Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Bank Data Is Sifted by U.S. in Secret to Block Terror

By ERIC LICHTBLAU and JAMES RISEN

WASHINGTON, June 22 — Under a secret Bush administration program initiated weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, counterterrorism officials have gained access to financial records from a vast international database and examined banking transactions involving thousands of Americans and others in the United States, according to government and industry officials.

The program is limited, government officials say, to tracing transactions of people suspected of having ties to Al Qaeda by reviewing records from the nerve center of the global banking industry, a Belgian cooperative that routes about $6 trillion daily between banks, brokerages, stock exchanges and other institutions. The records mostly involve wire transfers and other methods of moving money overseas and into and out of the United States. Most routine financial transactions confined to this country are not in the database.

Viewed by the Bush administration as a vital tool, the program has played a hidden role in domestic and foreign terrorism investigations since 2001 and helped in the capture of the most wanted Qaeda figure in Southeast Asia, the officials said.

The program, run out of the Central Intelligence Agency and overseen by the Treasury Department, "has provided us with a unique and powerful window into the operations of terrorist networks and is, without doubt, a legal and proper use of our authorities," Stuart Levey, an under secretary at the Treasury Department, said in an interview on Thursday….

Read the rest here

Well to my knowledge they, the Government, are not targeting US citizens. Unless of course you are talking to a known terrorist or suspected terrorist, then in that case I am cool with them looking at you closely.

By leaking this; the NYT has helped to hurt our chances of stopping those that wish to kill us all. It doesn’t matter if you are liberal, conservative, and indifferent. If you are not Muslim these murderers want to kill you, unless of course you subscribe to their 14th century ideology. Not sure about you but I really do not want to go back to push a horse and cart just to plow my garden.

Now I am not saying that the times should be tried as a whole. However the people that leaked this to the press should be tried for treason and punished according to the constitution. If the reporters will not release the names then they should be brought up on conspiracy charges or something similar and sentenced accordingly.

I do know that if the Democrats weren't so batty they would probably control one or both houses of Congress and probably the Presidency by now. Luckily for us they have moved so far to the left that the majority of Americans do not recognize the party that was for the little guy back in the 60’s. The NYT, LAT and company are just mouth pieces for this radical fringe. That brings me to my next point I read somewhere that 90% of journalists identify themselves as liberals and we know responsibility and Liberal go together much like water and oil

flag desecration falls by one vote

© 2006 FOX News Network, LLC

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

(Excerpt)

WASHINGTON — A constitutional amendment to ban flag desecration fell one vote short of the 67-vote threshold needed for Senate passage and referral to the states.

The proposed amendment, sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, read: "The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States."

The amendment did not seek to ban flag burning. It sought to give Congress the constitutional authority to define flag desecration and ban that behavior in the future. The careful language was an attempt to get around two Supreme Court rulings in 1989 and 1990 that called flag burning and other desecration protected free speech under the First Amendment.

The vote, one week before Independence Day, is the closest backers have ever come to passage. The previous Senate vote, on March 29, 2000, failed on a vote of 63-37. Last year, the House surpassed the two-thirds threshold to pass the amendment 286-130...

Read Article here

Being a veteran this saddens me greatly, many people have died protecting this country and the Flag represent their sacrifice. To allow people to burn it, shit on it, piss on it and soil it is nothing but a slap in the face of all those that have come before and after me serving this country.
Here is how the Senate voted. Please note all the traitors to our servicemen and woman and make sure you write them to tell them to get their act together.


My senators happened to split on this vote, being that Senator Stabenow is up for reelection this election cycle she voted for it. Senator Levin is safe till 2008 so he is hoping we forget about this slap in our face by then. The reason I think this was the case is because the Democrats and Republicans both know that the average citizen wants this amendment. So those that are up for reelection will do whatever they have to do, in order to dupe those of us that do not pay attention much throughout the years till it is close to voting again. It is maddening and these people should not be rewarded with their jobs.

As always this is my opinion disagree if you must I look forward to hearing from you.



Sunday, June 25, 2006

Paying a monthly bill to watch TV? Why would you do such a stupid thing?

I know you all have probably seen these satellite TV’s for your PC. I have it linked to the left hand side as I really enjoy my service. I decided to write about my experience with it tonight as I am just getting off of my second job. So I will start at the beginning maybe you will like to check it out yourself, it is quite crazy to be honest that this is legal and works.

I bought my software package 3 months ago I think, time flies when you are having fun after all. Anyway I wasn’t really sure if I wanted it as I was paying for digital cable already and I loved that. I loved the DVR that came with the cable and was able to get rid of that crappy VCR I had from 20 years ago. I found the site I linked to at that time, it was cheap, about $110 cheaper than I was paying for my cable bill each month. I had just worked some over time and seeing I get to keep the overtime pay for what I want I figured I would give this a try.

So I did some searching the site I have to the left was the cheapest for what was being offered, so I figured I would go with them,. Being that it was only $40 instead of $50 or the one site wanted $150, the $40 fit right in with what I had extra in my check so it was a perfect fit. If Uncle Sam didn’t take out so much I would have had more to play with, unfortunately they always seem to get theirs. Anyway I bought the package and was able to get it within 5 min so I was excited.

I took the next 15 minutes I was setup and ready to go. Boy was it cool! I am a tech geek from the word go and wow. I had literally 2000 channels at my finger tips. I was watching TV in France, granted I couldn’t understand a damn word of it but I had the channel. I was able to get all my favorite channels I had on cable plus some that I had only heard about form friends living over seas. No more waiting for some soccer game to come on, yes I am a soccer fan never been good at playing it but I do like it a habit I picked up from my friends in Italy when I was in the service. Got side track again didn’t I? Sorry have that habit when talking about something I enjoy.

So there I was with 2000 channels, paying only $40 for it. I was paying $140 to have 200 channels on cable, phone, and internet. I of course didn’t have my DVR but that wasn’t an issue as I was almost positive I could find someone that had one. Which of course I did and you can find them here. They offer many solutions to DVR’s for PC as well as normal DVR’s for your home TV’s.

If you are really paying a monthly bill for your TV, check these guys out. If you are like me it will save you $500 or more the first year! I know I can do a lot more with that $500 than giving it to the cable company.

These guys that are selling the program to get satellite on your PC say their rates are going to rise so check it out and get in on the deal while you can. Even if it does go up I would more than be happy to pay $150 for this system as it is saving me more than that within 6 months.


You can follow the links in this post or just click on the left hand side and follow that link. Do not worry you can get your money back if you are not happy with this, not sure why you wouldn't be absolutely overjoyed with saving money and getting more channels than you can shake a stick at, but you can get your money back in full if that is the case.

One last thing if you purchase this through my Blog here I will give you $10 dollars in your pay pal account after 60 days of you purchasing it, just send me a copy of the receipt to my email after the 60 days and I will send you $10, so it will cost you just $30 to get free TV! That is how sure I am that you will love this. I am willing to put my money where my mouth is. As always feel free to drop me a line and tell me how much you just love your free TV. I know my family and I just love it, so much we had to go and get a bigger Monitor so we can watch it while sitting on the couch.

Thursday, June 22, 2006

Choosing your Poison, Choosing your business Opportunity

I have worked my 9-5 job for the last 13 years; I know that I am like millions of other that are trying to break that daily grind. There is one popular alternative to this life style, which is looking for a business opportunity that turns you from an employee into a self-employed entrepreneur running your very own business.

I can see many good reasons why to make this move, it is a wise one in my honest opinion. Being your own boss means you can set your own hours. This can is the number one reason I have set to task as I have 2 small children and a wife I would like to spend more time with. Another good reason is that working from home can save you some valuable time, if your alternative is driving back and forth two or three hours a day to work. The last one and probably most important is you make a whole lot more working for your self than you do someone else.

I guess I am saying that being your own boss gives you a very valuable commodity called freedom. You are free from being someone else’s employee, and return you get to be responsible for your own future. As a self-employed entrepreneur you are free to do many of things I stated above, set your own hours, establish your own work habits, choose what you will and will not do for work, create your own products, find your own customers, and do whatever it takes to make those customers happy.

The most important aspect of working for yourself is that you are free to set your own prices. You get to choose how much you make or how little income you generate. You will not have anyone to answer too, unless like me and you have a wife that is curious at everything you are doing, other than yourself, suppliers and the taxman. Who is always there, in life only two constant Death and taxes, remember those as they will be forever in your life.

**There two alternatives I have found to getting started**

The two ways I have found through my research are quite obvious. The First is probably the most rash and not all of us are able to do this. Quit your day job and launch yourself fully into the new venture. The second is to continue on with your current employment and develop your business on the side, in whatever spare time you can find. I will call the first one “Pissing off the spouse” and the second I will call “Getting no sleep but saving your marriage” nah just kidding ha-ha. Just need to separate them while we discuss each.

Depending on your point of view, taking the first strategy can be either an act of courage or just plain reckless behavior. Unless you happen to be one of the top 2% of people in the world who are independently wealthy, planning and timing are extremely important with this approach. The reason should be obvious, once you leave your current employer your source of income will be gone and you will have very limited time to make your business work before the bills come a calling. It is truly “sink or swim” and you can sink pretty fast without a source of income, I know trust me it is painful.

This means that you need to plan the changeover to self-employed very carefully. Everyone will have a different situation. My aunt was able to step from her bus driving job into a private transportation business because the last six months of her employment she spent her time developing leads and contacts within the community. When she finally struck out on her own she had customers waiting and was able to more than double her income the very first year. I was shocked at how many parents couldn’t get to school to pick up their kids!

Unfortunately majority of us are not this lucky. We do not have the quality leads or specialized skills. Most of us cannot take the opportunity to use our present employment to build that launching pad of potential customers before we take off into the wonderful world of self-employment. However most of us are starting with very few ideas, not so defined skills, and a limited income. So our leap into self-employment had better take off within the next few months are we are likely to find a job at the local burger place or worst still return to our previous employer.

This is why I think the Second option is the best approach for most of the newly self-employed entrepreneurs, the second option lets you test your idea, develop your unique skills and build your business slowly. If you happen to be unsure about the products or services you are going to sell, this approach lets you try different product lines and see how well they fit with your overall objectives and abilities. It is often that our first ideas are not realistic, or there just happens to be no market for the services they want to provide. Or you find that you cannot charge enough to make any money with the products or services you have chosen.

**Choose your product carefully**

Like all new entrepreneurs, whether you like the first “piss the spouse off” or “Take your time and make a happy home” approach you should be very tight fisted with your resources, they are limited after all and you should not invest serious capital into a product or business idea till you have taken the time to thoroughly check it out. I have some suggestions on how to do this:

1. Talk to people who are already selling the product or service.

2. Establish the credibility of the person or company providing the product or service.

3. Make sure the company provides on-going support for their product(s).

4. Make sure there are no hidden or unexpected costs (such as franchise fees) that will eat away your profits.

This applies to everything you are looking at, whether it is an online product such as an MLM or affiliate scheme, or a more traditional product or service aimed at your neighbors or local customers as it were.

I can point to a few examples in the world where this holds true. Steve Jobs and Bill Gates started out in their garage, now look where they are today? My Aunt started out driving for the school land today she has her own employees and garage. Almost every millionaire today took some steps to secure that future for them. What is holding you back?

These are some rare instances I know, in the world of “business opportunities” many claim to have made millions and taken the “bull by the horns”. But many of the cases have never made their idea actually work and are floundering around doing what they hate the most.

Any successful entrepreneur will tell you, the choices you make in products will determine if you fail or succeed. Many of the ideas out there are bogus with no hope of working, and many others are purely designed to make maximum profits for their creators and small profit for people like you and me who choose to sell them. So no matter how hard you work; how committed you are to making it “big”, if you happen to choose the wrong product you will be doomed to failure. As they say try, try, try again till you do succeed. So do not take this to heart as many successful entrepreneurs have failed 3 times or more before finally making those cool millions

Senate Rejects Call to Withdraw Troops

I have to say I agree with the results of these two votes, it is about time the Democrats realize that we need to finish the work we started in Iraq. This is not the 1970’s and the Democrats do not have a monopoly on the information that gets out through the media. I am sure it is much to their dismay as it would just be easier for them if Americans “We Plebs” Were as stupid and blind and just followed the crap they spew from day to day.

Luckily for us we do have other media outlets that put the word out and without the typical liberal spin. This however was not the case during the Vietnam War, which the Democrats are quick to make comparisons too mind your, the anti-war movement then had whatever access they needed to bring down the US. The results are apparent, even the Generals of the North Vietnamese admit they were loosing the war and just held out for the anti-war crowd to change public opinion. Which we know is what happened, never have we seen such a successful attempt to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

David Horowitz, who helped to organize the first campus demonstration against the war at the University of California, Berkeley in 1962, has reflected on this tragedy

“Every testimony by North Vietnamese generals in the postwar years has affirmed that they knew they could not defeat the United States on the battlefield, and that they counted on the division of our people at home to win the war for them. This is what happened. The blood of hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese, and tens of thousands of Americans, is on the hands of the anti-war activists who prolonged the struggle and gave victory to the Communists...and we wanted them to win.” You can find this info

HERE

This is exactly what our glorious Senators, Kerry, Reid, and Levin, tried to accomplish today. Thankfully we have enough Senators that know better and knew that this would have given the signal to the insurgents that we are going to tuck tale and run. Especially after what happened the other day with those two young men, May god have mercy on their souls, my prayers go out to their families that they might find some peace in their time of grief.

You should know this, that if the Senate would have had voted in favor of either of these bills, we would have embolden the terrorists and shown them we do not have the fortitude to stand a few gruesome deaths. It would have been Mogadishu all over again and that one act inspired Bin Laden to attack us on our home soil. Who could know what would have been inspired in some other murderer had the Senate voted in favor of ending our presence in Iraq after this tragedy.

I do agree that we need to bring the troops home, but only after the mission is completed. If the military starts to take those of us with bum feet, I will be standing in that line to sign back up and go back into active duty. Till the day they take handicapped people I will have to be content in knowing that there are people that have stronger character than Senator Kerry, Reid and Levin willing to protect my rights to write this and their right to speak what they will.

These are my thoughts on this matter you can find this story Here

Greetings

Hello there, this is Talad and this will become my home for a time.

I will post my thoughts on everything going on the world, local, and national. I live in the United States and I have an opinion on just about everything. I work in the automotive field, currently attending college for a second degree into Internet and LAN Security. I am getting tired of dealing with the car makers as it were.

I am a father of two and have a very loving wife, We live in the Michigan and enjoy the summer months, the winters are getting to be a bit to much on my old bones so we might be moving south to warmer climates.

I look forward to giving you my thoughts, I am sure there will be some that disagree with me and others that agree. I welcome all comments and we might get into a pissing match if we disagree sharply enough.

I will begin posting my initial thoughts later today after I get home. I am so looking forward to this