The South Carolina Republican debate was the most revealing so far of Newt Gingrich's moral standards. He has none.

The purpose of debates (I thought) is to observe the candidates' moral character as well as their knowledge of the issues.

When asked about his ex-wife's remarks (she said he asked her to accept an "open marriage"), Gingrich lambasted the person posing the question. He used words such as "audacity" and "despicable" in scolding CNN's John King for using such an important event in history to discuss such trivial matters.

Whoa! This is exactly the time to ask, when candidates are under the spotlight and on the hot seat. We learned of Newt's despicable behavior and then his audacity to feel he did not have to answer to her claim.

This is a man running on the conservative ticket, hoping to portray himself as having a religious aura or halo about himself, and who will bring back conservative values to the White House.

Gingrich is the poster child for white trash who would run the White House as a plantation, bringing back those old southern conservative values of the past, where owning slaves for "whatever" was perfectly acceptable.

I believe in forgiveness too, but only for those who are truly sorry for their sins or aggressions. Gingrich did not exhibit sorrow; he exhibited anger and tried to change the subject.

While he is still testing the waters for a 2012 run, we can only hope that when he hits the water, it's boiling.

I'm sure most have heard about SOPA and PIPA the House and Senate Bills (respectively) to address on-line piracy. Is piracy a big problem? Depends on whom you're talking to works for. By and large the most pirated thing on the Internet is pornography. Oddly enough, I have yet to hear the porn industry crying about laying off workers or having to shut down studios. If anything - so I've heard (tongue pressed firmly in cheek) - they seem to be expanding. Thus it would seem, the same should hold true for the movie and recording industries.  

Let's be clear. You cannot make the argument that every song downloaded or every movie bootlegged is a lost sell. There are albums/CDs that people will never buy just to get the one good song on the entire project. There are movies that people will never shell out the money for an overpriced theater ticket to go see. However, after viewing a low quality bootleg copy, they might just purchase a blue-ray DVD.

Here is the problem. People either purchase a CD or DVD, check one out from the collection at their public library or in some cases take a digital camera into a movie theater and make a digitized copy they can play on their computer. They then share this file. Sometimes it is just with family and friends. Sometimes they upload the file to a file sharing site like "Mega-Uploads." Once uploaded instead of having to keep their computer up and running while their friends download a copy of the file, they can simply share a "link" to that file and their friends or anyone with that link can download the file at their leisure.  

Many of the file servers hosting these files are located in countries outside of US jurisdiction. Russia, China, Czechoslovakia etc are some of the favored countries. Thus US law enforcement is unable to raid these sites. To get around this problem, the recording and movie industries had their lawyers write the laws such that merely linking to such a site carries the same penalty as actually hosting or having the file in your possession.  Pause for a moment and consider the real world implications of this. It would be like a bank robber asking me for directions to a bank and me getting 20 years merely for telling him even though I didn't know he was a bank robber. Hopefully you're beginning to see the problem.  

To continue this analogy, not only would I be looking at 20 years, but also the manufacturer of the car he drove and whomever built the roads he drove over. This places the unfair responsibility on me to vet the person and intentions of anyone I give directions to. It also places the burden on the company who manufacturers and sells the car to KNOW it won't be sold to a bank robber.

If this sounds extreme, you understand why Facebook, Google, Wikipedia and others are up in arms. Here's how it works. Suppose I post a link on my wall to a funny video clip. Unbeknownst to me, the person who produced the clip has not given permission for it to be used. They catch wind of it and contact the Justice department about their rights being infringed.  The Justice department can shutdown Facebook, fine them and then come after me. Suppose you thought the clip was funny and shared it too? Now you're in the loop.

The Movie and Record Industries simply love this! All they need do is send a threat letter/E-mail and to avoid trouble Facebook or whomever will simply remove your account without investigation. Further suppose the name of the clip happens to match a copyrighted work. Note, it is not the actual work, the names are just similar.  The reality is nobody is going to hire the necessary staff to actually check this stuff. It is just a ham fisted, ultimately ineffective solution to a nonexistent problem.

Here's why the solution is ultimately ineffective. Your average computer has 65,000 ports. You can think of them as doors into and out of your computer or you can think of them as rooms. If you're reading this using your web browser, you're most likely using port 80. However, you don't have to be using port 80. We could agree to use - Facebook would have to send the data - any port we wanted. We could use port 22,336. People looking for our HTML based transmissions on the usual port 80 would never know we were communicating.  We could set up a chat room using anyone of the 65,000 ports available.  Even if we didn't password protect it and or use encryption, finding the right room would be like searching for a needle in a haystack.

Those who are heavily into file sharing use these techniques and more. What the Movie and Recording Industries are trying to do is like a company trying to continue to make record profits off of pay phones when everybody has smartphones. The business model needs to keep up with the technology.  Trying to pass laws mandating that everyone use pay phones isn't going to be successful.  Even if you could do it here, China, Russia and other nations will only laugh at us.  

Poor Newt, the media is picking on him and he is outraged. Well, maybe his record is not sterling but that does not matter because he discussed it with God. God apparently said it is OK to be an adulter on many occassions, it is OK Newt that you cheated on wife number one and dumped her when she started cancer treatment, it is OK Newt that you cheated on wife number two while creating the New Morale Majority and bringing the adultrious nature of Bill Clinton to light at the same time and then dumping her when she was diagnoised with MS, guess it is OK to take large sums of money for a book that wasn't written, God said it is OK Newt that you used your insider info the extract big fees from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. God forgave him and the Republicans at the recent debate cheered his feats. Now I get it, the morales and family values of the Republican Party is do what ever you want to whom ever you want but tell God and then it is OK.

I for one am sick of the Gods excuse, it is a put down for intelligent people and disrespect for God. Fifty one percent of people survied believe God interviened with the Denver Bronco's football games! The God who created the everything from - infinity to + infinity, our Milky Way with enough habital planents for every human on earth, created massive black holes that eat entire solar systems including our Milky Way spirialing around a massive black hole and like water in a flushed toilet going down the drain, really cares about a football game.

If God helped Denver win what does that mean? Denver does not have enough good players to win with out cheating? ( many people do believe that) If God did help Denver then the league needs to impose santions on Denver for cheating, maybe too many players on the field or fixing the game. Maybe Vegas need to pay back all the money people lost betting against the ponies. I don't know.

How many fools will believe someone who said God chose them or this is God's will. If you watched the GOP debate you saw many of them. Sorry just my opinion.

Now I am not a religious nut, however I do study the old Gnostic Writtings because I enjoy reading them. Quite often things come up that are in the least interesting.

In the first Century Phillip, a disciple of Jesus and one who traveled with Jesus recorded some of the teaching of Jesus and passed them on to others. To me this vese fits today.

From the writtings of Phillip;

             THE RULERS

The rulers wanted to fool the people since they saw that the people have a kinship with what is good. They took the names of what is good and assigned them the names of what is not good. They did this to fool the people with names and to link them to what is not good. So as doing the people a favor they took what was not good and transfered them to the good. In their way of thinking they made the bad good and they did this in order to make free men slaves.

Is this just as relevant today as it was two thousand years ago? I think so.

President Obama declared a long list of pardons on Monday. It is his third list of pardons during his term in office. The president has pardoned five individuals, guilty of various crimes. Obama also decided to commute the sentence of one. Previously, the presidential right to grant pardons has come under fire. Read the article here: http://www.newsytype.com/13660...

Who was let free?

Martin Kaprelian of Park Ridge, Ill. received a nine-year sentence for conspiracy to transport stolen property.

A three year sentence was given to Lesley Claywood Berry Jr. of Loretto, Ky. This was because of conspiracy to manufacture and distribute marijuana.

In Wesley Chapel, Fla., Dennis George Bulin got a $20,000 fine and five years of probation. This was because he had 1,000 pounds of marijuana he was caught with.

In Annville, Ky., Ricky Dale Collet got a year of probation. This was because of aiding and abetting the growing of 61 weed plants.

Because he was running an illegal gambling business, Thomas Paul Ledford of Jonesborough, Tenn., was given one year of probation.

Cutting short

In his first such act ever, Obama decided to commute (cut short) the sentence of Eugenia Marie Jennings of Alton, Ill. In 2001 she was convicted for cocaine distribution. She got sentenced to 22 years in prison. She is to be unveiled next month, but is still topic to eight years of supervised release.

Something presidents do

Everyone can be pardoned by the president. It can't be undone by any person when this happens. A judge is not being corrected with a presidential pardon. They also are not to correct a wrong. They're meant to give individuals a second change if they have repented for what they have done. Most pardons are given out at the end of a president or governor's period. This has become the tradition.

A lot of debate

Generally these pardons come without much community attention. Individuals usually notice if there is some inappropriate motivation behind it. This can consist of political motivation.

Probably the most controversial pardon was in 1974 when President Gerald Ford pardoned his impeached predecessor Richard Nixon after the Watergate scandal. George Steinbrenner was pardoned in 1989 by Ronald Reagan. This got a lot of criticism also. Steinbrenner put contributions into Richard Nixon's campaign illegally. Bill Clinton likewise came under fire for pardoning Marc Rich in 2001. The government lost millions to Prosperous. Rich's wife donated a lot of money to Clinton's Presidential Library and to the Democratic Party.

Sources

Los Angeles Times: http://articles.latimes.com/20...

Info Please: http://www.infoplease.com/us/g...

Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

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Places To See In Sydney, Luxury Hotels in Sydney

I come today to report wonderful news! The Occupy Movement is about 10 weeks old, and I consider it to be an early success beyond my wildest dreams! Those who are focused on whether or not the tent cities are allowed to remain are missing the big picture.

Do you find this statement surprising? I suspect you might, but perhaps you should not.

I will begin my explanation with something anecdotal from the state of New Hampshire. The New Hampshire Union Leader is the most influential conservative newspaper in the state. Their endorsement is highly coveted. This week, the Union Leader endorsed Newt Gingrich as the Republican candidate for president. Now, on no planet would a Gingrich endorsement be considered a victory for the Occupy Movement, but consider this: Explaining the unexpected nod, the paper's publisher Joe McQuaid predicted on Fox News that "Gingrich is going to have a better time in the general election than Mitt Romney. I think it's going to be Obama's 99% versus the 1%, and Romney sort of represents the 1%."

As I said, this is anecdotal, but I think it is huge. Conservative media outlets have long been known for their arrogance, and the insulated bubble in which they operate. The fact that the editor of this conservative paper, which has endorsed candidates with names like DuPont and Forbes in the past, has adopted the language of the Occupy Movement, and actually used the movement's chief position as the reason for endorsing a candidate, is seismic!

In order to understand the current temperature of the country, one has to make the connection between the Occupy Movement and the many related movements that are branches from the same trunk. Taken as a whole, this collective initiative has yielded some impressive results which I am quite sure would not have occurred in it's absence.

The most dramatic of these results came from the November state elections. In Ohio, the extreme union-busting legislation of Governor John Kasich was slapped down decisively. In the wake of the referendum loss, Kasich admitted that "It's time to pause. The people have spoken clearly". Kasich's 33% approval rating is also quite clear. 

On the same day, voters rejected a radical anti-choice initiative in Mississippi. Republicans had hoped to put this "personhood" legislation in place in many states. Mississippi was chosen as the first attempt because it was considered the state most likely to pass the bill. Now the personhood bill is considered dead, nationwide.
In Maine, voter suppression legislation was rejected. A Democratic governor fought off a lavishly-financed challenge in Kentucky. The state legislative leader who drafted the "papers please" law was tossed out of office in Arizona. A few days later, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer was dealt another blow, when a circuit court judge blocked her attempt to remove the state official in charge of a legislative redistricting that was not to her liking.

In many ways, the ancestor of the Occupy Movement can be found in Madison, Wisconsin. The state capital buzzed all summer long with protests against the union-busting efforts of Governor Scott Walker. The first concrete result of the Wisconsin protests was the recall of two Republican legislators. While it is true that three recalls were needed to flip the State Legislature, the fact that two Republican districts were flipped is no small thing. It should also be noted that Republicans forced recall elections against several Democrats, and lost every one.

Wisconsin has now turned it's attention to recalling Governor Walker. 540,000 signatures are required for a recall election. Democratic leaders are reporting that they have collected 300,000 signatures in the first 13 days of the effort.

Another cousin of the Occupy Movement is the "Move Your Money Project", pursuing an idea first floated by Arianna Huffington. People are being asked to take their money out of the big banks and move the funds into smaller neighborhood banks and local credit unions. As of November 9th, 650,000 customers had moved $4.5 billion out of the big banks, and these institutions are beginning to freak out a little.

It's been well publicized that Bank Of America decided to scrap the fees on debit cards which it had planned to initiate. This was the result of intense customer pushback. 

This week, a circuit court judge refused to sign off on the $285 million "settlement" between Citibank and the SEC, over the bank's selling of mortgage-backed securities. The judge blasted the SEC for it's laxity on the issue, and the decision has greatly increased the likelihood of criminal prosecutions.

Yesterday, Standard & Poor's reduced its credit ratings on 15 big banks, as the result of a sweeping overhaul of its ratings criteria.
JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Barclays, HSBC Holdings and UBS AG, were among the banks that had their ratings reduced by one notch each. S&P's overhaul is part of a broad effort by the agency to repair its reputation, which was badly tarnished by having wrongly put triple-A ratings on securities backed by subprime mortgages. The downgrade will likely lead to tighter margin requirements, a stated goal of Occupy Wall Street.

The environmental front is another area of concern for many of the Occupy Wall Street sympathizers, and there was a recent victory there, as well. President Obama decided to put an indefinite hold on the Keystone XL pipeline from Canada, a project which he had seemed destined to approve. Sustained protests by environmental groups are credited with making the difference.

Today I am not attempting to offer any great writing or bold opinion. I am only pulling together a bunch of stories that, when combined, paint a picture. The American people are sorely in need of some good news, of some evidence that they matter, that their voices are being heard. Well, I think the good news is coming in. It doesn't matter if the Occupy protesters are allowed to continue to pitch tents in parks. In the couple of months that this movement has been active, the winds have changed. Conversations that were only taking place among political junkies a few months ago have moved into the mainstream. This is only the beginning, but a fine beginning it is.

Another truly brilliant effort from these folks.

WASHINGTON.

Already being hailed as the moment the U.S. grabbed its ankles in the name of capitalism, President Obama late last night announced that the infamous 'Black Friday' would now be an official National Holiday. Biden was overheard during the President's Speech whispering to an aide "God is dead and this is his eulogy." Several hours later, The American Association of Catholic Bishops has issued this as their official statement on the President's announcement.

In light of last nights announcement, Capitol Hill is buzzing with activity, as lobbyists and Representatives alike attempt to formulate their own strategies on how to best handle this news. We were able to obtain a brief interview with Speaker John Boehner, in which he expressed his approval for the Presidents decision.

"Last minute deals and announcements are nothing new in Washington, though this act by the Obama administration certainly  tops them all." Speaker of the House John Boehner told our reporters. "The private sector and the American People have clearly dictated this is the direction we're heading, and it's only fit that our government recognize this."

Mirroring Boehner's sureness on this issue are those in the Private Sector, as financial experts predict the stocks of major retailers will climb rapidly. Best Buy CEO Brian J. Dunn stated in an impromptu interview with Forbes that "We are simply ecstatic over this news."

"Our entire Marketing Division is hard at work in light of this news, and Best Buy has committed every resource at its disposal to adjusting our marketing plan. It was a flimsy attempt at subtlety about marketing the holiday season that was holding us back, but we see this announcement as an invitation to abandon that pretense."

Though in the midst of this clamor of consumerism, a counter movement is being born: Occupy Walmart. In an unbelievable display of Freedom of Assembly, hundreds have assembled in a matter of hours in front of the capital on a day which most Americans consume half their body weight. As twitter accounts and facebook pages crop up for the group, plans are in the works to form protests in front of major retail outlets in major cities across the country, as the first protesters outside of DC begin to picket New York City retailers.

As the groups growing numbers portend large scale protests, Joseph Bartky, Professor of Sociology at Georgetown University believes the direction these protests are taking portend something darker. "Every year we hear horror stories of people being trampled in the entrances to stores so people can get a vibrator for 75% off" said Bartky. "Now we're seeing protesters whose express purpose is to block these people from entering the stores. Nothing good can come of it. There will be blood."

Unfortunately, our interview with Dr. Bartky was cut short, following mumblings about 'not wanting to live in this world  anymore'.

Fox News's Megyn Kelly thinks cops pepper-spraying unresisting prisoners isn't so bad, because after all, it's "a food product, essentially."

My advice to Megyn would be first, to spell her name with a normal vowel.  Megyn Price gets a pass because she's funny, humane, and sexy.  Megyn Kelly is no funnier than she is humane, which is to say not at all.  

My second bit of advice would be not to eat out for a while.  Definitely not at any restaurant where the waiters aren't her fellow one-percenters.  Look, personally I love the snotty cheerleader act, but I can see where it might wear thin with less-masochistic personalities, even in ordinary circumstances.

And these are exceptionally emotional times.  As might be expected in a country whose populace is just becoming aware that their local peace officers can be turned into corporate goons who cheerfully gas grandmas and pregant women.  

Even if her favorite eatery does not give Megan (see? I'm helping her get over herself) a painful lesson in just how bad that nasty tongue of hers can burn, she may find herself ingesting any number of unsavory "food products" without knowing it.

And then there's her partner in crimes against humanity, Bill O'Wrongly (I'm pretty sure I have that name right...anyway, who bothers to fact-check anymore?)  Bill, taking time off from his usual job of making viewers less informed than they were before they turned on his show, was the soul of fairness:

"I don't think we have the right to Monday-morning quarterback the police."

Well, you didn't exactly need slo-mo to analyze that play. Office Pike (there's a Dickensian name for a thug cop, isn't it?) waddled down the line of unresisting students and carefully sprayed an agonizing, blistering bio-weapon all over them.

Exactly what extenuating circumstance does Bill imagine might excuse this calm, deliberate sadism?

The only conceivable explanation is, that it was the end of a long Laurel-and-Hardy style confrontation, where the protesters kicked him in the shin, ripped his tie, then set fire to his car, while he stood patiently absorbing the indignities, then cocked his hat forward and proceeded to take his turn.  Until that tape shows up, we'll just have to imagine the hilarity that preceded, and justified, the chemical torture.

Of course, had the police looked cross-eyed at a Tea Party protest, we might have heard a different tune coming out of Billo.  But that's because there are BIG DIFFERENCES between Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party.  I can think of a Dozen right off.

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See more Doug's Dozen lists at www.dougsdozen.com.

And watch Doug's Dozen videos on FunnyOrDie.  

(I saw this on FB and had to take a moment to pop on back here and promote this absolutely freaking incredible piece! - promoted by faultguy)

After watching the debate rage about the "Occupy" movement over the past several days, I have come to the conclusion there is a lot of misinformation that has gone unchallenged by even some of the more perspicacious in the broadcasting industry. This is not surprising given that Republican pundits brought on to discuss and defend their positions, tend to throw as much monkey dust in the air as possible to obscure the real issues.

It seems that to be a Republican these days, cognitive abilities are not required. All one need do is memorize the talking points and jump in front of the nearest camera. You can hear the same arguments parroted over and over again. See if you recognize any of these arguments.  

What is it with the press and their obsession with remembering stuff from less than a decade ago?  

If Newt Gingrich rented himself out to help Freddie Mac market junk mortgages to people whose income didn't justify it...how is that his fault? That's what consultants do.  Hey, he had a mortgage to pay, himself!  

Of course the difference is, he still has his house.

And now he wants to trade up to a nicer one.  A big white house in D.C.  

But that might not happen, if all these meddling Mr. Memory types won't stop dredging up the recent past.  

If they want to bring up stuff from long ago, how about Newt's idea to clone extinct dinosaurs? Now THAT'S cool.  (Much cooler than keeping new species from going extinct.)  

So, as Newt was saying, the problem with our economy is greedy poor people.  Let's try and keep that in mind in case anything else embarrassing comes out about Mr. Gingrich between now and his inauguration.  

What else might come out?  

Why, any one of a dozen things!

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See more Doug's Dozen lists at www.dougsdozen.com.

And watch Doug's Dozen videos on FunnyOrDie.  

Since Lysia posted a video, and it seems to be okay with the people of left take; I am going to post a video that I found enlightening.

Part of the reasons I come here from time to time is to get a feel for how liberals see the world and politics.

This video raises some questions for me on both...

Manuka Honey

How does Herman Cain remain atop the Republican field in poll after poll?

The answer has to be...charm.

And by that, I mean an extremely lucky charm in his pocket.  

Or maybe the lucky charm is in Barack Obama's pocket, since Cain is the Democrats' dream opponent.  Except that the debates would be so unbearably sad that they might engender a sympathy vote for the rest of the Republican ticket.  

Cain even brags that when this farce hit the news cycle, his contributions went up.  So he projects confidence that his wife will soon be First Lady...while the reality is, he's now dealing with his fifth lady and counting.  

So despite his apparently illegal support from the billionaire Kochs' PAC, his cheerful inability to remember the names of countries and whether or not they've been a nuclear power for half a century, his winning slogan "Blame Yourself!", and the way he out-Romneys Romney with a new position on abortion within the space of a sentence...Cain is still a factor in the race for the Republican nomination.  

I said "factor."  

The sad truth is, for all his charisma, Cain hasn't been caught in an actual sex act, like Bill Clinton was.  Apparently, the man is not a closer.  

But he keeps trying, so here are a dozen of his surefire pickup lines, that you can try too.

See more Doug's Dozen lists at www.dougsdozen.com.

And watch Doug's Dozen videos on FunnyOrDie.  
 

I just got back from voting and had a quandary.  As usual these days, I immediately pressed the "Vote Democratic Ticket" button at the top of the ballot.  The machine then provided me each choice with the Democratic Candidate(s) already filled in.

Then I came to one County Commissioner which only had one Candidate and the "Write In" option, so I had no automatic selection.  No one was running a Write-In Campaign, so what to do?

I choose to vote for the one person who was running, as I feel we need to have our offices legally filled.  But I'd love to hear other opinions.  

Look around you. Smell the coffee. Watch "Casino Jack an the United States of Money" "The End of America" and "The One Percent". Well let me say, the American Dream is dead in North America. Perhaps someone else can pick up the torch and run with it before Global Warming destroys everything. Fuck all. Keep taking swings at the shadow puppets.