>> ^NetRunner:
Why does Alaska need more than 10 times as much per person?


duh... because it's next to russia, silly.

BTW, Here's the AP's "earmark map": http://ctchnedge01.ap.org/specials/interactives/wdc/state_earmarks/

They all have different levels per capita, but Alaska is #1 in "per capita" earmarks, and #10 overall.

States don't all get the same amount of money, and looking at the map, they're generally getting less than $100/person, while Alaska is getting $506/person. #2 in "per capita" is Hawaii, and they're getting a "mere" $226/person.

Wyoming, with a slightly smaller population than Alaska is getting $46/person, or $21 million to Alaska's $346 million.

South Dakota, with a slightly higher population than Alaska is getting $115/person, making them #7 in per capita, but 47th in total dollars, with $91 million (compare again, to $346 million from Alaska).

Any way you slice it, it doesn't make Alaska look like a state run by a champion of earmark reform.

^ Why wouldn't it be per capita? These are usually for infrastructure, and generally speaking more people = more infrastructure.

Therefore, more people = more money needed.

Illinois got $311 million in earmarks last year (none this year), and Alaska got $198 million in earmarks so far this year.

Illinois got 50% more money, but like you point out, there's over 13 times as many people in Illinois.

Why does Alaska need more than 10 times as much per person?

Nice try, but you can't judge the earmarks per capita. Illinois has a population of nearly 13 million, compared to Alaska's less than 700,000. Of course they're going to spend considerably less per capita.

I wasn't a fan of the laugh at the end, usually TPM doesn't do those kinds of things.

The clips at the beginning and end are actually taken from a new McCain ad (the first positive one from them I've seen since June).

Other than that, it seemed a pretty straight up debunking of taglines from the ad it's a response to.

Put another way, they're lying about Palin's past as an opponent to the bridge to nowhere, and as an opponent of earmarks. Not spinning, not embellishing, not exaggerating, just bald-faced lying.

People should feel insulted and angry, but not by the video.

^ They've been championing her as a anti-earmark reformer, yet her whole political career up 'til this point has been about getting as many earmarks for her state as possible.

This is not a new issue to her, just her position on it is new.

That is essentially the question. When public schools were started, it was because of the principle that an educated citizenry was better for everybody in the long run, including those who have no children. Of course I am talking about a real education, not the memorization of unrelated factoids for a standardized test.

Let's have a hypothetical. What if public schools were shut down at the end of this year, and the tax money earmarked for it was taken off the books, and everybody paid proportionally less in taxes?

First, the existing private schools would be overwhelmed with demand. They would be able to charge much more, and being good capitalists they certainly would. So that means the rich would get all the best that is currently available.

Of course, a massive number of private schools would begin appearing, with no history of stability and no oversight. At least they would be somewhat more affordable. All the good public school teachers would go to these new schools. And the parents who are smart and put all of their newly returned taxes (and probably much more since the burden isn't shared anymore) into their children's education would send their kids there. Hopefully the schools will be well run and won't fold up in the middle of a year taking all your money with it. Of course, after some growing pains, the quality competitive schools would stabilize, and those families who put a massive percentage of their resources into their children's education (think college-level investment here) would have good places to send their kids.

Of course there would still be a demand in the lower portions of the economic scale. Since children aren't allowed to work until age 16, they would have to do something during the day. The cheapest of the schools would get the teachers that the other schools didn't want, and with the lower pay scale and lower expectations these schools would be little better than day care centers.

Since most of our current population has no sense of personal financial management, the sticker shock of what good schooling actually costs would push more lower income parents to stick with the bargain basement level.

This is where comparisons to WalMart and McDonalds come in. They are cheap, so they are successful. Most people who support them don't know or care that their products are crap, they treat their employees like crap, and they are directly contributing to the destruction of the American economy and/or state of health. I don't buy their products, because I know better. But they are still wildly successful because they know how to work the capitalist system.

So what do you think would happen to the education level of the average citizen twenty years after some big corporate chain of bargain basement schools became the most successful school system? What kind of lessons will be taught by teachers who earn the minimum wage? Let's face it, those kids wouldn't even be qualified to work at WalMart or McDonalds. And there will be a LOT of them.

Well, hell, they're not your kids, why should you care?

>> ^Constitutional_Patriot:
freaky bald guy scares me.. aaaaagh!!!
Seriously they both make valid points.


Both make valid points? Her only points were that she 1. sold an airplane on ebay 2. was against the bridge to nowhere 3. is against corruption 4. her opponent is a sexist

1. The plane was bought for $2.7 million and sold on ebay for $2.1 million, so $600,000 loss right there. The state makes $62,492.79 payments on it each quarter, and it seats up to nine. When not in use by the governor, it was used to shuttle inmates. Sarah Palin flies commercial--most likely business class which is what, a couple grand a seat, especially on last minute bookings? So to fly herself and her family/aides around with business class is probably $5,000-10,000 a flight. If she flies mores than 6 times a quarter she is costing the state money. The reality was that the plane was described: "You can't stand up in it, and the bathroom is basically a port-a-potty. You dare not use it." Fine, if she wants to prevent taxpayer waste, but how about doing a cost analysis before you sell a plane for a $600,000 loss your first day in office?

2. "Last year, Palin announced she was stopping state work on the controversial project, earning her admirers from earmark critics and budget hawks from around the nation. The move also thrust her into the spotlight as a reform-minded newcomer.
The state, however, never gave back any of the money that was originally earmarked for the Gravina Island bridge, said Weinstein and Elerding.
In fact, the Palin administration has spent "tens of millions of dollars" in federal funds to start building a road on Gravina Island that is supposed to link up to the yet-to-be-built bridge, Weinstein said."

3. "Palin is under investigation to determine whether she pressured and then fired the state police chief in July because he refused to dismiss her former brother-in-law. At the time, the governor's younger sister was involved in a bitter divorce and child custody dispute with the man, a state trooper. A bipartisan committee of the state legislature voted unanimously to hire a retired prosecutor to investigate. His report is due in October.”"

4. The argument that Carville is sexist because he is questioning the credentials of a woman is insulting and sexist itself, especially when he brings up another woman who he thinks is more qualified.

All I see here is a vice presidential candidate who is woefully ignorant and already corrupt with what little power she has as a governor in Alaska. Do you even know her education, or her grades in college? Christ, she has BA in journalism from the University of Idaho and you want to elect her as next in line to president?

I really don't get why you want your doctors, lawyers, and scientists to finish in the top of their class after 7-8 years of schooling. Why you wouldn't dare fly on a plane, drive in a car, or ride on a boat designed by someone without a phd or masters degree--yet you will elect people to run your entire lives who are at the bottom of their class and hold a completely irrelevant or non-demanding degree.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'Lies Election08 Politics News' to 'sarah palin, john mccain, earmark, pork, reform, the real news' - edited by NetRunner

.."i now yield to my colleage from the great state of Texas, Mr. Paul, for as much time as he may consume...."

such obtuse formalities-
....pleased to address, blah blah blah.....Yield to the floor, hruumm pphhumm phumm...brggggggh....tell of the coming dire future, puny humans, blah blah blah...Beirut, Iraq, plughhhh, mmmmffffph! , ...guts, spending...budget....errrr, uhh problem attack go away...... earmarks, billions, uhhh, "

please, can I scalp a ticket off this motherfucker??!!!

headlines on where it stands currently.

almost 1/4 of it is supposed to be earmarked for expanding veteran's benefits.
and some other stuff. still about $100 billion that nobody seems to be mentioning much.

I think that you are all overreacting to this bill.

It doesn't add any new law enforcement powers beyond the already wildly expansive USA PATRIOT. It provides for a nice Commission, and an eventual Report, and perhaps one day a beautiful Center and seems to be an "earmark" project for California rather than the end of civil liberties as we knew them. Hell, federal agencies are not even required to turn over materials to the Commission. Good luck . . .

The key language in the First Amendment is "the right of the people peaceably to assemble." As far as I know, the Politics channel is not cooking plots of violent overthrow of the American system, the War on Terror channel can be withering toward US Policy but Cheney deserves it, and dag is only mailing shirt bombs to the Resistance (for now).

It is simply not traitorous to be opposed to those persons who would foment riot and worse via actions AND words. The First Amendment protects citizens precisely from that situation and this bill does not alter the 1st Amd.

blankfist! Thank you for the kind gesture, and I am sooo sorry that you wasted your save, but the thought is much appreciated. Let me know if you want any of your discards saved. I'd be obliged to help ya, siftin' comrade! My next save is earmarked for someone, but after that one let me know, k? The funny thing is, I posted it first, but I discarded it because some asshole downvoted it to ZERO the moment after I posted it. Needless to say, that made me want to discard it. I was a bit sad, because I really thought it soooo funny that I wished I had sifted it. I should have given it a chance and ignored that downvoting jerkoff. Oh well. The luck of the draw.

If I'm with the libs on anything, it's this. GIVE US FREAKING MORE MONEY! We're freaking curing your diseases. You spend more money on guns than medicine. If you've ever taken an antibiotic, you owe biomedical science your life.

And though I'm a capitalist, I still love the idea of open access scientific journals... It is extraordinarily annoying to go after a paper you need and find you don't have access to it. I'm proud to say that the highest journal in my particular field is open access, that is the Journal of Virology. It kills me to say it however, that I think journals should have the right to choose whether they're open access or not. It's their business. It's their money. I think there should be incentives for them to choose open source. Tax incentives? maybe.

Anyway, does anyone know if this particular funding was attached to other funding in the bill? I expect it was part of a HUGE mess of stuff like most bills. Seeing the trends in congress lately I wouldn't be surprised if it was part of a bill that also would mean MANY other radical funding changes or changes in policy. That way when it gets vetoed, they can cry foul on not funding science. yeesh. Could they please just divide that crap up? It's so obviously political BS anymore. Biomedical science needs money. Make a freaking bill that says just that alone.

Anyway, the Scientist:
http://www.the-scientist.com/news/home/53858/

I will warn that if this thing passes, it will be a MAJOR MAJOR MAJOR upset to non-opensource journals... as in possible colapse of several of them. I hope they are prepared.

FYI, America's "Science" and England's "Nature" are the 2 highest impact journals in the world by a landslide and they are NOT open source journals.

The president is allegedly not opposed to the open source bit, but of pork earmarks in the bill. Most bills have this sort of crap which should be in their own bills in the first place dang it. That sorta crap keeps money from where it should be.

Ok... first off, I'm merely trying to learn about the protocols of zion. It's written out very carefully and I admit that it may be a forgery, a fake, a hoax. I surely hope that it is, however there are parallels that raise alarms in the United States that is extremely troubling to patriots that wish to preserve the Constitution and national sovereignty of this great nation that our forefathers/founders intended for a truly free and non-oppressive country where immigrants from oppressive nations can find refuge (although we are starting to become a bit crowded and immigration is a little out of control thanks to NAFTA and the SPP).

1.) A shadow government has been exposed with massive control in our government.

2.) The Constitution is being subverted, violated, and slowly being trumped by the Executive branch which has also managed to virtually disable the Justice department and constantly vetoes important bills from the Senate. Some of this is justified due to the amount of pork and earmarks added to these important bills... the Senate and HR bill process needs to be revised to control the abuse of the vulnerabilities of this great but less-than-perfect system.

3.) I know some wonderful Jewish people and I don't wish to sound anti-semitic because I respect my Jewish friends very much, however... there are many powerful Jewish people that I feel are hurting this country and I despise - such as Silverstein, Ariel Sharon, Media giant Murdoch, Senator Charles Schumer, Alan Greenspan, Paul Wolfowitz and most importantly: Henry Kissinger.

4.) Silverstein profited big time (7 Billion dollars) on the tragedy of 9/11 from which he purchased the WTC and a multi-million dollar policy a few months before 9/11.
Mukasey (current Attorney General @ Justice dept selected by Bush) was the Judge that presided over this case.

5.) Media monopolist Murdoch continues to buy up any media source of signifigance.

6.) When Bush finally appointed someone to head the 9/11 commission (14 months after), he appointed Henry Kissinger - then realizing the fact that Kissinger which when confronted with the verifiable ties he and the Bush's has to the Bin Ladens he then stepped down from the position.

7.) The Bush family and the CIA has intimate ties with the Bin Ladens and Saudi oil tycoons and Israeli officials.

When Israeli foreign minister Shimon Peres warned Prime minister Ariel Sharon that refusing to heed incessant American requests for a cease-fire with the Palestinians would endanger Israeli interests and "turn the US against us. "Sharon reportedly yelled at Peres, saying "don't worry about American pressure, we the Jewish people control America."

9.) For decades the US has provided Israel with crucial military, diplomatic and financial backing, including more than $3 billion each year in aid.

10.) Admiral Thomas Moorer, former Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, has spoken with blunt exasperation about the Jewish-Israeli hold on the United States:

"I've never seen a President — I don't care who he is — stand up to them [the Israelis]. It just boggles the mind. They always get what they want. The Israelis know what is going on all the time. I got to the point where I wasn't writing anything down. If the American people understood what a grip those people have got on our government, they would rise up in arms. Our citizens certainly don't have any idea what goes on."

11.) I will agree that the protocols is a hoax only because it may very well be, however the things that are occurring in this country seem to prove otherwise. Hate me if you wish.... call me anti-semitic, call me the malicious names as you have in the past if you wish, but I've seen some very questionable things happening in regards to powerful Jewish ppl. I hope your right and I'm wrong.

12.) I will continue to research this and other topics and I thank God (if there even is one) that we have the internet to discuss such issues. The mass media seems to be mostly trivial crap focused on entertaining people keeping them from focusing on the seriousness of the problems with our government. This is one of the agendas in the PoZ but I'm sure that's just coincidence because it's a hoax intended to make people hate Jews, right?

P.S. qualm: When I refer to International Bankers, I don't mean it in code as as you continually perpetuate as it's meaning... International Bankers means to most people just what it implies... check wikipedia and that one video I posted: http://www.videosift.com/video/The-CFR-The-Capitalist-Conspiracy at the 1:15 mark for more modern definitions of the term. International Bankers are not just Jewish people.