Bits Bucket for November 7, 2014
Post off-topic ideas, links, and Craigslist finds here.
The Housing Bubble
Examining the home price boom and its effect on owners, lenders, regulators, realtors and the economy as a whole.
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Name:Ben Jones
Location:Northern Arizona, United States
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Denver, CO Sale Prices Turn Flat YoY; Down 6% QoQ and 2% MoM
http://www.zillow.com/denver-co/home-values/
When does YOY go negative nationally in these stats?
Alot of areas are already negative YoY. Those areas that aren’t are flat or near flat. Just one or two more negative MoM reports puts it all in negative territory YoY.
near flat.
‘Near flat’ doesn’t show sanity returning; near flat is roughly the rate at which housing prices always should have been increasing—roughly the rate of inflation.
‘Near flat’ is way better than “to infinity and beyond!”, of course…
Falling from double digits increases to zero to negative isn’t sanity returning eh?
Nice try kiddo.
I take it to mean that Sanity is still a long way down.
Precisely, Blue…
Legal pot seen as new frontier for jobs, entrepeneurs
“3,500 Coloradans were employed in the marijuana industry as of early 2014″
http://m.bizjournals.com/denver/news/2014/11/07/legal-pot-seen-as-new-frontier-for-jobs.html?r=full
Aurora, CO Sale Prices Go Negative 4% YoY; Plunge 7% MoM
http://www.zillow.com/aurora-co-80016/home-values/
I am in Aurora right now, and can’t imagine why anyone would actually choose to live here.
“I am in Aurora right now, and can’t imagine why anyone would actually choose to live here.”
The bountiful rainbow of colors?
Bad drivers, more obesity than the rest of metro Denver, very low walkscore, and just trashy people (of ALL colors) everywhere
You must be from Boulder.
nope. south denver, and that’s what people in boulder say about us.
and on an unrelated topic, do you know anyone who is looking for a babysitter this weekend?
Boulder is cool. Santa Fe is even better. But you need to be self-employed and no kids.
Sure beats fighting the wart on drugs forever. Jobs for Americans!! Taxes for states!
The FSA army up front and personal. And yes - they do vote.
————————-
Video: What happens when a reporter tries to out-squat a squatter in Detroit?
Hot Air | 11-7-14 | Mary Katherine Ham
Here’s Detroit reporter Charlie LeDuff, a truly great writer and character, giving a Detroit squatter a taste of her (his? It’s somewhat in question.) own medicine. A homeowner had allegedly been attacked by the squatter while trying to sell the property, so LeDuff paid a visit:
Detroit homeowner Sarah Hamilton wanted to sell her house, but was having some trouble.
No, it wasn’t a down seller’s market — it was a squatter.
Hamilton had a difficult battle: In the process of trying to get Lynn Williams out her house, WJBK-TV reported Hamilton was threatened with a knife. But things got more interesting after WJBK reporter Charlie LeDuff entered the picture. He met with the homeowner and her attorney, and was given a set of keys and the proper paperwork.
Then, after informing the police of his intentions, LeDuff donned a white bathrobe and walked right up to the front door to have a chat with Williams.
Of course, cameras were there to capture the pair’s conversation.
http://hotair.com/archives/2014/11/06/video-what-happens-when-a-reporter-tries-to-out-squat-a-squatter-in-detroit/
Where’s the proof they vote? My guess is that it is a very low percentage, something that will be even lower with Hillary.
Actually - Up to 100% voter turn-out for the FSA.
—————–
Did Dead People Vote in Philadelphia?
Philadelphia Magazine - Larry Mendte - November 16, 2012
It’s time for a real investigation into how we run elections in this city.
Such was the case in 2008, when Acorn was caught red-handed filling voter rolls with names out of the phone book and false signatures, while Black Panther members intimidated voters with billy clubs. It is the case again this year with questionable turnout, vote returns, voter rolls, poll-place shenanigans and the Black Panthers‘ encore.
This year was particularly egregious. In October came the first hint that something was fishy when the city’s voting rolls were discovered to be nine months pregnant with inactive voters. Federal law dictates that voters be removed from the rolls after they miss two consecutive presidential elections. In Philly, we are more forgiving. Two of three residents in the city are eligible to vote. Taking into consideration children and teenagers who can’t vote, the one million-plus registered voters is impossible. There are undoubtedly dead people on the rolls. The important question is: Did they vote?
Bloated rolls provide opportunity for the unscrupulous to pad the vote for a particular candidate and the turnout. Fortunately there are poll watchers legally certified from both parties that assure that can’t happen. However, in 75 Philadelphia polling sites, the Republican poll watcher was at first either barred from entering or thrown out. It took three hours before a Common Pleas Court judge issued an emergency order that they must be allowed in. A lot can happen in those three hours.
In Philadelphia, voter turnout in 20 of the wards was 97 percent and greater. That is 97 percent of the bloated voter rolls that probably include dead people. Zombies are in these days, and in Philadelphia, they vote.
In 59 Philadelphia precincts, Mitt Romney received no votes. Zero. If you total up just those precincts, Obama won with over 19,000 votes to nothing for Romney.
To recap, there are inflated voting rolls, a near 100 percent turnout in many precincts, Republican officials thrown out in precincts, Romney getting no votes in precincts, registered voters told they aren’t on the books, and the city recording vote and turnout totals way out of line with the rest of the state and even neighboring counties.
Everyone knows there is something wrong but no one wants to do anything about it. Welcome to Philadelphia. The only solace for the residents of the city is the knowledge that if you die between now and 2016, you’ll still be eligible to vote and someone will probably do it for you. It is a joke that is getting old.
Something where BO is not on the ballot would be historic lows I’d guess.
The only information that you’re introducing here is that someone somewhere in America is living in someone else’s house illegally.
Where’s my obama money!!???
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YfGLB8LO1aM
“Everyone hates everyone…”
“We need to pray more…”
“You have to hold on to your purse like your life depends on it…”
“I was the only one who had a father…”
“Put God back in everything…”
—————————
Life in a US city’s most dangerous postal code (Video)
BBC / YouTube | 11-6-2014
Plagued by violence and poverty, the US postal code of 70805 is considered the most dangerous part of Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
Join BBC Pop Up’s Benjamin Zand as he explores the community and meets the people that call it home.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gFHZR-wOJk
Let women and coloreds vote and this is what you get
Take America back
Get them off the democrat plantation and set them free…
“set them free”
Libertarian candidates got about 2.5% of the 2014 vote in Colorado
How many OWS got elected in 2014? Or have ever been elected?
————————-
How did the Tea Party actually perform in the House (Updated for accuracy)
email | 11/6/2014
Yes, the establishment robbed us of many high profile primary races, with Mike Simpson hanging on in Idaho as the most liberal Republican of that delegation, Boehner stooge James Lankford winning the senate nod from Oklahoma, and of course the despicable ruination of Chris McDaniel in Mississippi to save the dribbling Cochran.
But in the House in general, the story was not so clear cut in the final numbers. We did lose some members, half of whom lost while pursuing higher office, but we have MANY new members coming in who promise to be very solid.
John Ratcliffe (TX-4) - Shot down incumbent Ralph Hall in the Republican primary. Ran unopposed.
Dave Brat (VA-7) - Astonishingly demolished incumbent house majority leader Eric Cantor in arguably the cycle’s biggest upset. Won the general.
Tom Emmer (MN-6) - Succeeding Bachmann, Emmer has a solid fiery conservative record. He won easily.
Jody Hice (GA-10) - Succeeding Broun, this guy is infuriating Democrats who are calling him ‘the most evil republican of 2014!’… so you know he’s solid gold! Easily won in the deep red district and has said he won’t vote for Boehner.
Barry Loudermilk (GA-11) - Succeeding Gingrey, Loudermilk is actually more conservative than his predecessor, endorsed by SCF, ran unopposed and won’t vote for Boehner.
Mia Love (UT-4) - Early Tea Party favorite, after much struggle, she is IN!
Alex Mooney (WV-2) - Solid conservative wins the seat previously held by moderate now-Republican-senator Shelly Moore Capito in a walk.
David Rouzer (NC-7) - Been waiting to come to congress for a while, this was his year. Replaced retiring blue dog Democrat Mike McIntyre.
Ken Buck (CO-4) - Likely to be a little more conservative than now-Republican-senator Cory Gardner, former 2010 senate candidate is now a congressman.
Barbara Comstock (VA-10) - A Mark Levin pick for congress, she won easily the seat of retired RINO Frank Wolf.
Bruce Poliquinn (ME-2) - A very conservative candidate who won the primary in an upset. Establishment thought he’d lose. He didn’t.
Cresent Hardy (NV-4) - Conservative state assemblyman. He beat Democrat Steven Horseford in an upset. Democrats already griping that he’s a radical.
Mike Bost (IL-12) - Dubbed Meltdown Mike for his explosive defenses of the 2nd Amendment on the floor of the state house, he is going to be giving as much hell to the democrats and RINOs as Steve Stockman did.
Rick Allen (GA-12) – Finally laid to rest hard-to-hit Democrat John Barrow, the last white Democrat in the deep south. Tea endorsed.
Gary Palmer (AL-6) - Seizing the seat held by retiring RINO Spencer Bachus is a solid Alabama conservative.
French Hill (AR-2) – Retiring representative Tim Griffin had a pathetic conservative rating of 52%. Hill was Tea Party endorsed and won a narrow race against the rat.
Lt. Col. Steve Russell (OK-5) – Replacing Boehner acolyte James Lankford who won the senate race for the seat of retiring Tom Coburn, Russell will be much more likely to buck the establishment.
John Moolenaar (MI-4) – Replacing retiring Dave Camp, who scored a pathetic 50% with Heritage, Moolenaar has a solid record behind him and was Tea endorsed.
Glenn Grothman (WI-6) – Retiring Tom Petri was a little too cozy with the establishment. Grothman is a hair on fire conservative who the dems absolutely despise and he just won by over ten points.
Johnny Tacherra (CA-16)??? - Seems on course to unseat Democrat incumbent Jim Costa in an upset nobody saw coming. He comes out of the Tim Donnelly school of California right wing thought. This one is NOT yet secure, and Costa will likely try to steal it with provisionals.
2011 phoned, they want their OWS vs Tea Party narrative back
Your narrative has been scripted:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2046586/Occupy-Wall-Street-Shocking-photos-protester-defecating-POLICE-CAR.html
And keep fluffing the 0.1% like a good little serf
I love the term RINO. Somehow if they are called a RINO, they are not responsible for the GOP. LOL!!
Bush was just a RINO, like Reagan! vote GOP, we promise, no more RINOs! lol!
Reagan tripled the deficit, raised taxes 8x, gave 3 mill amnesty and grew the size of the gov. Yes a RINO, but your GOP-god as well.
Know Your Party 101.
Can wait for O to take some executive action. Since the do-nothing congress is all talk.
Hey guacamole, just wakin’ up? How’s life in Mom’s basement?
Hope and change….means being in your late 60’s and needing roommates to afford the rent.
The latest trend in housing? Roommates
CNNMoney.com - Les Christie - November 5, 2014
With rents rising faster than most American’s paychecks, finding a roommate to split the bills with isn’t just for kids straight out of college anymore.
The percentage of adults living with someone other than a spouse or partner hit 32% nationwide in 2012, up from 26% in 2000, according to Zillow’s analysis of the latest Census Bureau data.
And, judging by the ongoing decline in homeownership rates and tightened supply of rental vacancies, the trend appears to be gaining momentum.
In Brooklyn, N.Y., for example, the average one-bedroom apartment rents for more than $2,600 a month, according to Jonathan Miller, president of appraisal firm Miller Samuel. Renters willing to live together, however, pay an average of $3,200 for a two bedroom, each saving $1,000 a month. Those living in three bedrooms, which average $4,200 a month, save even more at $1,200 per person.
Writer Dina Wilcox and executive coach, Ann Fry, live in Manhattan, one of the nation’s most expensive housing markets. Both in their late 60s, most of Wilcox’s and Fry’s peers live with significant others or by themselves.
But these two have found life more enjoyable and affordable by splitting things like the utility bills and food costs in their Harlem apartment. Fry, for example, pays just $1,500 a month for her share of housing expenses.
Thikshan Arulampalam, 46, said he has had a roommate for almost the entire 18 years he’s lived in New York City. He’s been thankful for the savings. Money got very tight after he was laid off last year and started his own IT company.
There was a lame sitcom decades ago called The Golden Girls that who premise was people living in that arrangement. It’s not a new thing.
Gloria and another Mikey, Mike Stivik ,were living with Archie Bunker until they could afford a place also. Even further back.
I like the way you color your reality based on sitcoms of the 1970s…
that is DYN-NO-MITE!!!!
And three of my eight great-grandparents ran boarding houses back in the 1910s and 1920s.
And unlike a TV sitcom, this really did happen.
Yeah, those TV shows weren’t science fiction.
Not exactly a boarding house, but in the 40s my grandmother rented a spare room out to bring in extra money.
You mean the McMansions are turning into default multifamily homes? That’s what we predicted here. BFD.
It’s also interesting that you left out this part of the two women in their late sixties:
“Financially, it’s terrific. It meant I could pay what I was paying in my old sublet,” said Fry.
There’s also the added bonus of companionship: The two often entertain and cook together, she said.
Another thing to keep in mind is that, as the article states, Manhattan is a very expensive place to live. These ladies could save a bunch of money by moving to Queens or New Jersey. They made a choice to consume a very expensive product - life in Manhattan. As a result they have to make sacrifices to afford that life.
Bahahahaha … here’s a financial whistleblower who can’t land an honest job in finance (probably because there aren’t any):
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-9-billion-witness-20141106
Not even a smidgen of corruption…
Hope and change…
————
She was blocked at every turn: by asleep-on-the-job regulators like the Securities and Exchange Commission, by a court system that allowed Chase to use its billions to bury her evidence, and, finally, by officials like outgoing Attorney General Eric Holder, the chief architect of the crazily elaborate government policy of surrender, secrecy and cover-up. “Every time I had a chance to talk, something always got in the way,” Fleischmann says.
This past year she watched as Holder’s Justice Department struck a series of historic settlement deals with Chase, Citigroup and Bank of America. The root bargain in these deals was cash for secrecy. The banks paid big fines, without trials or even judges – only secret negotiations that typically ended with the public shown nothing but vague, quasi-official papers called “statements of facts,” which were conveniently devoid of anything like actual facts.
And now, with Holder about to leave office and his Justice Department reportedly wrapping up its final settlements, the state is effectively putting the finishing touches on what will amount to a sweeping, industrywide effort to bury the facts of a whole generation of Wall Street corruption. “I could be sued into bankruptcy,” she says. “I could lose my license to practice law. I could lose everything. But if we don’t start speaking up, then this really is all we’re going to get: the biggest financial cover-up in history.”
Matt Taibbi sure deserves a lot of respect, he is constantly releasing articles chasing after the crooks.
Almost makes me want to subscribe to Rolling Stone just to support their efforts.
Almost gives me hope a few bankers might eventually go to jail once obama is collecting his pension
Looking at the flip side if this financial honesty issue:
According to “The Wolf of Wall Street” soon after it was uncovered by Forbes that the The Wolf (a term Forbes coined in describing the guy) ran a penny stock firm and was regularly ripping off - HEAVILY RIPPING OFF -schmucks and earning (I choke at that word) FIFTY-PERCENT COMMISSIONS by doing so The Wolf’s office was FLODDED with job applicants - FLOODED with brokers who wanted to get in on the action.
There is a reason John Corzine is not in jail
And people kept investing with them?
From the article: “It goes without saying that the ordinary citizen who is the target of a government investigation cannot simply pick up the phone, call up the prosecutor in charge of his case and have a legal proceeding canceled. But Dimon did just that. “And he didn’t just call the prosecutor, he called the prosecutor’s boss,” Fleischmann says.”
These are deep state issues. From the immediately previous link, “It is not too much to say that Wall Street may be the ultimate owner of the Deep State and its strategies, if for no other reason than that it has the money to reward government operatives with a second career that is lucrative beyond the dreams of avarice — certainly beyond the dreams of a salaried government employee.”
With the election that just happened, one puppet or the other might win, and they’ll run in circles regarding some social issues about which there is a broad stalemate, keeping the single-issue voters happy. But these underlying issues are not up for debate. They’re influenced through administrative and lobbying channels, and no one has more influence on administrative and lobbying channels than the FIRE sector.
It’s true that unions give a lot of money to politicians. But they can’t promise jobs after office, or riches beyond avarice. Only one sector can do that.
From the article: “It goes without saying that the ordinary citizen who is the target of a government investigation cannot simply pick up the phone, call up the prosecutor in charge of his case and have a legal proceeding canceled. But Dimon did just that. “And he didn’t just call the prosecutor, he called the prosecutor’s boss,” Fleischmann says.”
It’s good to be the King.
2banana’s #1 rule of investing: NEVER, EVER buy anything even remotely tied to the Trump name…
But these fools think they are going to create a lot of “value”
——————–
NYC Trump Co-Op Dwellers Face Million-Dollar Bills
Oshrat Carmiel - Nov 6, 2014 - Yahoo!
The ground beneath Trump Plaza, at 167 E. 61st St., is up for sale as land prices break records.
Manhattan’s surging land costs are leaving the shareholders of an East Side luxury co-operative with a tough choice: pay a hefty price to buy the land under the building, or face increasing bills to keep renting it.
The ground beneath Trump Plaza, at 167 E. 61st St., is up for sale as land prices break records. The co-op board has offered to buy the property for $185 million, a cost that would saddle residents with assessments that, for some, would top $1 million, said Adam Leitman Bailey, a New York real estate attorney who has been contacted by owners concerned about the deal before it goes into contract.
“The fact that the family put it up for sale should terrify the co-op,” said Joshua Stein, a Manhattan real estate attorney who isn’t involved in the transaction.
“Whatever opportunistic investor buys the land will probably be way more aggressive about the rent reset than either an estate or a group of heirs,” he said. “Someone who is buying it, is buying it specifically to squeeze out every last dollar of rent.”
A Trump Plaza shareholder with a 1,000-square-foot (93-square-meter) one-bedroom apartment whose monthly maintenance fee is now about $2,100 would pay about $9,800 after the rent is recalculated in 10 years, Bailey said, citing a projection by the building’s co-op board. The rent increase would be about 8 percent of what the land value is in 2024, he said.
A resident of a two-bedroom unit who holds 440 shares in the corporation, for example, would be charged $1.02 million, Bailey said. A 1,600-square-foot three-bedroom apartment, worth 671 shares, would get a $1.56 million assessment. Residents get more shares the higher up their apartments are in the 39-story building.
“If you’re the co-op, getting rid of that threat is a really good thing,” Stein said. “There’s a lot of value being created.”
I think we should call a Whaaaamulance.
#Suckers!
Yet Trump is a hard core neo-con, nearly a GOP presidential candidate, how can he be bad?
“If you’re the co-op, getting rid of that threat is a really good thing,”
Anyone who bought a “box of air” where the “owners” don’t even own in common the land underneath it, strikes me as a complete idiot. Rent land on which you can then pretend to own a “box of air”??? WTF?!?
Probably better than a floating condo, though I can’t say for sure…
obama is out of control, corrupt and a lawless occupier of the While House that will do just about anything to retain power for himself and his party.
To put this “action” into perspective - The 11 million illegal aliens that obama wants to grant amnesty to equals the combined population of Hawaii, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Montana, Delaware, South Dakota, Alaska, North Dakota, DC, Vermont, and Wyoming.
———————————
Immigrants eager for presidential action on citizenship
Boston Globe | November 7, 2014 | By Maria Sacchetti
Few were as excited about Election Day as Moises Herrera. He did not run for office. He cannot even vote. But reaching Tuesday’s election, he hopes, will set in motion actions that will allow him to stay in the country.
“It’s the great hope,” Herrera, a 36-year-old father of four, said in an interview on Election Day, days after immigration officials released him. “There are many, many people in that jail, and they are waiting for that day.”
In Massachusetts, Herrera was at constant risk of deportation. In 2011, after a traffic stop in Everett, he was jailed and deported, but he returned to the state within weeks.
Nobody ever charged him. Instead, immigration officials detained Herrera for more than two weeks, through the birth of his son, and released him after he hired a lawyer and the Globe inquired about his case.
On Wednesday, Obama said he would not wait for Congress to pass a comprehensive immigration bill to deal with the nation’s 11 million illegal immigrants and declared that he would take action by the end of the year.
“obama is out of control, corrupt and a lawless occupier of the While House that will do just about anything to retain power for himself and his party.”
touchdown
I want 11 new stars for the flag.
Which flag amigo?
Nice!
Eat yor peas!!!
Gee - whatever happened to “working together”
————-
Reid plots final days in power
thehill.com | Nov. 7, 2014 | Alexander Bolton
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) hopes to confirm 50 of President Obama’s nominees and move an omnibus spending bill in a last hurrah before Democrats give up power in the Senate.
The nominees are part of a packed lame-duck schedule that Reid is furiously planning, and that will be a topic at Friday’s White House lunch meeting between Obama and congressional leaders.
I tend to the camp that believes it doesn’t really make a plug nickel’s worth of difference which of the two plutocrat parties wins.
But then I consider John McCain and his choice whether to run in 2016 when he’ll be 80 yrs old. This Gang of 8 hotshot is going to have to figure out what his message is with regard to the millions of illegals getting ready to be made legal. This will be the big issue for him in 2016 and if it is the wrong move he is going to face a primary opponent with a bunch of pissed off Tea Party support.
Yes - I go the memo - The old “both parties are equally corrupt” argument.
Tell me - then why do trial lawyers, private labor unions, public labor unions, reparation seeking minorities and environmental marxists consistently vote and give 99% of their money to democats?
And why is it that the only party producing ANY believable fiscally conservatives (and still way too few) is the Republican party? Or - just name ONE fiscally conservative democrat on the federal level?
So please stop trying to deflect the blame that the democrats deserve by constantly pointing the finger at the republican party (and saying all parties are equal) whenever the depravity of the democrat party manifests itself.
“I got a phone, a pen and a kill list…”
Russian tank column supposedly rolling into the Ukraine…this calls for another stern lecture from the finger-wagger-in-chief.
http://www.businessinsider.com/ukraine-is-heating-up-again–2014-11
“The finger-wagger in chief”. You mean Jan Brewer?
www dot drudgereport dot com
and that’s all you’ll ever need to know about anything
Despite losing the referendum over Scottish independence, a reinvigorated Scottish National Party is growing in leaps and bounds as it prepares to position itself as an alternative to the bankster-owned UK Labor, Tory, and Lib-Dem establishment parties.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/11/07/us-britain-scotland-idUSKBN0IR1EG20141107
Falls Church, VA (DC area) Sale Prices Crater 5% YoY As Housing Demand Sinks To New Lows
http://www.zillow.com/falls-church-va/home-values/
Coral Gables Sale Prices Crater 20% QoQ, 11% MoM; Now In Negative Territory YoY
http://www.zillow.com/coral-gables-fl/home-values/
Milwaukee, WI Metro Sale Prices Down 5% YoY
http://www.zillow.com/wi/home-values/
Chapel Hill, NC Sale Prices Plunge 19% YoY On Cratering Housing Demand
http://www.zillow.com/chapel-hill-nc/home-values/
Atlanta, GA Sale Prices Dive 5% YoY
http://www.zillow.com/atlanta-ga/home-values/
Great Neck, NY(Long Island) Sale Prices Dive 21% QoQ; Now Negative 6% YoY
http://www.zillow.com/great-neck-ny/home-values/
This is a lengthy article from the New York Times about some rabble rousing lawyer who wants to ban football in the USA
If you don’t like football, you are a floppy wristed sissyboy
Because American Exceptionalism = getting Alzheimer’s before age 40
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/09/magazine/how-one-lawyers-crusade-could-change-football-forever.html
The “Gay Lifestyle” is one of the most unhealthiest and dangerous lifestyles you can choose to live…
By wide margins - even more dangerous than smoking.
Eventually - will the trail lawyers will go after that too…
Did Matthew Shepherd’s bludgeoning death give you a tingle in your trousers?
It made me think - don’t be a drug dealer. A lifestyle choice even more dangerous than the gay lifestyle…
——————
‘Uncomfortable truth’ in Matthew Shepard’s death
Andrea Peyser - NY Post - October 28, 2013
But Jimenez unearthed a story that few people wanted to hear. And it calls into question everything you think you know about the life and death of one of the leading icons of our age.
Matthew Shepard, college student. Killed, at 21, for being gay.
Or was he?
Jimenez’s “The Book of Matt: Hidden Truths About the Murder of Matthew Shepard,” out last month, challenges every cultural myth surrounding Shepard’s short life and unspeakable death. After some 13 years of digging, including interviews with more than 100 sources, including Shepard’s killers, Jimenez makes a radioactive suggestion:
The grisly murder, 15 years ago this month, was no hate crime.
Shepard’s tragic and untimely demise may not have been fueled by his sexual orientation, but by drugs. For Shepard had likely agreed to trade methamphetamines for sex. And it killed him.
Jimenez, 60, a Brooklyn native who splits his time between New York and Santa Fe, NM, has seen his work attacked by organizations from the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation to the Matthew Shepard Foundation, which helped push through a 2009 federal hate-crimes law in the name of Shepard and James Byrd Jr., the black man dragged to his death behind a pickup truck in Texas in 1998.
The New York Times Magazine commissioned, then canceled, a piece from Jimenez in 2004. (The editor claims it wasn’t any good.) But ABC’s “20/20” ran with a story Jimenez produced, which won two major broadcasting awards. Yet the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Hatewatch blog recently accused Jimenez of serving as a lapdog of “right-wing pundits, radio hosts and bloggers.”
In Washington, DC, gay activists pestered bookstores to cancel Jimenez’s appearances. So much for free speech.
“It’s offensive,” said Jimenez.
I find it offensive that a gay journalist should be held to a different standard than a straight one. But Jimenez’s every word has been vetted by protectors of Matthew Inc. to determine his agenda. Is he a traitor to the cause?
Jimenez is not the enemy. He’s just a man who told an uncomfortable truth, as he saw it.
Crystal meth and gay sex are what Jesus wanted
http://www.foxnews.com/story/2006/11/03/evangelical-leader-admits-to-buying-meth-receiving-massage-from-gay-escort/
…
How about this lifestyle?
Senator Larry Craig (R) has not only been a vociferous opponent of the gay movement (except apparently his own gay movements) but it turns out to that he is yet another steaming hypocrite who has pandered to the vast gay-loathing base of the Republican Party.
Only like so many Republicans who have come before him (insert your own joke here) - he is revealed by his recent actions and guilty plea to be a self-loathing gay.
But what is priceless is the excuse he offered to the policeman who arrested him.
Trying to explain why he was playing footsie with the man in the next cubicle in the airport toilet - he came up with this all-time classic. So fallacious that it sounds as if it came out directly of George Bush’s mouth.
“I have a wide stance”
“rabble rousing lawyer who wants to ban football in the USA”
Is it too much to ask for clowns like this to just go away and leave us the hell alone?
Breaking news!!! We will all die someday.
#MindYourOwnBusiness
the GOP could easily win 2016 too:
Put bankers in jail
Allow for discharging of student loans in bankruptcy
Stop guaranteeing housing loans - force banks to eat bad loans
Stop bailing out banks
National Right to work laws/make unions collect their own dues
Allow for competition in the medical/health care industry
National concealed carry
Stop all muslim immigration
Deport all illegals
Build a real fence
Dare obama to veto them…
——————–
GOP, Show That You Can Govern: Pass Good Laws and Defy Obama to Veto Them
National Review | 11/7/2014 | Charles Krauthammer
Memo to the GOP. You had a great night on Tuesday. But remember: You didn’t win it; the Democrats lost it.
The defeat — “a massacre,” The Economist called it — marks the final collapse of Obamaism, a species of left-liberalism so intrusive, so incompetently executed, and ultimately so unpopular that it will be seen as a parenthesis in American political history. Notwithstanding Obama’s awkward denials at his next-day news conference, he himself defined the election when he insisted just last month that “these [i.e. his] policies are on the ballot — every single one of them.”
They were, and America spoke. But it was a negative judgment, not an endorsement of the GOP. The prize for winning is nothing but the opportunity for Republicans to show that they can govern — the opportunity to seize the national agenda.
Five weeks ago, I suggested a series of initiatives that would be like the 1994 “Contract with America,” but this time post facto. It’s not rocket science. Mitch McConnell, the incoming Senate majority leader, and House speaker John Boehner are already at work producing such an agenda.
“discharging of student loans in bankruptcy”
You are a big fat HYPOCRITE
And you need to get over that your first wife left you for a public labor union goon firefighter, it’s time to call that water under the bridge and just let it go…
How many different pseudonyms are you planning to use?
You do realize your frequent changing of aliases causes difficulties for Ben, right?
apologies to ben jones
he knows the two specific ip addresses that i post from, and that those have not changed in four and a half years
Stop all muslim immigration?
That one would be unconstitutional. You can’t treat people differently based on religion.
2brony just picks and chooses the parts of the Constitution that he likes
“Put bankers in jail (Bush loved Goldman S)
Allow for discharging of student loans in bankruptcy (I am getting my PhD if this passes!)
Stop guaranteeing housing loans - force banks to eat bad loans
Stop bailing out banks ( LOL, Bush and Paulson!)
National Right to work laws/make unions collect their own dues
Allow for competition in the medical/health care industry ( DEM tried, GOP removed it from ACA)
National concealed carry
Stop all muslim immigration
Deport all illegals (TX loves them and is your model state)
Build a real fence”
Just like they did under Bush with full control for 6 yrs!! But, but, but…. This time is different!
Got Meds?
Hope and change…
Fundamentally Transforming America…
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There Is No Wage Growth: America Will Soon Have More Waiter/Bartenders Than Manufacturing Workers
Zero Hedge | 11/7/2014 | Tyler Durden
And to visualize it: in October the US economy added the most waiters and bartenders in over a year. In fact at 42K, one in every five jobs “created” in the US economy went to a bartender, or a waiter.
Finally, putting it all in perspective, here is the total number of waters and bartenders Vs. manufacturing workers in the US since 1990. The red (bad) line has almost caught up with the blue (good) one. So much for Obama’s manufacturing renaissance promise as manufacturing workers have barely recouped any of the losses since the Great Depression started in 2008, while America has never had more waters and bartenders.
Manufacturing jobs = union goons
So you should be happy about this
“You work three jobs? How uniquely American” — George W. Bush
You do realize that for the last 30 years - every major new automobile factory has been built in right-to-work states?
You know - jobs that you are not FORCED to join an organizations as a CONDITION of employment. Jobs that you are not FORCED to give money to an organization as a CONDITION of employment.
You would be enraged if as a condition of employment in your current job you forced to join and pay money to the NRA, Pro-Life Groups, traditional marriage and the Rush Limbaugh organizations. You would call it unAmerican.
Yet democrats see nothing wrong with this process as long as it goes their political favor…
You do realize that for the last 30 years - every major new automobile factory has been built in right-to-work states?
They do that because they want to pay the workers as little as possible and treat them like crap.
They do that because they want to pay the workers as little as possible and treat them like crap.
Then why has not one car company opened a factory in Haiti where the average wage is about $1/day?
Maybe there is more too it than your “You have nothing to lose but your chains” meme…
Well they have opened a bunch of auto factories in Mexico since NAFTA was implemented. Mexican workers get paid even less than those in the American South.
Of course, manufacturers could probably pay Haitian workers even less. And there American companies that do light manufacturing there, such as clothing or footwear. There was also a time, decades ago, when the Rawlings Sporting Goods company made baseballs there. My guess is that Haiti doesn’t have the necessary infrastructure to support heavy manufacturing.
I haven’t been pushing any “You have nothing to lose but your chains” meme today although I have in the past expressed a similar sentiment. Americans sit around and moan and wail at the state of the country, but history shows that a lot can be accomplished when ordinary people get off their butts and work together. The one percenters and others who are pleased with the current state of affairs would prefer that people be isolated, discouraged and inactive.
Of course, manufacturers could probably pay Haitian workers even less.
Haiti lacks the heavy manufacturing infrastructure Mexico has, otherwise the auto plants would be there.
Mexico exports ~2 million cars to the US, more than Japan or Korea and is expected next year to surpass Canada as the top automotive exporter.
The next time you buy that all American pickup truck, check where it’s made. You might be surprised.
Labor and management work together to bring in profit. Then it comes time to divvy up the profit. Company leadership is organized. Labor is not. So it’s one organized entity bargaining with a thousand individuals. Leadership is going to give up the bare minimum required to keep labor on board, mostly. But labor has greater numbers and ultimately drives the economy.
So, if you want a healthy and robust economy, there must be some way to help labor get a larger share of the profit. Unions historically were that way. Also they improved the quality of life of their members.
Are there abuses and inefficiences with unions. Yup. Are there abuses and inefficiencies without unions? Yup (but a different sort of abuse and inefficiency).
Does this work in reverse?
If a company has a loss for the year - do they get to divy up the loss to all the workers?
Oh wait - they don’t get to do that.
So you saying you want all the profits to go to labor but none of the losses - who do you think you are - a bank with obama bailouts?
Start your own business with all of the risks if you want to keep/give all those profits that you think should be going to the workers…
we call it layoffs.
2banana is so bitter, why all the hate? Life is good, go out and play, find a mate.
“If a company has a loss for the year - do they get to divy up the loss to all the workers?”
Indeed they do. Layoffs, pay cuts, pay freezes, reduced working hours for hourly, increased workloads for salaried, reduced perks and benefits.
There is a big difference between a Union who’s primary goal is protecting workers and most of today’s Unions who’s primary goal is promoting Marxist Ideology.
#WolvesInSheepsClothing
Tutti Fruiti:
Can you please brainstorm and come up with a different tagline? Your existing one is starting to annoy me, much like a low-grade rash that won’t go away, and has persisted for years.
Is Barack Obama anti-Israel?
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-11-06/is-barack-obama-anti-israel
Don’t worry, teabaggers, because Sheldon Adelson will buy you a nominee who is sufficiently pro-Israel
And don’t forget to buy Rapture insurance for your pets
The left has such a strange hatred for the Judeo-Christian philosophy, and an even more bizarre sympathy for anti-gay/anti-woman stone-age killers practicing Islam.
#What?
speaking of floppy wristed sissyboys
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-06/same-sex-marriage-ban-upheld-by-u-s-appeals-court.html
because monogamous homogays = they attacked us on 9/11 because they hate our freedoms
anonymous gay sex in airport bathrooms = american exceptionalism
bootstraps go better with a little s & m
washington post - ferguson, mo. plans for grand jury decision:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2014/11/06/755fcc3c-6040-11e4-9f3a-7e28799e0549_story.html
this is a difficult narrative to script.
one on ’side’ you have the badge lickers who cream in their jeans every time they hear about a cop wasting some black kid.
and on the other ’side’ you have the social justice warriors who conveniently overlook that michael brown was a 300 pound adult grabbing for the cop’s gun.
is it ‘go time’ yet?
Uh oh, they might riot. Oh wait, they’ve been rioting this whole time. Does it really matter anymore?
“one on ’side’ you have the badge lickers who cream in their jeans every time they hear about a cop wasting some black kid.”
Don’t worry, in a few years your side will be back to forcing marxist policies down the throats of hard working Americans…the same 70 to 80 percent of Americans who would not support one fly egg on that trash if they were told the truth.
Have you taken 911 of the speed dial yet?
#FundamentalTransformationOfAmerica
People, the economy really is heating up. QE3 or not, this is true. There is a lot more traffic now on the way to work. I have also been noticing a much higher percentage of apparently unemployable people driving to work. They are covered with tattoos and facial piercings. They have purple hair. They have kids in the back seat, all the windows rolled completely down, and their radios are blaring as loud as their crappy little speakers will allow. They have jobs.
I rarely look at other people in their cars when I’m driving to work, but when I do I notice that many of them are fiddling with their phones. That worries me more than tattoos.
That wasn’t my point.
Yes, I know. I was making a different point.
I got a phone and a pen…
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Yes, in Your Country: Judge Says City of Philadelphia Can Take Artist’s Studio, Turn It Into Grocery Store
The Huffington Post | 11/05/2014 | Evan Bernick
James Dupree is a world-renowned artist and native son of Philadelphia, who is about to see his art studio turned into a grocery store, thanks to the rubber-stamp review that passes for judging when his city exercises the power of eminent domain.
James’ artistic accomplishments are truly awesome. He has five paintings in the permanent collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Others can be found in the National Museum of Art in Cardiff, Wales; the Schomberg Museum in New York; the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts; and the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
You can see the Philadelphia Museum of Art from James’ studio. It is located in the Mantua neighborhood of West Philadelphia, where James grew up. The studio was a dilapidated warehouse when he purchased it for a little under $200,000. He spent $60,000 installing new electrical equipment and plumbing, $68,000 on roof repairs, and thousands more on renovations, furnishings and appliances.
The investment paid off, for James and for Mantua. What was once a dead, abandoned building is now alive and bustling with activity. James has hosted and taught art classes at his studio and has plans to start a mentorship program in order to give artists an environment where they “can create serious work and receive the support and freedom to explore new ideas.”
My neighbor owns a successful restaurant. Hires at least 2-3 illegals to do the dirty work. None of them get free stuff as people think. They do get to wash dishes and scrub grease off the floor though. He cant find white people who work that hard for $12-15 an hr.
Where can they get these free phones and $$, I want to pass on the info to him?
All they need are fake IDs and they can get free cheese.
My sister is a bilingual ed teacher in North Carolina. Most of her students’ parents are illegals and most live in Section 8 apartments and get foodstamps, since all their income is under the table.
An infinite stream of poor people from other countries (where opportunity doesn’t exist) would tend to sap the opportunities from places like the United States. That’s what borders are for.
Besides, if they are paid $12-15/hr under the table, and they pay no income or Social Security or Medicare tax, and they get Section 8 housing assistance and free school lunches for their kids, then yes, they are getting free stuff.
here is an article that should ‘warm’ 2brony’s heart
http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-London/2014/11/06/US-mid-terms-Tom-Steyer-and-the-death-of-climate-change-as-a-serious-political-issue
Oh my - from the Nobel Peace Prize President…
I guess the Kill Lists were not enough…
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Exclusive: U.S. may significantly hike number of troops in Iraq - sources
Yahoo | 11/7/2014
The U.S. military has drawn up plans to significantly increase the number of American forces in Iraq, which now total around 1,400, as Washington seeks to bolster Iraqi forces battling the Islamic State, U.S. officials told Reuters on Friday.
Bush starts war in Iraq = good
Obama starts war in Iraq = bad
Singapore PM wins defamation case against blogger
SINGAPORE Fri Nov 7, 2014 5:27am EST
Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong speaks during a news conference at the Prime Minister’s office in Putrajaya outside Kuala Lumpur April 7, 2014. REUTERS/Samsul Said
Credit: Reuters/Samsul Said
(Reuters) - Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong won a High Court defamation case against a blogger on Friday, the first time the city-state’s leader has sued an online critic.
Roy Ngerng, 33, was sued for his blog post in May when he was alleged to have implicated Lee in impropriety in connection with how funds in Singapore’s mandatory retirement savings scheme, the Central Provident Fund(CPF), are managed.
Singapore’s leaders have in the past sued or settled out of court with several foreign media publications including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg and The Economist for alleged defamatory remarks but this is the first time a blogger has faced such action.
High Court judge Lee Seiu Kin ordered Ngerng was not allowed to publish or disseminate such claims in the future, or any words and images to the same effect.
Damages will be assessed at a later date.
“I think it is a sad commentary when the elected leader of a country can’t take criticism from its citizens about issues related to public policy,” said Phil Robertson, the Bangkok-based deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Asia division.
…
Don’t worry. It can’t happen in America since it would be unconstitutional.
Anyone know of a good recipe that uses mashed banana and avocado together? I hear there’s a clearance sale going on.
I’m confused. Is Avacado the one they sent to replace Rio or is it Dman?
Lola… liberace…. It’s all the same tripe.
The IP logs will confirm that all the posts come from the same Democrat Congressional staff offices.
Some good news to start your weekend
MarketWatch - Majority of new October jobs pay below average wage
And remember, there is no “pent-up demand” for $500,000 starter homes
Not today, not tomorrow, not ever
EVER
Since HA’s metaphor was so dead-on yesterday with respect to FNM’s inventory of REO in CA, it’s worth repeating:
“FNM’s inventory is nothing but raindrops in the desert.”
Relative to the 4.4 million excess empty and defaulted houses in CA, sure it is.
Raindrops in the desert…
See? You’re catching on Renal Wart.
Mexicans protest for 43 missing after mayor caught
By AFP
5:22AM GMT 06 Nov 2014
Tens of thousands of protesters swarmed Mexico City on Wednesday to demand the safe return of 43 missing students after authorities arrested the main suspects in the disappearance.
Demonstrators chanted “they took them alive, we want them alive” and held a large banner with images of the 43 college students, whose disappearance has drawn international outrage and turned into a full-blown crisis for President Enrique Pena Nieto.
After a month on the lam, Jose Luis Abarca, the former mayor of the southern city of Iguala, and his wife Maria de Los Angeles Pineda were arrested in a gritty neighborhood of Mexico City on Tuesday.
Their capture raised hopes that they could offer solid clues about the students’ whereabouts almost six weeks after they were attacked by Iguala police officers linked to the Guerreros Unidos gang.
The night of terror left six people dead and the 43 students missing.
Organizers said 120,000 people marched in the latest protest over the case while police counted 60,000.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/…/Mexicans-protest-for-43-missing-after-mayor-caught.html -
Region VIII
phony scandals