Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Obama Unveils $75 Billion Mortgage Relief Plan

From the AP on YouTube:

President Barack Obama unveiled his $75 billion mortgage relief plan, a series of measures the president says will keep 9 million people from losing their homes. (Feb. 18)


I will have a copy of the full video up as Obama gave a great epeech on this. It was frank and to the point and informative at a time the USA needs to solve this problem. More on the program specifics later.

United Airlines San Francisco Airport Terminal at 1 AM

OK, I got stuck overnight in United Airlines San Francisco terminal so I could make a morning flight. Here's how it looked (like right out of the movie Terminal) and what happened to me.

Michael Phelps Will Not Be Arrested For Photo

The latest good news in a country that needs it, is that Olympic star Michael Phelps will not be arrested for a photo taken of him smoking a "bong" in South Carolina. The episode led to some rather hypocritical behavior by sponsors who dropped Phelps, yet have employees who engage in the same activities at parties.

The bottom line is Michael's out of the woods and has learned an unfortunate lesson in how to watch out for all of the hypocritical asshole haters who just want to engineer a way to get him into trouble to make their lousy lives feel better.

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

President Obama Signs Stimulus Bill in Denver, CO - Goldies Look On

I have no idea who the Goldies are but they're happy that President Barack Obama signed the Stimulus Bill in Denver today. It's the first step in what investment we need to get America back on the economic track. We really need about 3 trillion in spending, but I'm not sure many Americans "get it" regarding what's happened to our economic system.

La Bron, Jay Z, and Who's That Girl?


30b141f3, originally uploaded by authenticeducator.

Japanese finance minister Shoichi Nakagawa drunk at G-7

From YouTuber miolesou:

February 16, 2009 - The Japanese finance minister, Shoichi Nakagawa, denied on Monday that he was drunk at a news conference in Rome where he slurred his words and said his political fate was up to the prime minister after the opposition called for him to be fired.

Nakagawa, a close ally of Prime Minister Taro Aso, told reporters that he had drunk alcohol the day before the press conference and took medicine on his flight to Rome for a meeting of Group of 7 finance leaders and central bankers on Friday and Saturday. He said the combination may have affected him badly.

Josh Wolf Documentary Project: Sierra Choi Needs Your Help

John Wolf spent 226 days in jail to protect his videos and sources, and caused the creation of a new law protecting video-bloggers. Now Sierra Choi is directing and producing a documentary - the trailer is here as part of my video blog.

At the time in 2006, I met Josh when he worked for the television division at Peralta Community College. He was also in the middle of his battle with the Federal Government, but even then was still focused on his work, and didn't spend a lot of time fretting about what could happen.

Then Josh defied San Francisco U.S. District Judge William Alsup's order to turn over the videos Josh had taken from a anti-G8 anarchist protes heldt in San Francisco on July 8, 2005. Wolf feared that the U.S. Government in the form of the FBI simply wanted to identify the people who were protesting and not solve a crime they claim had been committed against a police officer. Wolf's videos did not contain any footage of a police officer being harmed.

Still, U.S. District Judge William Alsup order Wolf to be held in jail for civil contempt of court later in 2006. Then, after negotiations, he was released but still refused to give up any of his videos, offering instead to post them online and show them to the Judge himself. Initially the judge refused, and Wolf was ordered back to jail.

Eventually, and after 226 days, Wolf agreed to show the then unseen video clip online and was released from jail. He never gave a copy of the video to the goverment.

In the wake of his ordeal and new stronger "shield" law has been placed in California law to protect journalists of all kinds, from print to blogs. We have Josh to thank for this.

Now, video film producer Sierra Choi is working to raise $250,000 to create a documentary called "Quiet Uprising: The Story of Josh Wolf" and needs our help. You can contact Sierra through me by sending an email here: zennie@sportsbusinesssims.com

Please help as many need to know Josh's story so this will never happen again.

Josh Wolf Documentary Project: Sierra Choi Needs Your Help


John Wolf spent 226 days in jail to protect his videos and sources, and caused the creation of a new law protecting video-bloggers. Now Sierra Choi is directing and producing a documentary - the trailer is here as part of my video blog.

At the time in 2006, I met Josh when he worked for the television division at Peralta Community College. He was also in the middle of his battle with the Federal Government, but even then was still focused on his work, and didn't spend a lot of time fretting about what could happen.

Then Josh defied San Francisco U.S. District Judge William Alsup's order to turn over the videos Josh had taken from a anti-G8 anarchist protes heldt in San Francisco on July 8, 2005. Wolf feared that the U.S. Government in the form of the FBI simply wanted to identify the people who were protesting and not solve a crime they claim had been committed against a police officer. Wolf's videos did not contain any footage of a police officer being harmed.

Still, U.S. District Judge William Alsup order Wolf to be held in jail for civil contempt of court later in 2006. Then, after negotiations, he was released but still refused to give up any of his videos, offering instead to post them online and show them to the Judge himself. Initially the judge refused, and Wolf was ordered back to jail.

Eventually, and after 226 days, Wolf agreed to show the then unseen video clip online and was released from jail. He never gave a copy of the video to the goverment.

In the wake of his ordeal and new stronger "shield" law has been placed in California law to protect journalists of all kinds, from print to blogs. We have Josh to thank for this.

Now, video film producer Sierra Choi is working to raise $250,000 to create a documentary called "Quiet Uprising: The Story of Josh Wolf" and needs our help. You can contact Sierra through me by sending an email here: zennie@sportsbusinesssims.com

Please help as many need to know Josh's story so this will never happen again.

Monday, February 16, 2009

Chevron Accuses Richard Cabrera Of Voodoo Economic In Ecuador

Professor Richard Cabrera, the economist who's estimates have served to frame the environmental damage terms of debate in the court battle between giant oil company Chevron and the coutry of Ecuador, has been accused of what could be called "Voodoo Economics" by the San Ramon-based firm.

In a damaging press release, Chevron write the following:

Despite an awareness of these fundamental defects, Cabrera’s amended assessment makes no effort to correct any prior mistakes and introduces a new series
of egregious errors, such as:

• Recommending more than $9 billion in damages associated with “excess cancer deaths” without identifying a single victim, let alone providing any corroborating documentation such as a death certificate or a medical diagnosis.
• Recommending more than $3 billion in damages associated with groundwater contamination
even though his own data clearly indicate no such contamination exists, and Cabrera
acknowledges that he has no basis for devising a remediation plan or developing a cost estimate.
Rather, Cabrera simply adopts plaintiffs’ counsel’s demands to assess damages and repackages
them as fact.
• Conceding that his work was conducted in such a fashion as to assign blame to Chevron instead
of performing an objective and unbiased scientific analysis of current environmental conditions,
as the court had ordered.

Their assertions continue and essentially build a case to attack Cabrera's work. But my charge has been it's almost impossible to find anything about Cabrera online, other than his work on the Ecuador lawsuit against Chevron, where the country is attempting to have the oil firm pay entirely for environmental damage that Ecuador itself is largely responsible for. In this matter, Cabrera has filed fraudulent economic report claims, making estimates of monetary damage costs without providing substantiated evidence to support his report findings.

Obama On The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act 2/14/09: Your Weekly Address

President Obama celebrates the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act while keeping his eyes on the tough road ahead.

(this video is public domain)

President Obama's NBA All-Star Game Message

From The White House:

President Obama discusses the importance of serving others in a message aired during the NBA All-Star Game halftime on February 15, 2009.

BART Shooting: BART Board Member James Fang's Views

Newspaper publisher and BART Board Member James Fang is much talked about but seldom talked to. At a BART Shooting meeting where he was accused of being racist, I talked to Fang about the matter of the BART shooting. We also talked about the racism charge, which Fang explains is a result of a "rogue" columnist at Asian Week, which Fang owned, and who wrote "Why I Hate Blacks"..and Whites and pretty much everyone but himself.