Think Progress

ThinkFast: July 17, 2006

By Think Progress on Jul 17th, 2006 at 9:05 am

ThinkFast: July 17, 2006


Several suspected Hezbollah rockets hit the northern Israeli city of Haifa today. The sixth day of the brewing conflict in the Middle East witnessed Israeli ground troops briefly entering southern Lebanon to attack Hezbollah bases on the border. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan called for the deployment of international forces to stop the violence. Meanwhile, G8 leaders “crafted a plan to stop the fighting.”

In “one of the bloodiest incidents in Iraq this year,” a bomber attacked a market just outside Baghdad today. Officials put the death toll as low as 40 and as high as 70.

Journalist Akbar Ganji, Iran’s “most prominent dissident,” said the war in Iraq has hurt his country’s reform movement by giving its regime an excuse to stifle dissent. “What has happened in Iraq did not support our movement in any significant way,” he said.

Four years after the G-8 nations pledged “$20 billion over 10 years to prevent terrorists from obtaining nuclear materials, only $3.5 billion has been donated — and far less has been used to secure enriched uranium, the key ingredient of a nuclear weapon.”

A $600 million shortfall at the Department of Housing and Urban Development is hurting local agencies that are “already struggling to meet community needs for affordable housing.” On top of the shortfall, President Bush has eliminated $1.7 billion in public housing funds since he took office.

The Bush administration “plans sweeping changes in Medicare payments to hospitals that could cut payments by 20 to 30 percent for many complex treatments and new technologies,” a move that doctors and patients’ groups believe “could be devastating.”

Nearly a year after Hurricane Katrina, “federal aid is finally starting to flow into the hands of people in Mississippi and Louisiana who lost their houses.” “The money is widely considered the most important single factor in rebuilding the still-ruined landscapes of New Orleans and the other devastated Gulf areas of the two states.”

University of Colorado biologists are installing a global warming alarm system near Boulder. “Like the alarm systems in your car or home, this one is designed to detect intruders. But in this case, the invaders are tundra plants moving up from lower elevations in response to global warming.”

The Arizona Voter Reward Act, a proposal to “award $1 million in every general election to one lucky resident, chosen by lottery, simply for voting” has qualified for the ballot, along with other initiatives such as a minimum wage increase.

And finally: A microphone picked up President Bush’s private conversations with other world leaders at the G8 summit. Bush on Putin’s flight home: “You eight hours? Me too. Russia’s a big country and you’re a big country. … Russia’s big and so is China.” Bush on Blair’s departure: “Yo Blair, what’re you doing? Are you leaving?” “Bush also remarked that some of the speakers at the meeting had the tendency to talk too long.”

What did we miss? Let us know in the comments section.




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29 Responses to “ThinkFast: July 17, 2006”

  1. Jack Says:

    I love this new American century


  2. Evil Spaniard Says:

    And finally: A microphone picked up President Bush’s private conversations with other world leaders at the G8 summit. Bush on Putin’s flight home: “You eight hours? Me too. Russia’s a big country and you’re a big country. … Russia’s big and so is China.” Bush on Blair’s departure: “Yo Blair, what’re you doing? Are you leaving?” “Bush also remarked that some of the speakers at the meeting had the tendency to talk too long.”

    His peanut brain hurts if someone talks to him say, long sentences or polysyllabic words?


  3. Subway Serenade Says:

    Still the most important news of the month is the Busby/Bilbray CA/50 HAND COUNT. This will be the first real audit of a Black Box Vote, and although in this case there are cusstody issues involving "sleepovers" that rendered the voting machines "Unsecured" in accordance with California law, I believe that when the HAND COUNT is finished, (Don't fall for the spin that says this is a recount.) Busby will have won this special election and both Diebold and Sequoia will be taken to task nationwide in time for the 06 election.

    Stay tuned to Bradblog

    there must be 50 ways to dump the Dubya


  4. koalablue Says:

    Another from GWB

    See the irony is that what they need to do is get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this s--- and it's over," Bush told Blair as he chewed on a buttered roll.

    See GWB is clever he can talk as well as eat


  5. Evil Spaniard Says:

    #4 See GWB is clever he can talk as well as eat

    Comment by koalablue — July 17, 2006 @ 9:36 am

    Nah. You've demonstrated that he can talk with his mouth full, but you provided no proof that he was thinking (anyone surprised when he chocked with pretzels?). And putting publicly shit, Hezbollah and Syria isn't very clever in a diplomatic meeting to solve it, after all.


  6. Evil Spaniard Says:

    Correction to #5: And putting publicly in the same sentence shit, Hezbollah and Syria isn’t very clever in a diplomatic meeting to solve it, after all.


  7. EasyRider Says:

    http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Usa/Med/Lbfm.html

    Check the weights of these things. The delivery is not by missles! It is by truck, Aircraft, or ship.

    Why is everyone getting stupid on these weapons? They are not going to make them in their garage or corner work shop.

    What we need is to get all the current weapons collected and destroyed. Then the terrorists and stupids can't get their hands on them.


  8. koalablue Says:

    Evil Spaniard...

    I was just trying to highlite GWB lack of Statesman like skills. The eating and talking.

    He could also equally do the same as the Syrians talking to Hezbollah, by talking to Isreal to "stop this shit"


  9. Evil Spaniard Says:

    Exactly, koalablue :)


  10. Doodle Bug Says:

    Every headline on this page is Irans fault according to Bush


  11. beavercleaver Says:

    With the world exploding/imploding, and generally a psychotic mess, all the decider wanted to do was talk to the press about "pig". What a leader of the last superpower...what a pig diplomat, talkin' pig smack when half the world is offended by the pigs, smack, and the decider.

    Insensitive, clueless, I'm hoping the moron doesn't get WW 3 goin' before the world can get him to the much deserved gallows. All hat and no cattle...all smart ass, and no intelligence. Sure hope the GOP are proud of the dimest bulb in a scary, bedarkened world.

    Never has the US of A been so insignificant on the world stage. With flame throwers like Bolton, Hughes and Darth, and the nitwit Rumy, and shit talk about winning nuclear wars, there may not be a need to worry about Diebold machines! Oh well, throw another pig in the pit, the Jews aren't pissed off at us yet...or, are they?


  12. dlet Says:

    "Wow! Brazil is big." —George W. Bush, after being shown a map of Brazil by Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Brasilia, Brazil, Nov. 6, 2005

    “You eight hours? Me too. Russia’s a big country and you’re a big country. … Russia’s big and so is China.”

    Our president....sigh. At least he is learning something during his presidency. I wonder if he knows about Canada yet?


  13. koalablue Says:

    Bush on Putin’s flight home: “You eight hours? Me too. Russia’s a big country and you’re a big country.....

    Otherwise it doesn't make sense


  14. Jason M. Hendler Says:

    Jacque Chirac is borrowing one of Richard Pryor's jokes:

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5181080.stm

    Here Jacques tries to scare the world into helping Africa with the threat of African refugees flooding the countries of the world, so we have to develop their economies to keep them in Africa.

    Anyone here remember Richard Pryor's skit, in which he was portraying a black activist holding a telethon to raise money for African Americans? The final joke of the skit, was that the telethon phones weren't ringing through the whole telethon, until he announced the "Back to Africa" movement, in which all money would be used to return all African Americans back to Africa, and then all the phones rang off the hook.

    Jacque Chirac seems to be using the same joke, except it is the "Keep them in Africa" movement.


  15. Jay Randal Says:

    Israel Controls The US Government
    Monday 17th of July 2006
    by Jay Randal

    "Every time we do something you tell me America will do this and will do that ... I want to tell you something very clear: Don't worry about American pressure on Israel. We, the Jewish people, control America, and the Americans know it." ( Israeli PM Ariel Sharon, 10-3-01, boast to Shimon Peres.)

    Former Israeli PM Sharon made the above remarks to Shimon Peres during a Kol Yisrael radio program claiming the US is controlled by Israael's government?

    Israel last week carried out a pre-planned attack on Lebanon, laying the blame for the hostilities on Syria and Iran, therefore to justify their war of aggression?

    The US corporate media/press are being manipulated to foist Israel's propaganda onto the gullible public to convince them that Israel is threatened by Syria/Iran?

    While the Bush Administration echoes Israel's pablum that Hezbollah terrorists are directly employed by the Syrian/Iranian governments to attack Israel's people?

    Why do members of the US Congress allow themselves to be purchased by Israel and forced to defend them too?

    ( Jay Randal, political activist and writer in Stone Mountain, Georgia.)


  16. Clyde the Ripper Says:

    The G8 bunch resolved to stop the violence in the Middle East by bad mouthing Israel but now where did I see that Mouth Full Of Shit Bush was going to stop the violence by bringing our troops home. Not only does he talk shit, he talks it out of both sides of his mouth.


  17. koalablue Says:

    The BBC's Heba Saleh in Damascus says Iran and Syria have a strong strategic alliance, based on what they see as their resistance to America's attempts to impose its agenda on the region.

    Diplomats in Syria say the country feels strengthened by Tehran's support and knows that the US would want to prevent a wider conflict involving Iran, our correspondent says.

    Seems a surprising statement from the BBC


  18. Rebel With A Cause Says:

    JAY RANDALL

    You are right on, once again.

    MEXICAN ELECTION UPDATE

    The IFE finally got around to it and discovered the fact that 20 and 50 peso notes were being handed out in precincts for people to vote for Calderon.

    Over 1 million marched yesterday in Mexico City for a recount.

    Oh how I wish we had a president worthy of the name.


  19. jules Says:

    Oh how I wish we had a president worthy of the name.

    Comment by Rebel With A Cause — July 17, 2006 @ 10:32

    AMEN!!!!


  20. Jay Randal Says:

    Post 18 > Thanks Rebel > keep us all posted about Mexico > Obrador is the real winner, but the Mexican elite and the Bush Regime want Calderon crowned as stooge president!


  21. Rebel With A Cause Says:

    Absolutely correct Jay Randall.

    Rove, or the RNC, or someone dispatched many bodies down here to throw money around and try and influence the election.

    The last poll before the election had Obrador ahead by 3 points. He lost by less than a half point. It is plain to see that something went wrong. Oh yeah, and the exit polls down here had Obrador the winner.


  22. MH Says:

    Preznit moron strikes again.


  23. madashell Says:

    THIS IS HOW ITS DONE!!!!!!

    July 16, 2006 | Downtown Mexico City swelled with an estimated 1.1 million people who arrived for "peaceful civil resistance" Sunday to force a vote-by-vote recount of ballots cast in their presidential election. The rally was the latest in a two-week electoral crisis expected to last two months while a special elections court hears Lopez Obrador's fraud allegations and decides whether to conduct a recount.


  24. Ho Chi Minh Says:

    More homeless people in Amerika so we can export democracy in Iraq.


  25. Isabella Says:

    The BBC’s Heba Saleh in Damascus says Iran and Syria have a strong strategic alliance, based on what they see as their resistance to America’s attempts to impose its agenda on the region.

    I agree!!


  26. Editor Says:

    Good roundup!


  27. Sharon Cox Says:

    Great post Jay....


  28. Ass Tight Ass Ass Worship Says:

    Ass Tight Ass Ass Worship

    I can not agree with you in 100% regarding some thoughts, but you got good point of view


  29. car alarm system Says:

    car alarm system

    Good post. I am looking into these issues on my blog.



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