Tick Tock -- America on the block

A very comments from the news

1. “The United States is failing to develop the math skills of both girls and boys, especially among those who could excel at the highest levels, a new study asserts, and girls who do succeed in the field are almost all immigrants or the daughters of immigrants from countries where mathematics is more highly valued.”

2. "We’re in the middle of a financial crisis, but most economists say there is a broader economic crisis still to come. The unemployment rate will shoot upward. Companies will go bankrupt. Commercial real estate values will decline. Credit card defaults will rise. The nonprofit sector will be hammered.

"By the time the recession is in full force, Democrats will probably be running the government. Barack Obama will probably be in the White House. Democrats will have a comfortable majority in the House and will control between 56 and 60 seats in the Senate."

3. "For six years, Vice President Dick Cheney and other hard-liners managed to block any serious talks with North Korea. In that time, North Korea’s scientists produced enough plutonium for at least four more weapons — in addition to the one or two already believed to be in its arsenal — and tested a nuclear weapon. There is no way that strategy can be considered a success."

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The above are associated with the New York Times of 14 October 2008.

Readers of my Downeast (Machias Valley News Observer) Column -- or this and related blogs -- know that I warned about Bush before his first election ... but wanted him elected so I could see if I was correct about the harm his administration would bring down upon us. I obviously was correct.

Readers are also aware that -- as the Dow Industrials passed 12000 and moved toward 14000 I warned that we needed to correct immediately ... or face a fall to 8000. Well, the markets continued up, reached their artificial peak and have been headed down ever since. The DOW bounced at 8300. Unless we get the game together, unless Obama wins a clear and decisive victory, expect the dow to see 4500 before it sees a new record high.

NATIONALIZATION ... SOCIALIZATION ... Bush, following the Reagan agenda, has said Social Security should be privatized -- your money should have been in the failed stock markets and not guaranteed by the Federal Government ... which now has the problem of guaranteeing the whole American Banking System -- and thus ensuring the soundness of the WORLD BANKING SYSTEM! Yep ... the system which could not be trusted to ensure your retirement is not ensuring the economy of the industrialized world.

We can socialize banks, but not medical care? We can reward those who lent money to those who had no jobs, income or assets -- the NINJA loan system. We can reward them by bailing them out without them feeling any of the pain they have caused us. That is, after all, the Republican way. It is the Fundamentalist Christian way ... no law, no regulation, just faith that the supreme powers which control all market forces, and all forces which affect our daily lives, will turn a blind eye to those who didn't care about their neighbor ... and ultimately punish those who obey the rules, place rules (build a wall around Torah) to ensure the rules are obeyed, and work to help their neighbors.

REALITY CHECK. We are withing weeks of the election and the decision as to the survival of the American Experiment. How will we vote? For or against our basic survival?

The clock is ticking.