President George W. Bush said today he's lifting a presidential ban on drilling for oil and natural gas on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf, setting up a showdown with Congress over a separate ban it put in place in the 1980s.
``Today I've taken every step within my power to allow offshore exploration of the OCS,'' Bush said in a statement at the White House. ``This means the only thing standing between the American people and these vast oil resources is action by the U.S. Congress.''
Democratic leaders in both houses of Congress rejected the president's call, saying the move to end the moratorium would have no effect on prices and better options are available.
A world-famous Texas oilman says our energy answer lies in alternative energy. While tilting at windmills, he says that we can't drill our way to energy bliss. So why do the Russians keep drilling?
McCain: Democrats Are Great, and I'll Compete for Your Votes, Too [Byron York]
More from the La Raza speech:
"I know many of you are Democrats, and many of you would usually vote for the presidential candidate of that party. I know I must work hard to win your votes, but you have always given me a respectful hearing, and I appreciate it. I know many of you were disappointed and hurt by those who used the debate on immigration last year, not to respectfully debate the issue, as most did, but to denigrate the contributions of Hispanics to our great country. I denounced those insults then, and I denounce them today."
Finally, McCain makes the appeal for votes. His pitch: Sen. Obama is great, just great. Sen. Clinton — well, she's great too. And I — well, I'll continue to compete for your vote.
" My friends, you know me. One of my proudest achievements as a politician is to have won 75 percent of the Hispanic vote in Arizona in my last re-election. I believe I’m the only member of the Senate to have twice won your Congressional Leadership Award, a distinction I am also very proud of. Senator Obama is a fine man, and an inspiring public figure. All Americans should be proud of his success. I also greatly admire Senator Hillary Clinton, and value her friendship. She, too, would have been a very worthy opponent. But I intend to compete for your votes by continuing to earn your trust."
Officials said, however, it was a good lesson in liberty for those students, especially the two young participants whose father was held in a Communist prison in Romania and another student who is a Russian immigrant.
"These future leaders have seen first-hand how we are losing our liberties – including simply expressing our patriotism in public," said Meredith Turney, the legislative liaison for CRI Impact and a graduate of City on the Hill.
Instead of wisely utilizing our abundant energy, America has been strangled by
various federal government bureaucracies, untold reams of burdensome government regulations and counterproductive policies, corrupt environmental special interest groups, and professional politicians who will bend whichever way the prevailing political winds blow.
These are the reasons America hasn't built a new oil refinery or new nuclear reactor in thirty or so years. Instead, as billionaire oilman T. Boone Pickens accurately stated the other day, we are transferring hundreds of billions of our national treasury to other nations. Even to our enemies. Truly bizarre.
Call me crazy, but I thought the goal of America was to be independent. It’s time to call a spade a spade. We are energy slaves to lesser countries. They own us. And unless we resurrect that unstoppable, mighty spirit of rugged independent individualism of our forefathers and throw off the energy shackles, these nations can permanently cripple, if not kill, our economy. The situation is that grave.
Indymac has been under attack from the hard left. The Center for Responsible Lending issued an attack on Indymac within a few days of Schumer’s letter. CRL is part of a small army of left of center ‘research’ groups, community organizers, and public interest law firms who make their living accusing home lenders of racial redlining and predatory lending. On June 20th the Center accused Indymac of unfair practices regarding minority borrowers.
The U.S. Treasury Department's plan to shore up Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is an ``unmitigated disaster'' and the largest U.S. mortgage lenders are ``basically insolvent,'' according to investor Jim Rogers.
Taxpayers will be saddled with debt if Congress approves U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's request for the authority to buy unlimited stakes in and lend to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Rogers said in a Bloomberg Television interview. Rogers is betting that Fannie Mae shares will keep tumbling.
``I don't know where these guys get the audacity to take our money, taxpayer money, and buy stock in Fannie Mae,'' Rogers, 65, said in an interview from Singapore. `
Modern accounting requires that corporations, state governments and local governments count expenses immediately when a transaction occurs, even if the payment will be made later.
The federal government does not follow the rule, so promises for Social Security and Medicare don't show up when the government reports its financial condition.
Bottom line: Taxpayers are now on the hook for a record $59.1 trillion in liabilities, a 2.3% increase from 2006. That amount is equal to $516,348 for every U.S. household. By comparison, U.S. households owe an average of $112,043 for mortgages, car loans, credit cards and all other debt combined.
While it is true that the ratio of Obama-to-McCain bumper stickers in West L.A. is about 250-to-1, there are untold closet Republicans in the entertainment industry who dare not advertise their beliefs in movie studio parking lots. (Unfortunately, car keying is a tactic wielded liberally by the self-described "tolerant.")...The environment is not so much unfavorable to the Grand Old Party as it is utterly totalitarian. There's simply no lifestyle choice that receives a worse response at dinner parties.
Convicted murderer? Has anyone optioned the rights to your story?
An expressive character actor already semi-famous thanks to his part in Inherit The Wind and guest spots on series like The Twilight Zone, Dick York became an icon of '60s television as Darrin Stephens, a hapless ad exec married to witch Elizabeth Montgomery on Bewitched. But viewers didn't see the pain York suffered from a years-old back injury.
With gas prices skyrocketing and 65 payments left on the Escalade, America is looking for ways to cut back. In these desperate times we'll do whatever is necessary, as long as it doesn't involve driving less.
Fortunately there are a number of fuel-saving alternatives that are easy, inexpensive and completely idiotic
John Lennon, famous for singing, "Imagine there's no heaven," is now said to have been "on the side of Christ," according to his own words recently unearthed from a long-lost radio interview.
"I'm one of Christ's biggest fans," the Beatles' songwriter is heard to say in a 1969 interview with Ken Seymour of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. "And if I can turn the focus on the Beatles on to Christ's message, then that's what we're here to do."
A new television drama, debuting earlier this week, is drawing complaints from viewers and critics over its portrayal of Christians as extremists who take their inspiration from the Crusades and behead a moderate Muslim in an unprovoked attack.
In the six-part series, Bonekickers, a multi-ethnic team of archaeologists "uncovers a compelling mystery from the past that tells viewers something profound and revelatory about the present," the BBC press packet promised. "Archaeology has never been so dramatic."
A divided US appeals court has ruled an Arizona school violated the constitutional rights of a 13-year-old student by conducting a strip search for ibuprofen.
Suspecting that a student had violated a policy against prescription or over-the-counter drugs without permission, public school officials in Safford, Arizona, ordered a search of Savana Redding.
Joseph Lieberman, the lapsed Democrat from Connecticut, strolled into the weekly lunch of the Senate Democrats, unaccompanied by a food taster.
He greeted his colleagues, including some who felt he should not have been there last Tuesday. He ate his lunch (salad, eschewing the macaroni and cheese) and sat through a discussion about gasoline prices and Medicare.
Then the conversation veered into the danger zone, the presidential election - specifically, Senator John McCain's recent votes, or nonvotes, on energy policy.
You may feel a little like batman when you get behind the wheel of VW’s upcoming hybrid, but your super power will be in the MPGs. Back in May we talked about VW’s plans to build a diesel-electric hybrid based on their One-Liter Car, with a release date of 2010. We have a few updates about their zippy little car.
Firing a .357-caliber handgun until it was empty, an Ocala woman chased two intruders from her home in the 3800 block of Southeast 68th Street on Wednesday morning.
Later Wednesday, Marion County sheriff's detectives had one home invasion suspect in custody and were looking for the second. Aaron Scott Beardsley, 25, was charged with armed home invasion robbery. Deputies were still looking for a heavy-set Hispanic male, about 6-foot-1 or 6-feet-2, who was wearing black shorts at the time, a dark T-shirt and a bandana.
French media loses big court case proving Palestinian propaganda false, New York Times ignores shocking story... Why?
France TV 2 has lost a major court case in France that makes the lie to a major piece of Palestinian propaganda. In 2000 an incident occurred in the Palestinian areas that has since been used as propaganda for the Palestinian cause all across the world and the New York Times has repeatedly been a willing host for this propaganda.
A Dutch tabby cat nurses an orphaned red panda cub in Amsterdam, Netherlands, Wednesday July 9, 2008. The panda's mother, Gladys, rejected her two cubs after they were born on June 30. The zoo-keepers initially put the cubs in an incubator, but one keeper's tabby cat had just given birth to four kittens, and the housecat was willing to nurse the newcomers. One of the panda cubs was too weak and died last Thursday.
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