SANTA CRUZ — By golly, a downtown bookstore has found a way to poke fun at former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and draw attention to her new book released this week, “Going Rogue: An American Life.”
Several copies of Palin’s book, about her experience as John McCain’s running mate in 2008 and life in Alaska, are stacked on the checkout counter at Bookshop Santa Cruz next to a bowl filled with small bags of walnuts — a 2-for-1 special of sorts.
Customers who buy Palin’s book, priced at $29 in hardcover, also get a free bag of “Just Plain Nutz.”
There’s a new slogan making its way onto car bumpers and across the Internet. It reads simply: “Pray for Obama: Psalm 109:8”
A nice sentiment?
Maybe not.
The psalm reads, “Let his days be few; and let another take his office.”
Presidential criticism through witty slogans is nothing new. Bumper stickers, t-shirts, and hats with “1/20/09” commemorated President Bush’s last day in office.
But the verse immediately following the psalm referenced is a bit more ominous: “Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.”
Even as drug makers promise to support Washington’s health care overhaul by shaving $8 billion a year off the nation’s drug costs after the legislation takes effect, the industry has been raising its prices at the fastest rate in years.
In the last year, the industry has raised the wholesale prices of brand-name prescription drugs by about 9 percent, according to industry analysts. That will add more than $10 billion to the nation’s drug bill, which is on track to exceed $300 billion this year. By at least one analysis, it is the highest annual rate of inflation for drug prices since 1992.
The drug trend is distinctly at odds with the direction of the Consumer Price Index, which has fallen by 1.3 percent in the last year.
James Gadiel of Kent, Conn., was a 23-year-old trader who died in the World Trade Center terror attacks. As a tribute to him, his father, Peter, approached local leaders to suggest placing a memorial plaque at the town hall.
Kent’s de facto mayor, First Selectman Ruth Epstein, readily agreed — until she saw the proposed wording: “James Gadiel, lifelong resident of Kent, murdered in the World Trade Center by Muslim terrorists on Sept. 11, 2001.”
I’m sure having your father be the President of the United States can be a pretty cool thing, but as a kid just trying to fit in, I’m sure it can also be a little embarrassing. But what can be even more embarrassing is when your father is giving a speech and mentions you made a 73 on a science test (45 second mark).
I bet Malia and her mother gave him an earful about that, but at least he admits she redeemed herself.
And I wonder who will be the first to comment that he or she is embarrassed to have him as a president.
A seventh-grader and her 80-year-old grandfather are allegedly the first people to discover that President Barack Obama is related to all other U.S. presidents except one.
BridgeAnne d’Avignon, who attends Monte Vista Christian School in Watsonville, traced that Obama, and all other U.S. presidents except Martin Van Buren, are related to John “Lackland” Plantagenet, a king of England and signer of the Magna Carta.
“One Nation Under God” is a painting by Jon McNaughton. If you visit his website, you can read his motivation for painting this piece, and you can use your mouse to hover over sections of the painting to get an explanation regarding its meaning. For example, when I placed the mouse cursor over the red sash worn by Jesus, I got the following:
NEW YORK (Reuters Life!) – The United States is the most admired country globally thanks largely to the star power of President Barack Obama and his administration, according to a new poll.
It climbed from seventh place last year, ahead of France, Germany, the United Kingdom and Japan which completed the top five nations in the Nation Brand Index (NBI).
“What’s really remarkable is that in all my years studying national reputation, I have never seen any country experience such a dramatic change in its standing as we see for the United States for 2009,” said Simon Anholt, the founder of NBI, which measured the global image of 50 countries each year.
He believes that during the previous administration of George W. Bush the United States suffered in the world ranking with its unpopular foreign policies but since Obama was elected, and despite the recent economic turmoil, the country’s status has risen globally.
“There is no other explanation,” Anholt said in an interview, referring to the impact of Obama.
The global survey, conducted by GFK Roper Public Affairs & Media, involved 20,000 people in 20 rich and developing countries around the globe. They were asked to rate 50 nations in categories such as culture, governance, people, exports, tourism, landscape and education.
Canada took the biggest hit in the latest survey, falling to seventh from fourth place, while China climbed several spots to 22nd, which Anholt believes in due in part to the successful staging of the Olympics.
In the most profound financial change in recent Middle East history, Gulf Arabs are planning – along with China, Russia, Japan and France – to end dollar dealings for oil, moving instead to a basket of currencies including the Japanese yen and Chinese yuan, the euro, gold and a new, unified currency planned for nations in the Gulf Co-operation Council, including Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi, Kuwait and Qatar.
Secret meetings have already been held by finance ministers and central bank governors in Russia, China, Japan and Brazil to work on the scheme, which will mean that oil will no longer be priced in dollars.
The plans, confirmed to The Independent by both Gulf Arab and Chinese banking sources in Hong Kong, may help to explain the sudden rise in gold prices, but it also augurs an extraordinary transition from dollar markets within nine years.
In an ironic twist, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Virginia sent a letter on Thursday to a rural Virginia high school defending the right of students to mount a protest at Friday night’s football game.
Since the landmark 2008 general election, there can be no doubt that a very large percentage of our Nation’s leaders have a liberal mindset. The undeniable fact is that the 111th Pelosi-Reid Congress and the Obama Administration demonstrate a far left political philosophy. And since the President nominates federal judges and Justices of the United States Supreme Court, the judicial branch of government could take on a decidedly more liberal bent as the Obama Administration wears on.
Liberty Counsel has therefore named this special new prayer-in-action program Adopt a Liberal. And that’s exactly what we invite you to do — adopt a liberal who is in authority for regular, intense prayer in accord with St. Paul’s admonition to his disciple, Timothy. In fact, we expect that many of our friends and supporters will choose to adopt many liberals as subjects of regular prayer!
The infamous Sarah Palin XBOX 360 was autographed at the governors picnic on July 24, 2009, in Wasilla, Alaska, just two days before her resignation as governor of that state. You can own this 60GB, perfect-condition, one-of-a-kind item before her expected run for president of the United States of America in 2012.
AUSTIN — The Texas Rangers are investigating the shooting death of a cousin of Gov. Rick Perry in a mysterious exchange of gunfire with sheriff’s deputies.
An attorney for Larry Don Wheeler’s estate says the 74-year-old North Texas man was sitting on his backyard deck after dinner Saturday night at his home at a Montague County country club. David Gossom says that’s when sheriff’s deputies responded to a disturbance call.
Montague County District Attorney Jack McGaughey says Wheeler was holding a shotgun and an officer was shot in the hand. No other details have been released, and an autopsy is pending.
Perry’s office wouldn’t elaborate on his relationship with Wheeler, a retired social worker listed as a member of Perry’s 2006 re-election campaign steering committee.
Washington, D.C., Sep 30 - After more than one year of fighting to restore references to our nation’s spiritual history stripped from the newly-constructed $621-million Capitol Visitor Center, Congressman J. Randy Forbes (VA-04) and Members of the Congressional Prayer Caucus today applauded the unveiling of our national motto “In God We Trust” engraved in stone in the Capitol Visitor Center.
The initial design of the Capitol Visitor Center was stripped of all references to America’s religious heritage and contained a number of factual inaccuracies, including incorrectly stating that our national motto was “E Pluribus Unum” and inaccurately representing Capitol church services.
Dawn Rizos didn’t need any formal recognition that The Lodge, one of the best-known gentlemen’s clubs in Dallas, was a successful small business.
But when former House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s conservative group named her an “Entrepreneur of the Year,” she was thrilled by the opportunity to accept the award in Washington and speak about ways to help small businesses.
That all changed, however, when Gingrich realized that The Lodge was a topless bar, not some other business in Virginia. He rescinded Rizos’ invitation to a private dinner and returned the $5,000 donation she made to his group, American Solutions for Winning the Future.
