Fausta's Blog

American and Latin American Politics, Society, and Culture

Archives for September 2012

September 26, 2012 By Fausta

Libya, you asked?


IT WAS AL QAEDA

Compare and contrast:
State Dept. spokesman won’t answer questions about Libya Fiasco, yet the US knew Stevens assassination was work of terrorists within 24 hours of attack.

Libyan President Tells a Baffled, Befuddled, and In All Ways Bewildered Ann Curry That The YouTube Clip Had Nothing to Do With The Terrorist Attack

Video below (starts right away):
[Read more…]

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Filed Under: 9/11, Barack Obama, Libya, terrorism Tagged With: Fausta's blog

September 26, 2012 By Fausta

Michelle came to Princeton to ask people to go to Pennsylvania

The day before her latest personal appearance in The View, Michelle Obama was in the vicinity for a $10,000/plate fundraiser that blocked traffic on Herrontown Road for most of the day. Surprisingly, the local papers did not report on the visit, except for a brief preview, PRINCETON: Some local Dems to skip the first lady. They probably “skipped” because of “other plans” that most likely do not involve coughing up ten grand.

However, NJ.com does have a report (more on that in a moment).

The home hosting the fundraiser had a huge tent in their side yard, but the hosts are the soul of discretion,

Representatives from the Obama national campaign office in Chicago and the New Jersey office did not respond to requests for comment to discuss the fundraiser, due to be held at the home of Andrew and Carol Golden.

Mr. Golden runs the company that manages the $17 billion endowment fund of Princeton University, while Ms. Golden works for Corner House, the local substance abuse program. She also is the chairwoman of the board of trustees of the Mercer County chapter of Planned Parenthood.

The couple are donors to Democrat politicians and causes, with Ms. Golden having given $11,000 to Texans for Truth, a group that challenged former President George W. Bush’s service in the Texas National Guard, election records showed. She declined to comment last month about the fundraiser.

I couldn’t find any photos of the event on the White House website.

However, the most interesting part of the event may be this:

First Lady Michelle Obama has made a campaign stop in New Jersey, urging her husband’s supporters to volunteer in the closing weeks of the presidential campaign – especially in swing states such as neighboring Pennsylvania.

As you may recall, in 2008 Obama took Pennsylvania by 10.1 percentage points over McCain. The Obama campaign is clearly not expecting that to repeat itself since Michelle was telling people on Sunday

“We need you to head over to Pennsylvania,” she told 230 people gathered in a white tent. “Get in the car, drive on over to Pennsylvania for a few days or a weekend to help get out the vote in that state.”

Also interesting,

Neither party has done much public campaigning in New Jersey, which is likely to go to the Democrats on Nov. 6. But campaigns have raised more than $5 million each in the moneyed state, with the president ahead by about $200,000.

That Obama has out-raised Mitt by less than 5% in New Jersey is astonishing. The bluest parts of the Garden State tend to be, like Princeton, the most affluent (with some exceptions). Maybe it has something to do with this.

Over in Ohio, another of Pennsylvania’s neighbors, today Mike Rowe meets Mitt to talk about how to get America back to work. Bryan Preston has the schedule.

Makes you wonder the residents of which state – Illinois? Michigan? – is the Obama campaign asking to head to Ohio to help get out the vote.

Stacy McCain’s been reporting from Ohio. Follow his links for his reports.

UPDATE,
Via Bryan’s commenter Allston, here’s the letter Mike Rowe wrote to Mitt,

Which brings me to my purpose in writing. On Labor Day of 2008, the fans of Dirty Jobs helped me launch this website. mikeroweWORKS.com began as a Trade Resource Center designed to connect kids with careers in the skilled trades. It has since evolved into a non-profit foundation – a kind of PR Campaign for hard work and skilled labor.
Thanks to a number of strategic partnerships, I have been able to promote a dialogue around these issues with a bit more credibility than my previous resume allowed. I’ve spoken to Congress (twice) about the need to confront the underlying stigmas and stereotypes that surround these kinds of jobs. Alabama and Georgia have both used mikeroweWORKS to launch their own statewide technical recruitment campaigns, and I’m proud to be the spokesman for both initiatives. I also work closely with Caterpillar, Ford, Kimberly-Clark, and Master Lock, as well as The Boy Scouts of America and The Future Farmers of America. To date, the mikeroweWORKS Foundation has raised over a million dollars for trade scholarships. It’s modest by many standards, but I think we’re making a difference.
–
Certainly, we need more jobs, and you were clear about that in Tampa. But the Skills Gap proves that we need something else too. We need people who see opportunity where opportunity exists. We need enthusiasm for careers that have been overlooked and underappreciated by society at large. We need to have a really big national conversation about what we value in the workforce, and if I can be of help to you in that regard, I am at your service – assuming of course, you find yourself in a new address early next year.


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Filed Under: Barack Obama, campaigns, Democrats, elections, Michelle Obama, news, politics, Princeton Tagged With: Fausta's blog

September 25, 2012 By Fausta

In Silvio Canto’s podcast

talking about Latin America with Silvio and Ray Walser, Senior Policy Analyst, THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION.

You can listen here.

UPDATE,
Here’s information on the Colombian economy.

THE CONSEQUENCES OF COLOMBIA’S NEGOTIATIONS WITH FARC

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Filed Under: Blog Talk Radio, Latin America, podcasts Tagged With: Fausta's blog

September 25, 2012 By Fausta

Obama at the UN

While the Muslim-led nations seek global ban on insults of Muhammad; as expected, Obama went right along:

Obama 2012: Because the future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam.

— jimgeraghty (@jimgeraghty) September 25, 2012

Whatever happened to the First Amendment?

Read the whole speech here.

UPDATE,
Video

Jennifer Rubin’s take.

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Filed Under: Barack Obama, UN Tagged With: Fausta's blog

September 25, 2012 By Fausta

Venezuela: Yet another fire at a refinery

Venezuela’s PdVSA Says Refinery Fire Extinguished

Firefighters have fully extinguished the blaze that engulfed a naphtha storage tank at Venezuela’s El Palito refinery, state oil monopoly Petroleos de Venezuela, or PdVSA, said Saturday.

Two tanks, each with capacity to hold more than 170,000 barrels of naphtha, caught fire Wednesday night after the compound was struck by lightning, authorities said. Firefighters were able to put out flames at one of the tanks that night.

PdVSA officials said crude processing at El Palito was never halted and that operations continued normally throughout the ordeal. They had initially said they would be able to put out the fire within a day but the efforts to smother the blaze continued until late Friday, the company said.

El Palito was the latest incident to hit Venezuela’s state-controlled oil industry, which has been marred by frequent accidents and mishaps in recent years. An Aug. 25 gas-leak explosion at the country’s largest refinery, Amuay, killed more than 40 people and raised questions over the adequacy of the government’s maintenance procedures at production plants.
…
In an annual report released in March, PdVSA listed El Palito as one of its production facilities most prone to accidents, which have posed a challenge for the company in recent years.

Meanwhile, the campaigning goes on, while Datanálisis comes up with puzzling data.


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Filed Under: Communism, elections, Hugo Chavez, Venezuela Tagged With: Fausta's blog

September 25, 2012 By Fausta

A note of thanks


Many thanks to the readers who have purchased books and other items through my Amazon links! Every time you do, I get a small commission.

And, may I remind you, you can read this blog on your Kindle, for only a $0.99 subscription. That way you can read it, anytime, anywhere.

Again, Thanks!

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Filed Under: books Tagged With: Fausta's blog

September 24, 2012 By Fausta

Life imitates art: Ahmadinejad in New York


Yum!


Last month I posted a brief review of Gary Buslik’s book, Akhmed and the Atomic Matzo Balls: A Novel of International Intrigue, Pork-Crazed Termites, and Motherhood. In it, the title character – who bears more than a passing resemblance to Ahmadinejad – loves to indulge in Jewish deli fare while on his junkets to the UN.

The NYPost must have hired Mr. Buslik, or perhaps they read his book:

The anti-Semite’s special welcome basket — from New Yorkers with love — included such locally procured goodies as Gold’s Borscht, Manischewitz Gefilte Fish and smoked whitefish from the world-famous Murray’s Sturgeon House on the Upper West Side.

If Ahmadinejad (pronounced: I’m a dinner jacket) needed midnight munchies during his visit to this infidel city, there were also plenty of H&H bagels, onion bialys and Zabar’s cream cheese.
…
There’s also a bobblehead Statue of Liberty to keep on his night table, a teddy bear to cuddle with during those cold Persian nights and a 9/11 American-flag refrigerator magnet that he can stick on the minibar.

For the (dic)tator who has everything!

Related,
Pass the bialy! Piers Morgan: Ahmadinejad would have ‘no problem’ if one of his children dated a Jew.

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Filed Under: books, Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, New York, NY, UN Tagged With: Fausta's blog

September 24, 2012 By Fausta

The Carnival of Latin America and the Caribbean

LatinAmerARGENTINA
Argentine Growth Halts as Fernandez Tightens Controls

Paypal suspends domestic transactions in Argentina
Paypal says that international transactions are still possible.
Paypal is to prevent users in Argentina from transferring money between their own accounts.

Argentina mints coin to commemorate Falklands war (h/t GoV)

BRAZIL
Economic policy in Brazil
Sparking recovery
The president cuts taxes again

CHILE
Nuestro Cine: Selling Democracy

COLOMBIA
Michelle Bachelet: Peace cannot be constructed without including women

White House staff involved in Cartagena brothel scandal?

CUBA
JFK Tapes: New Insight Into White House Tensions During Cuban Missile Crisis

Cubans and Americans

ECUADOR
Why Ecuador Is Sheltering Julian Assange
President Rafael Correa continues to follow the Hugo Chávez playbook

HONDURAS
Private city in Honduras will have minimal taxes, government

Vallecito Resists, Satuye Lives! The Garífuna Resistance to Honduras’ Charter Cities (h/t DP)

IMMIGRATION
Immigration Slows, Lowers Proportion of Latin Americans in US

JAMAICA
Jamaica and Zimbabwe
Lovers’ tiff

LATIN AMERICA
Prisons in Latin America
A journey into hell
Far from being secure places of rehabilitation, too many of the region’s jails are violent incubators of crime. But there are some signs of change

MEXICO
President Obama Falsely Claims Fast and Furious Program “Begun Under the Previous Administration”

‘Fast and Furious’ Report Not the End of the Issa-Holder Battle
The chairman says an unprecedented level of cooperation, like that shown to the inspector general, could “perhaps eliminate the need for a protracted fight in the courts.”

IG: WH ‘Made it Impossible’ to Pursue Lead in Fast and Furious Probe

NICARAGUA
Nicaraguan lawmakers approve construction of refinery, pipeline

PDV Caribe, a unit of Venezuelan state oil giant PDVSA, has a 51 percent stake in Albanisa, founded in Caracas on June 17, 2007, while Nicaraguan state oil firm Petronic holds the remaining 49 percent interest.

What could possibly go wrong?

PUERTO RICO

Compartiendo con los empleados del Wendys de Cidra, ya voy de camino para actividad del @pnp_pr yfrog.com/oe29dszj

— Luis Fortuño (@luisfortuno51) September 19, 2012

VENEZUELA
Situación actual de la refinería de Amuay

Venezuelan “Amigos” Upset Over Chavez Ad

Jimmy Carter: Get Lost, Stop Meddling In Venezuela!


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Filed Under: Argentina, Carnival of Latin America, Carnival of Latin America and the Caribbean, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, Honduras, immigration, Jamaica, Luis Fortuño, Mexico, Nicaragua, Puerto Rico, Venezuela Tagged With: Fast and Furious, Fausta's blog

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