Open Line Friday!

22 thoughts on “Open Line Friday!”

1. without the sun or warmth or day

   Log in to Reply

2. A catch, you bet there are catches…http://www.denverpost.com/business/ci_13573130

   Colorado appears to be winning the race to the bottom when you review this article.  Unfortunately, it fails to point out the gross increased employment has come in only government and non profit sectors.

   Breakdown of state numbers

   While taxpayers could, for the first time, plug in a ZIP code to find what companies in their neighborhood won stimulus contracts – as well as other isolated facts – a deeper analysis requires downloading data sheets into software programs.

   The story behind Colorado’s numbers, as analyzed by The Denver Post, looks like this:

   * $583 million in Recovery Act funds have flowed to 96 different companies, individuals and other entities such as housing authorities.

   * 163 contracts went to companies based here. The biggest job generators were deals with TeleTech, 4,231; Ball Aerospace, 58; the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, 42; and Navarro Research and Asphalt Constructors, 27. In 64 of the contracts, companies listed zero jobs.

   * Eight percent of the contracts, to the tune of $46.2 million, were given to local government agencies or pseudo-government entities. Among the biggest: $18.3 million to Colorado Springs Utilities for a solar conversion project and $26.3 million to the University of Colorado to build solar sensors for satellites.

   When the satellite work rolls out, CU officials estimate 300 people will be working on the project nationally, including 45 scientists at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics in Boulder.

   * Industries benefiting the most financially from stimulus funds so far are aeronautics/ space, energy, communications and the military. Of all federal agencies, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration provided the most money to Colorado, doling out four contracts worth $211 million.

   * The biggest contracts went to Lockheed Martin for $165 million worth of work on the planned Orion spacecraft at its Jefferson County facility. The aerospace corporation is among the companies that did not provide information on jobs it created or saved through the deal. The company also has not responded to requests from The Post for that information. The smallest contract went to KD Kanopy Inc. in Westminster for providing canopies that advertised for the U.S. Army.

   Economic impact hard to pinpoint

   Officials with the Colorado governor’s office also were watching the government’s first data release to understand the impact on Colorado.

   “The job numbers are still valuable because they show that people are getting work and benefiting from the Recovery Act,” said Myung Oak Kim, spokeswoman for the state’s economic recovery board. “The bottom line is that the Recovery Act is helping Colorado by creating jobs, cutting taxes, helping struggling families, and supporting schools and vital public services.”
   

   Though Colorado was ranked as the top job creator among states – given TeleTech’s hiring of 4,231 people to staff a series of call centers – only 379 of those employees worked in Englewood. The rest were scattered throughout the country, such as in London, Ky., and Ocala, Fla.

   The workers were hired, according to a summary TeleTech provided to recovery.org, to help its clients respond to public inquiries about the conversion from analog television transmission to digital. They were employed between April and August, according to the report. Company officials didn’t return phone calls from The Post seeking more detail about the jobs.
   

   Ed Pound, spokesman for the federal Recovery Board, said the government will be regularly posting updates to job data and other information to ensure accuracy.

   “There are opportunities to correct this information,” Pound said.

   So what’s the catch …. of the 4,700 jobs “created or saved”, 3,900 were not even in Colorado.  But big ups to the folks at Teletech for winning the business and putting people to work.

   “The bottom line is that the Recovery Act is helping Colorado by creating jobs, cutting taxes, helping struggling families, and supporting schools and vital public services.” – Office of Governor Bill Ritter, Jr.  

   If they mean reducing the payment of taxes to the government and include that in the definition of “cutting taxes” … well then they’ve just won the argument that lower economic activities and less jobs does seem to produce “tax cuts”.

   Log in to Reply

3. I know the whole thing has probably jumped the shark already but it’s starting to look like a hoax launched by gooberdad.  We’ll see.

   Log in to Reply

   1. Why are they on Larry King that night, getting interviewed? It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.

      Glad to see the Larimer County Sheriff’s Dept. will be looking a little deeper into this. I was pretty shocked yesterday when they said there’d be no charges–criminal, financial or otherwise.

      Log in to Reply

4. Thanks to everyone in my Colorado netroots who have helps us up here in Maine!

   Log in to Reply

5. Thanks to everyone in my Colorado netroots who have helps us up here in Maine!

   Log in to Reply

6. Yeah, hard to see it when I don’t provide a link!

   What I said was, “This video is a must see for anyone who remembers how better off the middle class used to be.

   This is a video from UCTV.  This woman did such original research about reasons for the decline of the middle class that are cutting edge original.  And many of the points made are classic “hidden in plain sight” types. Also, that dastardly boiling frog.  

   I saved it to my hard drive so that if I want to get really depressed I can watch it.  ”

   And the link is, drumroll please,

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…

   Log in to Reply

   1. I’ve read a lot of her work (and she was on the Daily Show).

      Its an hour long, but well worth the time.

      Log in to Reply

      1. Elizabeth Warren is brilliant. I was kindahoping maybe she’d get appointed to fill Senator Kennedy’s seat. Maybe she should primary Kirk.

         And I agree- it’s well worth watching.

         Log in to Reply

         1. I started watching another UCTV, Elaine Pagels of The Gnostic Gospels fame.  I forced myself to watch about ten or fewer minutes, and then stopped the pain.

            Here is a world famous theologian, cutting edge historical work, head of the T. department at an Ivy League school……..and her public speaking skills are worse than some jr. high shy kid.

            I digress…….  Yes, Warren is easy to listen to.  

            Log in to Reply

7. …the NFL Players Union, President Obama and “the Tiny Man who lives under my desk” for not being the Rams new owner:

   “http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/football/2009/10/15/2009-10-15_rush_limbaugh_blames_nfl.html”

   Again, this is the voice of the Conservative Thinkers in the GOP? Ye gods, you Repubs need to shut him for the good of your dwindling Party…  

   Log in to Reply

   1. is that the group he was in partnership with decided they didn’t want him as a partner.  The NFL didn’t kick him out.  The players’ union didn’t kick him out.  Barack Obama didn’t kick him out.  His own business partners kicked him out.

      This was pure capitalism in action.  He is a “hot potato” because of his mouth and his business partners decided that, in the interest of their business, they should get rid of him.

      The Republican Party would be wise to follow their example and distance themselves from him.

      Log in to Reply

8. I don’t know, but Barack Obama, Derrick Jeter, Halle Barry, Mariah Cary, Vanessa Williams, The Rock, and about a billion more interracial kids turned out better than Tim McVeigh, the Columbine Killers, Ted Bundy, Rush Limbaugh….

   What a load of horse shit! He even let’s his Black friends use the bathroom!  WTF!!

   Change the word interracial and insert Gay, that’s how stupid anyone against gay marriage will sound in about five years!

   (AP) NEW ORLEANS A Louisiana justice of the peace said he refused to issue a marriage license to an interracial couple out of concern for any children the couple might have. Keith Bardwell, justice of the peace in Tangipahoa Parish, says it is his experience that most interracial marriages do not last long.

   “I’m not a racist. I just don’t believe in mixing the races that way,” Bardwell told the Associated Press on Thursday. “I have piles and piles of black friends. They come to my home, I marry them, they use my bathroom. I treat them just like everyone else.”

   Bardwell said he asks everyone who calls about marriage if they are a mixed race couple. If they are, he does not marry them, he said.

   Bardwell said he has discussed the topic with blacks and whites, along with witnessing some interracial marriages. He came to the conclusion that most of black society does not readily accept offspring of such relationships, and neither does white society, he said.

   “There is a problem with both groups accepting a child from such a marriage,” Bardwell said. “I think those children suffer and I won’t help put them through it.”

   If he did an interracial marriage for one couple, he must do the same for all, he said.

   “I try to treat everyone equally,” he said.

   Bardwell estimates that he has refused to marry about four couples during his career, all in the past 2 1/2 years.

   http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…

   Log in to Reply

   1. There’s just no room for this shit in our society anymore. None.  

      Log in to Reply

   2. Louisiana, do you know where your Governor Bobby Jindal is on this story, which is making the international news, yet?

      As Jindal asks on his web page:

      I’m asking you once again to believe in Louisiana.

      Can you believe it?

      Sincerely, I hope Jindal comes up with a good response.  

      Log in to Reply

      1. http://www.fox8live.com/news/l…

         Baton Rouge, LA – Governor Bobby Jindal has called for an investigation fir [sic] the justice of the peace in Tangipahoa Parish that denied a marriage license to an inter-racial couple.

         In a statement Jindal says:

         “This is a clear violation of constitutional rights and federal and state law. Mr. Bardwell’s actions should be fully reviewed by the Judiciary Commission and disciplinary action should be taken immediately – including the revoking of his license.”

         Log in to Reply

         1. Timing is suspect though.  Wonder if they had to do some due diligence first to make sure he wasn’t a supporter !

            Log in to Reply

   3. happens when you let other people decide who should and should not be married.

      Log in to Reply

      1. .
         
         society has no business coalescing mores or reaching consensus on community standards ?
         
         .

         Log in to Reply

         1. that government has zero business acting as custos mores.  

            Log in to Reply

         2. you can’t claim to be for “limited government” out of one side of your mouth while trying to use those same powers of government to regulate the most private, personal relationships.

            Log in to Reply

9. http://www.latimes.com/news/na…

   The Obama Interior Department is reviewing a decision made by the Bush administration in its final days that attempted to lock in lucrative royalty rates and favorable regulations for oil companies holding leases for oil-shale development on public lands.

   The decision, which came in the form of amendments to existing leases, drew little public notice at the end of the Bush administration in January. But since then, congressional watchdogs, environmental groups and state officials in Colorado, where most of the leases are located, have denounced the amendments as a massive giveaway to the oil industry.

   Log in to Reply