News You May Have Missed

[Wingfoot]

It's Official: Missouri’s I-70 Survival
May Take Public-Private Partnership

Members of the Missouri’s Joint Committee on Transportation said the conversation about Interstate 70’s future is just beginning. Repairing the interstate across Missouri will require between $2 billion and $4 billion — money the state doesn’t have today, and doesn’t know how it’s going to get.

Although no bill has been introduced, Missouri Transportation Director Kevin Keith suggests MoDOT agree to a long-term lease-type contract with a private company that would rebuild the highway at it's expense. Then the private owner could charge tolls (15¢/mile on cars and 45¢/mile on trucks) to those using the 252 mile long Missouri span in order to recover it's costs.

According to an independent British newspaper editor, in the not-so-distant future, English drivers will be charged based upon the number of miles they drive, as is being done step-by-step in America.

On 12 January 2012, Mike Robinson, the editor of the UK Column explained, “'Road charging,' as it is called in England, is widespread, as fiber optic cable has been laid along most English roads to help track vehicle travel by the mile so drivers can be charged."

“It has been on the European Union agenda for quite a long time,” he added.

His comments came amid recent news of a radical plan to raise $200 billion by privatizing “the motorway network,” as Brits call it. The plan was presented to the three main political parties by NM Rothschild, the influential privately-owned investment bank, British news sources say.

The Rothschild bank, called “an architect of several privatizations,” reportedly made it's pitch in the weeks running up to the summer recess back on July 21, 2009. Bankers told leading politicians that the sale of the roads overseen by the [public] Highways Agency—all motorways and most “big trunk roads”—could help revive battered public finances. This is the same story Americans are being told.

True to form, toll-road companies and “infrastructure funds” would compete to operate and maintain stretches of the British toll network.

And how did U.S. politicians get the idea that privatizing roads was an acceptable future? Two words: Goldman Sachs, according to noted Texas columnist Ed Wallace.

“Yes, large Wall Street investment banks, led by the Rothschild family-owned Goldman Sachs, started advising states across the nation on how to raise fast money by diverting the most necessary publicly owned assets—roads—into public-private ownership,” wrote Wallace. “You have to admit, it’s brilliant, because it’s a forced and guaranteed market: Americans can’t get out of driving.”

And as Daniel Schulman and James Ridgeway wrote in a scathing article, “The Highwaymen,” in January 2007, “Many similar deals are now on the horizon, and MIG and Cintra are often part of them. So is Goldman Sachs, the huge Wall Street firm that has played a remarkable role advising states on how to structure privatization deals — even while positioning itself to invest in the toll road market.”

These swindlers do seem deserving of a special place in Hell. - Wingfoot.

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[TheCableVine]

I don't see anything good coming out of this. 15 cents a mile is quite a bit for an individual but 45 cents a mile for truckers is major. They already have slim margins as it is and even though the costs will be passed on to consumers sometimes you can't pass on all the costs.

I'm predicting this will fail.

[daman1]

I don't see anything good coming out of this. 15 cents a mile is quite a bit for an individual but 45 cents a mile for truckers is major. They already have slim margins as it is and even though the costs will be passed on to consumers sometimes you can't pass on all the costs.

I'm predicting this will fail.

I hope it fails but I'm not sure it will. I-80 has already been privatized in Indiana and Illinois. No one liked the idea at the time but the law allowing it passed anyways. Illinois sold their part for billions and squandered the money within months. Indiana has done better with it's billions and has a surplus. Not sure about Illinois but the fairs only went up a little so far in Indiana. I hate the whole concept of toll roads really. I remember my dad bitching when I was a kid that the state had promised in the 1950's to end the tolls when the cost of the construction had been off-set. Never happened of course and now its leased out for the next 60yrs. I avoided it when I could but the terms of the lease to an Australian corporation required the state not build any new competing roads. It's a captive audience. It'll probably work great until the first unethical company buys up the lease.

[paintitnow]

They are having a private company to build the road and be able to put a toll on it. Will this private company be responsible for a warranty on it? The normal up keep of patching it? snow plowing it? If it is a private road then I think they state or federal government shout make that company sign a contract to have it plowed. If a private road the police can not patrol it without that companies consent. what happen if the private company pockets the cash and runs? Who is responsible for the road? In Illinois the tolls were to paid off in the 60's but they found it such a cash cow. Over $100 million a year and the IDOT had no one to answer too as for budget and such. They built a $10 million office building and had like $300K in art and $2K conference room chairs.

[Wingfoot]

SIOUX CITY, IOWA - The alarms are sounding
in Iowa! Iowa GOP moving vote-count
to "undisclosed location."

Hard-line Republican elites are worried that Ron Paul will win Iowa Caucus. Caucus vote count to be moved to a secret location for "security measures".

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Iowa Caucus Vote Counter
Edward L. True Claims Miscount!

Did Mitt Romney Really Win Iowa?

No surprise to Wingfoot or Josef Stalin! Apanoose County, Iowa count was manipulated. Edward True claims the state Republican party miscounted his precinct's totals. Eight other Iowa precinct ballots are missing/lost and will never be found! Now we know what is meant by "security measures!" What-A-Joke!!!

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[Wingfoot]

Bribery Scandal Almost Nabbed Newt
A Buried FBI Investigation


Newt Gingrich and second wife Marianne Gingrich

Newt Gingrich, as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, was at the center of a U.S. Justice Department criminal investigation in the late 1990s! Newt was being investigated for a scheme to shake down an arms dealer for a $10 million bribe in exchange for Gingrich using his influence as Speaker to get the Iraq arms embargo lifted so Sarkis Soghanalian could collect $54 million from Saddam Hussein’s regime for weapons he had delivered during the Iran-Iraq War.

For several years, FBI agents instructed Soghanalian to get beyond the men who claimed to have ties to Gingrich and insist upon meeting with Gingrich and his former wife directly to prove that they could deliver the Speaker.

Israeli middlemen, associated with Marianne Gingrich through her employer - the Israel Export Development Corporation, convinced Soghanalian that Speaker Gingrich would use his influence to lift the embargo and allow Soghanalian to collect the millions of dollars owed to him by Iraq “in exchange for a $10 million payment to Gingrich through his associates.” Soghanalian was to pay the money – not to the Gingriches directly – but through a think tank, The Institute for Advanced Strategic & Political Studies (IASPS), which has offices in the United States and Israel.

Soghanalian was told $5 million was for Marianne Gingrich, another $1 million was for middleman Morty Bennett and the remaining $4 million was money to be used to help "grease the wheels" among other members of Congress who would help Gingrich expedite the operation.

The trap was set for Gingrich. A lavish reception was scheduled on June 8, 1997, in Miami at a luxury home which the FBI rented for the sting. Soghanalian was supposed to meet Gingrich there and solidify the deal under FBI electronic surveillance. But just hours before Soghanalian was to meet Gingrich and his former wife at the private Miami Beach fundraiser, FBI Director Louis Freeh called off the investigation. Freeh ordered the FBI in Miami not to secretly tape record the fundraiser and to stop Soghanalian from attending. The two-year investigation was brought to an abrupt halt just when the FBI might have caught Speaker Gingrich agreeing to accept the bribe.

Journalist Joseph Trento quoted one FBI agent, "We got so close. And when the target was in sight, we were stopped by Washington."

Assistant U.S. attorney Richard Gregorie of Miami and the FBI's Miami attorney, Martin King, wanted to pursue the investigation of Gingrich to the end, only to be frustrated by FBI Director Louis Freeh.

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[Wingfoot]

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Fox News says Ron Paul is the biggest threat
to Barack Obama. Not Mitt Romney



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[Wingfoot]

GAS – 5 BUCKS A GALLON?

• Wall Street set to profit at your expense
from rising tensions in Mideast

By Pete Papaherakles - 27 January 2012

Could prices at the gas pump reach $5 a gallon by Memorial Day? Experts on oil believe that projection is not unrealistic. Gas prices have already reached $4 in some parts of the country since the saber rattling over Iran started.

Speculation determines the actual price of gas, although we are told that it is based on supply and demand. In the United States analysts claim that production costs account for 68 percent of the price at the pump, refining 13 percent, distribution and marketing 7 percent and taxes 12 percent. However, speculators buy millions of barrels of oil at the auction floor and sell it as “futures,” betting that oil prices will rise. And they do. All that is needed is for the White House, Congress, the Pentagon and Wall Street to work together, creating crises the media can hype. Oil prices go up, speculators make a bundle, and all the 1 percenters are happy. On the other hand, we, the 99 percenters, are left “holding the pump.”

Some countries can sell gasoline to their citizens much cheaper than the U.S. In Venezuela, gas is 9 cents at the pump. In Nigeria, it sells for $0.38 and Saudi Arabia for $0.49 per gallon. In Qaddafi’s Libya, gas sold for $0.46 a gallon, but now that the country has been “liberated,” the price has skyrocketed to 28 times as much, or over $12. Meanwhile, in Europe, gas goes for as much as $9 a gallon.

The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq sent oil prices soaring in the U.S., although we get no oil from Afghanistan and 3 percent of our oil came from Iraq. The price per barrel of oil rose from $27 in 2001 to $38 when we went to war with Afghanistan. Then it jumped to $76 in 2006, well after we gained control of oil supplies in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The mere signing of the defense authorization bill at Christmas time, which authorized sanctions on the sale of Iranian oil, has already sent U.S. prices higher. As the sanctions progressively restrict Iran’s oil sales, it is expected the price will continue rising. This comes despite the fact that the U.S. has not bought Iranian oil for 20 years, and, in the end, we only get 7.5 percent of our oil from the Persian Gulf.

It will be hard to justify how a 7.5 percent reduction in supply, which our other suppliers will gladly fill, could account for a 50 percent increase in price, but there can be no doubt Wall Street will try to pull it off anyway.

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[sprayandpray]

I know Wall Street has their hands in the pie but a lot of these speculators are foreign, not American.

[Wingfoot]

Mitt a Conservative? NOT!

Mitt calls himself a conservative. Nothing could be further from the truth. The past has a way of catching up with all politicians. Mitt is no exception.

As the Florida primary looms closer, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has more and more strongly identified himself as a consistent conservative and Republican voter. In Thursday’s GOP debate, he implied he always has been a conservative.

But a review of the facts paints a different picture and counters Romney’s assertions. In the past, Romney has often gone to considerable lengths to distance himself from Republicans and conservatives.

• Romney had been a lifelong independent before he decided to run for Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat in Massachusetts in 1994, the Boston Globe reported at the time.

• The Los Angeles Times reported that after Romney entered the ’94 Senate race, his wife Ann said: “We didn’t know a single Republican when we jumped in.”

• The Times also disclosed that Romney even considered running as an independent “before rejecting the idea as impractical.”

• When House Speaker Newt Gingrich was promoting his “Contract with America” in 1994, Romney’s aides said he “had not read the document and had no plans to support it,” the Globe reported.

• The Washington Times observed that Romney “criticized the Republican campaign agenda, the ‘Contract with America,’ as too partisan.”

• Brent Bozell’s Conservative Victory Committee attacked Romney in 1994 for “running away from conservative Republican themes” and espousing a “left-wing agenda.”

• Washington Post columnist David Broder observed during the 1994 Senate campaign: “Eager to show that he is a moderate independent and no ideologue, Romney stressed his support for universal health insurance and abortion rights, criticized the Republican ‘Contract with America,’ and was more outspoken than Kennedy in arguing that the Boy Scouts should not exclude homosexual youths.”

• Romney donated to the 1992 campaign of U.S. Rep. Dick Swett, a New Hampshire Democrat; Rep. John LaFalce, a New York Democrat; and Democrat Doug Anderson, who was running for the Senate from Utah.

• The grass roots pro-family group Mass Resistance's 26-page comprehensive report “The Mitt Romney Deception” states, “Indeed, this report will demonstrate that Romney was probably the most pro-abortion and pro-gay rights Republican official in the nation for the last decade.”

www.MassResistance.org/romney The report goes on:

• Romney supports abortion in general, and believes in sustaining Roe v. Wade.

• Romney campaigned for Governor of Massachusetts as a pro-choice candidate, and was endorsed by a pro-abortion political group.

• Romney is willing to support some embryonic stem cell research.

• Romney Approves of Abortion Pill and Supports the Legalization of RU-486.

• Romney signs “Right to Privacy” Proclamation celebrating birth control availability.

• Gov. Romney has a long history of promoting and furthering the homosexual agenda, and working closely with leading gay activists.

• Romney twice sought and received the endorsement of the homosexual Log Cabin Republican Club.

• Romney’s campaign distributed pro-gay rights campaign literature during Boston’s “Gay Pride” events.

• Romney supports homosexual “anti-discrimination” laws.

• Romney advocates homosexual couples’ adoption rights be recognized by the government.

• Romney supports homosexual domestic partnerships.

• Romney supported and promoted legalizing homosexual civil unions.

• Romney Opposes the Boy Scouts’ Ban on Homosexual Scoutmasters.

• Romney barred Boy Scouts from public participation in 2002 Olympics.

• Romney appointed prominent homosexuals to key positions in his administration.

• Romney appointed prominent homosexual activists and Democrats as judges.

• “Governor Mitt Romney, who touts his conservative credentials to out-of-state Republicans, has passed over GOP lawyers for three-quarters of the 36 judicial vacancies he has faced. Instead, tapping registered Democrats or independents — including two gay lawyers who have supported expanded same-sex rights. Of the 36 people Romney named to be judges or clerk magistrates, 23 are either registered Democrats, or un-enrolled voters who have made multiple contributions to Democratic politicians, or who voted in Democratic primaries, state and local records show. In all, he has nominated nine registered Republicans, 13 unenrolled voters, and 14 registered Democrats.”

- Boston Globe 7/25/2005, “Romney jurist picks not tilted to GOP;
Independents, Democrats get call”

• Romney Rewards one of the State’s Leading Anti-Marriage Attorneys by Making him a Judge.

• Romney announces he won’t fill judicial vacancies before term ends.

• Romney’s Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth used huge taxpayer funding to promote homosexuality in the public schools.

• Romney’s Commission organized public gay “Youth Pride Day” parades and “transgender proms” which promote unhealthy and risky behavior.

• Romney issues a proclamation celebrating gay “Youth Pride Day.”

• Romney’s Department of Education promotes the homosexual agenda.

• Romney’s Department of Public Health (DPH) cooperates with the homosexual activist movement.

• Romney opposed federal legislation that would stop public schools from promoting homosexuality.

• Romney’s Dept. of Social Services honors homosexual “married” couple as adoptive “Parents of the Year.”

• Romney refused to endorse the original 2002 Mass. constitutional amendment absolutely defining marriage as one man and one women.

• Romney unnecessarily (and unconstitutionally) implemented homosexual marriages in Massachusetts.

• Romney had marriage licenses changed to allow same-sex marriages.

• Romney administration ordered Justices of Peace to perform homosexual “marriages” when asked – or be fired!

• Romney administration’s training of Town Clerks (on how to issue same-sex marriage licenses) states that marriage statutes were not changed.

• Romney signs bill eliminating Sexual Transmitted Disease (STD) testing requirement for marriage.

• When requested of him, Romney personally issues special one-day certificates to allow otherwise unqualified people to perform homosexual “marriages.”

• Was Romney’s public opposition to homosexual “marriage” based on expediency, not principle?

• Romney favors “Assault” Weapons Ban.

• Romney Favors Waiting Periods.

• Romney supports minimum wage laws.

• Romney Balances Budget with $500 Million in New Fees.

• Romney imposes “socialized” health care on Massachusetts.

• Romney’s dismal record as the Republican leader in Massachusetts.

• Romney pledged to build the Massachusetts Republican Party, but in fact he did almost nothing. During his tenure there were two elections for the entire Legislature (2004 and 2006). In each election the Republicans lost seats. Republicans now hold the fewest seats in the Legislature since the Civil War.

• During the four years of Romney’s tenure, the number of registered Republicans in Massachusetts fell by 31,000. During that same period, the Massachusetts Democratic Party gained 30,000. “…… That means Republicans now make up 12.5 percent of the state’s voters, … according to the data released by the Secretary of State’s office. When the state elected Romney, a Republican, in 2002, the GOP made up 13.4 percent of the electorate.”

- Boston Globe, 11/2/2006, “GOP ranks dropped by 31,000 since state elected Romney.”

• In the 2006 elections, most offices were not even challenged by Republican candidates. In the November general election for the six statewide Massachusetts constitutional offices there were more Green-Rainbow Party candidates on the ballot than Republicans!

• The party’s slide has been so precipitous that Republicans yesterday did not contest 130 of 200 legislative seats, fielded a challenger in only three of 10 congressional districts, and put up fewer candidates for statewide office (three) than the Green-Rainbow Party (four).

- Boston Globe, 11/8/2006, “For Republicans in Mass., a feeling of out and down.”

• Mitt Romney brought “gay marriage” to Massachusetts. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court made a ruling and ordered the Legislature to act. The Legislature did nothing, so Romney stepped in and ordered same-sex “marriages” to begin — essentially violating his oath of office.

• A new book, “Mitt Romney’s Deception — His Stealth Promotion of “Gay Rights” and “Gay Marriage” in Massachusetts.” Contrary to Governor Romney’s claim that he defended marriage, the Constitution, traditional values and religious freedom, he actually undermined them.

• While serving on the board of directors of Marriott, Mitt approved the hotel chain's lucrative porn sideline. The in-room porn business was an irritant to Romney during the 2008 campaign when one social conservative referred to Mitt as a "major pornographer."

• James Rappaport, former head of the Massachusetts Republican Party while Romney was Governor, held a press conference to announce his endorsement of Rudy Giuliani. Rappaport said Romney “has a strong record of showmanship as opposed to actual performance.”

• Rappaport's comment on Mitt's relationship with the State Legislature, “His word is no good … Mitt Romney would say one thing in a meeting and literally go out of the meeting to the press and tell the opposite story. There was no desire in the legislature to be accommodating to him because they couldn’t trust him…. Romney will be clear today on what he believes today, and he’ll be clear tomorrow on what he believes tomorrow, but they may be different things.”

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[TheCableVine]

When it comes down to Romney vs. Obama. It's a pretty easy choice. Romney has my vote.

[daman1]

It's like the rabbit voting for whether the lion or the fox gets to pick the lunch menu

[sprayandpray]

I still want a "None of the above" option on the ballot!

[paintitnow]

Ron Paul is scary? A libertarian in philosophy. He seems to have the under 30 year old group. similar to Obama did in his run. Paul probably will not make it as the republican but might come back in as an independent If he does it will take away from both parties. Any one seen the ad they banned on him?

[Wingfoot]

New York Times Publishes Hit Piece
Against U.S. Constitution!

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‘We the People’ Loses Appeal
With People Around the World

By ADAM LIPTAK
Published: February 6, 2012

In the hit piece, the author claims that the U.S. Constitution guarantees “relatively few rights:

"There are lots of possible reasons. The United States Constitution is terse and old, and it guarantees relatively few rights."

In a television interview during a visit to Egypt last week, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a sitting justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, recommends multiple other constitutions and human rights charters to Egypt over the very constitution she is tasked to protect!

“I would not look to the United States Constitution if I were drafting a constitution in the year 2012,” she said. Ginsburg recommended, instead, the South African Constitution, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms or the European Convention on Human Rights.

Justice Antonin Scalia of the U.S. Supreme Court agrees with Ginsburg that the United States Constitution is "outdated" and told the Senate Judiciary Committee in October, “Every banana republic in the world has a bill of rights.”

“The bill of rights of the former evil empire, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, was much better than ours,” Scalia said, adding: “We guarantee freedom of speech and of the press. Big deal. They guaranteed freedom of speech, of the press, of street demonstrations and protests, and anyone who is caught trying to suppress criticism of the government will be called to account. Whoa, that is wonderful stuff!”

What insane BULLSHIT from these two Justices! Wingfoot believes something even more wonderful, Justice Scalia - Why don't all you "outdated" globalists take a focking hike and QUIT!

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