikes does it take to strike OUT? How about these? 1. Doctors (mostly primary care docs) hate ins. paperwork, want to quit That's a very disheartening story from United Press International - UPI - about a huge survey of primary care physicians. Almost half say they are going to quit their profession or at least reduce their patient rosters. Of course, this is the very category of docs we need the most and have the biggest shortage of. Why this catastrophe? "The reported reasons for the widespread frustration among doctors include: increased time spent dealing with non-clinical paperwork, difficulty receiving reimbursement from insurance companies and burdensome government regulations." And... 2. New International Survey : More Than Half of U.S. Chronically Ill Adults Skip Needed Care Due to Costs Bottom line in this study: The U.S. is last of eight advanced nations in the quality of care for the chronically ill. And we spend the most out of pocket on

Why Are You Afraid of The Fairness Doctrine?

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Because Rush, Sean, Laura, Michael et al TOLD YOU TO BE? Jack S Margolis, lefty Joe Pyne, righty First hand report from Reality Radio Long story short: 1965 - 1967 I was the Program Director at the country's first 24/7 telephone call-in radio station, KLAC in Los Angeles. It was a double barreled hoot. The dreaded Fairness Doctrine was in full force. Results? Right wing talk was crushed? Noooo . We had Bob Grant spewing the precursor mud of Michael Savage and Sean Hannity . We had Joe Pyne , doing confrontational blitzing that makes Rush Limbaugh look like a wimp. We had Ray Briem , a calm, hard-right, all-night talker. These guys were tough, uncompromising Righties , and nothing in the Fairness Doctrine shut them up or even inhibited them. AND we had left-wing talkers, including the hilarious Arbogast (Bob) and Margolis (Jack) and the stunning Jill (daughter of Dore) Schary Robinson doing passionate left wing and feminist talk on the weekends.

Great First Responders

... And I don't mean emergency workers. When some of your smart buddies respond to a blog post with substance and smarts, it's a joyful experience. Joyful experiences being not all that common these days, I pass these along so that you might share mine: Outdone I am (By a successful entrepreneur acquaintance who called my "Obama Speech" and raised it with an Obama ad) I'm Barack Obama and I approve this message because the stakes are too high. · For 6 of the last 7 years, Republicans have controlled the House of Representatives. · They've controlled the Senate. · They've controlled the Whitehouse Republicans have had complete control over our Government. And look what Republicans have done. We've gone from record budget surpluses, to the largest deficits in our country's 332 year history. Real wages for a majority of our people are down, and people on main-street are scared. Unemployment is rising a

A Speech for Obama

What the heck.... My name is Barack Obama. Some of you are hearing it these days as Barack Hussein Obama, which is a whole 'nother issue. So let's talk about something important. For the record, I approve of this message, because it is what I whole-heartedly believe. [THIS IS THE 'CENTRAL THEME.' NEITHER CANDIDATE SEEMS TO HAVE ONE.] What you've been hearing on the news for the past several years is that Americans are growing ever more unhappy with the course our country is on. It's one of the oldest questions in the survey business about public attitudes: "Do you believe America is on the right course?" It's a yes or no question and there are years of tracking the results. It's never been this bad. As I'm sure you've heard, the "no" votes are building very rapidly. Lately 80%... eight out of every ten Americans... are saying "no." My central goal, the very reason I am committed to becoming President of th

The Fat American Mystery - New Clues [Updated]

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"High Fructose Corn Syrup"... Sound the Alarm! More on this later, but for now, digest this: "Our study shows for the first time the surprising speed with which humans make body fat from fructose. ...Once you start the process of fat synthesis from fructose, it's hard to slow it down." From an article by K.H. Shear This is from the September, 2008 "Center Times," a publication of The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas. Super credible. So read your labels. (Soft drinks, processed food, all that easy stuff.) Avoid fructose unless its actually in fruit. Save yourself. And your kids. And your friends. More to come. ... and here it is. If you don't check Digg.com occasionally, you are missing a lot of news. For a summary of all the recent postings about articles on HFructoseCS. Check this . And check THIS. I paid $2.14 for a bottle of fat juice called "SoBe Black & Blue Berry Brew" which looked like a rea