politicalpartypoop.com

7th Largest Black-Owned Bank Reports 37% Increase in First Quarter Net Earnings

In one of many things I’m allowed to talk about but you white people can’t…

I found this headline slightly amusing. I’m wondering, is there a difference between a “Negro” bank or a “whitey” bank?

By Thomas Sowell - From Real Clear Politics

People who are in the top one percent in income receive far more than one percent of the attention in the media. Even aside from miscellaneous celebrity bimbos, the top one percent attract all sorts of hand-wringing and finger-pointing.

A recent column by Anna Quindlen in Newsweek (or is that Newsweak?) laments that “the share of the nation’s income going to the top 1 percent is at its highest level since 1928.”

Who are those top one percent? For those who would like to join them, the question is: How can you do that?

The second question is easy to answer. Virtually anyone who owns a home in San Francisco, no matter how modest that person’s income may be, can join the top one percent instantly just by selling their house.

But that’s only good for one year, you may say. What if they don’t have another house to sell next year?

Well, they won’t be in the top one percent again next year, will they? But that’s not unusual.

Americans in the top one percent, like Americans in most income brackets, are not there permanently, despite being talked about and written about as if they are an enduring “class” — especially by those who have overdosed on the magic formula of “race, class and gender,” which has replaced thought in many intellectual circles.

At the highest income levels, people are especially likely to be transient at that level. Recent data from the Internal Revenue Service show that more than half the people who were in the top one percent in 1996 were no longer there in 2005.

Among the top one-hundredth of one percent, three-quarters of them were no longer there at the end of the decade.

These are not permanent classes but mostly people at current income levels reached by spikes in income that don’t last.

These income spikes can occur for all sorts of reasons. In addition to selling homes in inflated housing markets like San Francisco, people can get sudden increases in income from inheritances, or from a gamble that pays off, whether in the stock market, the real estate market, or Las Vegas.

Some people’s income in a particular year may be several times what it has ever been before or will ever be again.

Among corporate CEOs, those who cash in stock options that they have accumulated over the years get a big spike in income the year that they cash them in. This lets critics quote inflated incomes of the top-paid CEOs for that year. Some of these incomes are almost as large as those of big-time entertainers — who are never accused of “greed,” by the way.

Just as there may be spikes in income in a given year, so there are troughs in income, which can be just as misleading in the hands of those who are ready to grab a statistic and run with it.

Many people who are genuinely affluent, or even rich, can have business losses or an off year in their profession, so that their income in a given year may be very low, or even negative, without their being poor in any meaningful sense.

This may help explain such things as hundreds of thousands of people with incomes below $20,000 a year living in homes that cost $300,000 and up. Many low-income people also have swimming pools or other luxuries that they could not afford if their incomes were permanently at their current level.

There is no reason for people to give up such luxuries because of a bad year, when they have been making a lot more money in previous years and can expect to be making a lot more money in future years.

Most Americans in the top fifth, the bottom fifth, or any of the fifths in between, do not stay there for a whole decade, much less for life. And most certainly do not remain permanently in the top one percent or the top one-hundredth of one percent.

Most income statistics do not follow given individuals from year to year, the way Internal Revenue statistics do. But those other statistics can create the misleading illusion that they do by comparing income brackets from year to year, even though people are moving in and out of those brackets all the time.

That especially includes the top one percent, who have become the focus of so much angst and so much rhetoric.

Previously posted on June 30, 2006
 

rob of wilmington, del. said…
one problem is that you have sites like media matters pointing out use of conservative jargon, but most people only know media matters through the eyes of bill o’reilly and his ilk — trying to suggest that it’s a liberal propaganda site, misrepresenting its purpose.

unless you listen to al franken’s show on air america, you probably won’t get a fair use of (or even frequent mention of) sites like media matters.

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Soros funded ‘Media Reform’ conference
Featured charges U.S. troops targeting journalists in Iraq
Posted: May 23, 2005 - On World Daily NetTwo of the speakers at the Media Reform conference were David Brock of Media Matters and Andrew Jay Schwartzman of the Media Access Project. Together with Thomas Athans of Democracy Radio, they are backing a “Renew the Fairness Doctrine” campaign to have the FCC monitor and regulate conservative media sources.

Their website is registered to Nicco Mele, the webmaster for Howard Dean’s 2004 campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Mele started the Internet strategy group EchoDitto along with several other former members of the Dean Internet team. It now is a consulting firm with close to 20 full-time employees and a variety of high-profile clients and projects.

Those projects include Air America Radio, Alliance For Security, Barack Obama’s U.S. Senate campaign, Campaign For America’s Future, Defenders of Wildlife, Democracy For America, Democracy Radio, Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Miramax Books, NoIraqDraft.com, Service Employees International Union and the U.N. World Food Program.

While the Soros-funded “media reform” movement seeks to stifle or mute conservative voices, evidence has emerged that Soros is underwriting journalists who promote his own point of view on major issues.

READ FULL ARTICLE HERE

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David Brock Group Backpedals on Soros Funding
By Marc Morano
CNSNews.com Senior Staff Writer
March 03, 2005(CNSNews.com) - Media Matters for America, the group headed by conservative turned liberal writer David Brock, has changed course on its stated association with billionaire liberal financier George Soros.
After initially claiming on Dec. 1, 2004 that “neither Media Matters nor its president and CEO David Brock has received any money from Soros or from any organization with which he is affiliated,” the group is no longer disavowing any connection with groups “affiliated” with Soros.
The Media Matters shift came after Cybercast News Service questioned the group’s financial ties and demonstrated that there were numerous and extensive links between Media Matters and several Soros “affiliates” like MoveOn.org, the Center for American Progress and Soros ally Peter Lewis.
Media Matters for America (MMA) spokeswoman Sally Aman responded to Cybercast News Service’s questions with an e-mail. “In response to your query regarding donor funding Media Matters for America has never received funding directly from George Soros,” Aman stated, no longer denying any relationship with organizations affiliated with Soros.
She went on to reference the “early support from Moveon.org, and the New Democrat Network,” that Media Matters had received.
In its role as a liberal media watchdog, Media Matters for America takes on some of the biggest names in media. Brock also authored the 2002 book, “Blinded by the Right, The Conscience of an Ex-Conservative,” in which he denounced the conservative movement where he first gained fame and disclosed his homosexuality.

READ FULL ARTICLE HERE

THERE IS MORE…………

Established in May 2004, Media Matters for America is a “web-based, not-for-profit … progressive research and information center” seeking to “systematically monitor a cross-section of print, broadcast, cable, radio, and Internet media outlets for conservative misinformation.” But in addition to “news or commentary that is not accurate, reliable, or credible,” the organization’s concept of “misinformation” includes anything that “forwards the conservative agenda.” Thus political differences of opinion are often portrayed by Media Matters as lies or worse.Media Matters’ founder and CEO is David Brock. A reporter for the conservative magazine The American Spectator in the 1990s, Brock (in the aftermath of his biography of Hillary Clinton that brought disastrous reviews) engaged in a public self-denunciation, characterizing all his past writings critical of liberal figures as a confection of lies and slanders. In Brock’s present judgment, the mainstream media have fallen under the sway of conservative ideology. He believes that conservatives have moved the mainstream media “to the right and therefore they’ve moved American politics to the right. … I wanted to create an institution [Media Matters] to combat what they’re doing.” 

Standing behind Brock was John Podesta, a former chief of staff in the Clinton administration and the head of the “progressive” Washington, DC think tank, the Center for American Progress. In 2004 Podesta provided Brock with office space for his fledgling enterprise. Soon after, Media Matters received over $2 million in seed donations from a roster of affluent donors including Leo Hindery Jr., a former cable magnate; Susie Tompkins Buell, a co-founder of the fashion company Esprit and a close ally of Senator Hillary Clinton; James Hormel, a San Francisco philanthropist who nearly served as ambassador to Luxembourg during the Clinton administration; Bren Simon, a Democratic activist and the wife of shopping-mall developer Mel Simon; and New York psychologist and philanthropist Gail Furman. Media Matters, which can accept tax-deductible contributions under section 501(c)(3) of the tax code, has also benefited from the patronage of Peter Lewis, chairman of Progressive Corporation and a longtime consort of leftist financier George Soros.

Media Matters has not always been forthcoming about its high-profile backers. In particular, the group has long labored to obscure any financial ties to George Soros. But in March 2003, the Cybercast News Service (CNS) detailed the copious links between Media Matters and several Soros “affiliates”—among them MoveOn.org, the Center for American Progress, and Peter Lewis. Confronted with this story, a spokesman for the organization explained that “Media Matters for America has never received funding directly from George Soros” (emphasis added), a transparent evasion.

Nor were groups cited by CNS the only connection between Media Matters and Soros. As investigative journalist Byron York has noted, another Soros affiliate that bankrolled Media Matters was the New Democratic Network. In addition, Soros is reported to be involved in the newly formed Democracy Alliance, a partnership of some 80 affluent financiers who each have vowed to contribute $1 million or more in order to build up an ideological infrastructure of leftist thinks tanks and advocacy groups. News reports list Media Matters as a main beneficiary of the Alliance’s funding. By August of 2004, Media Matters’ operating budget had already doubled to $4 million.

Prior to founding Media Matters, David Brock met with a number of leading Democratic Party figures, including Senator Hillary Clinton, former Senator Tom Daschle of South Dakota, and former Vice President Al Gore. Today, more than a few of the organization’s roughly 30 staff members are Democratic operatives. Among these are Media Matters’ chief communications strategist Dennis Yedwab, who is also the Director of Strategic Resources at Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. Brock’s personal assistant, Mandy Vlasz, is a Democratic pollster and a veteran consultant to Democratic campaigns, including the 2000 Gore/Lieberman campaign. Katie Barge, the Director of Research at Media Matters, formerly presided over opposition research for Senator John Edwards‘ unsuccessful 2004 presidential campaign.

In 2004 Media Matters reported that its website had elicited some 150,000 comments in its discussion forums and that over 22,000 subscribers had registered to receive its e-mail alerts. Brock has also become a regular feature on leftist radio stations like Air America.

Media Matters receives financial support from the Tides Foundation, the Arca Foundation, the Peninsula Community Foundation, and the San Francisco Foundation.

Even more here from the blog: Sweetness & Light

Soros/Media Matters Wants Censorship Of Airwaves

Drudge Report:

DAVID BROCK WAS COMMITTED TO MENTAL WARD; BESTSELLING AUTHOR SUFFERED BREAKDOWN WHILE WRITING TELL-ALL, SAY SOURCES

Tuesday May 21, 2002

Controversial author David Brock suffered a breakdown last summer and was committed to the psychiatric ward of Sibley Hospital in Northwest Washington, sources tell the DRUDGE REPORT.

The breakdown came just months before Brock finalized production of his bestselling book BLINDED BY THE RIGHT — a book that has been widely challenged on points of accuracy!

“He had delusions, he thought people were trying to kill him,” reveals a source who befriended Brock last July at the hospital.

Brock told fellow patients that he did not feel safe — even inside of the hospital’s secure medical setting!

“He spent time in the ”The Quiet Room’, there was just a mattress on the floor, and he had some books. He was so tired and stressed.”

Reached by phone in Washington late Tuesday Brock strongly denied the hospitalization and breakdown in any way affected his ability to recall events depicted in BLINDED BY THE RIGHT. Brock strongly denied that any portion of the book was written at the hospital while he was under medical treatments, as is claimed by one source.

Publisher CROWN could not be reached late Tuesday.

Brock’s book of personal observations and first-hand accounts involving various Clinton scandals and scandal players generated divided opinion.

Former President Clinton chatted up Brock’s effort in Los Angeles last weekend.

“Clinton, who seems to have practically committed passages to memory, told his former aides that whenever they feel down, they should read Brock’s book to illuminate anew what they were all fighting against for eight years, and as a reminder of what ‘unhappy’ people their counterparts on the right truly are,” the LOS ANGELES TIMES reported.

But one source familiar with Brock’s breakdown questioned: “With all of this, how can he be considered credible?”

Brock said by phone, “I am not going to comment on private medical matters.”

So it would seem that the gentleman who once famously called Anita Hill “a little bit nutty and a little bit slutty” might share some of those characteristics.

Found on the blog Sweetness & Light, LA Times Story

Last year, to celebrate New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s reelection victory, Norman Hsu capped an amazingly successful year as a Democratic fundraiser by treating members of her campaign staff to several days at the glitzy Mandalay Bay hotel and casino in Las Vegas, complete with free show tickets and dinners at posh restaurants.

Among Hsu’s guests was Patti Solis Doyle, who now heads Clinton’s presidential campaign and has long been one of Clinton’s most trusted advisors…

Clinton’s campaign spokesman, Howard Wolfson, emphasized that Hsu never asked for any legislative favors from the senator in return…

By living on a lavish scale, he convinced associates that he was backed by great personal wealth. He also made a point of doing favors. He would provide hard-to-get dinner reservations at exclusive restaurants, or bestow elegant gifts on associates.

Clinton confidant Solis Doyle got a coveted, and pricey, designer handbag — a gift that made her so uncomfortable she returned it…

And yet Ms. Doyle had no qualms about accepting a far more expensive all expenses trip to Las Vegas.

The Clintonistas are all alike.

Folks all day have been commenting and blogging on Mrs. Bill’s billion dollar health care extravaganza. Anyone willing to look past her bullshit rhetoric whether it’s health care or some other entitlement program simply needs to refer back to these stories of her fundraising corruption.

This woman is about people living high of the hog in her presence whether it’s Vegas vacations, cushy jobs or cold hard cash.
Her power comes from her ability to deliver the goods to people who have her back via cash providers like Hsu.

However for the rest of us, she will attempt to deliver health care to the masses.
From more food stamps to government gas, she can’t give y’all cool vacations but dammit she can GIVE you free healthcare!

Just watch as she will promise more and more shit to the masses. This crazy bitch wants the presidency badly and she will do damm near anything and give away YOUR money to achieve that.

.

The Grand Junction Sentinel reports that Hsu was captured after getting sick on an Amtrak train: “Disgraced Democratic fundraiser Norman Hsu was arrested in Grand Junction tonight, after he failed to show up for a court appearance in California related to a felony theft conviction. FBI agents took Hsu into custody around 7 p.m. at St. Mary’s Hospital FBI, spokesman Joseph Schadler said in a statement. Hsu was traveling on an Amtrak train when he became ill. Grand Junction paramedics were summoned to the Amtrak station near downtown about 11 a.m. Thursday to treat a patient, Battalion Chief Robert Ferguson said. The patient, whom Ferguson said he found out eight hours later was a fugitive, was not in great pain, Ferguson said.

Much more on Michelle Malkin

Some of the leading Dems who’ve taken fugitive-former fugitive-fugitive Norman Hsu’s money can’t decide what to do. Looks like Pennsylvania’s Democrat governor Ed Rendell may need some public feedback to help him make up his mind:

Disgraced Democratic fund-raiser Norman Hsu, who was wanted by California authorities for the last 15 years, is once again on the lam, putting Gov. Rendell, a staunch supporter, in an increasingly awkward political corner.And for now, Rendell isn’t saying whether he will reverse his decision and return nearly $38,000 in contributions from Hsu or continue to stand by the man he recently called “one of the best 10 people I’ve met.”

 More at Michelle Malkin

I found the following links on a blog called bluecrabboulevard. He points out as have a number of other right leaning blogs that the left side of the blog world is dead silent on this issue. The MSM has only been begrudgingly mentioned it. On Tuesday I watched MSNBC damm near all day and except for Pat Buchannan mentioning it briefly on a segment with Andrea Mitchell the media is avoiding this like the plague.

 ”it’s an all-right extravaganza! Amazing, isn’t it? Not one left-leaning blog has commented on this - at least none are showing on Memeorandum. Michelle Malkin, Hot Air, Wizbang, Right Wing Nut House, The American Pundit, Suitably Flip,  Riehl World View, Wake up America, Don Surber, Jammie Wearing Fool, A Blog For All, Liberty Pundit, Fausta, Captain’s Quarters, Gateway Pundit, Sister Toldjah, Pajamas Media, Detroit Populist Times, TigerHawk, Betsy Newmark, NewsBusters, In From the Cold, The Belmont Club, Badger Blog Alliance, MVDG, The Oxford Medievalist, John Lott, The Influence Peddler“

Found this story while blog surfing at Protein Wisdom, under the headline “ This Should Kill Hillary’s Chances [Dan Collins]”

But unfortunately, probably won’t. Hsu has ties to the folks whom Bill Clinton waived to let the Chinese have missile guidance technology that otherwise would have taken them years to develop. And the Clintons are still reaping the financial benefits.

Gateway Pundit has the story.

 Color Bill Clinton shocked:  “You could have slapped me upside the head with a cock . . . “

From WND: 

A shady Chinese megadonor to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign has close ties to an aerospace mogul accused of placing his business interests before national security by sharing missile secrets with Beijing during the Clinton administration.Before his forced resignation last week, Norman Yuan Yuen Hsu sat on the board of trustees of the liberal New School university in New York with former Loral Corp. head Bernard L. Schwartz, who was allowed to transfer restricted satellite and missile technology to a People’s Liberation Army front after contributing a record amount of cash to President Clinton’s 1996 campaign.

The New School has removed Hsu’s name from its list of trustees. But the old list showing both Hsu and Schwartz is still captured on Google’s cache files. Here is the screen shot.

Schwartz, vice chairman of the New School board, was among officials who introduced Hsu to the school’s administration, WND has learned.

Last November, Schwartz and Hsu chaired a New School banquet at the Mandarin Oriental in New York which featured Sen. Clinton as keynote speaker. Clinton steered a $1 million federal grant to the college.

More recently, Schwartz and Hsu (pronounced shoo) appeared together at the New York Yacht Club for Democratic Rep. Patrick Kennedy’s 40th birthday bash.

The pair are so-called HillRaisers – major donors to Clinton’s war chest – with Hsu raising more than $1 million for her campaign. Hsu, like Schwartz, has lobbied the U.S. government to relax trade rules with China.

Before he was a Friend of Hill, Schwartz was a Friend of Bill. In fact, then-President Clinton feted Schwartz on his 71st birthday at a White House dinner.

Sources say Schwartz vouched for Hsu at New School, even though he was a fugitive convicted of grand theft in California.

New School President Bob Kerrey assumed Hsu, now in jail, was reputable. The former Democrat senator says he didn’t question Hsu’s credentials because he liked him. He also was taken by “his personal story, coming from China, and he had an interest in fashion as well.”

“It all intrigued me,” Kerrey said.

Of course, Hsu also gave generous sums of cash to Democrats and their causes, including The New School.

Kerrey assumed Hsu, a self-described apparel magnate, made his money in the garment industry. But even that claim is now in question.

It turns out that the various companies Hsu listed on federal campaign filings with the FEC no longer exist, and may always have been fictitious. Last decade Hsu declared bankruptcy.

The FBI has opened a criminal investigation into Hsu’s fund-raising activities.

Check out all the details at WND. Also Gateway Pundit has more Mrs. Bill donor problem links, including:

WaPo Reports Another Clinton Campaign Finance Fiasco Media Will Ignore

I peeped the headline above and read some of these, but frankly most of them are common sense things.
Shame on ole Snoop for assuming that all people had common sense.
So if you are in need of money travel tips, you will like these little tidbits.   

1. Airlines: Paper tickets
What it is You remember actual airline tickets, don’t you? If you aren’t comfortable with an electronic flight record, you’ll pay a steep price for an old-fashioned paper version.

What’s so bad The paper-ticket fee is all about forcing you to go electronic, thus saving the airlines money.

Ouch! $75 at United; $50 at American, Continental, Northwest and US Airways

What you can do Embrace change. When airlines routinely let you use a ticket on another airline if your flight was canceled, carrying a paper ticket was the safest bet. Today, flights are so full you probably won’t be able to get on another carrier. Plus, most major airlines have e-ticket agreements with competitors, so there’s no drawback to going paperless.

Check out the rest at CNN Money