The quadrillion dollar question that no liberal or conservative can answer:
What is the difference between qualifications and conflicts of interest?
This question becomes especially difficult if one makes special allowances for "hands-on practical experience," as opposed to academic credentials.

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Isn't American politics a lot like being stranded on a desert island with only one episode of Gilligan's Island that you didn't like very much the first time you saw it, and having nothing to do but watch it over and over and over?


FREE AMERICA

REVOLUTIONARY (DIRECT) DEMOCRACY

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As a doctor committed to universal health care, I have two words for Obama: Howard Dean.

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Surely, as smart as President Obama is, this will cause him to rethink his posts and to keep in mind the "new government" we're supposed to get--the one he's supposed to be bringing to the country.

Here's hoping.

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I keep hearing that Obama calls on the Washington insiders because he needs "qualified people who know the issues". Well, seems like the people who write articles for Alternet and other progressive media are pretty damn qualified and up to speed on the issues. Let's ask Obama the REAL reason why he won't bring any of them into his administration, but he'll hire any damn rightwinger and have cocktails with the rest. We ASKED for CHANGE, so what's up, bro?

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The change was an illusion because the people in Obama's new adminstration is not for Americans rights or anything it about the controlled of the American people.And if americans knew the true history then you will understand the so called Change was an illusion.

Emanuel, Rahm - Chief of Staff - Representative (D-Ill) since 2002 - Militant Zionist; Double-nationality: US and Israeli; Volunteer in the defense of Israel during the First Gulf War (1991 - led by former president George HW Bush against Iraq); Suspected of being an intelligence officer for the Israeli Armed Forces; Director at Freddie Mac; Adviser during the Clinton Administration; linked to Wasserstein Perella bank (Trilateral members); his father Benjamin Emanuel was a guerrilla fighter in the terrorist Irgun Zvai Leumi organization (then led by terrorist Menahem Beguin, later to become Israeli prime minister)

Gates, Robert M - Secretary of Defense - Republican - Gates was named at the DoD by former president George W Bush in 2006 to replace Donald Rumsfeld, and yet was "confirmed by Obama" - Former director of the CIA under former president George H W Bush (Senior) - Co-chaired foreign policy CFR task force with Zbigniew Brzezinski - Involved in the Iran-Contras Affair under the Reagan-Bush Administration - CFR, Bilderberg

Geithner Timothy F - Secretary of the Treasury - President since 2003 of the Federal Reserva Bank of New York. Prominent architect of the 2008 Banking Bail-out Plans, together with Bernard Bernanke (FED Governor - CFR), Henry Paulson (former Treasury Secretary – CFR) - Also held office during the Bill Clinton Administration, and was involved in the bail-outs of Mexico, Indonesia, Korea, Brazil, Thailand in the nineties, under then Under-Secretary of the Treausury Lawrence Summers - Introduced to Obama by Robert Rubin and Lawrence Summers - Former Director of Policy Development and Review Dept at the IMF – International Monetary Fund, from 2001 to 2003 - Former director at Kissinger Associates - Member of the Group of Thirty, his mentors include Lawrence Summers and Robert Rubin. Member, CFR, Trilateral, Bilderberg

Jones, James LA - Four-Star US Army Officer - National Security Officer (NSA) - Former NATO Forces Commander - Special Envoy to the Middle East for Security Affairs for former president George W Bush - Director at Chevron and Boeing - Zionist - Member of the Institute for International Affairs (founded by Air Force General Brent Scowcroft, former National Security Advisor under George Bush Senior) together with Zbigniew Brzezinski, Bobby Ray Inman (former CIA Director), Henry Kissinger and John Deutch (CIA director under Bill Clinton) - Member, CFR, TC, Bilderberg

Volcker Paul - Chairman of Obama's Advisory Board on Economic Recovery - Former Governor of the Federal Reserve Bank (1979 to 1987 – during the Carter and Reagan Administrations) - Zionist - Member of the "Group of Thirty" - President of Rothschild Wolfensohn Company, intimately linked to the Rockefeller family - CFR; North American Director of the Trilateral Commission; Bilderberger.

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...finding politicians who have not capitalized on their connections in Washington. That's what politicians DO!!! It should be no surprise that these two had their hands dirty because there is probably not a politician anywhere who hasn't got SOME skeleton in his/her closet SOME where, Obama included. In fact, there are many people who are not politicians who have these skeletons too. But ESPECIALLY politicians! Think about it; what kind of person wants to have power over other people in the first place?

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This week in many european newspapers the proposals of OBAMA to be approved by the Congress are published.
I and many europeans donot understand what is the new thing he brings in sothat the recession will be conquered.

NO all over health care for everyone but
20.000.000.000 dollars for an electronic pasport for all americans...

NO all over law for a livable minimum wage for everyone but;
140.000.000.000 for a yearly bonus of 500 or 1000 dollar for working people???
subsidies for old and disabled people
NO national plan for sustainable energy but a subsidie for companies which promise to invest in green energy.

Well I am amazed and surprised, our leaders mean that all this is to stimulate the USA MARKET inland.
Could any alternetter please tell me what are the CHANGES?? in political and economical reality???

Some politicians in Europe think it is a trick to send TAXmoney to the Corporations.
But I might be wrong..

How about ending the war on drugs
the war in Iraq and Afghanistan????

To end the strange fact that so many colored people are in jails for so long time???

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And it didn't. He clearly stated that the buck stopped with him and he took the blame. It's a copout to leave that out. His response was quick enough to include.

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Daschle (!oopsie!) forgot to pay more in taxes than most people earn, or ~$120,000. No wonder--Congress' inability to balance a budget demonstrates their collective lack of basic math skills.

...or, perhaps the rest of the country that has been screaming about how ridiculously complex the tax code is...well...perhaps they really do have a point, when folks who--themselves--built the tax code are incapable of tossing the chicken bones out in such a way that they pay their obligations.

It also refreshes the popular progressive argument that folks who make so much money that they overlook a hundred thousand or so dollars in taxes aren't really all that well equipped to represent us. Seeing that Congress' approval rating hovers around 15%, I think we're aware of the problem. The problem is we keep sending (mostly) the same scoundrels to D.C., expecting things to be different.

That's one definition of insanity, so I'm told.

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For my money Tom Daschle was a weak Senate majority leader when strength was needed in the first years of the Bush nightmare. He couldn't even protect his own U.S. Senate seat in '04. As for his lobbying activities, typical Washington insider. Screw'em.

Howard Dean is a better choice for head of Health and Human Services.

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Hey there, crime stoppers!

When you are finished reading all of the great articles and comments on AlterNet, have a gander at what I had to write this morning on this very subject. Here's a link:

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes (?)

Cheers!

Tom Degan
Goshen, NY

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.

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Here's a quote from Mr. Daschle on single-payer health care:

The key question for any health-care reform plan is, “How will it cover people?” Most of the world’s highest-ranking health-care systems employ some kind of “single-payer” strategy - that is, the government, directly or through insurers, is responsible for paying doctors, hospitals, and other health-care providers. Supporters say single-payer is brilliantly simple, ensures equity by providing all people with the same benefits, and saves billions of dollars by creating economies of scale and streamlining administration. But pure single-payer system is politically problematic in the United States, at least right now. Even though polls show that seniors are happier with Medicare than younger people are with their private insurance, opponents of reform have demonized government-run systems as “socialized medicine.”

Yes, he was a very well connected lobbyist with extensive ties to the health care industry. Yes, he had huge tax problems. Yes, we're all sick of the insider dealing in our government and all the corruption that goes with it.

Also, I'll never forgive Daschle, who, as the majority leader of the Senate, i.e. with Democrats in the majority, introduced the Iraq War Resolution that gave Bush the authorization he needed to invade Iraq.

Still, is it not possible that Daschle's experience in Washington and his support for single-payer could have been just the player we needed in the position? Is it not possible, warts and all, that he might have been one of the few people with the knowledge, experience and connections to bring about meaningful change on health care?

We'll never know what Daschle might have accomplished. Perhaps, just perhaps, we may have just lost a real opportunity for progress.

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It is easy in the hysteria of the moment to get caught up and not see those within the DC beltway truly believe they answer not to you and me. Back there in that inner circle of "friends" they fear not the IRS, that's only for those of us too stupid to understand and believe and know both the IRS and Federal Revere are "fake" designed to serve only a select few and that most assuredly is not me or you. Obama's vetting crew will no go through all the appointee like a dose of salt, heaven help anyone of those who thought their secrets were safely hidden out of sight. And it thank God for the internet and all of you who are doing your own vetting of the BS daily provided to us.

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The man who climbed in a limo with Larry Sinclair, concerned about who he surrounds himself with?

You've GOT to be kidding.

Go ahead, kill the post. Truth will come out in the MIDDLE of his term ANYWAY, when it will do the most damage to destroy him AND the DNC politically for the foreseeable future.

We've been down this road before with a certain Ms. Lewinsky, and how did that work out for ya?

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If the supporters of Obama had bothered to pay attention when he was running for office, you wouldn't always be so surprised at what he does....he is Chicago politics. Go back and review the people he surrounded himself with in Illinois. Axelrod who ran his campaign was a lobbyist. Obama, according to the foreign press who are doing their jobs, now has 17 lobbyists on his team so far. Have you seen that in the news here? No because our press is still busy worshipping instead of scrutinizing the new President. Only the big fish get caught and the little fish swim under the radar
screen.

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You bought it hook, line, and sinker.

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Ok, what the hell is that? you have one standard for those you don't know and another for your "friends"

If a man is smart enough to run the treasury, he is smart enough to what is taxable and what isn't and when it is due.

this is bullshit. Please Pres. Don't blow it in your first hundred days!!

i don't care if Daischle is the reincarnation of Jesus, he doesn't deserve to run the treasury or anything else.

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The pharmaceutical and health care industries are breaking out the champagne over their slick derailing of the Daschle nomination - and notice also that Geitner, with worse tax problems, was passed on through - because he's a proven servant of Wall Street.

So far, the same corporate interests that backed Bush have successfully advanced their agenda in the Obama Administration, and they've done that by putting a populist left-wing spin on their agenda, instead of a conservative right-wing spin (as was the case during Bush). Big Pharma and Big Finance and Big Media don't care so much about left-wing or right-wing issues; they just want to stay in the driver's seat and continue to control the public discussion and the government's decisions.

The pharmaceutical industry is notoriously deceptive and dishonest - and that explains a lot of the sudden outpouring of wrath towards Daschle by the "liberal left bloggers" - or the paid employees of PR firms (Burson-Marstellar, Edelman, etc.) employed by Pfizer, GlaxosmithKline, Altria Group and the like. It also explains why none of the attack pieces on Daschle bothered to mention his agenda:

1) A public heath insurance system (like Social Security, a public pension plan system) to compete with private insurance.

2) Low-cost generic versions of expensive patented drugs and investigations into generic price-fixing by the big firms.

3) Medicare reform aimed at paying doctors, not drug firms, and also aimed at preventative health care and public education.

4) An end to the politicization of the National Labs and an investigation into the Project Bioshield program and other "bioterrorism initiatives."

In order to move this kind of gigantic reform package through Congress, in the face of deep-pocketed resistance from pharmaceutical and health care loobbyists and shareholders, someone with inside knowledge of Congress - like Daschle - is needed.

In order to derail the nomination, the Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee did a fine-tooth comb job on Daschle's taxes - and they dug up some arcane tax provision that Daschle neglected. Charles Grassley (the leading Republican on the Finance Committee) and Utah's Orrin Hatch both list pharmaceutical and health care as their top donors (Hatch has taken over $1.2 million from drug makers alone).

Basically, the story is this:
"Jan. 8 (Bloomberg) -- President-elect Barack Obama’s plan to have new government health insurance compete with private coverage drew Republican fire at a nomination hearing for Thomas A. Daschle to run the Health and Human Services Department."

The only screw-up here is that Daschle's taxes were not vetted appropriately before he was nominated - if they had been, he could have cleared it up six months ago, and it wouldn't be an issue today.

What we really have here is a collaboration between Republicans, pharma-insurance cartels and corporate media, which successfully derailed Daschle. Notice that the key editorial was in the New York Times, the one that called for him to step down? It must be irrelevant that Raul Cesan, NYT corporate director, is an ex-CEO of Schering-Plough, or that William Keenard, another NYT corporate director, is also a director of the Carlyle Group, who is now heavily into pharmaceuticals, media, etc...

Big Pharma wins! Merck and Schering-Plough have all reported great returns... kind of low tax rates, though - and that's because they offshore their patents and profits in the Caribbean Islands... clever.

Economically speaking, the closet cannabis cultivator who puts their money in a local credit union or spends it in local establishments is a better model citizen than the pharma CEO... so quit the Paxil and Prozac and start smoking dope, is my advice.

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politicians always know they are in the public, and should be as careful and diligent as possible.

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These appointees have been a disaster, everyone of them had serious issues.

Does Obama think thats not paying taxes, or pardoning terrorists or criminals is a requirement for office?

Based on this disaster, I think the IRS should audit EVERY poltician who holds a national office. I suspect we might be able to put a big dent in the economic downturn!

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Out of respect for Mr. Barak Obama, I will in my posts refer to him as 'President' or, with humor, 'The Messiah'.

I really hate when posters refer to the man as 'Obama'.

But really? Who did you expect him to choose for posts?

The President was a lawyer with no real experience, and a consummate politician in Chicago..

How could he pick anyone for posts besides insiders? What does he know? Who else could run things? And the Treasury? Who else but a banker.

It's just a shift in power structure, not a revolution,or evolution.

Plus ca change, plus la meme chose.

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Obama better take a interest in all of Africa & very soon. Change to its new The African Union is taking place which can go sour for all business in America & Banking. It is not going to be easy to cope when the dis-favoritism begins. You recall the December 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103, which exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland. A total of 270 victims of the leadership in Libya caused this incident and the sanctions Libya had to accept was paying all those victums compensation of up to $2.7 billion - or up to $10 million each.

Former Iranian President Blames Tehran for Lockerbie, claiming it was destroyed in revenge for downing of an Iranian civilian airliner in 1988, says Abolhassan Bani-Sadr the former president of the Islamic Republic of Iran. On July 3, 1988, the navy cruiser USS Vincennes, also known as "Robocruiser," shot down Iran Air Flight 665 over the Persian Gulf. The civilian airliner was carrying mostly Muslims on their pilgrimage to Mecca -- 290 died, most Iranians. His story indicating Mohtashami-Pur, the then minister of the interior, acknowledged in an interview that he had contracted Ahmad Jibril, the leader of a Palestinian organization, to bomb an American airliner. The PFLP-GC (Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command), Ahmed Jibril's terror group. US intelligence knew about Iran's intention to bomb an American airliner. Israel in fact opposed that definition, but acknowledged after the arrest of 2 Libyan's that the bombimn was conducted by Jibril's organization. The connection to Libya was a Swiss Company named MeBo, which stands for Meister and Bollier that was selling 20 MST-13 timers to the Libyan military (machine-made nine-ply green boards), as well as a few units (hand-made eight-ply brown boards) to a Research Institute in Bernau, known to act as a front to the Stasi, the former East German secret police. A employee of the Swiss company named Ulrich Lumpert actually admitted in a document of July 18, 2007 that he had stole the third machine-manufactured PC-Board consisting of 8 layers of fibre-glass from MEBO Ltd. which at the trial was to represent the real Timer board but it was a fake non-functioning model of the real Timer Boards which were sold to the country of Libya. The last of the compensation $1.5 billion was received Oct 31, 2008 from Tripoli.

President & Mrs. Bush lead a big campaign to help African's, prevent malaria (remember Malaria Awareness Day, 2007 & the bilateral investment treaty with Rwanda President Paul Kagame, Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2008 in Kilgali, Rwanda). The future is no longer primarily about the US-Libya relations, it now concerns all of Africa as if it had too consider dealing with state matters.

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World Poverty - What is it & How To Deal With It In The Future? May our eyes focus on where charity was, Africans, Philippines, Indonesians, Thailand and India. That was up until the conflict in Kuwait & next Afghanistan then in Iraq which sort of shadowed the Kurdish people with the politics of Saddam & the trial. But the majority of charity focuses on African countries. I read in the news a more serious problem now that swung from Libya & now is engulfing all of Africa to soon demand a single economic issue directed at every Bank in all countries if they agree. Muammar Gaddafi, new Leader of The African Union, is about to change everything in Africa from Sovereign Countries which are members in the United Nations to a single Sovereign nation which is all of Africa & designate single states. Some of the Sovereign nations do not want this, banking would be shattered according to the past run-in with Switzerland over his son, Hannibal being arrested, Gaddafi retaliated by removing Libya's $7 billion of assets out of Swiss Banks & Stopped supplying Oil to Switzerland. His government has recalled some of its diplomats from Switzerland, reduced flights between the countries, stopped processing visa requests from Swiss citizens, demanded the closure of Swiss firms in Libya and detained two Swiss citizens, & closed the Libyan Embassy there. All that in retaliation of his son's arrest. When Gaddafi gets his anger up he becomes furious and retaliates, the new round of retaliation against the Obama regime is about to start so what is welfare to a nation being born whom in Africa is to be capable of beaaring with this retaliation anger. American Banking is in for a bad scenario and so is American Business in Africa, I suspect import/export tariffs will be first on the agenda to increase or disallowed entirely. If our charity organizations are going to be lied to they may just as well terminate every aspect of funding into Africa as it would go into Banks now to be controlled by a central government under rules of Gaddafi to distribute, food deliveries would also be a new management option demanding that his new military make all deliveries if allowed. Compensation of the failures would not come about with the U.N. either as Gadaffi would isolate the U.N. from the entire ordeal - NO U.N. Authority allowed. This gets worse, money that is not being used by Gaddafi could not be returned to a charity to be returned to America as the wire capability would be disallowed. Gaddafi is a ruthless mad man now in control of The African Union, that is all there is to it in a nut shell Welfare in Africa will be a new frontier for Gaddafi's Management & Control.

There will be no end to this, the world will be affected, Obama has a tuff challenge ahead to deal with it and so does everyone he must have to advise him and their situation becomes first priority. I also believe that Colonel Muammar Gaddafi will tone down instead of taking the angry approach to running Africa as he has shown in his last days in Libya.

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