It's Not Easy Being Green

By Joe Eaton:
Limousines, the very symbol of wealth and excess, are usually the domain of corporate executives and the rich. But the number of limos owned by Uncle Sam increased by 73 percent during the first two years of the Obama administration, according to an analysis of records by iWatch News.

Most of the increase was recorded in Hillary Clinton’s State Department.

Obama administration officials said most of the increase reflects an enhanced effort to protect diplomats and other government officials in a dangerous world. But a watchdog group says the abundance of limos sends the wrong message in the midst of a budget crisis. The increase in limos comes to light on the heels of an executive order from President Obama last week that charges agencies to increase the fuel efficiency of their fleets.

According to General Services Administration data , the number of limousines in the federal fleet increased from 238 in fiscal 2008, the last year of the George W. Bush administration, to 412 in 2010. Much of the 73 percent increase—111 of the 174 additional limos—took place in fiscal 2009, more than eight months of which corresponded with Obama’s first year in office. However, some of those purchases could reflect requests made by the Bush administration during an appropriations process that would have begun in the spring of 2008.

The department said it defines a limo as a vehicle that carries a VIP or “other protectee,” rather than by the type of car, but said most of its limos are Cadillac DTSs, which cost the taxpayer more than $60,000 for a 2011 base model and support the additional weight of armoring. The department said it also purchased a limited number of 7-Series BMWs for ambassadors in countries where vehicles are right-hand drive.

LET THEN EAT CAKE

Hail Mr. Transparent

OK so I'm beating a dead horse-Barack Obama promised to have the most open and transparent administration of all time.  Perhaps we should call Mister Obama, Mr. Orwell.  It's seems that almost everything uttered out of the man is Newspeak.  Totally opposite of what he promises.

If he is not banning the Boston Herald reporter from the fundraiser in Boston he is locking reporters in closets.
President Obama also has a penchant for punishing whistleblowers.
One case is that of former NSA senior director Thomas Drake.
The Justice Department’s indictment narrows the frame around Drake’s actions, focussing almost exclusively on his handling of what it claims are five classified documents. But Drake sees his story as a larger tale of political reprisal, one that he fears the government will never allow him to air fully in court. “I’m a target,” he said. “I’ve got a bull’s-eye on my back.” He continued, “I did not tell secrets. I am facing prison for having raised an alarm, period. I went to a reporter with a few key things: fraud, waste, and abuse, and the fact that there were legal alternatives to the Bush Administration’s ‘dark side’ ”—in particular, warrantless domestic spying by the N.S.A.
The indictment portrays him not as a hero but as a treacherous man who violated “the government trust.” Drake said of the prosecutors, “They can say what they want. But the F.B.I. can find something on anyone.”

When President Barack Obama took office, in 2009, he championed the cause of government transparency, and spoke admiringly of whistle-blowers, whom he described as “often the best source of information about waste, fraud, and abuse in government.” But the Obama Administration has pursued leak prosecutions with a surprising relentlessness. Including the Drake case, it has been using the Espionage Act to press criminal charges in five alleged instances of national-security leaks—more such prosecutions than have occurred in all previous Administrations combined. The Drake case is one of two that Obama’s Justice Department has carried over from the Bush years.
Gabriel Schoenfeld, a conservative political scientist at the Hudson Institute, who, in his book “Necessary Secrets” (2010), argues for more stringent protection of classified information, says, “Ironically, Obama has presided over the most draconian crackdown on leaks in our history—even more so than Nixon.”

How About An Office Of Sanity.

From KATU.com

PORTLAND, Ore. – Mayor Sam Adams wants to create a new city agency to provide more equity for minorities to the tune of a half-million dollars.

But the city already has an Office of Human Relations that works to eliminate discrimination and bigotry in the city. There is also a Diversity Development and Affirmative Action Office that works on equity issues in city employment. Even still, Adams says the city needs an Office of Equity.

The Coalition of Communities of Color, which did the study, says whites, on average, made $33,095 last year and people of color made $16,636 in Multnomah County.

It also found only 7 percent of whites here don’t graduate high school compared to 30 percent of minorities.

But how will the mayor’s new Office of Equity help?

“Well, we don’t know,” Adams said.

But he said that is why he wants the new office.

“So in terms of what is the Office of Equity going to do? Fundamentally, is figure out why Portlanders of color are actually seeing an increasing gap between white Portlanders, why that is and what we can do about it,” Adams said.

“It’s not a lot of money but obviously if you’re trying to make things more equitable that’s always a good thing,” said Marcus Pack with Reggie’s Barber Shop.

Perhaps the problem is that these people don't think that a half a million dollars a year is a lot of money.

Is Saudi Arabia Next?

From Press TV.

Anti-government protesters in Qatif are calling for human rights reforms, freedom of expression and the release of political prisoners.

They are also calling for the immediate withdrawal of Saudi troops from neighboring Bahrain.

After dispersing the protesters by force, Saudi troops attacked several homes in the city and arrested many people. They also destroyed vehicles parked in the streets.

Saudi Arabia's east has been the scene of anti-government protests over the past months.

"As the list of Saudi political prisoners grows longer, the silence of the US and the EU becomes more deafening," Christoph Wilcke, a senior Middle East researcher at HRW, said in the statement.

A Saudi-based human rights group had earlier reported that Saudi authorities have arrested 100 protesters for taking part or organizing anti-government demonstrations.

Human Rights First Society (HRFS) also revealed that some of the detainees were subject to torture both physically and mentally.

Come on Herr Hillary isn't it time we dropped a few humanitarian love bombs on Saudi Arabia in order to protect the "freedom fighters".

Planes Bad, Trains Good.

TOH- The No Agenda Show.

Woo, Woo- Don't forget May 7th. is NATIONAL TRAIN DAY!
If you are in the New York area on that day you can join Gladys Knight at the Beacon Theatre to help America celebrate National Train Day and AMTRAK's 40th aniversity for only $65-$200.
They have teamed up with Boys & Girls Clubs of America to present the Rock'n the Rail Way concert. However your ticket price is not tax deductible (What's up with that?)

I have commented before that there is a full court press in this country for overly expensive, unwanted high-speed rail. Often cited when trying to sell this turd are the Chinese and Japanese high speed "successes". Well, not so fast.


BEIJING — China’s expanding network of ultramodern high-speed trains has come under growing scrutiny here over costs and because of concerns that builders ignored safety standards in the quest to build faster trains in record time.


Last week, the new leadership at the Railways Ministry announced that to enhance safety, the top speed of all trains was being decreased from about 218 mph to 186. Without elaborating, the ministry called the safety situation “severe” and said it was launching safety checks along the entire network of tracks.
The Finance Ministry said last week that the Railways Ministry continued to lose money in the first quarter of this year. The ministry’s debt stands at $276 billion, almost all borrowed from Chinese banks.

“They’ve taken on a massive amount of debt to build it,” said Patrick Chovanec, who teaches at Tsinghua University. He said China accelerated construction of the high-speed rail network — including 295 sleek glass-and-marble train stations — as part of the country’s stimulus spending in response to the 2008 global financial crisis.

Zhao Jian, a professor at Beijing Jiaotong University and a longtime critic of high-speed rail, said he worries that the cost of the project might have created a hidden debt bomb that threatens China’s banking system.

“In China, we will have a debt crisis — a high-speed rail debt crisis,” he said. “I think it is more serious than your subprime mortgage crisis. You can always leave a house or use it. The rail system is there. It’s a burden. You must operate the rail system, and when you operate it, the cost is very high.”

It turns out that the ticket sales are not high enough to even service the debt. In other words pay the interest on the money borrowed to build these wonderful new trains. And this is what Obama is trying to convince us we need.

See Something, Say Something?

The Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced the expansion of the Dept.'s national "If You See Something, Say Something" campaign to hundreds of Walmart stores cross the country-launching a new partnership between DHS and Walmart to help the American public play an active role in ensuring the safety and security of our nation.

More than 230 Walmart stores nationwide launched the "If You See Something, Say Something" campaign today, with a total of 588 Walmart stores in 27 states joining in the coming weeks. A short video message will play at select checkout locations to remind shoppers to contact local law enforcement to report suspicious activity.



The above video will appear at Walmarts that have video screens at checkout counters.
Does this remind any of you of the 1984 telescreens?

Planes Bad, Trains Good.

From The Dvorak Uncensored Blog.

The push for high-speed rail is on. While making a simple trip to the airport as expensive and humiliating as possible Obama and gang are tossing out millions to those that will spend the money on developing high-speed rail.
One of the main selling points of the rail is that you can avoid the nude scanners and strip searches. But wait I guess that Home Land Security Czar Nappy Napolitano didn't get the message. To quote her, “[Terrorists] are going to continue to probe the system and try to find a way through,” Napolitano said in an interview that aired Monday night on "Charlie Rose."

“I think the tighter we get on aviation, we have to also be thinking now about going on to mass transit or to trains or maritime. So, what do we need to be doing to strengthen our protections there?”
Napolitano isn’t the only one who’s suggested that advanced scanning machines could be used in places beyond airports.

Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, introduced legislation this past September that would authorize testing of body scanners at some federal buildings.

PERS-Don't look over here.

The Oregonian is reporting that: "Oregon's Public Employee Retirement System is going to court to try to overturn a decision by the state's top lawyer and keep the names and pension benefits of its best-paid retirees a secret.'

Earlier this month, Kroger's office ordered PERS to release records to The Oregonian of all PERS-covered retirees whose annual retirement benefits exceed $100,000. The Oregonian argues that the public has an overriding interest in learning about individual benefits because they are stacking up as one of the most critical public finance issues of the decade.

PERS has hired outside counsel and filed for an injunction with the Marion County Circuit Court seeking to block release of the information.

It is highly unusual for a state agency to hire outside counsel and spend the money to appeal an order from its own legal adviser. The public records statute does provide for that process, though legal experts were puzzled why the agency, rather than the pensioners themselves, would seek to keep the information private.

Oregon PERS, however, has long argued that such disclosures would constitute "an unreasonable invasion of privacy" and be "highly offensive" to a reasonable individual.

That last line is very informative.  If revealing to the people who pay for your retirement compensation is indeed "highly offensive" then perhaps you do not feel that you can defend that largess.

Boondoggle in the Motor City: Detroit's Train to Nowhere

$500 million for a light rail train to nowhere. This is the stimulus. This is the infrastructure rebuild. This is what hope and change really looks like.
Toh-Dvorak Uncensored.

The Art Of Wasting Money.

STEEL WORK | $100,000 sculpture adorns city’s new bridge

By Mark Baker

The Register-Guard

Appeared in print: Friday, Sep 10, 2010

It’s 30 feet tall and made of seven red metal poles — jutting toward the sky at different angles — that support a shimmering net of stainless steel cables and reflective disks.

It’s Eugene’s latest public sculpture.

But what, if anything, does it represent?

“That’s part of the attraction — what the hell is that thing?” said Tim Smith, a member of the city of Eugene’s public art committee, who served on the selection committee for the above referenced piece, titled “Bountiful” by its creator, Dexter artist Lee Imonen.

The $100,000 art project, intended to honor Native American net and weir fishing in the Northwest and part of the city’s new $5.6 million Delta Ponds pedestrian and bicycle bridge, was paid for with federal stimulus money.

The city received $1.2 million in stimulus money to help pay for the bridge that crosses Delta Highway just north of Valley River Center. But when bids for the bridge came back much lower than initially estimated, the city was faced with having to hand back to the federal government some of the earmarked stimulus money, according to city civil engineer Michelle Cahill. Instead of returning a portion of the funds, the city decided to look at adding elements it previously had thought it could not afford for the project.

Although the city has an ordinance requiring that 1 percent of costs for public construction projects be allocated for art, it does not apply to transportation-related projects, said Isaac Marquez, the city’s public art program manager.

So art was not initially considered for the Delta Ponds bridge project that is scheduled to open for use in November and will be publicly dedicated by city officials Saturday, he said.

Faced with having to send some of the stimulus money back, the city decided to apply to the federal government to use the excess stimulus money for a sculpture, an island crossing for pedestrians and bicyclists on Goodpasture Island Road, better lighting for the bridge, and powder-coated railings, according to Cahill.

Let me get this right.  The money strapped City of Eugene not only builds a bike-pedestrian bridge for $5.6 million that we don't need but also wastes $100,000 on this piece of crap that they don't have to because they don't want to give back any of the "stimulus"money from the feds.  Believe me the next time the City cries poor mouth this issue will come up.